Star Trek: Prodigy and Star Trek: Picard worked together so this Star Trek: TNG character could return

Warning! The following contains SPOILERS for Season 2 ofStar Trek: Prodigy.

Star Trek: Prodigy unveiled its second season on July 1st, and the eighteen month wait for new episodes was worth it. This season has been, by far, one of the best seasons of any Star Trek series. And this is not just my opinion. All across the internet, you'll find fans saying the same thing. Prodigy did right by its core cast of characters, but it also brought some others back into the fold who needed to be utilized more.

One of those characters was Wesley Crusher, who ends up being instrumental in helping Dal and the crew fix the timeline and save Gwyn. Wil Wheaton returned to voice the character in what can only be described as the best Wesley Crusher has ever been. But as the events of season two of Prodigy take place before the third season of Star Trek: Picard, there was some collaboration between the series, with Picard's showrunner Terry Matalas even letting Prodigy creators Dan and Kevin Hageman in on Wesley's secret brother, according to CinemaBlend.

"And then they told us, ‘Wesley’s got a brother,’ so then we’re like ok we gotta figure out a way to get that in."

- Dan Hageman

Wesley was always going to be a part of season two of Prodigy, and it was Matalas who worked him into the second season of Picard.

"They were wonderful over on Picard. We were already in the middle of writing our season so Terry [Matalas] called us up and is like, ‘What are you guys doing with Wesley because we’re hoping to do something little.’ So we got in sync, but yeah, we were already down the road [writing that story] because we knew Wesley is the original prodigy. How great would it be for him to come back? Star Trek kind of abandoned him after Wesley walked off the screen of Next Generation. No one’s really touched where this character is. So, it was such a blast."

- Kevin Hageman

To have written the entire second season of Prodigy with Wil Wheaton's character in mind shows just how much the creators of the series are dedicated to keeping Star Trek united. And they're right; Wesley was the original prodigy, even though he wasn't a well-liked character during his tenure on Star Trek: The Next Generation. But both Prodigy and Picard brought Wesley back to give fans the opportunity to see a different side of Dr. Crusher's son, and Prodigy did it so well, that building on Wesley's life as a Traveler should be something Paramount considers for the future.