One might assume that a prequel series would be limiting to a writer. After all, the events of a prequel would, by necessity, have to link directly into an entertainment franchise’s extant lore, potentially stymieing a writer’s ability to stretch. “Enterprise,” for instance, couldn’t blow up the Earth in the 22nd century because we know it’s still there in the 23rd. That sort of thing.
Beck, however, didn’t think of “Enterprise” in those terms. Instead, he thought of “Enterprise” as a fresh start, a way to begin with a “Star Trek” tabula rasa that could be filled with a lot of complex lore that didn’t need to link directly back to the 1966 “Star Trek.” Beck recalled his interview with Brannon Braga, and how his viewpoint clicked with the showrunner immediately. Beck said:
“I wrote a spec script for ‘Chicago Hope’ and they hired me. I was, at that point, not only medical director of a clinic, but I was medical director for Sentinel Hospital. And yet it was no decision at all. It was my dream, so I went to ‘Chicago Hope.’ And then my next job was ‘Seven Days,’ followed by ‘Enterprise.’ I said something that hit Brannon, and he said, ‘That’s the philosophy of the show.’ I said it appealed to me that you get to start over and that you have an infinite amount of stories that you can tell. I remember him saying, ‘Yes, that’s it.'”
“Enterprise,” although the sixth “Star Trek” series, was the least nostalgic of the bunch, trying to explore a span of Trek history that hadn’t ever really been looked at closely. There was way more room to play than a casual glance might reveal.