The only genre television I am really looking forward to in September is Enterprise, the new Star Trek series, which debuts on Wednesday, September 26 at 8 PM. Smallville doesn't begin until October, and The X-Files is on hold until November.

Enterprise will be the sixth new Star Trek television series I have watched premiere.

It was at a Worldcon that I first set eyes on Star Trek. Two SF television shows premiered there. The first was Time Tunnel, which was loudly booed by the audience, because of its general silliness. Then came Star Trek, with a color print of "Where No Man Has Gone Before" by Sam Peeples and a black and white print of "The Cage" by Gene Roddenberry.

The audience loved it. I loved it. It was the intelligent science fiction we had all been waiting for, the first really good outer space SF in a visual medium since Forbidden Planet, ten years earlier.

SF fandom instantly split into the trek lovers and trek haters (the trek haters coined the word "trekie" to indicate their disgust with all things trek). I embraced the appellation. I was proud to be a trekie.

The anti-trekies complained that it was absurd for the Captain to leave the ship, that the Enterprise went Whoosh in a vacuum, and that written SF was light years ahead of Star Trek. All of which was true. All of which missed the point. Star Trek was intelligent. To find really intelligent visual SF you had to go all the way back to Destination Moon or the Flash Gordon comic strip when Harry Harrison was writing it. It was also great fun. I watched every episode, even the painfully bad ones.

It was at another Worldcon that Bjo Trimble introduced the premier of Star Trek – The Animated Series, "Beyond the Farthest Star", also by Sam Peeples. It was so good to have Star Trek back. I can't put it into words. You would have to have been there.

"Encounter at Farpoint", the premiere of Star Trek – The Next Generation, I watched at home with my children. I still remember how excited I was. I was particularly glad that nobody had spoiled the surprise at the beginning of the second hour. I like surprises!

My memory of the premier of Star Trek – Deep Space Nine is less vivid. The law of diminishing returns had set in. I do remember enjoying it, but I don't remember exactly where I was or what I was doing at the time.

And all I remember about the premier of Star Trek – Voyager is how deeply disappointed I was. Dumb Caretaker!

So, I await the first episode of Enterprise with mixed hope and trepidation. But I do know this. I want it to surprise me.