‘Starfleet Academy’ Canceled After Two Seasons

The new Star Trek show is already coming to an end.

Paramount and CBS announced that the latest addition to the Trek canon, Starfleet Academy, is coming to an end following the upcoming second season. This second batch of episodes has already been shot. The show debuted on Paramount+ streaming a little over two months ago.

In a statement, Paramount said…

We’re incredibly proud of the ambition, passion, and creativity that went into bringing ‘Star Trek: Starfleet Academy’ to life. The series introduced audiences to a bold new group of characters, welcomed familiar faces, and expanded the ‘Star Trek’ universe in exciting new ways. We’re grateful to Alex Kurtzman, Noga Landau, Gaia Violo, and the entire cast and crew who pushed storytelling boundaries in the spirit of Gene Roddenberry’s vision. We look forward to sharing the upcoming second and final season with everyone, and continuing to celebrate the cast, crew, and all that was accomplished with this series.

In their own statement, series showrunners Alex Kurtzman and Noga Landau said

It’s been my and Noga’s joy and privilege to help carry Gene Roddenberry’s extraordinary vision forward with Starfleet Academy, thanks to the hundreds of hardworking humans who pour every ounce of their talents into the work daily with imagination and reverence. We are in post-production now on what will be the second and final season. We’re so proud of what we’ve accomplished together on this show, and the world will get to see the work of these extraordinary artists when season two airs. We will finish strong.

Starfleet Academy focused on events at the new Starfleet Academy with the first class to join the institution following the events of Star Trek: Discovery. The cast included Holly Hunter, Sandro Rosta, Karim Diane, Kerrice Brooks, George Hawkins, Oded Fehr, and Star Trek veterans Robert Picardo and Tig Notaro, with Paul Giamatti in a recurring role.

READ MORE: Every Star Trek Film, Ranked From Worst to Best

The future looks unusually bleak for Star Trek right now. The franchise has produced one series after another for Paramount+ in recent years. Although most have garnered mixed reviews to varying degrees, they all at least lasted longer on the air than two seasons. Star Trek: Discovery produced five seasons, Star Trek: Picard got three seasons, and by the time Strange New Worlds concludes some time in 2027 it will have released five seasons’ worth of episodes.

At the same time, there hasn’t been a new Star Trek movie in a decade; Star Trek Beyond opened in theaters in 2016. Since then, there have been repeated attempts to get a fourth film featuring the same “Kelvin” cast off the ground, along with development on unrelated film projects. All of them came to nothing.

A new Star Trek film is supposedly still in development … supposedly. At this point, it’s hard to be optimistic, even if that is the primary message of so much Star Trek. We’ll see if and when we actually see it.