Scott Bakula and ‘Enterprise’ writer-producer Michael Sussman had previously worked on the pitch, ‘Star Trek: United,’ before Paramount turned it down.
Over the summer, we learned a little about how Star Trek: Enterprise‘s Captain Archer himself, Scott Bakula, had worked together with producer Michael Sussman on a pitch for a new Trek spinoff set after the events of the show called Star Trek: United. And now, thanks to Sussman, we have a little bit of a better idea of what the series might’ve entailed… and one day still could.
Speaking to TrekMovie‘s All Access Star Trek podcast recently, Sussman revealed more details about the proposed setup for United, which would’ve built upon Enterprise‘s brief revelation in the season four Mirror Universe two-parter “In a Mirror, Darkly” that one day Captain Archer was destined to become one of the first presidents of the nascent United Federation of Planets. The series, which Sussman had previously described as being tonally akin to the Star Wars political thriller tension of Andor, had been pitched to Paramount with Bakula’s involvement, only to be turned down due to a broader cutback in streaming funding ahead of the company’s recent sale to Skydance, as well as perceived familiarities to the upcoming Starfleet Academy show, which will also be primarily set on Earth.
According to Sussman, United would’ve balanced Archer’s political duties navigating the early years of the Federation’s existence with exploration of his family life.
