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11 Sci-Fi Shows to Binge If You Love ‘Star Trek’

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There is no dearth of shows set in the world of Star Trek nowadays. Thanks to Paramount+ (previously known as CBS All Access), Trekkies can enjoy all kinds of fare, from darker serialized stories in Star Trek: Discovery and Star Trek: Picard to old-school episodic style of storytelling in Star Trek: Strange New Worlds . We also have animated fare that appeals to adults, like Star Trek: Lower Decks, and Star Trek: Prodigy , that’s geared to younger generations.

But just because we live in an age of "All Trek All the Time", doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy some excellent science-fiction adventures outside the United Federation of Planets. Shows set in space have been around forever, though some have been forgotten. The shows on this list have vastly different tones and production values, and every viewer will have their own favorites. If you love Star Trek, or episodic adventures in space, then you may want to catch up with these shows in between seasons.

RELATED: Star Trek Day Programming and Global Pop-Ups Revealed for Paramount+ Event

An astronaut from Earth finds himself aboard the living spaceship Moya as the ship and its crew fight to escape a fascist military operation known as the Peacekeepers. Farscape aired in the early noughties, in an attempt to capture audiences who were losing interest in Star Trek , but unlike Star Trek the central crew aren’t always upstanding citizens. The protagonist, John Crichton ( Ben Browder ), is a great audience stand-in, with his pop culture retorts and easy-going air about him keeping him relatable. His perfect match turns out to be Aeryn Sun, played by Claudia Black , a no-nonsense former soldier who thaws into a compassionate character by the end of the series. Their dynamic is a big appeal of the show , as are the visuals and animatronics that bring this sci-fi universe to life.

Set aboard the titular space station, the space opera Babylon 5 focuses on what happens when humans and aliens must work together to bring peace to a galaxy that's still learning diplomacy. Babylon 5 doesn’t hold back on the horrors of war and the toll that it takes, while the show even touches on humanity’s darker aspects with plot lines featuring Xenophobic groups as well as the impact of political and religious influences. Parts of the show echo the atmosphere of Deep Space Nine , not only with its space station setting (there was some controversy around how similar the settings were) but also by showcasing how large-scale galactic events can affect the most ordinary of individuals.

Stargate is a sprawling franchise of shows based on the Roland Emmerich film, beginning with Stargate SG-1 , which debuted in the late 1990s and remains a favorite among genre fans. Later shows added to the canon of the franchise — the main premise revolves around Earth's discovery of a "Stargate," which is a cosmic portal that can ferry humans across vast distances. Of course, human beings decide to exploit this discovery for potential resources, which results in humanity battling aliens, especially the snake-like Goa'uld. Stargate is heavy on lore for sci-fi fans to immerse themselves in, but more importantly the show serves as "comfort viewing," with a fun and likable cast of characters.

Dark Matter

In the future, six people wake up on a spaceship with no knowledge of who they are and how they got there. They have to work together to discover the truth, but how can they trust each other? Based on the comic series of the same name, one of the most comparable aspects of Dark Matter to Star Trek is the introduction of The Android ( Zoie Palmer ), a character who is the smartest person in the room but knows little about human interaction. Though the show was canceled after only three seasons, it did develop a loyal fanbase, thanks to its combination of humor and darkness, with a diverse cast and a seemingly omnipresent villain. Dark Matter was less about the epic part of sci-fi, and more about the dynamics between people — something Star Trek fans will enjoy, since that franchise also emphasizes eclectic partnerships and friendships.

Killjoys deserved a lot more love than it received. This underrated sci-fi adventure follows Dutch ( Hannah John-Kamen ), Johnny ( Aaron Ashmore ), and D'avin ( Luke Macfarlane ), three bounty hunters who bungle every mission they’re on and still survive to tell the tale. The three protagonists have great chemistry and riff off each other perfectly. There’s a lot of quips mixed in with the brawls and space-hopping. What especially works for this Canadian show is that it’s a little more LGBTQIA+ friendly than Star Trek used to be, making for welcome change within the space opera genre. The show began with more episodic storytelling like older Trek , before introducing season-long villains like Deep Space Nine and Enterprise had. Also, one theme that appealed to fans of Killjoys was the concept of a found family — a quintessential theme of all Trek properties.

The Mandalorian

Star Wars and Trek are sometimes pitted against each other as franchises, which has never made sense. Now that Star Wars has debuted its own live-action series on Disney+, the differences between the franchises have decreased even more. You want an adventure in space? The Mandalorian has that as our hero flies from system to system to protect his young charge. You want aliens, betrayal, new and unconventional bonds formed? All of that can be found aboard the Razor Crest. What about epic battles, duels, and scheming villains — it’s in there! The Mandalorian is its own show, with a unique visual style, but the seasons so far definitely fill the void whenever you’re craving more Star Trek content, and you don’t feel like re-watching your favorite installment yet again.

Battlestar Galactica

If you’re a Trekkie, Battlestar Galactica has most likely been on your watchlist for a while. The reboot of the 1970s show is set aboard the titular spaceship, which leads the fleet carrying the last remaining humans in the universe. Admiral Adama ( Edward James Olmos ) oversees a crew consisting of fan-favorite characters like Katee Sackhoff ’s Starbuck and Jamie Bamber ’s Apollo, among others, alongside the newly-appointed President Laura Roslin (two-time Oscar nominee Mary McDonnell) . Adama has a destination in mind, but his hopes may be dashed as the fleet battles an old enemy in new form. The Cylons are like the Borg, insidious and relentless. Worse, the Cylons in the reboot can look like humans, so trust is at a premium in the show. Some of the storylines and character arcs on the show were controversial up to and including the series finale, but Battlestar Galactica continues to be thought-provoking, and the characters will easily become some of your favorites.

Lost in Space

For fans of space and exploration, the 2018 reboot of Lost in Space (yes, another reboot!) will be right up your alley. The show follows the Robinson family, Molly ( Maureen Robinson ), John ( Toby Stephens ) and their three children, aspiring doctor Judy ( Taylor Russell ), budding writer Penny ( Mina Sundwall ), and science-enthusiast Will ( Maxwell Jenkins ), as they travel to outer space. The Robinsons face several obstacles in space — from the environment, alien species, robots, and even their fellow humans — but always find a way to power through. As long as this family are together, they can overcome anything. Although they do need more than a little help from their friendly, albeit, taciturn, robot. Who else will loudly proclaim ‘Danger, Will Robinson’ at the first signs of trouble?

The Expanse

Set in the 24th century (like several Star Trek shows), The Expanse is one of the more critically-acclaimed science-fiction shows of the new millennium. Based on a series of novels by Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck , the series follows several characters unwittingly intertwined in a giant conspiracy that threatens to destabilize the already teetering state of peace in the Solar System. The characters are distinct and compelling, but it’s the political storylines that keep you hooked. Shohreh Aghdashloo is particularly riveting as United Nations member Chrisjen Avasarala, as is Frankie Adams , who joined the show in the second season as gunnery sergeant Bobby Draper. The dynamics among the crew of the Rocinante ship are another reason you’ll continue to tune in. With The Expanse, come for the space adventure, stay for the political intrigue.

Quantum Leap

The original Quantum Leap and its 2022 sequel capture the core values of Star Trek —understanding, tolerance and a love of all people, irrespective of their differences. While the original show may feel a little dated nowadays (well, so does some of Star Trek ), through Sam Beckett ( Scott Bakula ) ‘leaping’ into other people, the show examined tough topics including racism and women’s rights. It helps that Bakula also starred as Captain Jonathan Archer on Enterprise . The sequel series stars a diverse cast including Raymond Lee, Caitlin Bassett, Mason Alexander Park, Nanrisa Lee and Ernie Hudson . The show is an absolute delight with heartwarming stories brought to life by Lee’s effortless performance and a deeper relationship between the lead characters than there was in the original . The stories are also more representative, and include an episode with an Indian immigrant family, as well as an episode about a trans teenager who just wants to play basketball. There’s an extra layer of mystery added in that will keep you tuning in for more.

The long-lasting British science-fiction show Doctor Who has the episodic, planet-hopping, and alien-encountering fun of Star Trek , but brings its own distinct flavor. Every era has its own appeal, and now that the show has broadened its horizons to cast more women, people of color, and trans actors as leads, Doctor Who is becoming more representative with every series. The show is quirky and silly, but can be scary (Weeping Angels, anyone?), thought-provoking, and somber ( just take a look at Donna Noble's tragic companion arc ). Everyone will have their own favorite Doctor, but there are a lot of companions to cheer for as well. There’s never a dull moment when the Time-Lord steps into their Tardis and decides which planet or year to fly off to. Every episode is an unforgettable adventure, and one never knows if the Doctor will meet a strange new alien, a historic figure from Earth’s past, or something else completely out of this world.

TV Features
The Mandalorian (2019)

Upcoming Star Trek TV Shows: What's Ahead For The Sci-Fi Franchise

Here's what's ahead for Star Trek.

It’s a golden era for Star Trek tv shows, as the franchise is churning out more content than ever before. Fans with a Paramount+ subscription can stream a plethora of old and new content from one of the greatest sci-fi franchises of all time.

There’s a ton of new Star Trek content coming in the future, including the debut of a new show as well as the return of all the ones fans already know well. For those who need a breakdown of what all to expect, look no further because here’s where and when all the new Trek will arrive in 2023 and beyond. There’s even some information on planned shows that aren’t quite ready yet, but hopefully, we’ll see them soon enough.

Sonequa Martin-Green in Star Trek: Discovery

Star Trek: Discovery Season 5 - Premiering On April 4th 2024

Captain Michael Burnham and the crew are back, and based on what we've seen and heard about Star Trek: Discovery Season 5 so far, some changes are on the way. Season 5 will see the crew race against others in an attempt to secure an ancient power, and will apparently have a tonal shift that will skew more toward action and adventure. We also learned that this coming season will be the final adventure , as Paramount+ decided to end the series after this coming season. The final season will kick off in April and, fingers crossed, leave an avenue open for more stories with these characters in the 32nd century.

Anson Mount as Christopher Pike in Star Trek: Strange New Worlds

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Season 3 - In Production

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds is coming back for Season 3, and is currently filming for the upcoming season. It's likely the season will kick off with the second part of the adventure started in the Season 2 finale . Pike must decide whether or not he's going to listen to Starfleet and retreat to avoid further conflict with the Gorn or to stay and try to save the kidnapped crew members. I have a hunch I know what decision he'll make, but I'm also very invested in seeing if Scotty will remain with the crew and what other adventures will come as well.

Star Trek: Prodigy Season 2 - Coming In 2024

Paramount+ originally renewed Star Trek: Prodigy for Season 2, but announced later that it had been canceled alongside other shows on the platform. While the news was a bummer to many and encouraged responses from stars like Kate Mulgrew , there is a silver lining. After some talk with other companies, Paramount managed to negotiate a deal where the series will transition over to Netflix , and Season 2 will release over there. At this time, it's unknown whether or not this will lead to more seasons of Prodigy , but fans are thankful they'll at least get to see the season that was being worked on coming up in 2024.

Section 31 Movie - Production Complete

Section 31 was one of the first Star Trek spinoffs announced after Discovery , and yet it took the longest to get off the ground. The series was supposed to Michelle Yeoh ’s Phillipa Georgiou and her efforts in the secret ops Starfleet faction that does the jobs that others in the organization would rather not know about. Other former Discovery stars, like Shazad Latif, were involved at one point, but some believed the odds of it happening aren't great after Michelle Yeoh's Oscar win .

It turns out Yeoh was interested in making it happen, and Paramount+ decided to alter the idea to a movie . Fans are excited about the project all the same, and ready to see Michelle Yeoh back in her role. Production on the film is officially underway, and it's looking like a premiere sometime in late 2024 to 2025 is likely.

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Starfleet Academy - Production Starting In 2024

Alex Kurtzman revealed not long ago that Star Trek is actively working on another new live-action series , and it’s going to be set at Starfleet Academy. Of course, we don’t know exactly what era this series is set to take place during or who is going to star in it yet. We don’t really know much of anything, though it’s worth noting that Star Trek: Discovery did write off its character Tilly when she took an offer at Starfleet Academy. The episode where that happened seemed like it could be a backdoor pilot for the show, but again, we have no idea. We do know that the writer's room is underway, but details are scant beyond that.

As shown above, there’s still a ton of Star Trek on the way in 2024, and beyond. The only way to watch these shows is with a Paramount+ subscription , which is totally worth picking up with the increasing amount of shows and movies available to watch.

Mick Joest is a Content Producer for CinemaBlend with his hand in an eclectic mix of television goodness. Star Trek is his main jam, but he also regularly reports on happenings in the world of Star Trek, WWE, Doctor Who, 90 Day Fiancé, Quantum Leap, and Big Brother. He graduated from the University of Southern Indiana with a degree in Journalism and a minor in Radio and Television. He's great at hosting panels and appearing on podcasts if given the chance as well.

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New Star Trek shows: every future series, from Strange New Worlds to Lower Decks

From Lower Decks to Strange New Worlds, what's coming up?

It's a rich time for new Star Trek content, with streaming service CBS All Access building much of its content strategy around expanding the sci-fi franchise. If you're outside of the US, too, it's been pretty easy to keep up with it all, since Picard has released internationally on Amazon Prime Video, while Netflix has the rights to Discovery.

In April 2019, overseer Alex Kurtzman told THR that "The idea is to always have something" Star Trek-related on TV. "Two years from now, a show will end, there will be a little breath and then another show will begin."

While that ambitious plan for 2021 might be slowed down by this year's coronavirus-based TV production headaches, there's no doubt that CBS has enough content in the pipeline to back that up. Seven Star Trek shows are publicly known right now, though a couple don't have titles or even a premise yet, and this includes ongoing seasons of Picard and Discovery.

Do Star Trek fans like the shows being made? As with any franchise that has a long and complicated history, it's really hard to figure out what the consensus is on Trek as it stands. But the volume and tonal range of what's in the works surely has to excite an audience that once enjoyed 18 years of unbroken Trek shows.

We expect to learn a lot more about these series when Star Trek takes over a whole series of panels at Comic Con at Home, starting on July 23.

Below, we'll talk you through every Star Trek TV show currently confirmed to be in the works, so you can figure out if you want to watch them or skip them.

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Star Trek: Lower Decks

Release date: August 6

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Getting Rick and Morty writer Mike McMahan was quite a win for this first adult animated Star Trek series, which takes place on the lower decks of the Cerritos, a less important Starfleet vessel. It's the first Star Trek animated series in decades, and features a pretty big name voice cast, including The Boys ' Jack Quaid.

McMahan wrote one of the all-time best Rick and Morty episodes, Total Rickall, and co-created the recent Hulu series Solar Opposities, so hopefully the end result here will be good. Two seasons are on the way.

We're not sure where it'll be streaming outside of the US yet, though.

