Star Trek: Discovery - What to expect from the new TV series

Star Trek: Discovery, the franchise's first TV show in 12 years, premieres in September - and the buzz is already growing.

Created by Bryan Fuller (Hannibal, American Gods) and Alex Kurtzman (The Mummy), it is set a decade before the events of the original Star Trek series and follows the crew of the USS Discovery.

The cast includes Sonequa Martin-Green (The Walking Dead) and Michelle Yeoh (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon), together with Terry Serpico and Doug Jones.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

It's been a long journey for the series, which was first announced in 2015 with the mission to "introduce new characters seeking imaginative new worlds and new civilisations, while exploring the dramatic contemporary themes that have been a signature of the franchise", said Hollywood Reporter.

It was due to premiere on the heels of the original series' 50th anniversary in 2016, but has been hit by delays, including the departure of showrunner Fuller to work on American Gods.

The first trailer was released in May, during a 50th-anniversary celebration at Comic-Con in San Diego.

This week, Entertainment Weekly published images showing Jason Isaacs as Federation starship captain Gabriel Lorca and a scene from the transporter room.

Martin-Green says the new Star Trek will be "rawer and grittier" than previous incarnations, reports Digital Spy.

with producer Kurtzman pointing to Game of Thrones as an influence.

Eleanor Tremeer on MoviePilot says Discovery will "defy the conventions" of previous Star Treks by splitting the main cast between two ships: the USS Discovery and the USS Shenzhou.

Although this suggests the focus will shift between the two, she adds, "recent rumors suggest otherwise". Fans speculate the USS Shenzhou will, in fact, become the USS Discovery.

Tremeer continues that the rumours suggest the Shenzhou could be damaged in the first episode, then refitted, repaired and renamed USS Discovery.

However, she also says these could be merely fan theories - although she hopes they are untrue, "as splitting the main cast would make for very interesting television".

Another change prompted less positive discussion. Entertainment Weekly reported there had been an "ugly strain of criticism" online because the show’s cast is perceived as "too diverse for some of the franchise’s longtime fans" and the term "white genocide has been bandied about".

Original series star George Takei stepped in to defend Discover, while Martin-Green urged fans to "key into the essence and spirit of Star Trek that has made it the legacy it is".

She added: "That's looking across the way to the person sitting in front of you and realising you are the same, that they are not separate from you and we are all one.”

Star Trek: Discovery launches on Netflix UK on 25 September.

Star Trek: Discovery to have female lead - and more sex

11 August 2016

Star Wars isn't the only sci-fi franchise to be rebooted with a female lead; the new Star Trek spin-off television series, Star Trek: Discovery, will also have a female heroine - and reports say she probably won't be white.

The new show, which is due to start filming in two months, is set ten years before Captain James T Kirk in the "prime" universe - that of the original television series, not the recent JJ Abrams movies, revealed showrunner Bryan Fuller.

"We have the opportunity to bridge the gap between the Enterprise and the original series and really help us redefine the visual style of Star Trek," he said at the Television Critics Association press tour.

The setting also provides for a diverse crew, with the top news being that the show has a female lead. She will not, however, be the ship's captain, but a lieutenant commander.

The series has had a female lead before, with Kate Mulgrew playing Commanding Officer Kathryn Janeway in Star Trek: Voyager, says Nellie Andreeva on Deadline Hollywood. But the new show may "boldly go where no other Star Trek instalment has gone before" by making its female lead a woman of colour.

Almost all the women seen for the part so far are said to have been African-American or Hispanic, says Andreeva. No one has been cast yet, so the role could ultimately go to a Caucasian actress, "but the intention is to go diverse".

This is in keeping with what Fuller has said in the past, reports Katharine Trendacosta on Gizmodo, adding that showrunner has previous expressed interest in casting Angela Bassett as a Starfleet captain and Rosario Dawson as the first officer.

He's also promised to keep the progressive history of the show alive, she continues, and has confirmed there would "absolutely" be a gay character in the new show.

The rumour that Jeri Ryan's Star Trek: Voyager character, Seven of Nine, was going to be a lesbian saw Fuller and his co-writers on the show being bombarded with hate mail – he has a folder full of it. He vowed then that if he ever got the chance to create a Star Trek series, he would include a gay character.

Speaking at the press tour, Fuller also joked about the series' acronym, STD, reports TV Line, and said sex and swearing would probably have a place on the show.

"There will probably be slightly more graphic content," he said. "We discuss every day about language... Is it appropriate to have a bridge blow up and have somebody say, 'Oh, s***?'"

Not much else is known about the Discovery plot and characters, other than that the series will be a 13-episode continuous narrative. It will air on CBS in the US in January 2017 and Netflix will stream the show in the UK a day later.

New Star Trek TV series: Netflix to screen episodes in UK the day after US

19 July

Each episode of the hotly anticipated new Star Trek TV show will air in the UK just 24 hours after it is broadcast in the US.

The series is being produced by US network CBS, but Netflix will be the exclusive owner of the Star Trek brand in 188 countries, excluding the US and Canada.

The streaming site will be able to show all 727 episodes of the TV franchise, including Star Trek, Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Star Trek: Voyager and Star Trek: Enterprise, around the world by the end of the year.

Meanwhile, the new series, which has yet to be named, begins filming in Toronto in September for a January 2017 premiere – which will also be on Netflix.

The show "will return to television for the first time since 2005 with a new ship, new characters and new missions, while embracing the same ideology and hope for the future that inspired a generation," said the company.

"The launch of the new Star Trek will truly be a global television event," added Armando Nunez, the president of CBS Studios International. "The newest chapter of the story promises to continue the rich tradition of adventure and is sure to excite fans everywhere Netflix is available."

The new series is likely to be a huge hit due to the franchise's devoted following, reports CNN.

"It cannot be overstated just how big of a fanbase Star Trek has," it says. "The series, which is currently celebrating its 50th anniversary, has been one of the most successful franchises in pop culture history in terms of merchandising, television shows and film series."

With Netflix as its partner, Star Trek "will now be able to reach a worldwide audience while Netflix gets one of the most well known global brands this side of Star Wars".