Star Trek: Discovery is ready for takeoff.
CBS on Monday announced that the highly anticipated series will premiere on Sunday, Sept. 2, at 8:30 p.m. ET/PT. That same night, the two first episodes will be available to stream on CBS All Access, with subsequent episodes premiering exclusively on the streamer every Sunday.
However, the 15-episode first season of the sci-fi series will be split into two chapters. The first eight episodes will roll out through Nov. 5, and then the series will return with seven new episodes in January 2018.
As announced at CBS’ upfront presentation to advertisers in May, Star Trek: Discovery will be accompanied by a weekly aftershow, Talking Trek, which will also launch weekly exclusively on CBS All Access.
The rollout plan for the new Star Trek is similar to how CBS unveiled The Good Wife spinoff The Good Fight. CBS All Access’ first scripted series premiered on the linear network on Feb. 19, the same night the first two episodes became available to stream online. Subsequent episodes were released weekly, also on Sundays.
However, The Good Fight‘s first season ran just 10 episodes, so the season wasn’t split in half like Star Trek: Discovery will be. (The second season has been extended to 13 episodes.)
Also, unlike The Good Fight, Star Trek: Discovery‘s linear premiere may face NFL-related delays on Sept. 24, when it launches after the 90-minute season premiere of 60 Minutes.
Star Trek: Discovery will follow the voyages of Starfleet on their missions to discover new worlds and new life-forms, and one Starfleet officer who must learn that to truly understand all things alien, you must first understand yourself. The series will feature a new ship, new characters and new missions, while embracing the franchise’s well-known ideology and hope for the future that inspired a generation of dreamers and doers.
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First ordered to series in late 2015, the CBS TV Studios drama was originally set to premiere before The Good Fight earlier this year. However, delays behind the scenes, including the exit of original showrunner Bryan Fuller, pushed the start date back to May and then to late summer/early fall, while The Good Fight premiere was moved up from spring to February.
Fuller remains an executive producer on the project, along with Alex Kurtzman, Heather Kadin, Gretchen J. Berg & Aaron Harberts, Akiva Goldsman, Rod Roddenberry and Trevor Roth. CBS TV Studios produces along with Kurtzman’s Secret Hideout, Fuller’s Living Dead Guy Productions and Roddenberry Entertainment.
The Walking Dead grad Sonequa Martin-Green leads the cast, which includes Doug Jones, Jason Isaacs, Anthony Rapp, Michelle Yeoh, James Frain and Rainn Wilson, among others.
Outside of the U.S., Star Trek: Discovery will air on Netflix in 188 countries and on Bell Media’s Space channel and OTT service CraveTV in Canada.
