Now that Star Trek is officially dead (no new shows or movies, even in production) the time has come for a new idea.

Here's one.

Stardate.

It's an anthology series, built around various scientific "principles" that define the Star Trek franchise.

Think of it as Science made into Drama.

Yes, it's an excuse to make science exciting. (Just think of the educational spin-offs we can produce!) And the production costs are low enough to put this on the SciFi channel (where Enterprise should have been all along). Or might I suggest a pitch to Discovery Networks, which has got proven talent in making science fun with shows like Mythbusters?

For host, might I recommend Stephen Hawking? Playing the role Alistair Cooke made famous, he opens each show by describing the science (and the Star Trek technology) on which the show will be based. (I might recommend getting several scientists for this role, perhaps one for each specialty. But Hawking is a name. He'll do great for starters.) Or, with confidence this show will last for decades, Lance Armstrong, who's already under contract to Discovery, who knows how to read a cue card, and who owes his life to science?

More after the break.

Each show is a dramatization of real science. It's performed by actors, and written by writers, so there are stories (and time compression) but it's all based on real, published science. String theory. Room temperature superconductors. The problems of living in space, and of getting there. Rocket science.

Show the experiments. Show the arguments. Show the scientists as people, with ambitions, with real lives, and (sometimes) with flaws.

Many episode ideas suggest themselves right away. The discovery of Buckyballs. The space elevator. The private race to space (my favorite for the premiere).

Look, CSI has made a form of science seem appealing, even if they're not really doing science, but applications.

What if we created fiction that made the real thing exciting, that made a generation of kids want desperately to be a part of that?

Call me. We'll do lunch. (I've got my own sunglasses.)