‘Starfleet Academy’ Might Be the Last Time Jonathan Frakes Directs ‘Star Trek’—But Not If He Has Anything to Say About It

With the recent wrapping of production on Starfleet Academy‘s second season, the franchise has boldly come into a strange moment it’s not seen for the best part of a decade: right now, between TV and film, there’s not actually a new season of a Star Trek TV show officially in production.

Of course, that might change. We’re still holding out to hear news about Academy getting a third season—although given that its season two renewal came well before Paramount merged with Skydance, and now that bigger Paramount is trying to assimilate Warner Bros., just when or if we’ll hear about that is an uncertainty at this point—and we’re pretty early on into Trek‘s 60th anniversary year, which means there’s plenty of time to announce some new Star Trek (First Contact Day is coming up in early April; Star Trek Day itself is on September 8). Plus, we still have a lot of Star Trek we know is still coming; it’s just already wrapped filming: aside from Academy season two, there are seasons four and five of Strange New Worlds, and post-merger Paramount has already announced itself a new Star Trek movie from the Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves duo John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein.

But that doesn’t mean Star Trek finding itself in this momentary limbo doesn’t still feel weird for a series that has been thriving in its streaming renaissance for nearly 10 years since Discovery began. And it has some people, like Will Riker himself, Jonathan Frakes, reflecting on how this might be it for a while… and how he, at least, hopes it isn’t.

“That’s the last Star Trek I directed,” Frakes recently told TrekMovie of last week’s episode of Starfleet Academy, the penultimate season one episode “300th Night.” “I just did a couple of episodes of this new Big Bang spin-off, Stewart Fails to Save the Universe, right? That’s Trek-adjacent.”

Frakes’ legacy in Star Trek behind the camera is almost as strong as it is in front of it, playing Riker (and his transporter clone brother) over the years, especially in the contemporary Trek age, having stepped in to direct multiple episodes of Discovery, Strange New Worlds, Picard, and now an episode of Academy. It’s keeping his connection to the franchise alive after Discovery was the first Star Trek show in half a century to conclude without Frakes making an on-screen appearance in some capacity (Prodigy continued that streak shortly after, and it seems like Academy will too—the jury’s still out on Strange New Worlds, but it seems unlikely there as well).

None of that is stopping Frakes from hoping that this isn’t it, though—either for him as a director or as Riker. “I am an eternal optimist. I’m not ready to start looking back,” Frakes continued, before adding a simple “Why not?” when asked if that meant appearing on-screen again.

Fingers crossed that Paramount announces something he can get involved with either way soon.

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