By Steve Krutzler / 04:35, 18 August 2004 / TrekWeb Features

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He put in his time with the 'Crypt Keeper' and surveyed THE OUTER LIMITS. Along the way he found HOSTILE INTENT and created a STAR KID. His ODYSSEY 5 took him next to the STAR TREK offices at Paramount studios, where this new kid on the block has quickly become his own star.

Manny Coto joined STAR TREK: ENTERPRISE last season as a co-executive producer and contributed the controversial script "Similitude," dealt with religious fanaticism in "Chosen Realm," wrote the action-packed "Azati Prime" and suspensful "The Council." He balanced dangerous blows and romance in the ranks with delicate strokes in "Harbinger." Coto's arrival was a harbinger of a different kind.

When ENTERPRISE was narrowly renewed by UPN (and moved to Fridays) in May, Coto did what none had done in five years: take over the writing room. Excluding DEEP SPACE NINE, Brannon Braga has run the writing staff on STAR TREK since Michael Piller and Jeri Taylor departed VOYAGER in the late nineties. Although Ken Biller steered the final season of VOYAGER, Braga put his stamp on most of that series as well as ENTERPRISE. Since his days as an intern, he has been with the franchise for nearly fifteen years.

But with Braga developing new projects with Rick Berman, a changing of the guard has taken place at ENTERPRISE. TrekWeb chatted yesterday with the newest captain of STAR TREK's future, Manny Coto, about his course for the flagship franchise.

TW: Can you briefly summarize what your role is and your working relationship with Rick and Brannon?

MC: I’m running the writing room, which is generating the stories. Rick and Brannon are functioning as Rick did in the first three years of the show, which is approving and not approving, giving notes and in a more supervisory role. I’m more generating the stories and coming up with the thrust of the season.

TW: Are they generating stories at all?

MC: Not so much generating, but talking about them and helping develop them, absolutely.

TW: Now that you're essentially in charge creatively, what's your vision for the show?

MC: My vision is to try to fulfill what I think is ENTERPRISE’s promise, which is to create a truly prequel series. And that is beginning to tie ENTERPRISE into the overall STAR TREK canon and to really use the opportunity that we have to create stories that give us a glimpse into the formation of the STAR TREK universe. That’s in a nutshell my vision for this season, in any event. And on a simply fun level to do stories that STAR TREK fans would really love to see.

TW: You've already hired three new writers in Alan Brennert and Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stevens. Tell me how they became involved and what your impetus was for bringing them onboard.

MC: I have known Alan for a long time, I worked with him on OUTER LIMITS; when I was co-executive producer on OUTER LIMITS he wrote two of the best episodes of the season. I brought him on to ODYSEY 5 and he wrote really terrific episodes. I’ve known him very well, he is a huge STAR TREK fan and we’ve always talked about STAR TREK and when I came on to STAR TREK, he was one of the first names of someone that I’d like to bring onboard. Someone that was a novelist, that has a great love of STAR TREK and a great knowledge of the science fiction genre and just a terrifc writer. This year when I became executive producer one of the first things I wanted to do was bring Alan on.

Judy and Gar, I had loved [their novel] FEDERATION. I thought that they were really, as far as the STAR TREK novels, I thought theirs were stand outs, and because of what I wanted to do with season four, which is really tie ENTERPRISE with the STAR TREK universe I thought these two would be perfect to help flesh out the sense of scope that I wanted for the various story arcs. We’re operating in three-episode arcs and Judy and Gar with their novelist sense of sweep and their intense knowledge of the STAR TREK universe I thought would be perfect for what I wanted to do this year.

TW: Which scripts have these three written or will be writing?

MC: Judy and Gar haven’t written any yet, they probably will be writing one of the scripts on the Vulcan arc. Not probably, I’d say definitely going to write one of the scripts on the Vulcan arc, which we’re working on now. Alan has written episode two of the Soong arc “CS-12.”

TW: Will the Reeves-Stevenes write the possible William Shatner story?

MC: If the Shatner episode comes to fruition, which I’m hoping, yes they will write the Shatner episode[(s)].

By the way I should say that the Reeves-Stevens and the Shatner connection was actually completely coincidental. I wanted to bring on the Reeves-Stevens before we even knew Shatner was going to do the season. It was a strange thing, when I brought them in to meet with them they told me that Bill had this idea for the series and I said “oh really,” and I called Rick Berman and said “have you heard about this? Let’s move!” It was a strange coincidence but oddly enough worked out that way.

TW: What exactly is their position and role so far?