Star Trek Discovery season 3

Expected release date: late 2020

A third season of CBS All Access' flagship show Star Trek: Discovery finished filming a while back, and post-production has been ongoing. We're expecting this one to debut some time after Lower Decks has finished rolling out its 10 weekly episodes.

Star Trek: Discovery season 3 has a killer hook, taking viewers 1,000 years into the future of the Star Trek timeline, which will presumably give the writers a lot of scope to tell big stories without any lore-based restrictions.

Season 2 spent a little too long in the shadow of legacy characters, as well-acted as they were, so hopefully this season will shift focus back to the Discovery's own extremely likeable crew.

Star Trek: Picard season 2

Expected release date: 2021

Star Trek: Picard season 2 is officially happening, but where the story will go is something of a mystery after the series' eventful finale, as Picard survived (sort of) the Romulans' attack on the synthetic world of Coppelius. In season 2, expect the show to deal with the fact that (spoiler alert!) Picard now has a synthetic body, as he found a way to cheat death. We're expecting more TNG cameos in season 2, after season 1 gave fans all-too-brief glimpses of Riker and Troi. We also know Whoopi Goldberg will be reprising her role as Guinan from that series.

Our hope is that the writers will focus on making the crew of newer characters on the La Sirena a little easier to like; Star Trek: Picard doesn't yet have the complete-feeling ensemble that Discovery does, and that's a challenge they need to overcome.

Filming on Picard season 2 was meant to happen this June, but has been delayed for obvious reasons. We still expect to see it next year at some point, though.

Section 31 (working title)

The most intriguing spin-off in this list, and reportedly the next one in line for filming after Discovery season 3. Michelle Yeoh will reprise her memorable role as the Mirror Universe's version of Philippa Georgiou, who joined the titular mysterious Federation organization in Discovery. Section 31 operates autonomously in protection of the Federation, and is commonly known as an extreme group that works for what it perceives as the greater good. This should show a side of the Star Trek universe we haven't seen yet.

Reports suggested Section 31 was supposed to film in May of this year, but naturally that's bound to be impacted by the current global health crisis.

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds

Expected release date: 2021 (or later)

Star Trek Discovery season 2's versions of Captain Pike, Spock and Number One were evidently popular enough that they're getting their own spin-off. Star Trek: Strange New Worlds features Anson Mount, Ethan Peck and Rebecca Romijn reprising their roles in what's been described as a 'classic' Star Trek series with an angle of optimism, which should sit nicely alongside the more densely serialized likes of Discovery and Picard. As a more direct prequel to the Original Series, it'll be about the crew of the Enterprise in the pre-Kirk days.

Nickelodeon Star Trek animated series

Every ship needs a crew. Welcome aboard!We are proud to announce our very talented Writers’ Room for @Nickelodeon‘s untitled @StarTrek animated show: @TheJulieBenson @shawnabenson @DiandraWrites @QuandtumTheory @GoodAaron @Shoopeedoobydoo @nsjayaram @E_Mac777 @TheKeithSweet pic.twitter.com/LflgH34Oq2 July 30, 2019

Expected release date: 2022

Star Trek has so far lacked a counterpart to Star Wars ' Rebels and The Clone Wars animated series, but that's set to change. A so-far untitled Star Trek CG TV series is coming to Nickelodeon in the US, and as of July 2019, it had a writers' team in place. Dan and Kevin Hageman, who worked on the excellent Netflix series Trollhunters, are the key creatives behind the show, suggesting that something of a high quality that doesn't talk down to its audience is in the works here.

Little is known about the show, but it will have serialized storylines, and Kurtzman has suggested we might not even see it in action until after 2021. Like Lower Decks, two seasons of it have been ordered, which is partly motivated by the long lead times needed on animated series.

Untitled live-action show (possibly Star Trek: Starfleet Academy)

Back in January, series overseer Alex Kurtzman explained (as captured by Trek Core ) that two more live-action Star Trek series were yet to be revealed.

With Strange New Worlds' later announcement, we found out about one, but what about the other? It remains a mystery, but a younger-focused series called Starfleet Academy was reportedly in the works back in 2018, from the Gossip Girl duo of Josh Schwartz and Stephanie Savage. An old Variety report about Kurtzman's work on Trek also suggested it was possible a series about the antagonist Khan Noonien Singh was also in the works.

We'll just have to wait and see on this last one. It might even be a different project we haven't heard about yet.

One thing's for sure, though: you'll get all the Star Trek you can handle over the next couple of years.

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Samuel is a PR Manager at game developer Frontier. Formerly TechRadar's Senior Entertainment Editor, he's an expert in Marvel, Star Wars, Netflix shows and general streaming stuff. Before his stint at TechRadar, he spent six years at PC Gamer. Samuel is also the co-host of the popular Back Page podcast, in which he details the trials and tribulations of being a games magazine editor – and attempts to justify his impulsive eBay games buying binges.

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The Best Sci-Fi TV Shows and Movies Inspired by Star Trek

From classic space adventures to parodies to stories about loving Star Trek, these are the best TV series and movies inspired by the Final Frontier.

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Enterprise in Star Trek: The Original Series

Star Trek is one of best and most well-known science fiction franchises of all time, so it’s no surprise that it’s had a huge influence on the rest of the genre. From other space-faring adventures to distant worlds to straight up parodies of the Enterprise and its crew, there are plenty of shows and movies that owe a bit to Gene Roddenberry ‘s creation.

This is not a list of every single show or film that has been inspired by Star Trek because that list would cover a pretty good proportion of sci-fi on screen since 1966. But if you want to watch something Star Trek -adjacent, we’ve picked out 10 of our favorite shows and movies that were, to a greater or lesser degree, inspired by Star Trek .

Back in 1998, BBC 2 ran a Red Dwarf Night featuring interviews with celebrity fans, one of whom was Patrick Stewart. Stewart talked about how he was channel hopping (remember that, fellow oldies?) one night around 1993 or 1994 and came across something that, to his own “horror and outrage”, appeared to be a “rip-off” of Star Trek: The Next Generation . He was reaching for the phone to call his lawyer, “when something happened that made me laugh – and it was something that certainly would not have happened on The Next Generation .” Stewart realized the show was a comedy, not a cheap rip-off, started laughing, and became a fan.

Red Dwarf actually started around the same time as Next Gen , both being developed from 1986, though Red Dwarf was delayed in getting to air until 1988 due to an electricians’ strike. Following the misadventures of the last human being alive as he embarks on a 3 million year journey to get back to Earth, the series combines elements of a few different space-set shows and films, including Silent Running and The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy , but there is clearly a hefty dose of Star Trek: The Original Series in there. As time went on, more and more Next Generation crept in as well, especially with the addition of android crewmember Kryten as a full time cast member in Series 3.

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Stargate SG-1

Stargate SG-1 was spun off from the 1994 Dean Devlin and Roland Emmerich film Stargate , and the basic premise comes directly from that film: a US Air Force team go through a mysterious gate found in Egypt to another planet – or, in the case of the TV show, lots of other planets. When the show was adapted for television, although it did not feature many spaceships until later seasons, it did start to draw on the well-established tropes of Planet of the Week style space opera that Star Trek helped to popularize. The tortured military hero gained a wise-cracking style to suit star Richard Dean Anderson that aligned him more with “always a joke at the end of the episode” Kirk, the typical 1990s-nerdy Egyptologist slowly became more of a respected expert who sneezed less often, and more importantly the team gained a woman who was not sold to the Egyptology nerd in marriage (yes that is really the plot of the movie and yes, she calls him out on it) and a stoic alien.

The addition of Teal’c is where we can really see the influence of Star Trek creeping in because Teal’c is basically the love child of Spock and Worf, in the best way. He is extremely calm and composed – he has very deep emotions, but he keeps them under the surface and meditates frequently. He is also quite fond of a raised eyebrow. The “scientist” position on the team was already taken by Carter, so Teal’c fulfills the “warrior” role. Standing out as a warrior in a military setting is quite the task, but like Worf, Teal’c’s “honorable warrior” approach and fondess for his own culture’s weapons marks him out as a warrior among warriors.

Futurama follows Philip J Fry, who accidentally falls into a cryogenic freezer on New Year’s Day in 2000 and wakes up on December 31, 2999 (and leaves his dog behind, in quite possibly the most traumatic episode of television ever made). Fry finds work with his distant nephew (an elderly man) at a delivery company called Planet Express. Being a science fiction comedy set in a future full of spaceships, there are of course references to Star Trek scattered throughout, and the short-skirted, egotistical, womanizing recurring character Captain Zapp Brannigan clearly has more than a bit of Kirk in him.

Futurama also incorporated Star Trek into its stories more directly on occasion. The show’s very first guest star was Leonard Nimoy as his own cryogenically preserved head, welcoming Fry to the Head Museum (a regular feature on the series). And later there was a whole episode dedicated to Star Trek itself, “Where No Fan Has Gone Before.” In this episode, Fry discovers that Star Trek inspired a whole religion, which led to the Star Trek Wars, which led to the show and everything associated with it being banned. But a powerful alien being has watched the whole show, and has given the preserved heads of most of the original actors new bodies so they can participate in an eternal Star Trek convention. It’s a loving, joyous send-up of the show and features all but one of the then-surviving original cast members plus, inevitably, Jonathan Frakes, because every spin-off of Star Trek in any form must feature Jonathan Frakes in some role. This is the Rule.

Battlestar Galactica (reboot)

Battlestar Galactica 2003/4 – 2009 is a reimagining of the original 1979 series Battlestar Galactica , so needless to say its main point of reference is that show (though the original has some connections with Star Trek as well, as we covered here ). But it was also developed, executive produced, and had many episodes written by Ronald D. Moore, who first earned his stripes as a writer on The Next Generation , Deep Space Nine , and briefly on Voyager before his working relationship with his writing partner Brannon Braga broke down and he left.

While in many ways Battlestar Galactica was deliberately the anti- Star Trek – featuring a somewhat grimmer world view and an even higher body count – it also had many similarities, inevitably, since they are both set on space ships and led by a ship’s Captain or Commander. But Moore also emphasized some of the most interesting themes of 1990s Star Trek in his noughties version of BSG . Having left Voyager after only a couple of episodes, he obviously felt he had more to say about a spaceship on a long journey to get to Earth. And he had done a lot of work on Deep Space Nine , at the time the grittiest Star Trek series (possibly overtaken by Discovery or Picard since then– argue that out in the comments!). DS9 ’s penchant for morally gray characters and storylines and for stories based around a mysterious alien religion is clearly reflected in the themes emphasized by Moore’s reimagining of Battlestar Galactica .

Firefly/Serenity

Firefly (and its follow-up movie Serenity ) is another show that, on the surface, seems to be deliberately doing something different to Star Trek . Set in the future and following the crew of a spaceship, it has a Western-inspired vibe. The ship has a courtesan and a mercenary on board, and the use of Chinese phrases scattered among the English seems to be a reaction against the perceived tendency of Star Trek and other series to make the future look very American (somewhat unfairly, and Uhura’s native language is very specifically established as Swahili in “The Changeling,” although she is admonished and told to speak English which is especially odd as they all have Universal Translators… but we digress).

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But actually, Firefly is very directly inspired by Star Trek , which was famously conceived by Gene Roddenberry as a “wagon train to the stars.” Its even more famous tag line describes space as “the final frontier,” clearly positioning the show as basically a Western in space. Firefly takes that basic idea but goes in a different direction with it. Instead of focusing on the exploration aspect of the movement of immigrants to America ever further west in the 19th century, Firefly picks up on other elements of Westerns and Western tropes – particularly the lawlessness in a frontier environment with minimal law enforcement. It is the yin to Star Trek ’s yang.

WALL-E ’s most obvious and immediate inspirations are the films Silent Running and 2001: A Space Odyssey , but if you look closely, there is a good bit of Star Trek in there as well. It is, of course, largely set on a spaceship and one of the main characters is the ship’s captain – so far, so superficial.

But there are deeper connections to Star Trek here. One of the things that is notable about WALL-E is just how good and well-intentioned all the future human characters are. The present-day human character played by Fred Willard, and by implication all the other present-day humans, are somewhat terrible, but all of the future humans we meet are good people who are open to new experiences when they are exposed to them. Their sedentary, passive lifestyles are simply what they have been taught and brought up with. The simplest and briefest exposure to the world around them, even just by being accidentally toppled out of their mobile chairs, sets them off on a journey of discovery, and the ship’s captain is thrilled and excited to learn more about Earth and about his own ship’s true mission. That attitude is pure Star Trek – a passion for discovery and exploration, even when it is one that ultimately leads back to Earth again.

The Orville

There was a point, around 2017-2019, when The Orville was famous for being more like Star Trek than Star Trek . This is not meant – by us anyway – as a criticism of Star Trek: Discovery , which is a great show. But in its first two seasons, Discovery deliberately leaned away from some of the Star Trek series that had come before, following a disgraced former mutineer instead of a Captain or Commander, featuring a morally dubious Captain who actually turned out to be “evil,” focusing on war and trauma, and using arc-based instead of episodic storytelling. It was pretty similar to Deep Space Nine in many ways, but for fans of the more upbeat, Planet of the Week, episodic storytelling of the Original Series , The Next Generation , or Voyager , it was a bit of a shock ( Star Trek: Enterprise , like Discovery , re-tooled itself somewhat halfway through).

The Orville , on the other hand, basically is Star Trek in the 1990s mold of Next Gen or Voyager . Seven episodes of the show were actually written by Brannon Braga with his new writing partner, former scientific consultant on Star Trek , André Bormanis. And yes, writers are of course capable of writing different things, but although The Orville started out as a Star Trek spoof, pretty much the only difference between the two by season 3 is that people on the Orville sometimes eat pot brownies.

The show also stars Deep Space Nine ’s Penny Johnson Jerald in a regular role as the ship’s doctor, and has guest-starred Next Gen ’s Marina Sirtis, Voyager’ s Robert Picardo and Tim Russ, and Enterprise ’s John Billingsley, and the show’s directors include Star Trek ’s Brannon Braga, Robert Duncan McNeill and, of course, Jonathan Frakes. So it must be Star Trek .

Avenue 5 is a sadly short-lived science fiction comedy that blends elements of Voyager , Red Dwarf , and WALL-E . It takes from Red Dwarf and Voyager the basic plot that a spaceship has ended up a long way from home, and an essential crew member has been killed and must somehow be replaced. It then adds a well-meaning Captain who was only ever intended to be a figurehead, and not to actually run the ship, from WALL-E . Hilarity – and some surprisingly shocking deaths – ensue.

Although the somewhat less than inspirational characters skew closer to Red Dwarf , Battlestar Galactica , or Firefly , Avenue 5 shows its Star Trek side pretty clearly in the hiring of Voyager ’s Ethan Phillips (Neelix) as former astronaut Spike Martin. It also features an entire plot line built around the ability to split the ship into two, a clear reference to one of the Enterprise -D’s most famous (and least used) features.

