We're on board with the idea of Star Trek having an animated film somewhere down the line. It's a solid idea and financially, it makes total sense. It'd give you the attraction of a series without all the costs. Since animation is one of the best ways to broaden the fandom to be more youthful, it should be a priority. We're we disagree with the general sentiment that Star Trek: Prodigy shouldn't be the first animated film.
Not before squeezing the series for all it has. The Star Trek franchise isn't producing content like it used to. Long-running series are no longer "long". The benchmark was 90+ episodes not that long ago, but now the series will be lucky to reach 50. All of a sudden, the robots and endless Star Trek storytelling universe seem no longer robust or endless. Now, it seems quite light on content.
Sure, we have six or seven shows that have come out since 2017, but all together they come up short collectively compared to a Voyaer, Deep Space Nine or the Next Generation. Considering each show popped out 170+ episodes in seven years, and now seven shows can't hit that same number over the same time span, it's not a great look.
Streaming hasn't done Star Trek any favors. That's why Prodigy is so important. They're the only show whose first two seasons have hit 20 episodes each. In five seasons, that's 100 episodes. Only three shows have hit that mark and Prodigy could make history if it's allowed to continue on that trajectory. Abandoning plans just to do an animated movie just doesn't make sense.
We're on board with an animated move, heck we're even on board with a Prodigy animated move, just not now. Prodigy is likely going to be the last show in the franchise's history with a chance to hit 100 episodes so it should be allowed to do so.
Give it that milestone, because we know there's no chance a show that produces just 10 episodes a season is going to last the 10 seasons required to do so. Not in this current environment, where it takes two years to produce 10 episodes.