Four new Star Trek shows in the works as TV universe expands

Star Trek fans will be boldly going all over the universe in the next few years, if CBS’ franchise expansion plans stick.

According to Variety, four new Trek series are actively in development at the network, presumably as programming for CBS All Access, the streaming-only service that premiered Star Trek Discovery in late 2017. Alex Kurtzman, whose credits include the Star Trek Kelvinverse films, several Transformers movies, and the recent “Dark Universe” reboot of The Mummy, is supervising all of the shows in development, as well as taking over showrunner duties on Discovery season two.

What can we expect from the new iterations of Trek? The report has a few hints: The first is a series set at Starfleet Academy, an idea that’s floated around ever since Enterprise went off the air. The show will come from Stephanie Savage and Josh Schwartz, the creators of Gossip Girl, The CW’s Dynasty reboot, and Hulu and Marvel’s Runaways series. One can only imagine the show falling in line with those series, an entry point for younger audiences who know comic book characters from the Arrowverse and call The Force Awakens their Star Wars.

The second idea in the works is positioned as a limited series that Variety says is “based around the Wrath of Khan story. More likely is a show centering on Khan Noonien Singh, portrayed by Ricardo Montalbán in the Star Trek: TOS’ Space Seed episode and again in the film Star Trek II. (Benedict Cumberbatch’s Star Trek Into Darkness character John Harrison also turned out to be Khan, but let’s move past that.) What story of Khan’s still needs to be told on screen? All signs point to something set during The Eugenics Wars. Polygon has heard that Wrath of Khan director Nicholas Meyer is involved with this project, which he seemed to confirm in May 2018.

The final two shows are even lighter on the details, but we do know one is intended to be an animated series. If the show takes flight, it will be the first animated Star Trek property since The Animated Series ended in 1974.

Then there’s an out there idea: could the final mystery show bring back Jean-Luc Picard? According to The Hollywood Reporter, Kurtzman and Discovery season one writer Akiva Goldsman are reportedly in the works on a series that could bring Patrick Stewart back to the iconic role.

One thing is clear about Star Trek’s future: it’ll be exploring new worlds, and soon.