Avengers: Endgame

This one is probably the biggest surprise on this list. Granted, it does feature spaceships and space travel, but as a big budget superhero film, it does not obviously have much in common with space opera.

What connects the second-highest grossing film of all time with Star Trek is the importance of the ensemble and the relationship between a group and its leader. Kevin Feige has mentioned a couple of times (both times speaking to Entertainment Weekly ) that he loves The Next Generation and that he had its final episode “All Good Things” in mind when developing Avengers: Endgame . “All Good Things” (written by Brannon Braga and Ronald D. Moore) has some time-hopping going on that is not dissimilar to Endgame , but Feige talked specifically about the very last scene, when Picard finally sits down to play poker with his senior officers. That relationship between the Captain and his crew and them all coming together, just like the shawarma-based post-credits in the first Avengers film, is what Feige really wanted to take from Star Trek and incorporate into the MCU.

The film also takes its title from the final episode of Voyager and directly lifts its closing images featuring the autographs of the actors playing the six main characters from Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country , the final film focusing on the original Star Trek crew played by their original actors, symbolizing its similar position as a grand ending to the earliest phase of a franchise.

Galaxy Quest

We’re finishing with a film and a show that are not just “inspired by” Star Trek – to all intents and purposes, they are Star Trek , or very nearly. The premise for 1999’s Galaxy Quest is that aliens have been watching a Star Trek -like show and mistaken it for “historical documents,” so when they find themselves facing an enemy they can’t defeat, they crash a convention to ask the “crew” of the NSEA Protector for help. With a cast led by Tim Allen (a perfect Shatner-a-like), Sigourney Weaver (of course), and Alan Rickman (whose sad passing is the reason a proposed TV show never got off the ground), the resulting story is hilarious, heart-warming, and heart-breaking in equal amounts.

Galaxy Quest is perfect. It just is. If you are a Star Trek fan and you haven’t seen it, why not? Go and watch it immediately! You will never be able to watch an episode of Star Trek without quoting a line from Galaxy Quest ever again (especially not the Original Series episode “Arena”). Hear yourself constantly saying, “I’m the guy that dies to show the situation is serious!” “Quick, let’s get out of here before one of those things kills Guy!” “Does the rolling help?” “I see you managed to get your shirt off,” “Whoever wrote this episode should die!” and of course, “That’s not right!” And I know I just spoiled several of the funniest lines, but go and watch it anyway, I promise it’s worth it.

Juliette Harrisson | @ClassicalJG

Juliette Harrisson is a writer and historian, and a lifelong Trekkie whose childhood heroes were JRR Tolkien and CS Lewis. She runs a YouTube channel called…

'Star Trek: Strange New Worlds': Everything to know about the latest Paramount+ series

Tomorrow is yesterday in the newest "Star Trek" series.

“Star Trek: Strange New Worlds,” the 12th series in the franchise , boldly goes into familiar territory, following the space adventures of Captain Christopher Pike (Anson Mount); Mr. Spock (Ethan Peck); and Number One, aka “Una” (Rebecca Romijn), all of whom we last saw at the end of the second season of “Star Trek: Discovery. ”

Pike, Spock and Number One – along with Nyota Uhura (Celia Rose Gooding), Nurse Christine Chapel (Jess Bush) and Dr. M’Benga (Babs Olusanmokun) – first appeared aboard the USS Enterprise on NBC's original “Star Trek" (1966-69), for which “Strange New Worlds” serves as a prequel.

The Enterprise’s five-year mission might be the same, but there’s still some newness to the landscape – a new theme song; more intimacy between characters; a gender-neutral title sequence intro changing its final phrase from "where no man has gone before" to "where no one has gone before," like in the intro of “Star Trek: The Next Generation”; and new people to meet.

How many episodes and how are they structured?

“Star Trek: Strange New Worlds,” created by Akiva Goldsman and Henry Alonso Myers, premieres May 5 on Paramount+, joining other recent Star Trek series “Star Trek: Discovery,” “Picard” and “Star Trek: Lower Decks” on the platform.

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The first season will have 10 episodes, released weekly. Filming has begun on a second season, though no premiere date has been announced.

More: The 40 best TV shows to watch on Paramount+: A new 'Star Trek' beams in this May

The structure of “Strange New Worlds” is also more reminiscent of the original series, a contrast to the more sweeping storytelling in some other "Star Trek" entries. There will be character arcs, but most adventures in the episodes will be self-contained and less serialized.

Mount, a lifelong "Star Trek" fan, says the structure inspired the name of the new series.

"When you go to watch a new episode of 'Star Trek: Strange New Worlds,' we wanted that sense of excitement from the top," Mount says. "Not just because you didn't know where the Enterprise would end up, but because you don't know where the Enterprise is going to start. That's what the original series had. You never knew where they're going to be in the galaxy and what new thing was going to be discovered."

Who is on the show?

When “Strange New Worlds” starts, Pike is home in Bear Creek, Montana, watching the 1951 film “The Day The Earth Stood Still” and seeming to question whether he will return to command the Starship Enterprise. An unexpected visit from Admiral Robert April (Adrian Holmes) comes with a direct order. Pike’s first officer Number One is missing, and the Federation needs his help to find out what happened to her.

Pike is haunted by what he was shown by the Klingons about his tragic future in “Discovery,” a future we’ve seen partially played out in “The Cage” and “The Menagerie” episodes of the original series. But he's trying to continue on despite where his destiny leads.

Pike was played by Jeffrey Hunter and Sean Kenney in the original series and Bruce Greenwood in J.J. Abrams' 2009 and 2013 films, "Star Trek" and "Star Trek Into Darkness."

In his relationship to his crew as captain, Pike has some Kirk-like moments where he follows a hunch, but none of it seems spontaneous.

“When we were talking about developing Pike back in the early days of this,” Mount says, “I said to the showrunners Akiva and Henry, 'All I know is that if Kirk leads with his machismo, and Picard leads with his brain, I think Pike leads with his heart.’ His superpower is empathy. And that's what makes him such a good leader."

Science Officer Spock, played by Peck (and originally by Leonard Nimoy), has matured since our time with him on “Discovery.” But there’s a familiarity to this Spock, in his actions and even in how he pronounces some words.

"There are times when there is no other way to play a moment than with some sort of eyebrow expression or with a tilt of the head that just feels like how Nimoy would do it," Peck says. "I really hope that I'm channeling some version of his spirit of Spock in my performance."

Number One/Una, played by Romijn, was briefly featured in the first series, mostly through a lens of her relationship to Captain Pike.

"She was really a blank slate," says Romijn, a longtime "Star Trek" fan. "Our writers have really had this incredible opportunity to flesh out this character. But it comes with some pressure because the 'Star Trek' fans are so protective of the canon and so protective of these characters. I feel like I'm just a caretaker. I get to take some artistic liberties and the writers have come up with so many fun layers for her. And we just want to get it right."

More: New 'Star Trek' documentary unveils star Nichelle Nichols' impactful NASA connection

"It's been incredible to step into this legacy," says Gooding about taking on the mantle of Uhura. "Every day, I'm awestruck by the privilege that I have to tell the origin story of this legend, this icon in the sci-fi community. I get to show sides of her that are well-loved and also introduce sides of her that maybe there wasn't space to hold that sort of storytelling in the past."

New to the crew are chief security officer La’an Noonien-Singh (Christina Chong), relative of villain Khan, pilot Lt. Erica Ortegas (Melissa Navia) and engineer Hemmer (Bruce Horak).

What about Captain Kirk?

Look for the other OG captain in Season 2. Paul Wesley, known for his role on "The Vampire Diaries," has been cast to play a young James T. Kirk .

What to watch

Because "Strange New Worlds" pulls from two other franchise series, it may be helpful to watch or revisit previous series. Here are episodes worth a look to help connect names, plots and other references:

"The Cage"/"The Menagerie" ("Original Series")
"Q&A" ("Short Treks")
"Brother" ("Star Trek: Discovery")
"Light and Shadows" ("Star Trek: Discovery")
"If Memory Serves" ("Star Trek: Discovery")
"Through the Valley of Shadows" ("Star Trek: Discovery")
"The Naked Time" ("Original Series")
"Space Seed" ("Original Series")
"Amok Time" ("Original Series")
"A Private Little War" ("Original Series")

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Hooray, Star Trek Feels Like Star Trek Again

Occasionally, it is necessary to convene a conversation between Vulture writers to discuss an important and timely issue in culture. This time, critics Angelica Jade Bastién and Kathryn VanArendonk discuss their mutual admiration of the newest Star Trek television series, Strange New Worlds, and what makes it feel more like Star Trek than any of its recent predecessors in the franchise.

Angelica Jade Bastién : I’m so excited to get into this. A fun Star Trek series? What a concept. I want to start with a simple question, Kathryn: What’s your relationship to the Star Trek franchise?

Kathryn VanArendonk : My first Star Trek was The Next Generation , and my earliest memories of it are of surreptitiously trying to watch it over my father’s shoulder so he didn’t realize I was watching and then turn it off. Within a few years, I was trying to catch it whenever it happened to be on because that’s how TV worked in the early ’90s, and for decades I was haunted by seeing only half of “The Big Goodbye” before being told it was dinnertime. (How did the holodeck become real, Angelica?!) At some point, I made my way through all of Deep Space Nine and most of the movies, but my relationship was then and has largely remained fond familiarity rather than “able to hold my weight in a grad-student Star Trek trivia game where you have to know the name of the service tunnels.” How about you?

AJB: Anyone who truly knows me knows my love of Star Trek is lifelong. When I was a young girl, my mother would sometimes play TNG when braiding my hair at night, and the curiosity and camaraderie of the series set something aflame within me. While I hold the belief that TNG is the platonic ideal of a Star Trek series, DS9 is the best the franchise has ever been — not just curious but bristling in its confrontations toward capitalism and fascism, while feeling intrinsically Black thanks to Avery Brooks as Captain Benjamin Sisko. I have seen every film and series, some of them, like TNG and DS9, several times over . I can hold my weight in a Star Trek trivia game with the best of them.

So I feel confident in asserting that the problem with modern Star Trek, with Discovery as the nadir of this, is that it has internalized all the wrong lessons about the franchise’s history. It sometimes feels like these creators are uncomfortable with being Star Trek, so they try to conform its trappings into shapes that don’t work. Star Trek is wholly political (I’d say even edging toward communism sometimes) and culturally curious. It should not be relentlessly grim, dim, and cruel, nor should it be empty fan service that mentions its past but doesn’t learn from it.

What makes Strange New Worlds work so much better — I’d argue it’s the best Star Trek has been in decades — is that it has learned from its past while charting a new course for its future. I was extremely hesitant when I learned it was happening as a prequel to the original series , which I actually don’t much care for beyond the films. I have also grown tired of Spock as a linchpin, especially since Leonard Nimoy’s performance is so, so damn good and specific. But Strange New Worlds surprised me. I think the show is indebted to DS9 far more than people are talking about — looking at Captain Christopher Pike cooking for his crew!

KVA: I am 100 percent onboard with your assessment that Strange New Worlds is the best the franchise has been for a long time. The thrill of Discovery and Picard was always wrapped up in the potential of streaming TV more broadly: What could TV be if it weren’t so stuck inside the commercial constraints of network television? What if it didn’t have to bend to episodic limitations or act breaks that could squeeze in ads for new cars? That frontier seemed so exciting and so wide open, and given the approach to other genre franchises (and to shiny, expensive TV more generally), it was not hard to feel excited about what a modern-era Star Trek could be. It could be heavily serialized; it could be grimdark and finally take stuff seriously ; it could jettison all the goofy side plots where everyone just sits around playing poker and Data talks about his relationship to cat ownership. And sure, all of that is very exciting in the way that anything you’ve never seen before sounds like a fun new experience.

What Discovery , Picard , and now the sharp left turn of Strange New Worlds suggest, though, is that if you take out episodic storytelling and quiet human character beats and jam-pack every episode with multiple timelines and mirror worlds and perpetually looping elaborate backstories, what you have is … no longer Star Trek . The reason Strange New Worlds feels like the best Star Trek has been, for me, is that it feels like the only recent installment in the franchise that is actually a Star Trek show.

AJB: Exactly. I feel like Discovery and Picard are Star Trek in name only. The episodic nature, the silliness, the sweet interpersonal dynamics among the crew — that’s what makes this franchise what it is. They’re baked into the concept as much as the series’ curiosity and utopian, communal beliefs.

Before getting further into what works about Strange New Worlds , though, I want to touch on one issue I have: For all its grandeur and beauty, I do worry about Star Trek ’s inability to look beyond its own past (beyond Discovery, which is terrible). Where is a post–Dominion War series, damn it?! Strange New Worlds is genuinely fun and nimble and dynamic, but I hope those in charge now do not interpret its success to mean the franchise should remain rooted in its own past. We have to move forward and beyond Spock.

Which brings me to how the show is handling characterization. We should start with Spock specifically, but the rest of the crew is full of revered legacy characters at the beginning of their Starfleet careers, like Uhura, and new characters who are connected to old ones, like La’an Noonien-Singh, who is related to the franchise’s infamous villain Khan. How are you feeling about Spock? Do you think the series is finding new dimensions in the character?

KVA: Ethan Peck’s Spock, for me, succeeds because it does not feel like a Nimoy impression. There are influences, certainly. The way that character relates to everyone else and his role in the ship’s overall group dynamic feel tied to the original Spock without being overly beholden or nitpicky. In general, I dislike prequels, especially those with an earlier version of a beloved character — that later iteration feels like homework, and watching Guy You Know But Young Now tends to have that sense of wanting the writers and performers to show their work. I know the answer is Spock, so now they have to solve for Spock.

There is still some of that in Strange New Worlds , but Peck’s Spock and Celia Rose Gooding’s Uhura both have a shining inner sincerity that pushes against the cynical foreknowledge of why these characters are in this series at all. It could come off as so cloying, but by and large, I find I’m just happy to spend time with them.

AJB: I think all the performances of legacy characters we’ve seen on Strange New Worlds are pretty impressive overall. The writing nods to what we’ve seen before while giving these actors the space to try to make the characters their own. Mr. I’m Gregory Peck’s Grandson is striking a good tone with Spock, and I’m surprised to find myself interested in his rendition of the character even as a Nimoy loyalist.

I’m more hesitant about Uhura, whose writing I find a little too neat. I think I struggle with Uhura more than anyone else on the show simply because her position as an emblem of Black racial progress for people like Martin Luther King Jr. makes her the trickiest to develop out of all the original series’ characters. How do you square Uhura today? How do you nod to Blackness in a universe where racial division on Earth is no longer in effect?

