The first season of Star Trek: Discovery showed moments of promise, definite points where things went in fun and different directions but was also disappointing in other respects. This was evidenced in a fractured Trek fanbase which argued online about whether Discovery is “real” Star Trek, with some even pointing to Seth MacFarlane’s The Orville as being truer in spirit to what the franchise is supposed to represent.
Behind the scenes troubles, which Discovery has experienced from the get go with original creator and showrunner Bryan Fuller exiting before the first episode even streamed, have continued with Gretchen Berg and Aaron Harberts being fired by CBS reportedly for budgeting issues and abusive treatment of the writing staff. Alex Kurtzman, Discovery’s co-creator and co-writer of J.J. Abrams’s Star Trek and Star Trek Into Darkness, has taken over the day-to-day duties for season two and has been put in charge of expanding Star Trek with both continuing, limited, and animated series, along with Trek short films, for the CBS All Access streaming service. Among the rumored shows in development are a series set at Starfleet Academy (which would try to appeal to the younger Riverdale demo), and a limited-run miniseries which would tell the tale of Khan Noonien Singh’s rise to power and dictatorship on Earth during the Eugenics Wars.
This weekend Kurtzman announced the first part of this expansion. Patrick Stewart will return to the role of Jean-Luc Picard for a new TV series. Details are scarce, but Kurtzman, Stewart, and author Michael Chabon (The Yiddish Policemen’s Union) are among the creative team, and the new series will be the first Star Trek in almost 20 years to move the story of the franchise forward, since it is neither a reboot or prequel, and will be set after the events of Deep Space Nine, Voyager, and the TNG movies.
Patrick Stewart: [Jean-Luc Picard] may not, and I stress may not, be a captain anymore. He may not be the Jean-Luc that you recognize and know so well. It may be a very different individual. Someone who has been changed by his experiences. Twenty years will have passed, which is more or less exactly the time between the very last movie – Nemesis – and today … It will be, I promise you, I guarantee it, something very, very different. It will come to you with the same passion, and determination and love of the material and love of our followers and our fans, exactly as we had it before.
As I said, details are very sparse about this, but for Star Trek fans this news does raise some questions and potentially will cause some controversies.
- Will elements of TNG canon be altered?: The division of Viacom in 2005 is reportedly one of the main reasons why everything Star Trek since that date has been aesthetically changed. Prior to 2005, both CBS and Paramount Pictures were owned by Viacom. When Viacom split into two separate corporate entities, it created rights issues between the resulting CBS Corporation and (new) Viacom. Paramount Pictures, now part of (new) Viacom, holds the rights to all of the previous Trek TV series and films. However, the intellectual property rights, trademarks, the ideas around and the creation of new material is controlled by CBS Corporation. In order to make Star Trek films and TV series, Paramount now has to license the intellectual property from CBS. The Abrams films were created under a licensing agreement, but it requires visual differences between the original material and the new material (e.g., the color hue of the uniforms and the pattern of the fabric in the Kelvin Timeline are slightly different from those in the The Original Series). Any material with a likeness to anything in the original films or TV series between TOS all the way to Enterprise has to be negotiated. According to some reports, Star Trek: Discovery is being made under the Paramount/Bad Robot licensing agreement, which if true would mean the production is legally obligated to change things. And this has been confirmed to some extent by members of the production, with one major example being the appearance of the USS Enterprise (NCC-1701) in the season one finale of Star Trek: Discovery. The design of the Enterprise was altered from the classic TOS look for legal reasons. Therefore, this creates questions about the Picard series: Will the Klingons, and even Worf (Michael Dorn), remain like the TNG-era Klingons, or changed to reflect the changes Discovery made to the Klingons? Does everything from TNG get an “update” which changes the designs a little?
- Does anyone else from The Next Generation appear in this?: Just because Patrick Stewart is doing this series does not mean The Next Generation cast is getting back together, since it’s not even a given the show will be set on an iteration of the Enterprise. Also, for some of the old cast, it becomes a question of whether they can write them in a believable way. Brent Spiner, like all of us, has aged a bit, and can he still play Data/B4 as a somehow aging “old Data?”
- How much of the extended universe gets pulled in?: The rules of Star Trek canon are that anything which appears in a movie or television series is part of the franchise’s official lore, while books, video games, etc., are not. Both TNG and DS9 have had continuations in book form and Star Trek Online is a continuation of the prime timeline into the 25th century. These properties developed ideas, characters, and story ideas which in theory could be pulled from (e.g., the Typhon Pact) for this series.
- What is the shape of the Federation and Alpha Quadrant now?: The flip side to the questions about whether Data/B4 can appear is that this show wouldn’t be limited to just The Next Generation cast. It could touch on characters and aspects of the franchise which might be fun to return to. The last time the franchise was in this time period there were major events occurring. The Federation had barely survived the destruction of the Dominion War. The Cardassians had betrayed all the major powers, and were almost exterminated. The Romulan government had been torn apart at its seams. The Borg had been dealt a crippling blow which severely hindered their abilities to expand. All of these story aspects of previous series might be interesting places to wonder what happened next? Also, they could touch on characters and places. Captain Sisko had disappeared into the Bajoran Wormhole to join the Prophets. Janeway had returned with the crew of Voyager. What are they doing now? What is the state of Deep Space Nine? It’s possible these things could be touched on.