Spoiler Warning: There are minor spoilers ahead for Star Trek: Discovery Season 3.
In addition to the first teaser image for Star Trek: Prodigy, a recent update from ViacomCBS (that was primarily directed at their investors) has given us a couple of interesting bits of news regarding both current and future Star Trek projects. Today I thought it would be worthwhile to take a look at what was said and try to figure out what may or may not be coming our way in 2021 and the first half of 2022.
The most significant piece of news was that ViacomCBS plans to have something from the Star Trek franchise on Paramount+ every quarter. Since it’s already almost March I think we can rule out anything in Q1 this year! But that still potentially leaves us with three Star Trek projects before the end of 2021.
I said just after New Year that I believed we’d see both Prodigy Season 1 and Lower Decks Season 2 this year, and those will almost certainly be two of the three. With Discovery Season 4 having been in production since November, I have to assume that will be the third series planned for this year – perhaps targeting a Q4 broadcast like Season 3 received in 2020. That’s ambitious in my opinion – post-production work on Discovery Season 3 took over nine months to complete – but if ViacomCBS and Paramount+ can manage it, it will be a fantastic achievement! And it will mean one extra Star Trek show in 2021 that I wasn’t expecting!
If that’s the plan, that would then open up Q1 and Q2 of 2022, and it seems certain that we’d get Picard Season 2 (which has just started filming) and Strange New Worlds Season 1 in the first half of next year – probably in that order. So this current quarter could be the longest we’ll have to go without any new Star Trek for quite some time!
What will happen after that is in question, and this is where the other interesting bit of news comes in: ViacomCBS has no plans to produce any other Star Trek shows until those currently in production have concluded.
This seems to mean that the Section 31 series, which originally had a premiere date suggested for this year, is going to be delayed yet further, and I interpret comments by some of its writers and producers to mean that the series going ahead at all is less certain now than ever. Strange New Worlds completely stole the Section 31 show’s thunder, both before and after it was announced, and as I said a while ago, I never really got the impression that there was much excitement for Section 31. Many Discovery fans were clamouring for a Pike series almost from the first episode of the show’s second season, but Georgiou and Section 31, while not badly received, were very much the lesser part of that story overall.
Georgiou’s recent departure from Discovery has set the stage for Section 31 – but it also left things very open as to where (and when) she will end up. Perhaps behind the scenes what’s going on is some major retooling of the Section 31 show’s premise; it had been suggested by Alex Kurtzman and others fairly recently that the scripts were still being worked on, and this feels like another indication of changes to the upcoming series.
So this unfortunately raises the question of the Section 31 show’s ultimate fate. Is this the first step to it being cancelled… or “un-announced?” It feels like it could be, sadly. Despite not being as interested in Section 31 when it was announced, I’ve recently come around to the idea of this kind of spy thriller. If done well I think it could be something really fun and different within Star Trek, and with it having been announced I kind of want to see it come into being. Even if it only runs for a single season, or gets cut down to a miniseries or television movie I still think it could be worthwhile.
The longer-term futures of other Star Trek projects are less clear. No future seasons of any in-production shows were announced – though it seems likely, according to the rumour mill, that we’ll see Discovery Season 5, and Picard Season 3 was said to be there for the taking if Sir Patrick Stewart wanted it. Beyond the halfway point of 2022, though, Star Trek’s future gets a little harder to predict. We could see Lower Decks Season 3, Prodigy Season 2, or perhaps a new set of Short Treks mini-episodes.
What is clear, though, is that Section 31, the potential Ceti Alpha V miniseries that I covered a few weeks ago, and the still-unannounced live-action series that is in pre-production won’t be coming imminently.
ViacomCBS has “plans” for expanding Star Trek beyond the projects that we know about, though, and there was talk of ideas and concepts being worked on behind the scenes. Paramount+ is being established with a view to a widespread international rollout, which will begin next month with the USA, Canada, and Australia, before heading to Scandinavia and Latin America later in the year. Hopefully it’ll come to the UK soon!
Other recently-announced projects for Paramount+ include a Halo television series, a prequel to Western drama Yellowstone, a reboot of Nickelodeon cartoon Rugrats, and more. CBS All Access has grown its subscriber base since it was launched, passing the 8 million mark last year. The relaunch of the service as Paramount+, with its promised live sport and varied mix of films and television shows will surely bring in a lot of viewers – keeping Star Trek on the air for a long time to come.
These announcements were interesting, and I feel reasonably confident now that we’ll see three Star Trek shows this year instead of the two I had been expecting, so that’s fantastic! And I cannot wait for both Season 2 of Picard and the debut of Strange New Worlds next year. It’s a wonderful time to be a Star Trek fan right now – we have literally never had so many different projects all on the go at once. Someone pinch me… I must be dreaming!
The Star Trek franchise – including all properties mentioned above – is the copyright of ViacomCBS. This article contains the thoughts and opinions of one person only and is not intended to cause any offence.
Trekking with Dennis 