KVA: What really strikes me about this version of Uhura is the choice to give her some ambivalence about Starfleet. Trying to square that character now, both in terms of her cultural legacy in our world and as a Black woman in a Star Trek universe where contemporary racial identities no longer carry the same meanings, is an impossible task! But of all the ways they could’ve gone, starting from the idea that Uhura should be actively choosing to be here and that everyone onboard should start from the idea that they would be lucky to have her if she so chose — I was happier to see them go in that direction than in many of the other possibilities.

Uhura and Spock were always going to be tricky characters to pull off, but I think excellent iterations of them are bonuses: great if they work but not instantly a disaster if one of them had been a real dud. For me, if the Christopher Pike character had not really, really nailed it, the show would be sunk. I say this not out of any special love for Captain Pike! But if the Star Trek captain sucks, then very little could ever save the rest of the series. Anson Mount as Captain Pike, happily, is everything my swashbuckling pompadour space-daddy Star Trek desires could have wanted.

AJB: Oh yeah, he is totally a fine-ass space daddy. And I don’t usually go up for white men like that! So far, I am most enamored with Captain Pike and his No. 1, Una, played with steely force and precise care by Rebecca Romijn. Their characterization alchemizes dynamics we’ve seen in Star Trek before but in a bold new way.

I think a major reason the characterization is working so well comes back to the structure of the series itself. Strange New Worlds smartly takes a page from DS9 ’s early years in the sense that it’s episodic in nature but has overarching considerations rooted in the emotional lives of the characters, which don’t outweigh whatever new problem on a new world they have to solve, whether it’s outrunning the Gorn or Spock switching bodies accidentally with his betrothed. By having the through-lines be emotional — with Pike’s fear and resignation about his own death — allows the show a lot of space to play.

I’m now going to say something spicy that betrays me as a film critic at heart: The problem with a lot of modern television — Star Trek included — is that it has forgotten what makes television work and seems even anathematic toward the episodic, the contained, the balance necessary for a television show to work. Strange New Worlds does not have that loathsome problem.

KVA: My only argument is that I refuse to let you claim that as a film-critic stance because plenty of TV critics have been marching to the beat of that argument for a while now!

AJB: I don’t want to get into a tiff, but while I see TV critics saying this, sometimes I see a lot of grading on a curve for television shows that doesn’t bear that out. I’ll quote this 2018 piece from The Baffler : “If a decline in quality writ large is indeed evident on the networks and streaming services, one could hardly guess it from the continuing tone of TV coverage.” I know we disagree on this, but I bring this up only to say that Strange New Worlds isn’t being graded on a curve just because the Star Trek works coming out around it absolutely blow chunks.

KVA: The episodic rhythm of Strange New Worlds feels like an immense relief in the current TV landscape. It feels like such a relief that I am almost waiting, afraid, for the moment when the show suddenly abandons episodic structure and slowly bleeds into a more serialized plot. Some would be fine! A nice two-parter as a treat! But aside from the way that episodic plotting creates a solid structural framework, there’s something crucial about the way an episodic format allows Strange New Worlds to play with a variety of tones. Not every hour of the show needs to feel the same. The palette is broader, and there’s something so lovely about not knowing exactly what each new episode will feel like. I’d argue that it’s not necessarily a problem for Star Trek to be grim. The problem is when it’s grim all the time . Your point about character-based emotional through-lines fits in here, too. We can have some backstory about why Captain Pike feels haunted, but we could also have emotional through-lines about romance plots or friendships or a much broader spectrum of emotional experiences. Episodes! Are! Our! Friends!

AJB: DS9 definitely got grim at points, especially toward the end, but we still had those sweet, sweet holodeck episodes. Episodes are not only our friends; they are the structure necessary to contain the wonder a television show can produce. Limits are important to great storytelling. With Strange New Worlds , Star Trek feels at once beautifully constrained in how it wants its narrative to develop within the episodic format and limitless in the ways it can induce awe, challenge the viewer, and offer the kind of hope we all are desperately in need of — onscreen and in life.

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Paramount+’s ‘star trek: strange new worlds’: tv review.

Akiva Goldsman, Alex Kurtzman and Jenny Lumet's new 'Star Trek' series focuses on the USS Enterprise under Captain Pike, Captain Kirk's predecessor.

By Daniel Fienberg

Daniel Fienberg

Chief Television Critic

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In the ever-innovating landscape of television, what was old is suddenly new again.

Netflix is contemplating a subscription option with commercials. Hulu broke out of the small-batch programming rut by renewing a sitcom for a whopping 20-episode season. And, after a string of spinoffs characterized by gritty darkness or twisty mythologizing, Paramount+ may have cracked the Star Trek code with a new series that’s bright, optimistic and fundamentally episodic in nature.

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds

Airdate: Thursday, May 5 (Paramount+)

Cast: Anson Mount, Rebecca Romijn, Ethan Peck, Babs Olusanmokun, Christina Chong, Celia Rose Gooding, Jess Bush, Melissa Navia

Creators: Akiva Goldsman, Alex Kurtzman and Jenny Lumet

I actually kinda liked both Star Trek: Discovery and Star Trek: Picard . Both have ideas that interest me and performances I’m happy to support. But they’re both shows that, once I fell a little behind, I never felt any desire to catch up on.

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Star Trek: Strange New Worlds

Season two of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds finds the crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise , under the command of Captain Christopher Pike, confronting increasingly dangerous stakes, exploring uncharted territories, and encountering new life and civilizations. The crew will embark on personal journeys that will continue to test their resolve and redefine their destinies.

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds streams exclusively on Paramount+ in the U.S., U.K., Australia, Latin America, Brazil, South Korea, France, Italy, Germany, Switzerland and Austria. In addition, the series airs on Bell Media’s CTV Sci-Fi Channel and streams on Crave in Canada and on SkyShowtime in the Nordics, the Netherlands, Spain, Portugal and Central and Eastern Europe. Star Trek: Strange New Worlds is distributed by Paramount Global Content Distribution.

Key Art for Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Season 1 showing Captain Pike and the crew on the surface of a Strange New World with the U.S.S. Enterprise behind them and several moons and planets in the sky.

The series follows Captain Pike, Science Officer Spock, and Number One in the years before Captain Kirk boarded the U.S.S. Enterprise , as they explore new worlds around the galaxy.

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Captain Christopher Pike on the bridge of the U.S.S. Enterprise as seen on Star Trek: Strange New Worlds

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Spock, Kirk, Gorn — Oh My! How ‘Star Trek: Strange New Worlds’ Breathed Thrilling New Life Into the 56-Year-Old Franchise

Anson Mount as Pike of the Paramount+ original series STAR TREK: STRANGE NEW WORLDS. Photo Cr: Marni Grossman/Paramount+

SPOILER ALERT: This story discusses major plot developments in several episodes of the first season of “ Star Trek : Strange New Worlds,” including the season finale, currently streaming on Paramount+.

“We’re Just Gonna Try to Do Classic ‘Trek'”

When CBS All Access (now Paramount+) re-launched “Star Trek” as a television enterprise in 2017 with “Star Trek: Discovery,” it’d been 12 years since a “Trek” show was last on the air. In that time, serialized storytelling became the dominant narrative model for streaming dramas, especially genre ones; “Discovery” has followed suit, telling a single, ongoing story every season. Starting in 2020, “Star Trek: Picard,” a sequel series to “Star Trek: The Next Generation” starring Patrick Stewart, has done the same.

Fan response has been mixed. “Trek” has ventured into serialization before, with the 1990s series “Star Trek: Deep Space Nine,” and “Discovery” and “Picard” have taken full advantage of the opportunity to paint on a broader narrative canvass. But the original “Trek” series and “The Next Generation” remain among the most beloved — and re-watched — “Trek” series because they adhered to the old school, episodic structure of a brand new adventure every week.

“Telling a really long overarching story is so challenging,” Myers says. “You don’t often get little downtime moments.”

“Strange New Worlds” has forged a middle path, with each episode telling a self-contained story while threading longer character arcs that span multiple episodes — or occasionally, the whole season.

“The other ‘Star Trek’ shows are doing bigger, broader experiments, which I think are cool,” Myers says of “Discovery” and “Picard.” “They’re definitely trying to open up the sandbox and do different kinds of things with ‘Trek.’ We’re sort of the opposite. It’s a little easier to be like, ‘We’re just gonna try to do classic ‘Trek.'”

Most episodes of “Strange New Worlds” focused on one or two characters as the central driver of that week’s episode, and the self-contained storylines allowed the writers more breathing room to allow the characters to simply bounce off each other. “I love genre storytelling, but when it skimps on character, it just never works, and when it delivers on character, it makes everything work,” Myers says. “We get to relish the downtime moments. It’s the comforting part of television that you don’t always get out of movies. If we focus on character, the action will feel like it has more stakes, the romance will feel like it actually matters, and the humor will be funnier, because it’s coming from people that we know and like to hang out with. I think that that’s the thing that we’ve gotten to do a little more than other [‘Trek’] shows.”

“ We Didn’t Know if We Would Be Able to Get Kirk”

One of the most inflexible pieces of “Star Trek” canon is that until the original series episode “Balance of Terror,” it had been 100 years since anyone in the Federation had seen or heard from the Romulans — one of the most lasting and resonant “Trek” villains ever. The “Strange New Worlds” writers solved that problem with its season finale, “A Quality of Mercy,” which transported Capt. Pike into a future, alternate timeline in which he , not Capt. Kirk, was leading the Enterprise during the events of “Balance of Terror.”

The episode, Myers says, was the marriage of two ideas floating in the “Strange New Worlds” writers’ room. Idea one: “What if we took a classic ‘Trek’ episode and changed the timeline so we’re retelling that episode with our characters in a high-budget context?” Idea two: “What if your future self comes back and says, ‘Don’t do what you’re about to do’ — how would you respond?”

In the original series, we learn that Pike suffered a horrific, debilitating accident that removed him from command, allowing Kirk to take his place. On “Strange New Worlds,” Pike knows of his eventual fate, and in “A Quality of Mercy,” he tries to change it, causing his future self to appear and show Pike what will happen if he takes that path.

Placing Pike at the helm of the Enterprise when Kirk was meant to captain it also presented the tantalizing prospect of having the two men share the same scene — but that meant finding an actor to play Kirk. Myers says that after extensive auditions, they ended up offering the role to “The Vampires Diaries” star Paul Wesley , but the decision came down to the wire.

“Part of that episode ended up being about the differences of command the differences between Kirk and Pike and how they approach things very, very differently,” Myers says. “But there was a brief moment when we didn’t know if we would be able to get a Kirk. I wrote two versions of the script, one with Kirk and one without.”

“There’s a Reason People Haven’t Touched the Gorn”

The reptilian aliens made their debut in an episode from the first season of the original series, “Arena,” in which Capt. Kirk (William Shatner) is pitted in a fight to the death on an alien planet against a Gorn captain. Since then, the species has occupied the fringes of the “Trek” universe, showing up again only fleetingly over the years, most often in animation. That’s because on the original series, the Gorn looked like, well, a man in a giant rubber lizard suit.

“You couldn’t do the Gorn now the way they did the Gorn,” Myers says. “I think audiences would have an instinctive organ transplant rejection to the classic version of the Gorn. Audiences now are sophisticated, they expect a certain level of effects work, of verisimilitude.”

But Myers says that Goldsman “has wanted to do something with the Gorn forever,” and made resurrecting the species a goal for Season 1 of “Strange New Worlds.”

“I mean, look, I love ‘Arena.’ ‘Arena’ is a great episode. But there’s a reason people haven’t touched the Gorn much since then,” Myers says. “They’re extremely hard to do. It’s expensive, it’s challenging. You have to reimagine them.”

Doing so meant bending “Trek” canon a bit, and reconceiving the Gorn as at once highly intelligent and yet feral in their primal, ferocious aggression. It also meant keeping the species largely off screen, since making them look realistic to 21st century eyes required a full, and costly, CGI redesign. The result maintained the feeling from “Arena” that the Gorn were unrelentingly dangerous while deepening their mythology enough to place them on par with the A-list of “Trek” alien adversaries.

“I’m aware of some of the the canon challenges,” Myers says. “Knowing that you’re going to have to change them is an opportunity to try to do something different.”

“We Wanted to Show That There Were Stakes”

Characters die all the time on “Star Trek,” but it remains exceedingly rare that it happens to a member of the main cast — and even then, it’s because the actor involved wanted to leave the show. That wasn’t the case with Hemmer (Bruce Horak), the irascible chief engineer on Enterprise who sacrifices himself at the end of Episode 9, “All Those Who Wander,” after his body is implanted with Gorn offspring. The writers knew from the start that they were going to kill Hemmer off.

“When we cast Bruce, we told him,” Myers says. “He was like, ‘Great. I’m down. This is awesome!'”

The issue, Myers explained, was that “Strange New Worlds” had to make clear the characters were at real risk. “One of the knocks on a prequel is that we know Uhura’s going to make it, we know Spock’s going to make it,” he says. “We wanted to show that there were stakes in this show.”

Don’t worry: While Hemmer is dead, the actor who played him is not gone. “We are finding and have currently found ways to have Bruce circle back in our universe in a very classic ‘Trek’ way,” he says. “It won’t be the last you see of Bruce Horak.”

“It Was All About Telling the Story About Spock”

Perhaps the most surprising twist in Season 1 of “Strange New Worlds” was the revelation that Spock’s fiancée T’Pring (Gia Sandhu) is unknowingly overseeing a Vulcan prison that houses Spock’s half-brother, Sybok. The character was introduced as the main villain in the 1989 feature film “Star Trek V: The Final Frontier,” as played by Laurence Luckinbill (after Sean Connery couldn’t do it), but the movie is widely considered one of the worst “Trek” films ever, and the character has since faded into obscurity. (It didn’t help that Spock had never mentioned Sybok before “Star Trek V,” either.)

Myers can’t remember who had the idea to bring Sybok back into the “Trek” fold, but says it grew out of the conception of Episode 7, “The Serene Squall,” which centered on Angel ( Jesse James Keitel ), a nonbinary space pirate who befriends — and then betrays — Spock in an (initially successful) attempt to commandeer the Enterprise.

“We wanted to do a villain that harkened back to classic ‘Trek’ — a really fun, scenery-chewing villain who you just want to see again and again and again, but also could be a villain that we can only do now ,” Myers says. “In doing a story about someone who’s nonbinary, it really tied into the story about Spock reckoning with his identity. The Sybok piece was an interesting way to tie into Spock’s past, and to reclaim a piece of ‘Trek’ lore.”

Despite Sybok’s dubious origins in “Star Trek V,” Myers and the writers liked that the character’s decision to forsake logic and embrace his emotions contrasted with Spock’s dogged pursuit of pure logic.

“You know, look, that movie is, uh — let me just say it’s not my favorite of the ‘Trek’ movies,” Myers says with a laugh. “But even in the ‘Trek’ movies that don’t work as well, there’s always something interesting. I liked that character, and the idea of a Vulcan who is wrestling with emotion. Science fiction is about playing with ideas. We’re not just moving chess pieces around.”

