Posted in: Paramount+, TV | Tagged: Mike McMahan, star trek: Lower Decks

Star Trek: Lower Decks: Mike McMahan Talks "Regrouping" Post-Finale

Star Trek: Lower Decks creator Mike McMahan on where he's at with things post-finale, the future of the "Star Trek" Universe, and more.

To say it's hard to say goodbye when you're on such a beloved TV show, especially when you have plenty of stories to tell, would be an understatement. But there have been quite a few instances throughout the history of the Star Trek franchise where that's happened, from The Original Series getting that last-minute third season, Enterprise failing to secure that fifth season on UPN, and in the streamer era, Prodigy and, now Lower Decks. As in the cases of the animated shows, both had their starts on Paramount+ with the Dan and Kevin Hageman series getting the plug pulled after one season before landing its second season on Netflix, but still in limbo. Lower Decks was allowed to have five seasons before Paramount+ decided five seasons was enough, and while creator Mike McMahan and company took what the streamer gave them, they were anything but silent about wrapping the journey of the U.S.S. Cerritos up. McMahan spoke to TrekMovie.com about the series finale and its future.

Star Trek: Lower Decks Creator on "Taking the Victory Lap" for Now

While Prodigy was canceled despite much of season two work being completed, fanfare sustained mostly from creatives and talent about saving the Nickelodeon series before Netflix finally came through. With Netflix dropping all 20 episodes of season two at once instead of splitting them up into different windows, there wasn't any sense of finality as we did; we more of legacy characters with Wil Wheaton's Wesley Crusher "reunite" with space mom Gates McFadden's Dr. Beverly Crusher at the end to meet his half-brother Jack Crusher, Jr. Then nothing as Netflix hasn't announced if a season three is going to take place.

As far as Lower Decks goes, McMahan and cast members like Dawnn Lewis (Freeman) and Fred Tatasciore (Shax) admitted multiple seasons are ready to be churned out should Paramount+ have a change of heart about ending the series or allowing it to find another home. The Rick & Morty alum had a few ideas about how the series can continue.

"I mean, it's tough. If you ask people from the crew and production, of course, it's possible. We'd all like to keep making it. I have more stories I want to tell. Our cast wants to keep working together. Our producer loves to pay his mortgage. [laughs] But at the same time, the reality of the situation is we have five seasons of a show that is a miracle that it exists," McMahan said. "And with the help of [my original series] 'Secret Hideout,' I got to make exactly the show I wanted to make. And I grew up as a writer making this show. This was my first show I ever sold. This was my first at-bat. I'm really proud of what we did. And there's things happening in the industry, not just at Paramount, but all over the place. We are in a moment of regroup, which I guess is the nicest way to put it. For me, okay, when do I take my shot again at getting to do more of this? Because you don't amass 'no's' and then turn in all the "no's" tickets like at an arcade to get a slappy hand. If you start to amass 'no's,' you are permanently the guy who was told "no," and then you don't get to do it again."

McMahan also helped keep things in perspective about the current state of the Star Trek franchise while being grateful for the opportunities he got. "So, for me, it's making sure that the fans know that we love the show. I can't tell them how to vocalize that they want more of it. I can't be the one who leads that charge because I benefit creatively and financially from this show. It takes more voices than mine in order to cause any change to happen. But the people that I have access to talk to, they love the show too. Like, if our executives on the studio side could have kept the show going, they would have too. There's forces at work that are bigger than us. I'm also excited about seeing the other Star Trek stuff. I'm excited for Section 31. I'm excited for 'Starfleet Academy' and 'Strange New Worlds!' This isn't like the ending of 'Enterprise' where it's like question marks. There's three Star Trek things coming that you guys even know about! So, for me, being a Trek fan in general, I'm happy. I love that there's more Trek coming. I love that we have the 'Lower Decks' comics. I love that we got to do 'Lower Decks.' As a Lower Decks fan, I'm going to just regroup, take the victory lap for a second, and then when the industry and Paramount seem to kind of be in a place where 'Lower Decks' can pop back again, I'm going to make a hard push to get to do whatever we can get – more episodes, a movie, a live-action spinoff? Who knows?"

All episodes of Star Trek: Lower Decks are available to stream on Paramount+

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