`EARTH' GOES PLODDINGLY WHERE RODDENBERRY NEVER WENT BEFORE.

Byline: Ron Miller Knight-Ridder Tribune News Wire

If there's a golden name in TV syndication, it's probably Gene Roddenberry, creator of the original ``Star Trek,'' the most durable product line in syndication for more than two decades.

That's why stations lined up to sign contracts last year when Tribune Entertainment took orders for a first-run show called ``Gene Roddenberry's Earth: Final Conflict.''

Actually, the show originally was called ``Gene Roddenberry's Battleground Earth,'' but the name had to be changed because it was too similar to the title of the late L. Ron Hubbard's novel ``Battlefield Earth,'' and nobody at Tribune wanted a bunch of angry (and litigious) Scientologists up in arms over their new show.

It's unique these days for any new Roddenberry project to be launched, as Roddenberry died in 1991. It's also rare that it's not being done under the umbrella of Paramount, which runs the ``Star Trek'' franchise and all of its spinoffs, including the feature films, the syndicated series ``Star Trek: The Next Generation'' and ``Star Trek: Deep Space Nine,'' and UPN's network spinoff ``Star Trek: Voyager.''

But ``Earth: Final Conflict'' is a project Roddenberry created in 1976 and unsuccessfully tried to get off the ground during the next few years. Absorbed with the first big-screen ``Star Trek'' project and with the TV spinoffs, Roddenberry put it on the back burner.

Now his widow, Majel Barrett Roddenberry, has dusted it off with the help of several writer-producers and is sending it out to an eager audience of followers and fans.

Based on the film that introduces the series Saturday, there's good news and bad news:

The good news is that ``Earth: Final Conflict'' has some mind-bending concepts and stirring special effects.

The bad news is lead character William Boone (Kevin Kilner), who is a man caught between his native Earth and the world of the Taelons, who say they're here to ``help'' humanity by sharing their science. Boone is less than arresting, which made the show rather tiresome.