Star Trek's enduring popularity

To me, the most important element of Star Trek, the thing that's made it endure and made it so popular over three and a half decades, is that it portrays a very hopeful and positive view of the future. There's a lot of science fiction out there that's quite apocalyptic, painting a very dark picture of the future.

Star Trek has always painted a picture of the future that people can look forward to and people can wish that they were a part of. That was something that was a very, very strong part of Roddenberry's vision of the future and something that we've tried very hard to continue with all of the other projects that we've done. It becomes the most enduring part of the show in terms of its popularity, generation after generation.

The Gene Roddenberry characters of the 23rd and 24th century were a perfect, well adjusted, better form of Mankind. The characters that we are introducing in are almost all the way there but not quite. They're a combination between the Roddenberry perfection and you and me.

They have potential and they're on their way to being Roddenberry's vision of where Humanity is going to be.