The first episode of the long-awaited Star Trek: Discovery spinoff Star Trek: Strange New Worlds will be arriving for streaming on Paramount+ on May 5th, 2022, but what about that other spinoff of Discovery, the Michelle Yeoh-fronted Star Trek: Section 31 series? In an interview with Entertainment Weekly about the new movie she stars in, Everything Everywhere All at Once, Yeoh shared some tantalizing details about the upcoming show, saying it is completely different from previous outings in the Star Trek galaxy and compared its tone to two beloved franchises.
"Section 31 is that universe but different," Yeoh told Entertainment Weekly. "It’s like Mission: Impossible meets Guardians of the Galaxy in space."
The Star Trek Universe only continues to expand. So far this year, there hasn’t been a week without a new episode of a Star Trek show, with fresh entries in Star Trek: Prodigy, Star Trek: Discovery, or Star Trek: Picard arriving each Thursday. For the duration of 2022, Trekkies can look forward to the remainder of Picard’s second season, making first contact with Strange New Worlds next month, the third season of Star Trek: Lower Decks this summer, and the next batch of Prodigy episodes later this year.
Star Trek: Picard is Ending After Season 3
It looks as though Paramount is hoping to continue that trend into the future. However, if there’s anyone who knows that all good things must end, it’s Captain – that is, Admiral Jean-Luc Picard (Sir Patrick Stewart). The star of the currently ongoing Picard series will appear alongside the best-known crew of the Federation Starship U.S.S. Enterprise-D thanks to the fact that the main cast of Star Trek: The Next Generation is returning to reprise their roles for the upcoming third season.
But Paramount also recently announced that the third season of Picard would be its last. While this will give the opportunity for Picard to ride the high of its stellar, time-shattering second season into the final act, it does make it clear to keep up with a weekly Star Trek episode that Paramount will have to ensure they’ve always got multiple shows set in the universe in production.
Enter Section 31! The long-rumored spinoff centers on the eponymous espionage organization. First seen in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, which explored some seedier corners of the quadrant after Star Trek: The Original Series and TNG focused on the pristine and aspirational flagship Enterprise, Section 31 is willing to take questionably moral steps without becoming bogged down by Starfleet sentimentality. We got a better idea of how this shadowy organization came to be in a few episodes of Star Trek: Enterprise (and if you’re wondering if they’re still around, on Lower Decks, Eugene Cordero's Rutherford is still pretty afraid of them).
Given that Yeoh’s character, former Terran Emperor Philippa Georgiou, was last seen traversing a temporal portal opened by the Guardian of Forever (yes, that Guardian of Forever, although looking a bit different and now played by Paul Guilfoyle), there are plenty of possibilities for where on the timeline this Discovery spinoff might land.