The final frontier just got a bit further away. Star Trek: Discovery, which was previously scheduled to premiere on CBS as early as January 2017, has now been pushed back to May of the same year. Variety had the story.
According to CBS executives, producer Alex Kurtzman (Limitless, Transformers) and showrunner Bryan Fuller (Hannibal, Pushing Daisies) asked for more time to work on the series in order to meet the high expectations associated with the Star Trek name. In addition to allowing more time for writing and casting, the delay would also give the post-production team more leeway to polish the special effects. This announcement comes less than a month after Fuller revealed several new details about the series.
A statement from Fuller and Kurtzman said: “Bringing Star Trek back to television carries a responsibility and mission: to connect fans and newcomers alike to the series that has fed our imaginations since childhood[…]We aim to dream big and deliver, and that means making sure the demands of physical and post-production for a show that takes place entirely in space, and the need to meet an air date, don’t result in compromised quality. Before heading into production, we evaluated these realities with our partners at CBS and they agreed: Star Trek deserves the very best, and these extra few months will help us achieve a vision we can all be proud of”.
In the meantime, CBS has scheduled the spinoff of The Good Wife to premiere in January, in order to fill the programming slot previously held by Discovery.
Star Trek: Discovery will begin production this November in Toronto. Currently, the series is still looking to cast its female lead, although CBS stressed that casting had nothing to do with the delay.
When Discovery does premiere in May 2017, episodes will be available on the CBS All Access streaming service. In countries besides the United States, episodes will be available to stream on Netflix 24 hours after their original broadcast.