MC: They are executive story editors. They’re in the room, we’re all in the room tossing out ideas, and they have already submitted some great ideas for story arcs that I want to do later in the year.

TW: And what is the status of the Shatner situation? Are they actively working with him?

MC: They’re actively talking with him. They’re going back and forth with numbers, I know it’s a tough negotiation. I couldn’t tell you whether it’s going to work out or not, I’m hoping that it will. I know that there is interest from UPN and Paramount, they really want to try and make it work, but it’s a tough negotiation. It [would be] later in the year.

TW: So let's talk about another guest star, Brent Spiner, who I guess is shooting right now?

MC: I just left the stage! He’s over there, wearing his handcuffs!

TW: Was this a story that was sitting around and when you found out that he was interested you tailored it to him?

MC: Essentially, yeah. I’ll tell you, this story arc was originally going to feature 'Colonel Green'.

Colonel Green? Think, think...

MC: When we found out that Brent was interested we tried to tailor it to him, and having seen the dailies he’s terrific in this part. For a little while I even toyed with the idea of him playing Colonel Green, but I think he’s more interesting playing this character.

Damn, I have to just ask...

TW: Colonel Green, that's a STAR TREK connection right? I run the web site but I can't think of it!

MC: [Laughs]. In [“The Savage Curtain”, from ST:TOS] the classic episode with Lincoln... there were four figures from Earth’s good side, and four from the bad side. And one of the evil figures is this Colonel Green, who is mentioned as somebody who in Earth’s history led a genocidal war--that’s all that’s said about him. The Reeves-Stevens actually layered Colonel Green’s movement into FEDERATION, so I always thought that he was an interesting character to bring to life and flesh out. But the implication was that he had something to do with the Eugenics Wars as well. With Brent’s interest we decided to tailor it to Brent.

TW: How did his guest appearance come about?

MC: Brent and Rick had been talking about it and Rick casually mentioned it and -- I think that’s how it went, I could be wrong -- and Brent said “I’d love to do something” and so Rick mentioned it to me and I said let’s figure it out.

TW: And that will be a three-episode arc [beginning with "Borderland", Oct. 22, in production this week]. You mentioned this format earlier; will the entire season be like that?

MC: There’ll be a couple of standalones and some of them may turn out to be two-episode arcs, it depends on how the stories flesh out. That’s the idea.

TW: One of those you talked about at the press tour was the Vulcan plot dealing with a civil war. You discussed that the storyline is going to sort of explain various behaviors of Vulcans in the first three seasons that may be seen as inconsistent. How do you tell Rick and Brannon that what they did should be "explained"?

MC: I didn’t present it in the sense of "let’s explain it." It exists, "this is what you guys did; let’s use it as a fascinating springboard to tell a terrific story arc that kind of shows the evolution of Vulcan from, kind of, where you guys started to how the Vulcans were in the original series." So it wasn’t so much to say “I’ve gotta explain what you guys did,” but let’s use it. "This is what you did, it’s not going to go away, so let’s use it."

We’re actually developing that story now and it’s turning into this great, really fascinating LAWRENCE OF ARABIA tale with T’Pol and Archer in the desert to go and find these Vulcans who are traitors.

TW: And this will take place on Vulcan?

MC: Oh yeah, the whole thing!

TW: You mentioned that Romulans will be involved. Of course the first thing the hardcores will remind us is that no one knew what the Romulans looked like until the original series.

MC: No one will know what the Romulans look like. No one will know.

TW: The audience already knows so there’s no point in hiding it from us?

MC: Right, the audience will know. Although I don’t have the whole story worked out yet because we’re still fleshing it out, but there may be a possibility of someone finding out and that person can die. There are ways to do it so that we can preserve canon, but no, no one will find out that they were Romulans.

TW: Jolene Blalock has said publicly that she is looking forward to taking T'Pol in a new direction this season. What's in store for her character?

MC: By the end of this Vulcan arc she will become hopefully she will find her center as a Vulcan, and will become a Vulcan in the grand tradition of Spock and other Vulcans that we have known, and will accept the true Vulcan calling.

TW: Will she get the Kohlinar?

MC: I don’t know if she’ll get as far as Kohlinar, but I -- maybe she will, that’s a great idea. I should write that down.

TW: The pitch session has begun! [Laughs].

MC: [Laughs].

Check back tomorrow for the conclusion of our interview with Manny Coto, in which he talks about the cliffhanger in "Zero Hour" and his resolution in "Storm Front," the first three years of ENTERPRISE, and the future of STAR TREK. Is there life beyond 2005? Plus, Manny drops another hint about a story he'd like to do involving a classic episode of TOS.