Sybok appears only from the back at the very end of “The Serene Squall,” and that’s the last we see of him in Season 1. But Myers is tight-lipped on when, or whether, he may show up again. “Sometimes you do these things in TV where you pull the thread just to see where it gets you,” he says. “You don’t have to wrap everything up. We wanted to throw out some more ideas that may come back and intersect with the show in the future.”

“This Is the Pike Show”

The future of “Strange New Worlds” is, at least in part, already written: The series wrapped production earlier this month on Season 2, and will feature Wesley as Kirk years before he becomes a Starfleet captain.

When Mount, Peck and Romijn were first cast, it was for Season 2 of “Discovery” — with no sense at the time that they would ever be spun-off into their own show. Now that Myers has actors for Kirk, Spock and Uhura, however, it’s hard to ignore the prospect of continuing the “Star Trek” story into the era of the original series.

“Look, I would love nothing more than to then to go all the way forward to the future, and eventually do that with them,” he says. “But there’s a lot of stories before that. I’ll tell you what Kirk isn’t: He isn’t the replacement captain. This is the Pike show. This is the Spock show. This is the Number One show. We have a lot of stories yet to tell with them. That said, who knows what the future holds. We would be so lucky to have that Enterprise.”

He pauses, and answers with a knowing glint in his eyes. “I think that that would be an unbelievably interesting experiment,” he says. “But I don’t want to put the cart before the horse, because I love this show. And I hope we get to do it for a while.”

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Entertainment

Hulu's Star Trek-Like Sci-Fi Gem Is Now Streaming on Disney Plus

The Orville is must-see television for science fiction fans.

More people need to watch The Orville.

The Orville: New Horizons, the third season of Seth MacFarlane's sci-fi series, concluded last week on Hulu and makes its way to Disney Plus on Wednesday. What began life as a parody of Star Trek has evolved into a show that expands on the ethical dilemmas and social commentary the iconic sci-fi series was known for.

Plus, it has the kind of laughs expected from the creator of Family Guy and American Dad. There's still that love of Star Trek in every episode, but The Orville's maturation makes me enjoy it more than the series that inspired it. Both Hulu and Disney Plus subscribers can watch all three seasons to see the evolution of the show.

The series is set in the 25th century and follows the adventures of the starship USS Orville, which gets its name from Orville Wright of the Wright brothers.

MacFarlane plays Capt. Ed Mercer, who leads the ship with his second-in-command and ex-wife, Commander Kelly Grayson (Adrianne Palicki). Like Star Trek, the crew is made up of humans and aliens exploring the far reaches of the galaxy, but its characters are more modern, with plenty of human (or alien) flaws and behaviors. They straddle the line between the almost flawless, erudite crew of the Enterprise in the original Star Trek series and The Next Generation, and the more gritty and foul-mouthed characters of Picard and Star Trek: Discovery .

Episodes focused on ethical dilemmas and commentary about modern issues are what made me a Star Trek fan, and they are what's won me over as a fan of The Orville. There's a sentiment about The Orville that fans put this way: "The Orville out Star Treks Star Trek."

This third season really exemplifies the saying, with episodes focused on ethical problems that aren't so easy to answer, in contrast to the original Star Trek and TNG, which often trod more lightly or tied up episodes with a clear decision. Like the Federation's Prime Directive in Star Trek, The Orville's Planetary Union has its own rules to not interfere with the customs of other civilizations, and those regulations are put to the test constantly.

A perfect example of this is the penultimate episode, Domino, where crew members develop a weapon that can easily annihilate an entire race that's been hostile to members of the Planetary Union. This leads to the question of how to use such a device and, as expected, there's turmoil over the ethics of the weapon, leading to another dilemma.

#TheOrville New Horizons is now streaming on @hulu . pic.twitter.com/NDSpAjZNwY — The Orville (@TheOrville) June 2, 2022

In another episode from season 3, Twice in a Lifetime, Lt. Gordon Malloy (Scott Grimes) gets sent back in time to 2015 after a mishap on the ship. Earlier in the episode, he'd showed his interest in this time period by carrying around a replicated smartphone and showing it off to the crew. He ends up living in the past for 10 years before the crew can find him in 2025. Viewers learn the Planetary Union has regulations for time travel: Stay put, don't interact with anyone in the past and wait for rescue. Gordon breaks the rules, leading to a dilemma over whether to destroy this tainted timeline and create an entirely different future.

One ethical puzzle from an earlier season involves Lt. Commander Bortus, who's part of the male-dominated Moclan race. In the first season, Bortus and his mate Klyden had a baby girl named Topa. What the crew found out is that the Moclan despise women so much that they change the sex of their girls, which Bortus and Klyden decide to do for Topa. The third season shows the ramifications of their decision on Bortus' family, the Orville's crew and in fact the whole Planetary Union. This scenario is similar to stories in The Next Generation, but not so much in the current batch of Star Trek shows.

For longtime Star Trek fans, the franchise holds an important place in our hearts. It always presented a brighter side of the future, where the world comes together for the betterment of humanity. But then the current iteration of the franchise seemed to view that aspect of the show as milquetoast, focusing on space battles instead of what fans really want: a future version of humanity solving problems not so different from what humans deal with today.

The Orville, however, has taken on this challenge. It gives viewers thought-provoking yet memorable scenarios that make viewers question their own morals and ethics, which is what a sci-fi fan should expect from a show about a utopian future. This made me a fan of The Orville, and it's also the reason I prefer the series over the current batch of Star Trek offerings. Hopefully, other people will come around to enjoying the show just as much.

Every Upcoming ‘Star Trek’ Show on Paramount+

The “Star Trek” universe is expanding to theatrical, with a Michelle Yeoh-led film in the works

The “Star Trek” universe continues to expand, with fan favorites returning and new shows (and worlds) to explore on the Paramount+ streaming service even as “Star Trek: Picard” comes to an end.

“Strange New Worlds” and “Lower Decks” are eyeing a summer return, with “Prodigy” slated for a winter release.

They’re also several projects in development, including a “Starfleet Academy” focusing on young cadets, and a “Section 31” movie centered around Michelle Yeoh’s deliciously evil anti-hero from “Discovery.”

Below we run down every upcoming new “Star Trek” TV series coming to Paramount+.

“Star Trek: Strange New Worlds” (Season 2)

Premiere Date: June 15, 2023

Cast: Anson Mount as Captain Christopher Pike, Rebecca Romijn as Number One, Ethan Peck as Science Officer Spock, Jess Bush as Nurse Christine Chapel, Christina Chong as La’an Noonien-Singh, Celia Rose Gooding as Cadet Nyota Uhura, Melissa Navia as Lt. Erica Ortegas and Babs Olusanmokun as Dr. M’Benga. Season 2 also features the return of special guest star Paul Wesley as James T. Kirk and new addition Carol Kane in a recurring role as Pelia.

Number of Episodes: 10

Summary: The series follows Captain Pike, Science Officer Spock and Number One in the years before Captain Kirk boarded the U.S.S. Enterprise, as they explore new worlds around the galaxy. The new season includes the previously announced special crossover episode featuring both live-action and animation, with “Lower Decks” stars Tawny Newsome as Ensign Beckett Mariner and Jack Quaid as Ensign Brad Boimler joining the U.S.S. Enterprise. The episode was directed by “Star Trek: The Next Generation” and “Star Trek: Picard” actor and director Jonathan Frakes.

Watch the teaser trailer here:

“Star Trek: Lower Decks” (Season 4)

Premiere Date: Late Summer 2023

Cast: Tawny Newsome as Ensign Beckett Mariner; Jack Quaid as Ensign Brad Boimler; Noël Wells as Ensign Tendi; Eugene Cordero as Ensign Rutherford, Dawnn Lewis as Captain Carol Freeman; Jerry O’Connell as Commander Jack Ransom; Fred Tatasciore as Lieutenant Shaxs; and Gillian Vigman as Doctor T’Ana.

Number of Episodes: TBD

Summary: An unknown force is destroying starships and threatening galactic peace. Luckily, the crew of the U.S.S. Cerritos isn’t important enough for stuff like that! Instead, Ensigns Mariner, Boimler, Tendi, Rutherford and Provisional Ensign T’Lyn are keeping up with their Starfleet duties, avoiding malevolent computers, and getting stuck in a couple caves– all while encountering new and classic aliens along the way.

“Star Trek: Prodigy” (Season 2)

Premiere Date: Winter 2023

Cast: Kate Mulgrew as Hologram Kathryn Janeway, Brett Gray as Dal, Ella Purnell as Gwyn, Rylee Alazraqui as Rok-Tahk, Angus Imrie as Zero, Jason Mantzoukas as Jankom Pog, Dee Bradley Baker as Murf. and John Noble as The Diviner.

Summary: A motley crew of young aliens must figure out how to work together while navigating a greater galaxy, in search of a better future. These six young outcasts know nothing about the ship they have commandeered – a first in the history of the “Star Trek” franchise – but over the course of their adventures together, they will each be introduced to Starfleet and the ideals it represents

“Star Trek: Discovery” (Season 5)

Premiere Date: 2024

Cast: Sonequa Martin-Green as Captain Michael Burnham, Doug Jones as Saru, Anthony Rapp as Paul Stamets, Mary Wiseman as Sylvia Tilly, Wilson Cruz as Dr. Hugh Culber, David Ajala as Cleveland “Book” Booker, Blu del Barrio as Adira, and Callum Keith Rennie as Rayner.

Summary: The fifth and final season will find Captain Burnham and the crew of the U.S.S. Discovery uncovering a mystery that will send them on an epic adventure across the galaxy to find an ancient power whose very existence has been deliberately hidden for centuries. But there are others on the hunt as well … dangerous foes who are desperate to claim the prize for themselves and will stop at nothing to get it.

“Star Trek: Starfleet Academy”

Premiere Date: TBD (Production begins 2024)

Summary: “Starfleet Academy” will introduce us to a young group of cadets who come together to pursue a common dream of hope and optimism. Under the watchful and demanding eyes of their instructors, they will discover what it takes to become Starfleet officers as they navigate blossoming friendships, explosive rivalries, first loves and a new enemy that threatens both the Academy and the Federation itself.

“Star Trek: Section 31” (Film)

Premiere Date: TBD (Production begins 2023)

Cast: Michelle Yeoh, TBD

Summary: Emperor Philippa Georgiou joins Section 31, a secret division of Starfleet tasked with protecting the United Federation of Planets and faces the sins of her past.

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The 25 Best Shows Like 'Star Trek: Discovery', Ranked By Fans

This curated list of shows will transport you to galaxies far and wide, capturing the essence of exploration and discovery akin to Star Trek: Discovery . These series were handpicked for their shared themes and tones with the beloved sci-fi saga, offering viewers a thrilling ride through the unknown realms of the universe. The shows on this list have been meticulously curated based on votes from Rankers like you, ensuring a collection of top-notch recommendations for fans of interstellar adventures.

Embark on a journey through the stars with these captivating series that echo the spirit of exploration and intrigue found in Star Trek: Discovery . Featuring diverse storylines, compelling characters, and breathtaking visuals, these shows will immerse you in worlds where the boundaries of science and human nature are continually tested. From tales of survival in space to encounters with alien species, each series on this list promises an unforgettable experience for sci-fi enthusiasts. Plus, with convenient “Where to Watch” buttons below each show, streaming services like Netflix, Amazon Prime, Apple+, and more bring these interstellar adventures right to your screen.

After you've delved deep into the mysteries of Star Trek: Discovery , why not continue your voyage with shows like The Mandalorian , Intergalactic , and The Ark ? These series offer a mix of space opera, resilience, and moral complexity that will keep you on the edge of your seat as you explore the uncharted territories of the cosmos. So, grab your popcorn, settle in, and get ready to discover new worlds and encounter thrilling adventures across the stars. Don't forget to vote up your favorite shows on the list to share your love for intergalactic storytelling!

The Mandalorian

The Mandalorian is a sci-fi series set in the Star Wars universe, following the adventures of a lone bounty hunter known as Din Djarin as he navigates through a vast galaxy far, far away. Tasked with protecting a mysterious child known as Grogu, the Mandalorian embarks on a journey filled with danger, intrigue, and unexpected alliances. Featuring Pedro Pascal as the titular character and a rich ensemble cast, the series blends elements of space opera, action, and Western vibes in a thrilling exploration of the outer realms of the Star Wars universe.

In a narrative akin to Star Trek: Discovery , The Mandalorian embarks on a quest through the outer reaches of the galaxy, as characters traverse through diverse planets and encounter a myriad of fascinating species and cultures. Both series delve into the complexities of the cosmos as characters navigate through treacherous environments and forge new alliances in the unexplored regions of space. With its blend of space fantasy, interstellar escapades, and character-driven storytelling, The Mandalorian offers a captivating journey into the depths of the Star Wars universe that resonates with fans of galactic exploration.

Is The Mandalorian Worth Your Time?

Star Trek: The Original Series

Star Trek: The Original Series follows the iconic crew of the starship Enterprise under the command of Captain James T. Kirk as they voyage through the final frontier. The series explores themes of diversity, morality, and the inherent human curiosity for the unknown. Featuring memorable characters like Spock, McCoy, and Uhura, Star Trek: The Original Series set the standard for the beloved franchise.

Much like Star Trek: Discovery , Star Trek: The Original Series captures the inherent optimism of humanity's future in the vastness of space. Both series showcase the thrill of discovery, the challenges of venturing into the unknown, and the importance of unity and cooperation in facing the mysteries of the universe. With its distinctive tone of adventure and moral complexity, Star Trek: The Original Series remains a cornerstone of the Star Trek legacy.

Is Star Trek: The Origina... Worth Your Time?

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Battlestar Galactica

In the realm of science fiction, Battlestar Galactica presents a riveting narrative of humanity's fight for survival amidst a devastating alien attack. The series follows Commander Adama and President Roslin as they navigate political and military challenges while safeguarding the last remnants of civilization. Focusing on themes of identity, loyalty, and hope, Battlestar Galactica offers a gripping and thought-provoking journey through space.

Similar to Star Trek: Discovery , Battlestar Galactica embarks on epic sci-fi adventures that explore the resilience of humanity in the face of overwhelming threats. Both series feature complex characters, intricate storylines, and moral dilemmas set against the backdrop of space exploration. With its blend of drama, action, and intrigue, Battlestar Galactica resonates with viewers seeking immersive and captivating narratives in the science fiction genre.

Is Battlestar Galactica Worth Your Time?

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# 5 of 281 on The 260+ Best SciFi Shows Of All Time

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Star Trek: Picard

Star Trek: Picard explores the themes of redemption and self-discovery as it follows retired Admiral Jean-Luc Picard on a personal journey. With a talented ensemble cast led by Patrick Stewart, the series delves into emotional depth and character growth. Balancing nostalgia with innovation, Star Trek: Picard skillfully navigates familiar territories while charting new courses in the Star Trek universe.

