Star Trek Day 2023 feels anything but a celebration

Star Trek Day feels lacking with two strikes and a mass of cancellations.

Star Trek Day may be happening but it sure doesn’t feel like a moment to celebrate. Usually, when Star Trek Day rolls around, you get a lot of hype and buzz. Big announcements, new shows, trailers, interviews, and the works. This year, however, it doesn’t feel like we should be celebrating, not with the state of the franchise and the overall state of the entertainment business as a whole.

From a macro perspective, the entire industry is on strike. Every major studio has shut down all of its projects. Some smaller studios are still making things, but that doesn’t help the everyday Star Trek fan who is hoping for more from their favorite franchise. Actors and writers are far from striking a new deal as a of press time and due to that, every show and film has shut down.

With no end in sight.

But it gets worse. Star Trek: Picard, despite everyone, including Patrick Stewart, being on board for more seasons, has been canceled after it ran its three planned seasons. Discovery was canceled, ending after season five. Prodigy, despite being announced for a second season, was canceled mid-production.

Now with the strike at hand, it feels very possible that Lower Decks and maybe even Strange New Worlds could be canceled as well, as Paramount+ is hemorrhaging money and is trying everything it can to dig itself out of the crippling debt it’s in. This includes canceling shows in an effort to gain tax credits.

Shows and films that Paramount+ was in the middle of production may in fact get cancelled as well, depending on how much money is lost on them during the strike. So the Trek film Section 31 and the new Starfleet Academy show are not locked to launch.

And if all that isn’t bad enough, we’re still dealing with the failure of Star Trek 4 and the inane decision to announce the film, despite having nothing ready.

Brilliant.

Star Trek Day is hollow this year

This is a hollow, sad gesture that the folks at Paramount are trying to put out this year. It feels almost like what Paramount tried to do with the Pandemic, but worse. That was a time when everything was shut down and no one was making anything. Everyone was trying to stay safe and stay alive, so it was understandable.

Now? It’s all about corporate greed.

And it shows in this hollow, self-serving Star Trek day, which is predicated on trying to keep interest in the franchise high, all while pushing a profit margin with discounts at their online store.

Sadly, this feels like one Star Trek Day you can in fact afford to skip.