Star Trek: Discovery Will End With Season 5

Star Trek: Discovery, the Sonequa Martin-Green starring series which revived the Trek television franchise in 2017, will end its 65-episode run with the completion of Season 5 in early 2024, Paramount+ revealed today.

The studio is planning to celebrate the show in the lead-up to Season 5 with “year-long celebrations and appearances at key events in markets around the world,” according to a press release issued by the streamer.

Sources tell IGN that while principal photography on Star Trek: Discovery is mostly complete, there will still be some additional filming done for the final season.

“I will never forget how it felt to stand together as a show family, cradling the heirloom of ‘Trek’ with all those from the franchise at large and with the fans,” said Martin-Green. “The fans welcomed us into their hearts as we launched a new iteration of ‘Trek’ and an entire entertainment platform, and we’ll never forget it.”

Indeed, Discovery was the flagship of the CBS All Access fleet when the series debuted, and it helped usher in the current golden age of Star Trek that has given us the likes of Picard, Strange New Worlds, Lower Decks, Prodigy, and more.

Infinite diversity in infinite combinations

From the get-go, the series pushed the frontiers of the Star Trek mission statement of inclusion and Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations, which began with creator Gene Roddenberry way back when the original Trek series debuted in 1966.

Martin-Green was the first Black woman to lead a Trek series, and her character, Michael Burnham, went on to become the first Black woman to captain a ship when she took over the helm of the Disco. The series’ focus on LGBTQIA+ representation was popular and hugely important to many fans. And the show also successfully brought the serialized story style of modern television to the franchise.

“The ‘Trek’ universe means so much to so many – including us – and we couldn’t be prouder of everything Discovery has contributed to its legacy, particularly with representation,” said executive producers and co-showrunners Alex Kurtzman and Michelle Paradise. “If just one person sees themselves, or the possibilities for their future, in a new way because of Discovery, then we think we’d have made Gene Roddenberry very proud.”

David Ajala, Doug Jones, Anthony Rapp, Mary Wiseman, Wilson Cruz and Blu Del Barrio will return with Martin-Green for Season 5 to conclude the story of the Discovery crew. Not much is known about the new season yet, though Paramount says that it will “send them on an epic adventure across the galaxy to find an ancient power whose very existence has been deliberately hidden for centuries.”

A trailer for Season 5 was revealed at New York Comic Con in October.

And of course, one can’t help but wonder… just because Discovery is ending as a series, who’s to say that we might not see Captain Burnham or some of these other characters again in some future Trek? The possibilities are… fascinating.

Scott Collura is Executive Editor of Entertainment Features at IGN.