Why 2022 Is Star Trek's Biggest Year Ever | Screen Rant
2022 is set to be Star Trek's biggest year ever with five TV series streaming on Paramount+ throughout the calendar year. Star Trek has been a cultural touchstone for 55 years and has spanned multiple TV shows as well as 13 feature films. While Star Trek's mainstream popularity has ebbed and flowed, the enduring franchise created by Gene Roddenberry is undergoing a renaissance overseen by executive producer Alex Kurtzman. In 2022, there will be more new Star Trek shows than there have ever been before in a single year with all 5 new Star Trek series streaming on Paramount+.
The Star Trek franchise's last great apex was over 25 years ago. In 1994, Star Trek: The Next Generation left syndication after seven hugely successful seasons to take over the Star Trek movie franchise following the retirement of Star Trek: The Original Series' cast. Star Trek Generations featured the death of Captain James T. Kirk (William Shatner). 1995 began with Star Trek: Voyager premiering as the flagship show of the United Paramount Network (UPN). Meanwhile, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine found its creative footing in season 4 and brought in TNG's beloved Klingon, Worf (Michael Dorn). 1996's Star Trek: First Contact was a crowd-pleaser that Trekkers regard as the best of the Star Trek: TNG movies and it was the culmination of the golden age of Star Trek under executive producer Rick Berman. Afterward, the TNG movies declined in box office and fan response. DS9 and Voyager ended in 1999 and 2001, respectively, and the prequel series, Star Trek: Enterprise, struggled in the ratings until it was canceled after only four seasons in 2005.
After four years of no new Star Trek of any kind being produced, the franchise's return to prominence began in 2009 with J.J. Abrams rebooting the Star Trek movies and ushering in a dynamic new cinematic style with blockbuster special effects. Abrams only produced three Star Trek movies and the last, Star Trek Beyond, was met with disappointing box office in 2016. However, in 2017, Star Trek: Discovery launched as the flagship Star Trek series of the CBS All-Access streaming service (which later became Paramount+). Another prequel show, Discovery was met with controversy at first and its serialized style alienated longtime Trekkers. Yet Star Trek: Discovery was successful and opened the door to more Star Trek shows, beginning with Patrick Stewart returning as his iconic Starfleet hero in 2020's Star Trek: Picard. 5 years after Star Trek: Discovery premiered, Paramount+'s Star Trek franchise will now deliver even more adventures in the final frontier with a Star Trek show for just about every type of Trekker in 2022.
In season 4, Star Trek: Discovery has never been better. Finally installed as Captain of the Discovery, Michael Burnham (Sonequa Martin-Green) is leading her starship against a new threat to the galaxy, the Dark Matter Anomaly or DMA. In Star Trek: Discovery's mid-season 4 finale, Burnham and her crew are poised to jump across the Galactic Barrier into a new galaxy Star Trek has never explored before, which puts the USS Discovery on a collision course with Unknown Species 10C, the creators of the DMA. This is especially significant because Star Trek's Galactic Barrier, which surrounds the entire Milky Way galaxy, has been part of the franchise since Star Trek: TOS but it has only been briefly crossed by Kirk's Enterprise. Star Trek: Discovery will finally show Trekkers who and what is on the other side of the Galactic Barrier, which is truly going where no one has gone before.
Ever since the show's setting changed to the 32nd century, Star Trek: Discovery has been repositioned to become the bona fide flagship of Star Trek on Paramount+. Disco's far-future timeline allows the show to incorporate any and all aspects of the Star Trek franchise and recontextualize it all to suit the 32nd century. While Discovery trailblazed Star Trek's current serialized style and blockbuster quality special effects, season 4's episodes have been intriguingly more cerebral and feature moral and ethical quandaries that harken back to the best episodes of Star Trek: TNG. Although Paramount and CBS haven't announced Star Trek: Discovery season 5 yet, when the show returns from its hiatus in February 2022, hopefully, the second half Star Trek: Discovery season 4 will deliver on its promise to show Trekkers something they've never seen before that will, in turn, set up Star Trek: Discovery season 5.
Unfortunately, the COVID-19 pandemic meant no new Star Trek: Picard episodes streamed in 2021 but the Patrick Stewart-led series is making up for lost time. Not only will Star Trek: Picard season 2 finally arrive in 2022 but the show is also producing Picard season 3 back-to-back, ensuring even more episodes to come, possibly in 2023. Star Trek: Picard season 1 was met with great fanfare for Stewart's comeback as the Starfleet legend and Picard was also a TNG reunion of sorts, with appearances by Data (Brent Spiner), Will Riker (Jonathan Frakes), Deanna Troi (Marina Sirtis), and Hugh Borg (Jonathan Del Arco).
