Star Trek is coming back to the small screen in a brand new format. Broadcaster CBS is boldly taking the cult sci-fi franchise where it’s never gone before – to the web with a new weekly episode-based series through its own streaming network.
The online Star Trek TV series will be available only through CBS All Access, a service which costs $5.99 per month in the U.S and features other top telly such as NCIS and The Big Bang Theory. A synopsis of the show itself is yet to be revealed but we do know that it will continue the space-faring missions of Starfleet and the United Federation of Planets – which was confirmed in a logo for the show which features the iconic Starfleet insignia.
What’s interesting is that the new show will defy the timeline of the current movie series. As most will know, Star Trek was controversially rebooted by JJ Abrams in 2009 and it recast familiar characters such as Kirk and Spock setting up an ‘alternate’ timeline where action took precedence over the techno-babble (case in point – Fast and Furious director Justin Lin will continue the reboot model with Star Trek Beyond, released later this year).
When eventually launched in early 2017, the yet-to-be-named Star Trek CBS show will be based in the ‘Prime’ timeline and will be set after Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country and before Star Trek: The Next Generation with a storyline penned by veteran show writer Bryan Fuller (who most recently worked on the superb Hannibal series). This should satisfy Trek purists (Trekkies and Trekkers alike) and since it will be based in established Star Trek lore it could offer potential for some great cameo appearances from favourite crew members and gadgets from yesteryear (or future-year even?)
It should come as no surprise that after five decades of helping to inspire and shape the real life tech world we all live in, TV’s longest running science fiction show would embrace a digital model. The iPads and tablets that were inspired by Star Trek will soon be used to watch its latest adventures – and that, to quote the late great Leonard Nimoy, is ‘Fascinating’.