Paramount+Will Ethan Peck, Paul Wesley, Celia Rose Gooding, Martin Quinn, and Jess Bush continue to play Spock, Kirk, Uhura, Scotty, and Chapel in a sequel series to Star Trek: Strange New Worlds? Ever since SNW was announced, this has been a somewhat reasonable, if initially premature question. Because the series is set before the classic adventures of Kirk and Spock, how does Strange New Worlds segue into the era of the original 1966 Star Trek? The short answer is that next year, in 2027, Strange New Worlds Season 5 will provide a special six-episode season leading up to the moment Kirk takes command of the USS Enterprise. Right now, Season 4’s tagline is, “Boldly go one step closer to where it all began,” suggesting that the connective tissue between SNW and TOS is already getting stronger.But could the much-discussed sequel series, unofficially called Star Trek: Year One, even happen at this point? The short answer is probably not. But if it did happen, there’s really only one wild yet conceivable way to pull it off.Why Star Trek’s Future On Streaming TV Is Fuzzy Right NowMartin Quinn as Scotty in Strange New Worlds Season 4. | Paramount+On June 11, as reported on Collider and later picked up by TrekMovie, neither Paul Wesley nor Ethan Peck has received any communication about reprising their roles as Kirk and Spock beyond whatever happens in SNW Season 5 next year. “We always talk about how we'd love to do a spin-off, and if we get the phone call, we'll do it,” Wesley said. “But we haven't got the phone call yet."Wesley’s comments aren’t surprising, and the best way for Trekkies to think about what’s going on right now is that it ain’t 2023 anymore. Just three years ago, with Picard Season 3, Lower Decks Season 4, and Strange New Worlds Season 2, it seemed that the new age of Trek TV couldn’t end. But now, after the 2025 Paramount-Skydance merger and the impending Paramount-Warner Bros. merger, Star Trek is a franchise under Paramount’s purview that’s certainly going to go through a lot of changes. While fans might simply want Paramount to move forward with Star Trek: Year One or another new series, that’s not really the issue. Since 2017, Alex Kurtzman’s production company, Secret Hideout, has produced every single Star Trek streaming series. But that may no longer be the case after 2027. It hasn’t been publicly confirmed that Kurtzman and Secret Hideout will no longer produce Trek shows after 2027, but with both SNW and Starfleet Academy ending that year, and no new shows in production, it seems like we’re at the end of an era. In fact, with a new Star Trek feature film in the works from Paramount Pictures, it’s likely the next big Star Trek project post-2027 will be on the big screen. While it’s possible that characters and actors from the Trek streaming era could be involved in that film, 2025 reports on the movie stated outright that it will “not be connected to any previous or current television series, movie, or prior movie development projects.”Taking all of that into account, it’s unlikely that Star Trek: Year One will materialize as a direct follow-up to Strange New Worlds. There is one way the series could work... but it’s a long shot.An animated Star Trek: Year One is the best betStar Trek: The Animated Series in 1973. | CBS/ParamountIf you’re wondering why anyone would call a SNW follow-up “Year One,” it’s because the original five-year mission of the USS Enterprise lasted from 2265 to 2270. But the only Original Series episode set in 2265 is “Where No Man Has Gone Before,” meaning we have a transitional year that’s basically missing from canon. This year would, in theory, also make the aesthetics of SNW more closely align with TOS, which is what a hypothetical Year One show would be about: a direct lead-in to The Original Series, with SNW vibes. And that would be best accomplished with an animated show.If Star Trek: Year One were animated, the challenge of integrating the styles of SNW and TOS would be easier. Animated sets could pay homage to both styles at once, and the uniforms could subtly change as episodes went by. Even the likenesses of the characters could be a blend of TOS and SNW styles; a kind of merging of Paul Wesley and young William Shatner, with Wesley providing the voice. Ethan Peck voicing an animated Spock would also work perfectly, without us having to worry too much about him looking exactly like Leonard Nimoy in TOS.Year One couldn’t really become an ongoing series anyway, simply because The Original Series exists, and eventually, you’ll start running into the canon of those episodes (arguably, SNW already has this problem). So, a limited animated series that uses the voice talents of the SNW cast, with some artistic, canon-combining flourishes, would literally be the best of all worlds.Will this happen? Like the hypothetical live-action version, probably not. But if we’re going to dream, we might as well dream logically.Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Season 4 hits Paramount+ on July 24, 2026.Phasers on Stun!: How the Making — and Remaking — of Star Trek Changed the WorldAmazon -