Excitingly, when Star Trek: Picard season 2 arrives in 2022, it will include Q (John de Lancie), Jean-Luc's omnipotent foil from Star Trek: The Next Generation. Further, Picard season 2 will be a time travel story about an alternate reality where the United Federation of Planets became a fascist regime and it will also include the Borg Queen (Annie Wersching). In addition, Star Trek: Picard's motley crew including Seven of Nine (Jeri Ryan), Soji (Isa Briones), and Lt. Raffi Musiker (Michelle Hurd), are all back in season 2.
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds is possibly the most anticipated new Star Trek series in years. Anson Mount's heroic portrayal of Captain Christopher Pike in Star Trek: Discovery season 2 proved to be so popular, Trekkers clamored for the original Captain of the USS Enterprise to get his own spinoff. CBS and Paramount delivered and Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, starring Mount as Captain Pike, Rebecca Romijn as Number One, and Ethan Peck as Lt. Spock, is finally set to premiere on Paramount+ in 2022, with production on season 2 already underway.
Perhaps the most exciting aspect of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds is that the 23rd century-set prequel will bring back the episodic style of classic Star Trek. Strange New Worlds promises to be an "adventure of the week" show with Pike and his crew tackling a new problem every episode. In addition, Strange New Worlds' Starship Enterprise will feature some familiar faces, including a young Cadet Uhura (Celia Rose-Goodin) and a young Nurse Christine Chapel (Jess Bush), as well as new characters like La'an Noonien-Singh (Christina Chong), who may have ties to legendary Star Trek villain Khan (Ricardo Montalban).
Before Mike McMahan's ribald comedy, Star Trek: Lower Decks, premiered in 2021, Star Trek only had one foray into animation, Star Trek: The Animated Series in the 1970s. But Paramount+'s Star Trek animated series is now doing things the live-action shows can't. Star Trek: Lower Decks is an utterly hilarious homage to The Next Generation era of Star Trek that weaves in plenty of love for TOS as well. Led by the dynamic duo of Ensign Beckett Mariner (Tawny Newsome) and Ensign Brad Boimler (Jack Quaid), Lower Decks won over doubtful Trekkers thanks to McMahan's adoration of all things Trek, the show's endearingly goofball characters (including Jonathan Frakes returning as Captain Will Riker), and its anything-goes premise of showing what Starfleet life is like in the bowels of the USS Cerritos. Star Trek: Lower Decks season 3 likely hits Paramount+ in late summer 2022, which was the timeslot of the previous two seasons.
Star Trek's campaign to convert younger viewers into lifelong Trekkers resulted in the dynamic Star Trek: Prodigy. A joint venture between Paramount+ and Nickelodeon, Kevin and Dan Hageman's stunningly animated all-ages series takes an outsider's view of Star Trek is winning over fans new and old. Prodigy also brought back one Star Trek icon Kate Mulgrew as Captain Kathryn Janeway, who oversees Prodigy's eclectic crew of teenage alien space adventurers. Star Trek: Prodigy is only beginning to delve into the show's many secrets about the incredibly fast USS Protostar and the villainous Diviner (John Noble), but when the animated adventure series returns from its hiatus in January 2022, its homage of Star Trek's icons as the young heroes learn about Starfleet crystalizes Prodigy's unique place in the Star Trek franchise and sets up more surprises to come. Star Trek: Prodigy season 1 is also 20 episodes, with the second half of the season likely streaming on Paramount+ in fall 2022.
Production on the next Star Trek movie may finally begin in 2022. Last year, producer J.J. Abrams hired WandaVision director Matt Shakman to helm the long-awaited next Star Trek movie, with a Captain Marvel screenwriter Geneva Robertson-Dworet reportedly already completed. While it's unknown whether the next Star Trek movie will bring back Chris Pine as Captain Kirk and Zachary Quinto as Spock, Paramount has already set the film's premiere date of December 23, 2023.
Whatever the next Star Trek movie will entail, it will be coming hot on the heels of the continued expansion of Star Trek on Paramount+. Along with Star Trek: Picard season 3 and, possibly, Star Trek: Strange New Worlds season 2, 2023 could also see the premieres of the long-rumored Section 31 series starring Michelle Yeoh as Emperor Phillipa Georgiou. The announced Starfleet Academy TV show could also join Paramount+'s wave of Star Trek series that will make 2022 the franchise's biggest year.
Star Trek TV series and movies are streaming on Paramount+.