Star Trek: Prodigy doesn’t need a film, even if there’s a story for one

The producers of Star Trek: Prodigy want a film for the series.

If Kevin Hageman gets his way, Star Trek: Prodigy will be the next Trek series to get a feature-length film. That is if there’s an audience for it. Hageman spoke to the folks on the Mission Log podcast and revealed to them that the hope is to have a film made featuring the cast and crew of the animated all-ages show, Star Trek: Prodigy.

The talk wasn’t just about the show getting a feature-length film either, but maybe, even theme park rides. Though that seemed more like a pie-in-the-sky idea.

Here’s what the Prodigy producer had to say about the film;

"All our heads are always in the clouds here. Like we want to do an animated movie. I would love for the show to keep going for many, many seasons. And then, sort of like what they did with The Next Generation—they had the show, and then they started to spin off and do the features. And so to be able to have the show, and then to have a feature, like it’d be amazing. Not just an animated feature, but if you could do a live-action feature it would be absolutely stunning. So we have lofty ambitions."

Now, an animated Prodigy film makes no real sense. Simply put, an animated film based on a cartoon series property isn’t usually so good that it’s worth doing. The budgets are bigger but the ideas usually aren’t. There is nothing you can do in an animated film that you can’t in an animated series across four episodes.

Just look at some of the animated shows to get features. First, there’s the Simpsons. Sure you got Tom Hanks for a cameo and had more of a budget to do unique shots but did either item really make the film must-see? No. Because it wasn’t.

Even Bob’s Burgers thought it’d be good to do a film, a film that underperformed at the box office. Then if you want to get a bit more obscure, there were the My Hero Academia films. Sure, at times the films had higher production values but nothing so much that it warranted a film. So doing an animated Prodigy film just doesn’t make sense.

However, Hageman did mention something worth pointing out.

A live-action Star Trek: Prodigy film would make the concept worthwhile

Assuming that a Prodigy film is realistic, a live-action one would be worthwhile to do. Especially if you crossed over with other shows and characters. The biggest issue with the Nu Trek, aside from the uneven quality, is that not all of the shows share the same media presentation. Some are animated, and the animated shows aren’t even in the same style.

So it makes crossovers that much harder. A live-action Prodigy show would help reduce that issue, if only for one outing. Plus, it’d be great to see how some of these characters look in live-action, namely Rok-Tahk and Murf.