Star Trek: Strange New Worlds has benefited from the shutdown

Maybe no other Star Trek property was affected more by the pandemic than Star Trek: Strange New Worlds and that may have been a good thing.

Star Trek, like most other properties in the entertainment world, was upended by the global pandemic that shut down the world for a period of time, and while things still aren’t back to normal, some things have begun to gravitate that way. The shutdowns hurt a lot of people and businesses, a cruel side effect of a necessary response to the situation, yet that doesn’t mean the shutdown hurt everything.

Alex Kurtzman believes that the shutdown and delay allowed them more time to fine-tune Star Trek: Strange New Worlds a bit more. Talking to SFX Magazine Kurtzman spoke about that very idea.

"The silver linings are that Akiva [Goldsman] and Henry [Alonso Myers] are ready to show up and able to really get ahead with scripts. By the time we go back into production, we will have a lot of scripts ready to go, which is not usually how it is for us. We’re always running ahead of the freight train that is production and trying not to get flattened, but this time we actually have some advance warning with a lot of prep time."

Some fans see Strange New Worlds as “nu-Star Trek’s” last attempt to cater to the old audience. It’s an idea that even Kurtzman and those making the show keep referencing, partly due to the series returning to its old style of storytelling that was seen in Star Trek’s Deep Space Nine and Voyager. A series that will have a seasonal arch but also a “planet/alien/issue of the week” concept.

This is a similar story element that The Orville has been using as well.

With Strange New Worlds comes to a lot of hope and optimism, a series that will seek to shift the tone established by Discovery and Picard away from the darker and dreary versions the shows became known for and more towards a positive, more familiar tone that Star Trek fans have expected from the series.