As Star Trek: Strange New Worlds prepares for season 3, the creators are revealing the unmade plans for a crossover with another classic Trek show!
The joy of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds is how easily it channels the feel of The Original Series. Set a decade before that show, SNW expertly plays out its themes as viewers love the adventures of Christopher Pike with a crew that includes a younger Spock with James Kirk still a rising star in Starfleet.
The series relishes in breaking the conventions of Trek and doing different genres. That includes the famous musical episode that worked well. There was also the excellent "Those Old Scientists," which managed to bring live-action versions of Star Trek: Lower Decks characters Mariner (Tawny Newsome) and Boimler (Jack Quaid) to meet the Enterprise crew thanks to time-travel shenanigans.
As it turns out, had plans gone through, another animated Trek show could have been the subject of a SNW crossover!
Speaking to SFX Magazine to promote the third season, showrunners Akiva Goldsman and Henry Alonso Myers previewed the new episodes, while also talking about some of the ideas that didn't make the cut.
Among them was a wild idea to have the Enterprise somehow crossover into the world of the 1970s Star Trek Animated Series!
"We really wanted to do a TAS [The Animated Series, made by Filmation in the '70s] episode, and for a bunch of reasons we couldn't quite get there. We haven't done a straight animated episode and I don't think we will. Whether it would break the show or not I don't know. Probably not. It's hard to know what would break it."
Airing for two seasons in 1973-74, Star Trek: The Animated Series hit just as a new wave of popularity for the original show was coming about. The entire cast reprised their voice roles with several episodes using unproduced TOS scripts. The show was able to use the freedom of animation for more outlandish planets, alien races, and new characters like the feline M'Ress and the three-armed Arex.
The show is considered canon among Trek writers and was able to keep Trek alive until the movies fully revived the property. While the Filmation animation seems dated, it still captured the spirit of Trek quite well with the return of Tribbles, Harry Mudd and other characters.
The idea of the SNW crew entering this world would be intriguing as a full-fledged animated episode done in that style. While most of the TOS cast have sadly left us, they might have gotten soundalikes or even the possibility of William Shatner himself as Kirk. It might have used M'Ress and Arex among others and just been a pure romp as fans would enjoy. The animated intro alone would have been lovely and it's just the inventive type of episode SNW does so well.
Hopefully, a future season may allow the creators to go ahead with this crossover to further link these eras of Star Trek together.
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds season 3 premieres July 17 on Paramount+.
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