Both series offer viewers an immersive journey into the complexities of human and alien interactions, blending sci-fi, action, and drama seamlessly. With a diverse cast of characters and compelling narratives, Star Trek: Picard and Star Trek: Discovery stand as exemplary entries in the Star Trek franchise.

Is Star Trek: Picard Worth Your Time?

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The Orville

The Orville follows the crew of the titular starship as they navigate the challenges of space exploration and interstellar diplomacy in a lighthearted and comedic sci-fi adventure. Created by Seth MacFarlane, the series blends elements of humor, drama, and social commentary within the framework of a spacefaring vessel. With a diverse cast led by MacFarlane as Captain Ed Mercer and Adrianne Palicki as Commander Kelly Grayson, The Orville offers a fresh and playful take on the science fiction genre.

Inspired by the optimistic tone and ensemble-driven storytelling of the original Star Trek series, The Orville presents a whimsical and heartfelt exploration of space exploration, ethical dilemmas, and the complexities of human (and alien) nature. Both series engage viewers through a mix of comedy, drama, and moral lessons, inviting audiences to reflect on the human condition and the possibilities of the cosmos. With its blend of humor, adventure, and commentary, The Orville carves its own niche in the realm of sci-fi TV with a nod to the timeless themes of its iconic predecessor.

Is The Orville Worth Your Time?

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Star Trek: The Next Generation

Star Trek: The Next Generation follows Captain Jean-Luc Picard and the crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise on a voyage of exploration and diplomacy. With a mix of science fiction and moral dilemmas, the series delves into social issues and ethical quandaries. Led by Patrick Stewart and a talented ensemble cast, the show captivates audiences with its engaging storytelling and diverse characters.

Like Star Trek: Discovery , Star Trek: The Next Generation embodies the spirit of adventure, teamwork, and the quest for knowledge in the vast expanse of the universe. Both series offer a rich exploration of alien encounters, moral challenges, and human nature, captivating audiences with their thought-provoking narratives. With their blend of timeless themes and compelling characters, both shows contribute to the enduring legacy of the Star Trek franchise.

Is Star Trek: The Next Ge... Worth Your Time?

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# 3 of 281 on The 260+ Best SciFi Shows Of All Time

Doctor Who follows the adventures of the Doctor, a Time Lord who travels through time and space in the TARDIS, a ship disguised as a British police box With a mix of wit, charm, and heroism, the Doctor encounters various alien species, historical figures, and complex moral dilemmas. The series explores themes of compassion, bravery, and the infinite possibilities of the universe, captivating audiences with its imaginative storytelling.

In a similar vein to Star Trek: Discovery , Doctor Who embarks on epic sci-fi adventures that span across different time periods and galaxies, showcasing the boundless wonders of the cosmos. Both series highlight exploration, heroism, and the triumph of good over evil as characters face challenges and embark on daring missions to save the universe. With its iconic character and timeless narratives, Doctor Who stands as a beloved and enduring entry in the world of science fiction.

Is Doctor Who Worth Your Time?

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Intergalactic

Intergalactic is a sci-fi drama that follows a group of female prisoners who escape captivity on Earth and embark on a perilous journey to a distant prison colony in space. As they navigate through unknown galaxies and encounter various threats, the women must band together to survive and uncover the truth behind their imprisonment. Featuring a diverse ensemble cast led by Savannah Steyn, Parminder Nagra, and Eleanor Tomlinson, Intergalactic explores themes of resilience, liberation, and the quest for justice in a futuristic setting.

Echoing the spirit of exploration and diversity in Star Trek: Discovery , Intergalactic delivers a gripping narrative that revolves around a group of individuals on a daring space adventure to assert their freedom and seek redemption. Both series delve into concepts of social justice, empowerment, and the bonds formed through adversity as characters navigate the challenges of the cosmos. With its focus on strong female leads , high-stakes drama, and interstellar pursuits, Intergalactic offers a compelling space opera that resonates with fans of epic sci-fi.

Is Intergalactic Worth Your Time?

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Babylon 5 is set aboard the titular space station, a hub for various alien species and civilizations seeking peace and diplomacy in a turbulent galaxy. With political intrigue, epic battles, and complex character relationships, the series explores themes of war, redemption, and the struggle for unity in the face of interstellar conflicts. Led by characters like Commander Sheridan and Ambassador Delenn, Babylon 5 weaves a rich tapestry of alliances and betrayals against the backdrop of a universe on the brink of chaos.

In a manner akin to Star Trek: Discovery , Babylon 5 unfolds in a dynamic space station setting that serves as a microcosm of the diverse cultures and tensions present in the galaxy. Both series emphasize diplomacy, teamwork, and the quest for peace in a universe fraught with political intrigue and cosmic threats. With its intricate plotlines, morally gray characters, and epic space battles, Babylon 5 stands as a riveting space opera that immerses viewers in a world of galactic struggles and moral dilemmas.

Is Babylon 5 Worth Your Time?

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Star Trek: Voyager

Star Trek: Voyager follows the adventures of the crew of the starship Voyager as they find themselves stranded in the Delta Quadrant, far from home. The series explores teamwork, survival, and the pursuit of a way back to Earth, led by Captain Kathryn Janeway. With a diverse cast of characters including Seven of Nine, the Doctor, and Neelix, Star Trek: Voyager offers a unique blend of science fiction and human drama.

Similar to Star Trek: Discovery , Star Trek: Voyager captures the essence of exploration, teamwork, and the challenges of navigating unknown territories in space. Both series contain motifs of unity, discovery, and overcoming obstacles as the crew faces new civilizations and encounters in the far reaches of the galaxy. With its distinct tone of adventure and resilience, Star Trek: Voyager embraces the spirit of exploration that defines the Star Trek universe.

Is Star Trek: Voyager Worth Your Time?

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seaQuest DSV

seaQuest DSV is a sci-fi series that follows the crew of a high-tech submarine in the future as they embark on underwater missions to explore the depths of the oceans and encounter various challenges and mysteries. Led by Captain Nathan Bridger and a diverse team of scientists and specialists, the crew tackles environmental issues, marine research, and unexpected discoveries beneath the sea.

Reflecting the adventurous spirit of Star Trek: Discovery , seaQuest DSV delves into the exploration of uncharted waters and the wonders of the ocean depths through the lens of futuristic science fiction. Both series showcase a crew of individuals driven by a desire to discover and understand the unknown, whether in the vastness of space or the unexplored realms of the sea. With its focus on marine exploration, environmental issues, and technologically advanced storytelling, seaQuest DSV presents a captivating journey into the mysteries of the ocean that resonates with the spirit of exploration found in iconic space operas.

Is seaQuest DSV Worth Your Time?

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Farscape follows astronaut John Crichton who becomes stranded in a distant part of the universe aboard a living spaceship with a motley crew of aliens. The series explores themes of survival, identity, and the complexities of interspecies relationships in a vibrant and unpredictable universe. With its innovative creature design, intergalactic conflicts, and imaginative storytelling, Farscape offers a unique and immersive sci-fi experience.

Like Star Trek: Discovery , Farscape embarks on epic sci-fi adventures that push the boundaries of exploration and encounter in the vastness of space. Both series feature diverse worlds, intricate alien cultures, and character dynamics that add layers of depth to their respective universes. Through its blend of adventure, humor, and drama, Farscape captures the essence of thrilling sci-fi storytelling that resonates with fans of interstellar escapades.

Is Farscape Worth Your Time?

Star Trek: Enterprise

Star Trek: Enterprise is set in the 22nd century and follows the crew of Earth's first Warp 5-capable starship, the NX-01 Enterprise, as they embark on pioneering missions of exploration. Led by Captain Jonathan Archer, the team navigates uncharted territories, forges alliances, and uncovers the origins of the United Federation of Planets. With elements of science fiction, adventure, and diplomacy, Star Trek: Enterprise offers a fresh perspective on humanity's interstellar endeavors.

In a manner akin to Star Trek: Discovery , Star Trek: Enterprise embodies the themes of discovery and the quest for knowledge in the unexplored regions of space. Both series showcase the challenges and triumphs of exploration, the complexities of human-alien interactions, and the spirit of discovery that defines the Star Trek franchise. Through its distinct blend of adventure and diplomacy, Star Trek: Enterprise stands as a notable in the Star Trek universe.

Is Star Trek: Enterprise... Worth Your Time?

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Stargate SG-1

Stargate SG-1 follows a team of military personnel and scientists as they use an ancient alien device to travel to other planets and encounter new civilizations. Led by Colonel Jack O'Neill and archaeologist Daniel Jackson, the team navigates through the Stargate to explore the galaxy, facing enemies and forging alliances along the way. Themes of exploration, teamwork, and diplomacy are interwoven throughout the series, offering a mix of action, adventure, and sci-fi elements.

Much like Star Trek: Discovery , Stargate SG-1 takes viewers on epic sci-fi adventures that delve into the mysteries of space and the complexities of interstellar interactions. Both series capture the essence of exploration, discovery, and the quest for knowledge as characters venture into the unknown to uncover the secrets of the universe. With its entertaining cast of characters and engaging storytelling,iprovides a thrilling and immersive experience in the realm of science fiction.

Is Stargate SG-1 Worth Your Time?

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Dark Matter

In the realm of science fiction, Dark Matter follows a group of amnesiac individuals who wake up on a derelict spaceship with no memory of their identities. As they piece together their pasts and navigate the dangers of space, they uncover dark secrets and hidden agendas that challenge their trust in each other.

Much like Star Trek: Discovery , Dark Matter unfolds in the vastness of space, where a diverse group of characters must confront their pasts and navigate the complexities of life aboard a spaceship. Both series contain characters grappling with the challenges of their environment and the unknown threats lurking in the cosmos. With its blend of mystery, intrigue, and character development, Dark Matter offers a captivating space opera that captures the essence of exploration and survival.

Is Dark Matter Worth Your Time?

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Falling Skies

Falling Skies is a post-apocalyptic sci-fi series that follows a group of survivors led by former history professor Tom Mason as they resist alien occupation and seek to reclaim Earth from extraterrestrial invaders. The characters navigate a world devastated by an alien invasion while uncovering the truth behind the alien motives and their own place in the grand scheme of the universe. Starring Noah Wyle as Tom Mason and Moon Bloodgood as Anne Glass, Falling Skies blends elements of action, drama, and sci-fi in a gripping tale of humanity's fight against overwhelming odds.

Drawing parallels to Star Trek: Discovery , Falling Skies embarks on a journey of uncovering the mysteries of the unknown, as characters navigate through a post-apocalyptic landscape rife with alien technology and existential threats. With its focus on survival, camaraderie, and the human spirit's resilience in the face of adversity, Falling Skies offers a compelling narrative that resonates with the spirit of discovery and courage found in iconic sci-fi tales.

Is Falling Skies Worth Your Time?

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For All Mankind

For All Mankind is a sci-fi drama series that reimagines an alternate history where the global space race never ended, leading to a continued rivalry between the United States and the Soviet Union in the quest for dominance beyond Earth. Set against the backdrop of NASA's efforts to reach the moon and beyond, the series explores themes of ambition, sacrifice, and the impact of technological advancements on society through the eyes of astronauts and engineers.

Mirroring the exploration themes of Star Trek: Discovery , For All Mankind delves into the interstellar race for dominance and the untapped potential of humanity's quest for the stars. Both series embrace space exploration, scientific innovation, and the human spirit's indomitable drive to conquer the unknown as characters navigate through the challenges of space missions and geopolitical tensions. With its blend of historical speculation, character dynamics, and technological marvels, For All Mankind presents a thought-provoking journey into an alternate reality where space exploration shapes the course of human history.

Is For All Mankind Worth Your Time?

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The Expanse

The Expanse is a sci-fi series set in a future where humanity has colonized the system, leading to political tensions and conflicts between Earth, Mars, and the Belt. As tensions escalate and a mysterious alien protomolecule emerges, a disparate group of characters, including Detective Joe Miller and Executive Officer James Holden, find themselves caught in a web of intrigue and interstellar conspiracy. Through its intricate world-building, complex characters, and grand-scale storytelling, The Expanse explores themes of power, survival, and the consequences of human ambition in the vastness of space.

In a manner reminiscent of Star Trek: Discovery , The Expanse follows a diverse ensemble of characters driven by a compelling need to explore the unknown and uncover the secrets of the universe. Both series embrace the complexities of human nature as characters navigate through treacherous space environments and encounter unforeseen threats. With its blend of thrilling space opera, political drama, and moral quandaries, The Expanse captivates viewers with its epic scope and thought-provoking narratives.

Is The Expanse Worth Your Time?

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In the realm of sci-fi westerns, Firefly tells the story of Captain Malcolm Reynolds and his ragtag crew aboard the spaceship Serenity as they navigate a lawless galaxy. Set in a universe where multiple planets have been colonized, the series explores themes of freedom, loyalty, and survival amidst political unrest. With a talented cast that includes Nathan Fillion as Mal, Gina Torres as Zoe, and Alan Tudyk as Wash, Firefly blends elements of space opera, adventure, and humor in a unique and captivating narrative

Drawing inspiration from the original Star Trek series, Firefly embarks on spacefaring adventures that celebrate diversity, exploration, and the spirit of camaraderie among a misfit crew aboard a spaceship. Both series capture the essence of interstellar exploration, moral dilemmas, and the search for belonging in a vast and unpredictable universe. With its blend of genre-bending storytelling and dynamic character interactions, Firefly stands as a beloved sci-fi series that pays homage to the legacy of the pioneering sci-fi franchise.

Is Firefly Worth Your Time?

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# 1 of 281 on The 260+ Best SciFi Shows Of All Time

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine centers around Commander Benjamin Sisko and the diverse characters aboard the space station of the same name. With a focus on political intrigue, moral dilemmas, and personal growth, the series dives deep into the complexities of its ensemble cast. Through its exploration of new alien species and human perseverance, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine offers a unique perspective within the Star Trek universe.

In the vein of Star Trek: Discovery , Star Trek: Deep Space Nine showcases themes of exploration, cooperation, and discovery. Both series feature rich narratives, diverse characters, and engaging plotlines that capture the essence of the Star Trek franchise. With shared focus on adventure, diplomacy, and teamwork, both shows exemplify the enduring appeal of Star Trek storytelling.

Is Star Trek: Deep Space ... Worth Your Time?

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Stargate Atlantis

Stargate Atlantis follows a team of explorers who travel to the lost city of Atlantis in the Pegasus Galaxy, where they encounter ancient technologies, hostile alien species, and the mysteries of a long-lost civilization. Led by Dr. Elizabeth Weir and Colonel John Sheppard, the team embarks on missions of discovery, defense, and survival as they navigate the challenges of a new galaxy. Themes of exploration, cooperation, and adaptation drive the series, offering thrilling and immersive space adventure.

