Starfleet Academy took a long time to make it to television

Rumors of a “Star Trek” spinoff set at the United Federation Academy have circulated online for years, though the series — officially titled “Starfleet Academy” — is only now becoming a reality. The first time we heard about the series was back in 2018, when current franchise president Alex Kurtzman signed an overall deal for development. Several “Star Trek” shows, including “Discovery.” The next update came three years later, after the Paramount+ streaming service arrived and provided a natural outlet for all things “Trek,” especially A younger spinoff series that follows Starfleet cadets. Now, the show is gearing up to premiere in early 2026… but, as it turns out, there was a very good reason for its long, winding path from start to finish.

In a new profile with Entertainment WeeklyKurtzman and fellow Starfleet Academy alum Noga Landau talked about some of the biggest hurdles they faced in getting the series to the finish line. The biggest challenge seems to relate to the show’s premise. By its very nature, the story told in an academic setting must be consistent. You can’t exactly pull a Captain Kirk and fly to the nearest planet, on fire, if you’re stuck in a school with fresh-faced kids learning the ropes. According to Landau:

“It’s hard to come up with a circumstance and acceptance where you can still enjoy ‘Star Trek’ adventures with real stakes and real dangers, but it’s also a school. It’s really important for viewers to know that these kids are actually going on real ‘Star Trek’ missions, and there are real ‘Star Trek’ dangers and complex situations that they have to navigate.”

Fortunately, the show’s creative team found a clever solution to this: turning the school into a spaceship.

We’ve seen plenty of “Star Trek” shows set on starships before, and we’ve seen others that take place largely in one location (like “Deep Space Nine”), but we’ve never seen one attempt to have the best of both worlds the way that “Starfleet Academy” does. One of the biggest reveals was made at this year’s “Star Trek” New York Comic Con panelThe idea of ​​building a mobile academy immediately sets this series apart from the rest. Far from just a gimmick, this turns out to be the most exciting way to accept the first class of cadets in over 100 years (if you remember, The future events of “Discovery” prove that Starfleet has largely become a shell unto itself) and basically make them learn on the job. Co-showrunner Alex Kurtzman described this to EW as:

“We actually likened it to a teaching hospital. You can only learn by being thrown into the fire.”

The series feels like a mixture of several different eras of “Trek” – you have the “Discovery” timeline, Noteworthy connection to “Deep Space Nine” and Benjamin SiskoAnd even the remains of “Voyager” through the return of Robert Picardo’s anthropomorphic Doctor. Through it all, we’ll be invested in the adventures of a young group of students (led by Sandro Rosta as Caleb Mair), their advisor/Captain Nhla Aki (Holly Hunter), and the dastardly half-Klingon, half-Tellarite villain Nos Braca played by Paul Giamatti. But there’s a nugget buried in EW’s article that the series, which is already in the middle of filming for Season 2, could get a third season if viewers prove enthusiastic.

“Starfleet Academy” moves to Paramount+ on January 15, 2026.