In this age of the crossovers, it seems like only a matter of time before Star Trek attempts one of its own. The franchise has always loved mixing together the different corners of its universe and all the signs are pointing to another cross-generational encounter occurring soon between the two ongoing shows on CBS All Access – Star Trek: Discovery and Star Trek: Picard. And here’s how it could be pulled off.
ComicBook.com has noted that both Discovery season 2 and Picard season 1 had overarching villains who were very similar in concept. Discovery has introduced a mysterious antagonist from the 28th century who corrupted Starfleet’s battle strategy system A.I. Control, almost to disastrous consequences. Meanwhile, there’s the Synthetic Alliance of Picard, essentially the gods of the machine race. They could be separate threats, but the fact that time is irrelevant to both of them heavily suggests they’re one and the same. Or at least connected.
Both shows have also teased the idea of a “techno-pocalypse,” so a potential crossover would likely have the Discovery and Picard casts having to come together to save the galaxy from a machine takeover. But how would they come together, given their different time periods? Well, there are a couple of ways around this. First is that the U.S.S. Discovery has already jumped forward into the 32nd century, so why not have them jump back to the 24th century, too? Also, Picard is now an android, remember. So, he could theoretically be alive in the 32nd century.
But will a DIS/PIC crossover actually happen? Well, ViacomCBS has said that they’re aiming for greater cross-media synergy and We Got This Covered has heard that such an event is already in the works. Our intel even points to Pike and his early Enterprise crew and Michelle Yeoh’s Georgiou getting involved as well. This has since been backed up by another outlet, too, so it seems our sources are onto something.
In any case, we’ll have to wait and see. But for now, we can tell you for certain that Star Trek: Discovery season 3 airs later this year, while Star Trek: Picard will return for season 2 in 2021.