Monday 6 August 2018

CBS wants to give us constant Trek

And who are we to stop them!

Talking to Deadline CBS's David Stapf (TV Studios), Marc DeBevoise (All Access), and Julie McNamara (Original Content), who are all titled presidents of one sort or another, had a lot to say about their plans to bring us a lot more Star Trek.

Perhaps the most exciting comment came from Stapf, who seemed to suggest an eternal supply of Trek to keep All Access alive:
My goal is that there should be a Star Trek something on all the time on All Access. We know it draws an audience, and Discovery has done quite well.
They discussed how they plan to work on both limited and ongoing series of Trek, which could include direct spin-offs from Discovery, as described by McNamara:
We’ve really talked about virtually all of the characters who popped in Discovery as potential spin-off shows. It’s obviously very much driven by our conversations with Alex Kurtzman’s Secret Hideout and the other creators involved.
Deadline specifically asked about potential Georgiou and Mudd spin-offs (based on the teaser clip of Emperor Georgiou joining Section 31, and the forthcoming Mudd focused Short Treks episode), and both were described as characters with potential, but no more commitment was made than that. Here's Stapf's take on that:
I think what you are asking is are we incubating things potentially, and the answer is Yes and No. There’s not a grand design of “lets plant a Rainn idea and see how that does.” It’s more Secret Hideout and the rest of the Trek brain trust coming to us and saying, “we think this would be really cool, storywise, characterwise.”
Off the back of the TNG revival Deadline did also ask about other series getting possible follow-ups, and got a straight no to that - So I guess don't expect Captain Archer's Romulan War Chronicles anytime soon!

Also related to that was talk of international distribution, which sounds like a headache in the making. When asking whether the rest of the world can expect to see other new Trek on Netflix, there was sadly not a simple yes:
It’s complicated. Some are, some aren’t, depending on how it gets defined as series or a spinoff.
They seem to be keeping their options open for how the Picard series or anything else new is distributed internationally (including presumably CBS All Access expanding into more markets), but at least anything directly related to Discovery appears to be tied down to Netflix for now.

The three had a lot more to say about all things Trek, as well as their overall ideas for All Access and the other shows they are working on. So go check out the full interview for more.




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