Star Trek: Prodigy may have the last, best shot at reaching iconic milestone

It's fair to say that one of the franchises that has suffered the worst since the transition to streaming has been Star Trek. We're not talking quality, as that's a subjective thing. No, we're talking about the simple fact that a single Star Trek show, once dropping 20+ episodes a season, is now lucky to get just 10 every two years. It's a sad state of affairs, as a reduction in episodes simply makes enjoying these series less involved and therefore less fun.

It's no surprise that arguably the three most popular modern series, The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, and Voyager are the three longest-airing shows in franchise history. The Next Generation has the most episodes across Star Trek with 178, Deep Space Nine is second with 176, and Voyaer is third with 172. No other series has that many. In fact, no other series has 100 episodes.

Enterprise is fourth with 98, and Discovery is fifth with 65. No other show is even close. Strange New Worlds would need to be on the air for nine more seasons at their current rate to hit 100. Considering the longer and longer delays in between seasons, that may take almost 20 more years to happen. That's not good.

There is a dark horse, however, who could be in line to hit 100 episodes, if it finds success in its new home; Star Trek: Prodigy. With its upcoming second season on Netflix, if the series does well, it could be picked up for a third season. If it's picked up for the same rate of episodes that the first two seasons got; 20 episodes each, the Prodigy could be at 60 episodes by the time a potential fourth season is picked up.

Prodigy is the only Nu Era series to get 20 episodes at launch. Discovery had 15, but the rising cost of production and the costs there within saw the show's budget get slashed considerably. This isn't surprising, as Prodigy was originally meant for a television premiere on Nickelodeon before Paramount+ started harvesting other shows just to survive.