10 Times Star Trek Hit The Reset Button

In over fifty years of history, Star Trek has had to rely on re-invention from time to time, much like any long-running story. New series and new casts have helped to keep the ideas that the franchise espouses alive, yet these are not the only changes that have occured within the show.

There are obvious hard reset buttons that involve time travel or paradoxes. Year of Hell, All Good Things and Endgame are all examples of this - stories that are almost self-contained, yet with enough residuals to either be alluded back to later, or have enough groundwork laid to be payoffs in their own right.

But this list is not simply a list of time travel changes that pop up within the show. What are the big changes that the franchise made along the way? Which are the behind the scenes decisions that either benefit Star Trek the most, or detract from the overall quality of the franchise for the sake of doing something flashy?

While this list is not entirely centered on the newer shows that have released in the last few years, there certainly will be a discussion on them as, arguably, Star Trek is currently enjoying its biggest shake-up since the days of James T. Kirk.

But before any of that, wind the clock back.

Star Trek famously stumbled out of the starting gate before it was wrangled back in again for a spot of maintenance. By which we mean a complete overhaul and tone shift, lest the idea die before it had any chance to breathe.

The Cage had all the hallmarks of what Star Trek would become later in the franchise, with its cerebral plot proving too much for an introductory episode. To be fair, there is a lot of sense in this argument. There are many franchises that have lasted for years with pilot episodes that have very little to do with what the show became. The Cage was a mirror of this - but it was a hard sell to the networks.

Where No Man Has Gone Before is much closer to the tone of early Star Trek, with Kirk in his shirt-tearing best in his brawl against the superhuman Gary Mitchell. Spock, the only holdover (bar the ship itself) from The Cage was still present, though was now a cold, unfeeling officer, rather than the more overtly emotional one displayed before.

While Jeffery Hunter's Christopher Pike shares many traits with Kirk, including their love of horseriding and affinity for scantily clad women, Pike was a slower-to-act person, haunted by recent tragedies, whereas Kirk was more of an action hero ready to go. He would later evolve into a character more closely resembling Pike, but this was after the show had been sold.