Star Trek: Jonathan Frakes Compares Fan Reactions to New Shows to Next Generation

Jonathan Frakes sees similarities to the newest Star Trek shows and The Next Generation. Frakes helped bring Star Trek back to television in 1987 as Cmdr. William Riker in Star Trek: The Next Generation. Now he's doing it again as a director on Star Trek: Discovery and a guest star and director onStar Trek: Picard, and it sounds like he'll keep doing it for upcoming Star Trek television shows. Speaking to GalaxyCon, Frakes reflected on how slow some fans were to accept The Next Generation when it debuted. "The audience were very hardcore Original Series fans," Frakes says. "They were skeptical. They were suspicious. They were generally not terribly interested and completely unfamiliar with the new Star Trek which had a bald English captain with a French name, and an entirely new cast. They wanted their Kirk, Spock, and Bones Star Trek.

"I don’t think it wasn't until the second or third year when the show really got good," that fans started to accept Next Generation, as Frakes recalls it. "And remember we did 26 a year, so that is a lot. It was 50, 60 shows in. They realized there was room in their worlds for both shows.

He's sees something similar in how older Star Trek fans were hesitant to accept Star Trek: Discovery when it debuted in 2017. "My friends at Discovery, which I was privileged to be part of and still am, it was a similar vibe when that show came out. They didn’t want to find room in their hearts for another Star Trek, which there clearly is, and one of the reasons that was not a factor in the launching of Picard was that the hardcore fans love Picard and were inclined to look forward to the show and look forward to having him and look forward to whatever story because they knew him and they knew who he was. I think the familiarity with all fandom is so important. It's like the canon of these shows… they want a touchpoint. That's exactly what it is. And, it’s important, and it clearly worked, because Picard is wonderful."

As for those who keep saying these Trek shows aren't "real" Star Trek, Frakes seems bemused. "But they’re watching," he notes. "They’re watching to make sure they hate it."

The first two seasons of Star Trek: Discovery are now available to stream on CBS All Access. The third season is expected to debut in 2020. Star Trek: Picard Season One is now available to stream on CBS All Access. The show's second season is in pre-production.

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