Like Star Trek: Discovery , Stargate Atlantis transports viewers to the depths of space where a diverse team of characters must navigate unknown territories and confront the dangers lurking in the unexplored regions of the galaxy. Both series capture the spirit of space exploration, teamwork, and the pursuit of knowledge as characters face challenges, form alliances, and uncover the mysteries of the universe. With its blend of adventure, science fiction, and intergalactic conflicts, Stargate Atlantis offers a captivating journey into the wonders and perils of space exploration.

Is Stargate Atlantis Worth Your Time?

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Stargate Universe

Stargate Universe is a sci-fi series that follows a group of individuals who find themselves stranded aboard an ancient spaceship called Destiny on the other side of the universe. As they struggle to survive and uncover the mysteries of the ship, the crew encounters new worlds, alien threats, and moral dilemmas. Led by characters like Colonel Everett Young and Dr. Nicholas Rush, the team must band together to navigate the challenges of space exploration and self-discovery.

Echoing the spirit of exploration and curiosity in Star Trek: Discovery , Stargate Universe chronicles the adventures of a group of individuals as they traverse the cosmos aboard a mysterious spacecraft. Both series delve into themes of survival, teamwork, and the quest for knowledge as characters confront the unknown and face personal growth through their interstellar journeys. With its focus on distant galaxies, alien encounters, and the human drive for exploration, Stargate Universe offers a compelling narrative that resonates with the spirit of discovery.

Is Stargate Universe Worth Your Time?

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The Outer Limits

The Outer Limits is a sci-fi anthology series that explores speculative fiction and moral dilemmas through a range of thought-provoking and eerie scenarios. Each episode presents a standalone story featuring unique characters, settings, and futuristic technologies, challenging viewers to contemplate the boundaries of science and human nature. With a rotating cast of actors and diverse storytelling styles, The Outer Limits offers a diverse and captivating exploration of the unknown and the unexplained.

In a manner reminiscent of Star Trek: Discovery , The Outer Limits delves into the realms of the mysterious and the uncharted, inviting audiences to ponder existential questions and ethical quandaries in the face of the enigmatic. Both series embrace themes of exploration, existentialism, and the quest for understanding as characters navigate through surreal and mind-bending narratives that push the boundaries of imagination. With its anthology format, thematic depth, and thought-provoking storytelling, The Outer Limits presents a captivating journey into the realms of the unknown that challenges perceptions and sparks curiosity.

Is The Outer Limits Worth Your Time?

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The Ark is a sci-fi series that follows a group of survivors aboard a massive spaceship, The Ark, as they flee a dying Earth in search of a new home in the distant reaches of the galaxy. Led by Captain Samantha Caldwell and a diverse crew, the inhabitants of The Ark must navigate through unknown territories, encounter alien species, and grapple with internal conflicts as they strive to ensure the survival of humanity.

In a narrative reminiscent of Star Trek: Discovery , The Ark charts a course through uncharted space, as characters embark on a perilous journey to find a new home amidst the unknown vastness of the cosmos. Both series delve into ideas of exploration, unity, and the search for a better future as characters confront the mysteries of the universe and the trials of interspecies diplomacy. With its blend of spacefaring adventure, moral complexity, and character-driven narratives, The Ark offers a compelling odyssey into the uncharted territories of the galaxy that resonates with viewers seeking stories of courage and discovery in the outer galaxies.

Is The Ark Worth Your Time?

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Torchwood is a sci-fi series that follows a covert team led by Captain Jack Harkness, tasked with investigating and combating alien threats in modern-day Cardiff. As they navigate through extraterrestrial encounters and moral dilemmas, the team delves into the mysteries of the universe while dealing with personal struggles and ethical dilemmas. Featuring a diverse cast including John Barrowman as Captain Jack and Eve Myles as Gwen Cooper, Torchwood blends elements of sci-fi, mystery, and action in a thrilling exploration of the unknown.

Echoing the quest for answers in Star Trek: Discovery , Torchwood showcases a team of operatives who delve into the enigmatic world of alien phenomena and uncover the truths behind the unexplained. Both series delve into themes of discovery, identity, and the pursuit of knowledge as characters confront the mysteries of the universe and grapple with the unknown. With its blend of intrigue, supernatural elements, and character-driven narratives, Torchwood offers a gripping tale of exploration and revelation that resonates with fans of interstellar adventures.

Is Torchwood Worth Your Time?

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The Orville

Set 400 years in the future, the crew of the U.S.S. Orville continue their mission of exploration, navigating both the mysteries of the universe, and the complexities of their own interperso... Read all Set 400 years in the future, the crew of the U.S.S. Orville continue their mission of exploration, navigating both the mysteries of the universe, and the complexities of their own interpersonal relationships. Set 400 years in the future, the crew of the U.S.S. Orville continue their mission of exploration, navigating both the mysteries of the universe, and the complexities of their own interpersonal relationships.

Seth MacFarlane
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Trivia Unlike the first two seasons, the whole third season was written in advance, and scenes from different episodes were shot in a row, based on the location and actors' availability. Jon Cassar and Seth MacFarlane split the direction duties for the 10 episodes so they could work like that.
Goofs Moclan biology makes no sense. It appears that the "males" have all the necessary equipment for reproduction, which implies that they are in fact hermaphrodites. If that were the case, cisgender Moclans would have been bred out as useless, and the concept of "male" and "female" would be at best only a dim memory in the lexicon of the race.

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Captain Ed Mercer : Alara, you want to open this jar of pickles for me?

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September 10, 2017 (United States)
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'Star Trek: Prodigy' Season 2 Will Be Released Like No Other Trek Series

Star Trek: Prodigy's second season hits Netflix on July 1, giving fans a binge-worthy experience with all twenty episodes at once.
This marks a departure from the usual weekly release strategy, making Prodigy stand out in the galaxy of Star Trek series.
The show follows a young alien crew escaping tyranny aboard a Federation starship, guided by holographic Captain Janeway.

Star Trek: Prodigy 's second season is coming to Netflix on July 1 - but don't expect a weekly release like Paramount+'s galaxy of Star Trek series. In accordance with Netflix' typical release strategy, all twenty episodes of the season will be released on the same day. TrekCore.com has a confirmation of the show's release schedule.

It will be a new experience for Star Trek fans, as all previous Trek series to debut in the streaming era, starting with Star Trek: Discovery in 2017, have released one episode a week for the duration of their seasons - typically premiering a season with two episodes at once. Netflix and Amazon Prime Video remain the only two major streamers to stick with the binge-watching model , as streamers Max, Apple TV+, Paramount+, and Disney+ have largely used a weekly release schedule for their series. There have been exceptions, however; the Marvel Spotlight series Echo had all five of its episodes released on Netflix on January 9, 2024.

What is 'Star Trek: Prodigy' About?

Star Trek: Prodigy follows a team of young aliens - Dal ( Brett Gray ), Gwyn ( Ella Purnell ), Jankom Pog ( Jason Mantzoukas ), Zero ( Angus Imrie ), Rok-Tahk ( Rylee Alazraqui ), and Murf ( Dee Bradley Baker ) - who escape from the tyrannical Diviner ( John Noble ) aboard a lost Federation starship, the experimental USS Protostar . Guided and mentored by a holographic avatar of legendary Starfleet captain Kathryn Janeway ( Kate Mulgrew ), the ragtag group races towards Federation space over the course of the first season. In the first-season finale, the Protostar, and the holographic Janeway, were destroyed, but the crew found themselves taken under the wing of the real Janeway. The second season will see the team take off on another adventure - minus Gwyn, who departed to help her people, the Vau N'Akat, seek peace.

Star Trek: Prodigy almost never made it to Netflix at all. The series premiered on Paramount+ in 2021, and was well-received by Star Trek fans young and old, but it was unexpectedly canceled and taken off the streamer in 2023 - even though the show had already been renewed for a second season, which had nearly been completed. After fan outcry , the second season was completed and licensed to Netflix.

Watch on Netflix

All twenty episodes of Star Trek: Prodigy 's second season will be released on Netflix on July 1, 2024 . Stay tuned to Collider for future updates.

Star Trek: Prodigy

A group of enslaved teenagers steal a derelict Starfleet vessel to escape and explore the galaxy.

Sonequa Martin-Green as Burnham, standing in a yellow field with weird lights, raising her hand

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Star Trek: Discovery tore itself apart for the good of Star Trek’s future

And it helped set the tone for where Star Trek is now

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If you were to jump directly from the first episode of Star Trek: Discovery to its finale — which just debuted on Paramount Plus — the whiplash would throw you clear out of your seat like your ship had suffered an inertial damper malfunction. Since its first two chapters premiered on CBS All Access in 2017, the series has moved to a different ship and a different century, and has acquired an almost entirely different set of characters. Moreover, Discovery has received a radical tonal refit, evolving in fits and starts from a dark and violent war story to a much sunnier action-adventure serial.

Though it never won the mainstream attention or critical acclaim of its spinoff, Strange New Worlds , nor the gushing fan adulation of Picard ’s Next Gen reunion , Discovery spearheaded Star Trek’s return to television , the franchise’s maiden voyage into the frontier of premium streaming content. Like any bold pathfinder, Discovery encountered obstacles, suffered losses, and made some major course corrections. But, if you ask the cast and crew, the adventure has been more than worth the tumultuous journey.

Tacking into the wind

“We were on wobbly legs for a long time,” admits star Sonequa Martin-Green, whose character, Michael Burnham, has had the rug pulled out from under her a number of times over the course of the series. In the first season and backstory alone, Burnham lost her parents, saw her mentor murdered, was tried for mutiny, discovered that her first love is a Klingon sleeper agent, and was betrayed by not one but two Mirror Universe doppelgängers of trusted Starfleet captains.

Move over, Deep Space Nine — this was instantly the grimmest canonical depiction of the Star Trek universe on screen. Season 1 of Discovery was rated TV-MA and featured more blood and gore than the franchise had ever seen, not to mention an instance of graphic Klingon nudity. (Actor Mary Wiseman recalls seeing her co-star Mary Chieffo walking the set wearing prosthetic alien breasts and thinking, What the hell? ) The corpse of Michelle Yeoh’s character is cannibalized by Klingons off screen, and her successor, portrayed by Jason Isaacs, turns out to be a manipulative psycho from the Mirror Universe who tries to mold Burnham into his plaything.

Sonequa Martin-Green as Burnham, midflip as she tries to escape from someone’s hold

The bleak, adult-oriented tone was not the only sticking point with Star Trek purists, as Discovery would take place a decade before the original 1960s Star Trek but have a design aesthetic much closer to that of the 2009 movie reboot, leading to some irreconcilable clashes with continuity. The show’s serialized, season-long arcs were a far cry from the familiar “planet of the week” stories of most previous incarnations of the franchise. Then there was Burnham’s backstory as the never-before-mentioned human foster sister to Trek’s iconic Vulcan Spock , a creative decision that has “clueless studio note” written all over it. Even ahead of its debut, Discovery faced vocal opposition from the fan base for straying so far from their notion of what Star Trek was supposed to be. (Not to mention the revolting but quite vocal faction of fans who were incensed that Star Trek had “gone woke,” as if it hadn’t been that way the whole time.) Many of Discovery ’s detractors flocked toward The Orville , a Fox series starring and created by Seth MacFarlane that was essentially ’90s-style Star Trek with the occasional dick joke thrown in. The Orville offered fans alienated by Discovery ’s vastly different approach to Star Trek a more familiar (but far less ambitious) alternative.

The grim Klingon War story was the brainchild of co-creator Bryan Fuller, who had been a member of the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and Voyager writers rooms before creating cult series like Pushing Daisies and Hannibal . Fuller would end up departing Team Discovery before production even began, asked to resign after a string of creative differences with the studio. New showrunners Aaron Harberts and Gretchen J. Berg carried out a version of Fuller’s plans without him, and then oversaw the show’s first major pivot. Discovery ’s second season was immediately brighter, more colorful, and cozier with established Star Trek lore. (This is the arc that would introduce the versions of Pike , Spock , and Number One who now lead Strange New Worlds .) But things weren’t so sunny behind the scenes — Harberts and Berg were fired midway through the season after writers accused the duo of creating an abusive work environment.

As different as Discovery would eventually stray from the HBO-style drama of its first season, co-creator Alex Kurtzman feels that the mission of the series has never changed.

“One of the things that we set up in season 1 is that we knew that Burnham would start as a mutineer and end up a captain,” says Kurtzman. “What was exciting about that is that we knew it would take time.”

Captain on deck

Lt. Nhan (Rachael Ancheril); Michael Burnham (Sonequa Martin-Green); Captain Pike (Anson Mount); Linus (David Benjamin Tomlinson); Saru (Doug Jones); and Lt. Connolly (Sean Connolly Affleck), all standing in an elevator on the ship

It was after Harberts and Berg’s departure that Kurtzman, who had remained involved but been primarily occupied with the development of the growing television Star Trek franchise as a whole, took the helm of Discovery himself. Before long, he would promote writer and co-executive producer Michelle Paradise to the role of co-showrunner, which she would retain for the remainder of the series. Just as the late, great Michael Piller did during the third season of The Next Generation , Paradise brought a sense of stability and confidence to Discovery , which reverberated onto set.

“I commend Michelle Paradise and the rest of the writers because this show evolved ,” says Martin-Green. “Our initial showrunners, Aaron Harberts and Gretchen Berg, they made their impact and that’ll never be erased, but landing where we did with Michelle co-showrunning with Alex Kurtzman, jumping farther than any Trek had gone before, I feel that’s when our feet were solid on the ground and when we really established our identity.”

Season 2 fell into a steady rhythm that felt more in tune with Kurtzman’s “movie every week” philosophy, never far in tone from the reboot film trilogy on which Kurtzman served as a writer and producer. The steady presence of Michelle Yeoh’s deliciously amoral Emperor Georgiou was a major boon, essentially becoming Star Trek’s answer to Buffy ’s Spike or Dragon Ball Z ’s Vegeta. However, Discovery was also undeniably borrowing clout from legacy characters Pike and Spock, and the constant friction with established canon wasn’t sitting well with Kurtzman or the audience.

The season ended with a surprising twist that resolved the continuity problems but also changed the entire nature of the show. The titular starship and its crew would be propelled 930 years into the future, past the furthest fixed point in Star Trek’s continuity. No longer forced to tiptoe around the sacred canon, Discovery was free to sprint in a bold new direction. Once again and in a more tangible way, it was a whole new show.

“If the folks who came in had sort of taken us off the rails that would have been a very different experience,” says Anthony Rapp, who portrays the prickly Commander Paul Stamets. “But Michelle Paradise came through as such a shining light and a beautiful presence in our lives. She took the show into this territory of being able to have the heart in its center in a way that felt very grounded and meaningful, and really helped us to make that transition.”

