The Enduring Appeal of Star Trek: Paramount+'s Secret Weapon

Are we sleeping on the Star Trek franchise? Of course, the 57-year-old property is beloved and boasts remarkable endurance. Few concepts are rich enough to ever be reimagined in as many different ways as the final frontier has been. Yet Star Trek is hardly mentioned whenever the topic of Hollywood’s most dominant franchises arises. 

While Star Wars may boast the bigger overall ceiling and The Mandalorian remains the gold standard for streaming IP, the first four days of Paramount+’s second season of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds holds its own amongst some of the most popular titles and brands in TV. At 45.0x more in demand than the average series in that span, Strange New Worlds is easily going toe-to-toe with the same stretch of Marvel's She-Hulk: Attorney at Law, Yellowstone and The Boys. These are tentpole brands and series for rival services. That’s no small feat in today's genre-heavy entertainment arena. 

Strange New Worlds isn’t the only Star Trek series arguably punching above its weight. The final season of Picard, which served as an expertly coordinated reunion for The Next Generation with warp drives fueled by well-executed nostalgia, was the 17th most in-demand TV series in the US during its February-April run. Star Trek: Discovery will soon conclude a five season run in which it has ranked among the top 2.7% of all series in the US in demand since premiering in 2017. In fact, the Star Trek franchise accounted for 32.4% of Paramount+’s audience demand in the US throughout 2022. 

Few brands emerge as such reliable anchors for audience attraction as Star Trek. While its big screen fortunes may have never approached the billion dollar heights of Marvel, DC, Star Wars or Lord of the Rings, its ability to remain relevant and attractive to audiences across decades continues to boost Paramount+.