Posted in: Paramount+, Star Trek, TV | Tagged: star trek, Starfleet Academy

Starfleet Academy Writer Not Looking to Overwhelm Fans with Trek Lore

Writer and producer Kirsten Beyer discusses balancing 55 years of Star Trek storytelling and 800 years of canon for Starfleet Academy.

To say Kirsten Beyer is one of the hardest-working writers and producers in the Star Trek universe would be an understatement since her involvement on Discovery, the flagship franchise series that would help launch with Paramount+. She was also co-created Short Treks and the TNG sequel series Picard, not to mention contributing to every other live-action series for the streamer, including Strange New Worlds and the upcoming Starfleet Academy, the first 32nd-century spinoff from Discovery. While promoting her work on the audio drama Star Trek: Khan alongside The Wrath of Khan director Nicholas Meyer and David Mack, Beyer spoke to TrekMovie.com about not overwhelming new and old Star Trek fans with 800 years of history while trying to make an entertaining TV series.

Starfleet Academy: Kirsten Beyer on Writing for the Series, Tawny Newsome and More

Despite not working on the animated Lower Decks, Beyer got to work with star Tawny Newsome, who's writing for Starfleet Academy. "Tawny and I got real close working in the room together on Season 1 of Academy and writing that episode together," she said. "There were so many days where people are pitching things, and she and I just looking at each other like, 'Oh my god, are you going to take this one, or am I going to take this one?' Like, bless them, they work very, very hard, but there's just so much Star Trek to know. And they can't know necessarily right off the bat, when they're just really kind of stepping into it. So I'm usually the lone voice of that in any room that I am in. And so to have her there was just so helpful. And also, she goes deep in areas where I'm less familiar or less off-the-top-of-my-head familiar. And she is also very passionate about the ideas that she believes in and the things she wants to discuss. And I'm totally always here for that! So getting to know her through the process of working on 'Academy' was one of the greatest joys for me. And yeah, we still talk whenever. She's amazing, and I love her."

Created by Gaia Violo with showrunners Alex Kurtzman and Noga Landau, Starfleet Academy follows a new class of cadets at the Federation on Earth, led by Captain Nahla Ake (Holly Hunter), who not only runs her ship, but is also the Chancellor of the institution. As far as balancing the 55 years of Star Trek and the 800 years of canon, Beyer broke down the process. "The operating instructions are you should not have to have ever seen Star Trek to be able to step into Academy and enjoy it. That said, if you have seen a lot of Star Trek, you should also very much recognize it as a continuing part of the history and tradition that you are familiar with," Beyer said. "On the one hand, it seems like you have a metric ton of canon to sort of contend with, but it doesn't have to be a weight around your shoulders as you're creating these stories. Because we're able to totally move forward into the unexplored, and that's super exciting. You just want to make sure that it's informed by what we know went before."

Beyer also emphasized that it's more important to serve the story than worrying about needing to know the "95 other things that probably happened between that moment and where we are right now." For more on Beyer talking about where she is on season two, you can check out the entire interview. Starfleet Academy, which features the returns of Robert Picardo, Mary Wiseman, Tig Notaro, and Oded Fehr, also stars Sandro Rosta, Karim Diané, Kerrice Brooks, George Hawkins, Bella Shepard, Zoë Steiner, and Paul Giamatti and premieres in Early 2026.

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