An open sky

Anthony Rapp, Michelle Yeoh, Mary Wiseman, and Sonequa Martin-Green on the bridge of the Discovery in Star Trek: Discovery

Season 3 of Discovery offered Kurtzman, Paradise, producing director Olatunde Osunsanmi, and the rest of the creative team a rare opportunity to completely rewrite Star Trek’s galactic map . Not since the launch of The Next Generation in 1987 had a writers room been able to venture onto such “fresh snow,” as Paradise puts it. In the 32nd century, beyond the furthest point explored in the established Trek canon, the righteous United Federation of Planets has all but collapsed in the aftermath of “the Burn,” a mysterious space calamity. Some longtime friends are now adversaries, and even Earth has become an isolationist state. The USS Discovery, displaced in time, becomes the means by which to reconnect the shattered galaxy. It’s not hard to read this as a mission statement for Star Trek as a whole — a relic from another time, back to offer hope to a bleak present.

Season 3’s 13-episode arc restored a bit of Star Trek’s space Western roots, with warp drive a rare and costly luxury in the ravaged 32nd century and half the galaxy dominated by a vast criminal empire known as the Emerald Chain. Michael Burnham spent much of the season out of uniform, having found a new purpose as a more roguish freelance courier alongside the sweet and savvy Cleveland Booker (David Ajala). This is arguably the most interesting version of the show, as Michael questions whether or not Starfleet — the institution whose trust she has worked so hard to restore — is still her home.

By the end of the season (and right on schedule with Fuller and Kurtzman’s original plans), Michael Burnham finally accepts her destiny and becomes captain of Discovery. More subtly, this altered the premise of the show for a third time, as the central question of “Will Michael ever become captain?” had been answered in the affirmative. But, since she’d already been the central character and a figure of improbable cosmic import, the change was mostly cosmetic. And symbolic — Martin-Green considers her presence “being Black, and a woman, and a captain sitting in that chair” to be her greatest contribution to Star Trek. After three seasons of struggle and uncertainty, Burnham could now be as aspirational a character as Picard , Sisko, or Janeway .

The tone on which the show settled at the end of season 3 would be the one that finally stuck. Where the series had initially been bloody and brooding, it was now squarely an adventure show featuring a cast of characters with a boundless and demonstrative love for each other. The crew would face mortal danger each episode and a galactic-level threat each season, bolstered by very expensive-looking visual effects and a rousing score. At the same time, many conflicts both large and small would eventually be resolved by characters talking through their feelings and finding common ground. This was exhausting as often as it was compelling, but it was consistent. For its final two seasons, viewers could finally know what to expect from Star Trek: Discovery .

Discovering itself

This “feelings over phasers” approach was not for everyone, but it was never intended to be. Even from the outset, before Paramount began pumping out more Star Trek series to target different facets of the fan base, Discovery was never meant to be a definitive Star Trek experience that checked every box.

“You’ll never be able to be everything to everybody,” says Michelle Paradise. “The goal was always to make the best version of Discovery . It’s a different kind of Star Trek. It’s serialized, it’s fewer episodes, it’s a movie every week. That’s a thing that will appeal to many people, and for some people it won’t be their cup of tea.”

Burnham (Sonequa Martin-Green) sits in the captain chair in the season 3 finale of Star Trek: Discovery

Discovery has bounced up and down my personal ranking of Star Trek series a number of times during its run, more than any of its past or present siblings. I have begun each season of the show with great excitement, and that excitement is frequently exhausted by season’s end. Most Trek series have good years and bad years. To me, Discovery suffers from being simultaneously brilliant, innovative, lazy, cringe, inspiring, and eye-rolling at all times, only in different measures. It features the franchise’s strongest lead actor since Patrick Stewart, and a supporting cast that has never been leveraged to my satisfaction. In my career, I have written more words about Star Trek: Discovery than any other television series, and I still haven’t made up my mind about it. For as many cheerleaders and haters as the show must have, I imagine there are many more viewers who feel the way I do — it’s a show that I wanted to love, but never fully fell in love with.

As Discovery disappears in the aft viewport, some will bid it a fond farewell, some will be blowing it raspberries, and some will turn away with total disinterest. But regardless of how well Discovery itself is remembered in the coming years, it has already made a substantial impact on the franchise. It paved the way for every Trek series that followed, including three direct spinoffs. Its second season was the incubator for Strange New Worlds , now the most acclaimed Trek series in a generation. Michelle Yeoh had such fun in her recurring role on Discovery that, even after winning an Academy Award , she was still keen to return for the upcoming Section 31 TV movie . Discovery ’s 32nd-century setting will continue to be explored in the new Starfleet Academy series , leaving the door open for some of its characters to return.

Even the new shows that have no direct relationship to Discovery have benefitted from the precedent it set by being different from what came before. Lower Decks is an animated sitcom, Prodigy is a kid-targeted cartoon , Picard is… a bunch of different things that don’t work together , but they are all different shows. Star Trek was one thing, and beginning with Discovery , it became many things. And for Star Trek, an institution that preaches the value of infinite diversity in infinite combinations, that’s a legacy to be proud of.

Star Trek: Discovery is now streaming in full on Paramount Plus.

Star Trek: Discovery boldly goes where no Trek has gone before by saying religion is... OK, actually

Star trek: discovery is cracking open a box next gen closed on purpose, star trek: discovery is finally free to do whatever it wants, loading comments....

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Biggest star trek happenings in 2024: returning shows, movie updates & more.

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10 Things We Want From Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Season 3

Walter koenig interview: star trek the original series & the 7th rule podcast, 8 star trek: discovery things to know before season 5.

Star Trek fans have a lot to look forward to in 2024, with virtual and in-person conventions, Star Trek Day, podcasts, and new series announcements.
Despite uncertainties, the production of Star Trek: Section 31 and Lower Decks Season 5 are progressing smoothly.
The final season of Star Trek: Discovery is set to premiere in April 2024, marking the end of Captain Burnham's voyages.

Star Trek has a big 2024 on tap, and here are 8 things to look forward to from the final frontier this year. Although the dual WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes halted Hollywood production and the ability of talent and creatives to promote their work for much of 2023, Star Trek had a phenomenal year. Star Trek: Picard season 3, Star Trek: Strange New Worlds season 2, and Star Trek: Lower Decks season 4 released a cumulative 30 episodes, were highly acclaimed as some of the most innovative Star Trek in years, and many episodes charted in the Nielsen streaming Top 10. All in all, 2023 was a great year to be a Star Trek fan.

Significant questions loom over Star Trek in 2024, however. Paramount may be up for sale, which would certainly impact Star Trek on Paramount+'s various series and projects. There remains no new Star Trek theatrical movie in development, going on 8 years since Star Trek Beyond hit theaters in the summer of 2016. And there is no indication that Paramount+ will greenlight Star Trek: Picard 's proposed spinoff, Star Trek: Legacy , in spite of the same type of dedicated fan campaign that helped Star Trek: Prodigy jump to Netflix after it was canceled by Paramount+. The WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes also delayed production of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds season 3, which likely won't premiere until 2025. Still, Star Trek has a massive 2024 planned , and here are 8 things for fans to be excited about.

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds season 3 is in production now, and hopefully the next 10 episodes will deliver on these storylines and plot threads.

8 Star Trek Has Amazing Podcasts

The 7th rule, the shuttlepod show, inglorious treksperts, the delta flyers, and more.

Star Trek has podcasts to satisfy every type of fan , and they're available to watch on YouTube or stream wherever you get your podcasts. Walter Koenig joins The 7th Rule with Cirroc Lofton and Ryan T. Husk to discuss his episodes of Star Trek: The Original Series. The Delta Flyers: Through The Wormhole added Terry Farrell and Armin Shimerman, who join Star Trek: Voyager 's Garrett Wang and Robert Duncan McNeill to review episodes of Star Trek: Deep Space Nin e. Inglorious Treksperts hosts Mark A. Altman and Daren Dochterman continue their unrivaled expertise of classic Star Trek with podcasts and live panel shows. Sadly, The Shuttlepod Show 's co-host Dominic Keating has left the podcast, but hosts and producers Connor Trinneer, Erica LaRose, and Mark J. Cartier will continue to dive deep into the lives and careers of their illustrious Star Trek guests. Star Trek fans have a wealth of podcasts to enjoy in 2024, with new episodes weekly.

Screen Rant interviews Walter Koenig about his joining The 7th Rule podcast to review Star Trek: The Original Series, his Trek memories, and more.

7 Star Trek Virtual & In-Person Conventions

Trektalks, virtual trek con 5, the llapy awards, stlv, and more.

Star Trek has a connection to its fans unlike any other in entertainment, and thanks to the various Star Trek conventions, both virtual and in-person, Star Trek fans have the privilege and ability to meet and hear from their favorite talent and creatives. Star Trek essentially pioneered the fan convention and 2024 kicks off with two huge virtual events: TrekTalks 3 , hosted by John Billingsley of Star Trek: Enterprise and Bonnie Gordon of Star Trek: Prodigy, streams live on YouTube on January 13th with a full day of panels featuring over 30 Star Trek guests, all to benefit the Hollywood Food Coalition. TrekTalks 3 will also feature a can't-miss Star Trek: Picard season 3 panel.

Virtual Trek Con 5 , from Cirroc Lofton of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine , Ryan T. Husk, and The 7th Rule podcast, streams on YouTube from February 15-19 with 4 days of Star Trek panels with numerous special guests. VTC5 is capped off by the 3rd annual LLAPy Awards , the only Star Trek awards show voted on by fans , which streams live on YouTube on Sunday, February 19. For in-person Star Trek cons, two of the biggest are Creation Entertainments ST:SF in San Francisco in March and STLV: Trek to Vegas in Las Vegas in August, both featuring dozens of Star Trek talent. And, with no strikes this year, Star Trek on Paramount+ will no doubt return once again with huge panels at San Diego Comic-Con in July and New York Comic-Con in October.

6 Star Trek Day 2024

Star trek celebrates the franchise in person again.

2023 sadly saw Paramount+'s annual in-person Star Trek Day event canceled because of the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes. Since 2021, Star Trek Day has been a celebration of the franchise bringing together talent and creatives from Star Trek on Paramount+'s series and Star Trek 's legacy shows and films. Held at the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles and streamed on Paramount+ and Star Trek 's social channels, Star Trek Day is expected to return in September 2024, with a likely agenda of honoring the departing Star Trek: Discovery and looking ahead to Star Trek: Strange New Worlds season 3 and more.

Screen Rant was on the red carpet for Star Trek Day 2022 .

5 Star Trek: Starfleet Academy Announcements

Expect information about the newest star trek series.

Star Trek: Starfleet Academy was announced by Paramount+ in April 2023, and nothing more is known about the newest upcoming Star Trek series besides the fact that Star Trek executive producer Alex Kurtzman and Noga Landau ( Nancy Drew ) are the showrunners, and the writers' room includes Tawny Newsome of Star Trek: Lower Decks . 2024 should finally see more information about Starfleet Academy, which will hopefully announce the actors/characters of the show, and perhaps even confirm that Starfleet Academy is set after Star Trek: Discovery season 5 , as expected.

4 Star Trek: Section 31

Star trek's first made-for-streaming movie..

Announced in April 2023, Star Trek: Section 31 finally begins production from January to March in Toronto for a possible release in late 2024. Section 31 stars Academy Award-winner Michelle Yeoh , who reprises her Star Trek: Discovery anti-hero, Emperor Michelle Georgiou, and Yeoh used her clout from her Best Actress Oscar to ensure Section 31 is made. Star Trek: Section 31 is directed by Olutande Osunsanmi and written by Craig Sweeny, but nothing else is known about the first Star Trek movie made exclusively to stream on Paramount+ . Section 31 's potential success could lead to the plan for a new Star Trek streaming movie every 2 years to come to fruition. Even if Star Trek: Section 31 doesn't premiere in 2024, fans should at least finally learn what other characters are in the movie and what era of Star Trek Section 31 is set in.

3 Star Trek: Lower Decks Season 5

Premieres in 2024 on paramount+..

Star Trek: Lower Decks season 4 may have been the animated comedy's best season yet, and hopes are high that Star Trek: Lower Decks season 5 will top it. The SAG-AFTRA and WGA strikes didn't affect the production of the animated series, and Star Trek: Lower Decks was able to complete its scripts, with 10 new episodes in production for the show's traditional late summer/early fall release date on Paramount+. Little is known about the stories planned for Star Trek: Lower Decks season 5 and the newly-minuted junior Lieutenants of the USS Cerritos, except that there will be more exploration of the Orion culture through the eyes of former Lt. D'Vana Tendi (Noel Wells). And while there are fears that season 5 could be the last for Star Trek: Lower Decks, hopefully, the 2023 crossover with Star Trek: Strange New Worlds created more fans of Lower Decks, and creator Mike McMahan's hilarious animated show can continue for years to come.

2 Star Trek: Discovery Season 5 - The Final Season

Premieres april 2024 on paramount+..

The only live-action Star Trek series on Paramount+'s 2024 schedule, Star Trek: Discovery season 5 is the final season marking the end of the voyages of Captain Michael Burnham (Sonequa Martin-Green) and the USS Discovery. It was Star Trek: Discovery' s success on CBS All-Access, which became Paramount+, that led to Star Trek 's current TV renaissance. Although Discovery season 5 was not originally planned as the final season, following Paramount+ canceling the series in March 2023, reshoots were completed to turn Discovery 's season 5 finale into a proper ending for the entire series . Star Trek: Discovery season 5 is also a shift in tone to an Indiana Jones -like intergalactic treasure hunt adventure, according to Jonathan Frakes, who directs the penultimate episode of Discovery . Premiering in April 2024, Star Trek: Discovery will be the Star Trek event on Paramount+.

Star Trek: Discovery returns for season 5 in 2024 after a 2-year hiatus, and here's what you need to know about Captain Burnham's final adventures.

1 Star Trek: Prodigy Season 2

Premieres in 2024 on netflix.

With a huge global audience discovering the all-ages animated series on Netflix, Star Trek: Prodigy season 2 is possibly the most anticipated Star Trek event of 2024 . Netflix premiered Star Trek: Prodigy season 1 on Christmas Day, priming viewers new and old for 20 all-new Star Trek: Prodigy season 2 episodes from creators and showrunners Kevin and Dan Hageman and their team. Star Trek: Prodigy season 2 promises to go even bigger than season 1's high stakes, taking Admiral Kathryn Janeway (Kate Mulgrew) and the young ragtag former crew of the USS Protostar into an alternate 25th-century future and beyond. Star Trek: Prodigy season 2's massive scope will reportedly touch upon the entire Star Trek franchise, and the already-announced new castmember The Doctor (Robert Picardo) as well as the new USS Voyager-A are only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the surprises, fun, and adventure Star Trek: Prodigy season 2 has in store.

Star Trek: Discovery and Star Trek: Lower Decks are streaming on Paramount+. Star Trek: Prodigy is streaming on Netflix.

Star Trek: Discovery

Star trek lower decks, star trek: prodigy.

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