Jonathan Frakes thinks there’s a future for Star Trek: The Next Generation

Jonathan Frakes will be in every episode of Star Trek: Picard’s final season.

And that’s just fine with him. The actor/director told Trekmovie in a recent interview that Terry Matalas, the showrunner for Star Trek: Picard, spoke to him during season two of the series and asked him how he felt about playing a lot of Riker. Frakes was on board and said it was a blast to work with Patrick Stewart again and that he had some great stuff with Marina Sirtis.

Then the talk moved to questions about whether Frakes felt like this was a proper send-off to the characters of Star Trek: The Next Generation as Matalas had promised. Frakes made it clear that the final season doesn’t feel like an ending to him.

"It is much more exciting for us collectively than Nemesis was. But it doesn’t feel so much as an ending as the possibility of moving forward. I think there’s a future."

Jonathan Frakes wants to be involved in a Picard spin-off series.

There have been a lot of discussions about a potential Picard spin-off series, and when asked how deeply he’d want to be involved with it and whether he would want to be a recurring character, executive producer, or producer-director, Frakes responded with an “all of the above.”

Star Trek, according to Frakes, changed his life. He said that both of his “alleged” careers have been blessed by being part of the Star Trek family.  And he and Matalas discuss a Picard spin-off series and the future each time they talk. And he added a bit of extra anticipation for fans by saying that the end of episode ten of the series feels to him like it could continue into the next story.

So though the final season of Picard has been billed as a proper send-off, it certainly sounds like this is more of a set-up for a future that will include Star Trek: The Next Generation characters.