In Apple's For All Mankind, The Star Trek Franchise Charted A Very Different Course
The article contains spoilers for "For All Mankind" season 4.
Somehow, while no one was looking, Apple TV+ became the home of terrific sci-fi TV — from the incredible adaptation of "Foundation" to the "Monarch: Legacy of Monsters" series that expands the MonsterVerse's lore in meaningful ways and, of course, "For All Mankind." Originally billed as an alternate history show about a world where the Soviet Union reached the moon before the U.S., "For All Mankind" is one of the best current dramas on TV. It also serves as a pseudo-prequel to sci-fi shows like "The Expanse" or "Star Trek," bridging futuristic sci-fi with contemporary grounded drama.
As a drama, the show has plenty of memorable characters and compelling plotlines, aided by a story spanning decades that the show constantly mines for conflict and pay-offs. Then there's the sci-fi. As the show goes on, it introduces more and more changes to the timeline, with incredible repercussions: John Lennon survives his assassination; electric cars are commonplace in the 1980s; and nuclear fusion becomes widespread to the point where we have all but solved climate change.
In its fourth season, the timeline in "For All Mankind" looks very different. There is a human colony on Mars, there's asteroid mining, and also space heists. This is the kind of story that, like "The Martian" or "Dr. Stone," truly makes you fall in love with science and humanity's ability to make things better.
Among the many changes to the timeline, probably the weirdest and funniest is how "For All Mankind" changes movies and television, like having "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" break a record for the most Oscars won with 12 wins. Then there's "Star Trek," a franchise this show owes a lot to and is very different in the "For All Mankind" universe.
A different Star Trek
In the latest episode of "For All Mankind," avid TV watcher and "The Bob Newhart Show" enthusiast Danielle Poole sends a video message to her son, who is about to have a baby. She mentions how excited she is to share her fandom with the baby: "I'm gonna make sure my grandbaby is a full-blown Trekkie. That's right, we're gonna watch all the series, all three of them."
Of course, there's a little problem: that doesn't match the number of "Star Trek" shows by 2003. In our reality, there were already five shows by then: "Star Trek," "Star Trek: The Next Generation," "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine," "Star Trek: Voyager," and "Star Trek: Enterprise." So, at least two of those don't exist in the world of "For All Mankind." Except, the show's changes to the "Star Trek" franchise go even deeper thanks to creator and executive producer Ronald D. Moore.
In the "For All Mankind" universe, the success of the space program means a much bigger interest in science fiction (as evidenced by the awards success of "Close Encounters"). That also extended to the first "Star Trek" show and its sequel.
You see, in an interview with Inverse, Moore said that in the show's timeline, "Paramount does make the Phase II show in the mid-'70s. And then they transitioned into 'Wrath of Khan' and not 'Star Trek: The Motion Picture,' because of the [...] critically acclaimed run of Phase II, it's a year later that 'The Wrath of Khan' comes out."
If you're worried about changes to the hugely popular movie, don't worry. As Moore noted, it is still the same movie: "I love 'The Wrath of Khan' and I couldn't bear to change that. So it's the same thing."
The final frontier
Phase II was originally going to be a sequel to the first "Star Trek" back in the '70s, but it failed for several reasons — including Leonard Nimoy not being a part of the show.
Given that elements of that show became "Star Trek: The Motion Picture," it makes sense that the franchise would go straight to "Wrath of Khan" in the "For All Mankind" timeline. Now, where things get interesting is what happens after that. If "The Original Series" was popular enough to get Phase II as a sequel, then it is unlikely that Paramount executives would be surprised by the franchise's longevity and order what would become "The Next Generation." And without it, the other two shows wouldn't get made since they are in the same timeframe. Instead, the likeliest scenario would be a completely different "Star Trek" show original to the alternate timeline, possibly even starring a re-imagined original cast.
But for the sake of speculation, let's assume it's one of the existing shows that gets made in the "For All Mankind" universe. Moore began his career writing for "The Next Generation" and its two follow-ups before having a big falling out with executive producer Brannon Braga while making "Voyager" — meaning, that show is probably out. Likewise, it seems unlikely that Moore would reference his own shows, given that Moore's other famous sci-fi series, "Battlestar Galactica" has not been referenced once.
And so we are left with "Star Trek: Enterprise." Given that it is a straight-up prequel. it is more likely that alternate-universe Paramount executives would want to keep mining the popularity of "Star Trek" while changing things up a bit ... for example, by going a century back in time to the early days of space exploration (like in our own timeline).
"For All Mankind" is streaming on Apple TV+.