Over the last few years my family and I have binged all of Star Trek, then moved on to Star Trek adjacent shows like The Orville and Stargate. At the moment we’re not really watching anything sci-fi. I was wondering if anyone had recommendations for similar shows (or maybe some books) that fill the void left by Star Trek. In particular I really like the episodes that deal with interacting with other civilizations, diplomacy, and exploration more-so than say, an anomaly episode.
I’d say the The Expanse fits the bill. It is a book series with a very successful television adaptation.
100%. Just finished watching the entire series a couple days ago and thoroughly enjoyed it.
Concur. I’m a huge Trek fan, and The Expanse fits that blend of optimism and realpolitik.
I’d have enjoyed it a lot more with a better main character. He really is the blandest white man in the universe.
Definitely. There were a few things that could have been optimized a bit more, like dat invented language wot dey speaking in. David Strathairn totally sounded like Bruce Lee when he tried to get the accent down. But I appreciated their attention to details, like requiring “juice” for high-g burns (as opposed to Star Trek ships hitting near light speed with the crew only needing to hold the edge of a nearby desk to handle the acceleration).
I’m still wondering what the heck the storyline idea was with those weird dog like creatures 🤷🏻♂️
the infuriating thing is that according to the books he is a pretty unique mix of … checking … ”the only child in a family co-op of five fathers and three mothers“
they could have done almost anything with the character in terms of appearance and chose this sigh
I love the expanse i think it is one of the best recent space sci fi shows.
But its not really a startek style show and i dont think its what op is looking for.
I think the show sliders would be much better if stargate is a good example of a non startrek franchise that fits the bill.
But then so is Doctor Who now that i think about it
Huh, I didn’t really think of Dr Who and Star Trek in the same terms. I guess? Dr Who is great, but it’s so much campier than anything after TOS. Also, I’ve only watched New Who. I did try watching the first old ep a while back but it wasn’t really something I could watch. But it’s such a long running series, are there any seasons of the old show that are super worth watching?
I’ll also check out Sliders.
Classic Who went through enough changes that there might be something you enjoy in there. It was arguably at its best during the Tom Baker years. (Season 12). If you can’t get into that, then it may just not be your jam. A lot of the charm to the old series came from the low budgets and aggressively short production times. But with the 4th Doctor they had gotten a little more confidence from BBC and I think their budgets started getting bigger for a few years.
The original Doctor Who in the 60s was more like original series Star Trek, in that it sometimes felt more like a stage production than a television show, and that kind of writing is understandably dated.
I was worried about it being a bit of a departure, but it does fit if we apply your interest broadly
And no i cant recommend any of the old Who because i also could not watch it.
Sorry friend, but i hope you find something that scratches your itch! Ide love an update if you find something that fits the bill! Even if its just s DM letting me know what you settled on
Oh that’s one I’ve seen. I enjoyed the first few seasons but got kind of tired it after trying to watch the first few eps of a recent season. Around the time where that spacer started hucking rocks at Earth. I don’t know how it was gonna go from there, but it was starting to feel very… supervillain has a good point so let’s make them do awful things so you can’t sympathize with them. Idk, I could probably be convinced to give it another try if people thought it got good.