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Just when people thought they knew what to expect from the final frontier, the Star Trek Universe panel at San Diego Comic-Con 2024 brought something entirely unexpected. Nope, not a new alien life-form (although we should probably expect some of those before too long, given the history of the franchise) — instead, an all-new series described by producer Alex Kurtzman as “the first live-action Star Trek comedy,"

The show will be co-created by Dear White People’s Justin Simien (who was also the moderator of the 90-minute panel in Hall H at the San Diego Convention Center) and Tawny Newsome, who brings a very particular brand of Trek credibility, having voiced Ensign Mariner in Star Trek: Lower Decks for the show’s entire five-season run, and also worked in the writers’ room for the upcoming Starfleet Academy.

The new show, which wasn’t even named (and may, in fact, not even have a title yet), was described with a number of purposefully cryptic pitches Newsome and Simien threw at Kurtzman, including “a clash of leadership, outsiders and odd couples. 25th century appointment viewing,” “People on a thing... shenanigans... uh oh!” and "shenani-once, shame on me, shenani-twice, you best believe I'm gonna shenan-again.” Simien’s most promising pitch was simply, “vibes.”

So what can we really expect from this show? Who can tell — but it’s probably going to be a very interesting experience finding out.

The next Star Trek series to debut on Paramount+ is going to be the fifth and final season of Star Trek: Lower Decks, on October 24.

Get a fuller San Diego Comic-Con experience with a full rundown of our SDCC 2024 stories, as well as all the big SDCC 2024 news, how to make the most out of San Diego Comic-Con, and the real burning question: how much does it actually cost to go to SDCC?