| Season Number: | 3 |
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| Network: | Paramount+ |
| Episode List: | List of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds episodes |
The third season of the American television series follows Captain Christopher Pike and the crew of the starship Enterprise in the 23rd century as they explore new worlds and carry out missions throughout the galaxy during the decade before . The season is produced by CBS Studios in association with Secret Hideout, Weed Road Pictures, H M R X Productions, and Roddenberry Entertainment, with Akiva Goldsman and Henry Alonso Myers serving as showrunners.
Anson Mount, Ethan Peck, and Rebecca Romijn respectively star as Pike, Spock, and Number One, along with Jess Bush, Christina Chong, Celia Rose Gooding, Melissa Navia, Babs Olusanmokun, and Martin Quinn. Planning for a third season of Strange New Worlds began by June 2022, and it was officially announced in March 2023 ahead of an intended filming start that May. Production was delayed by the 2023 Hollywood labor disputes and instead started in December 2023. Filming took place at CBS Stages Canada in Mississauga, Ontario, until May 2024. The showrunners continued the series' episodic storytelling approach, giving each episode a different genre and tone. Many of the regular actors and several guest stars portray younger versions of characters from The Original Series in the season.
The season is expected to premiere on the streaming service Paramount+ in 2025, and run for 10 episodes. A fourth season was ordered in April 2024.
In June 2022, during the airing of first season and the filming of its second season, co-star Melissa Navia said discussions about a third season had begun. Co-showrunner Henry Alonso Myers confirmed this a month later, explaining that the third season had not been officially ordered yet but the crew had begun planning for it due to the amount of time needed to complete scripts and prepare the series' sets and virtual production technology. He added that the third season was "definitely the next thing in line". In August, CBS Entertainment CEO George Cheeks highlighted the critical and viewership success of the first season and said they were "just getting started" with the series, suggesting that it would continue beyond the second season. Co-showrunner Akiva Goldsman revealed in March 2023 that filming for the third season was about to begin, and Paramount+ officially announced the 10-episode season order a week later. However, filming was delayed indefinitely due to the 2023 Writers Guild of America strike which started on May 2.
During the Writers Guild strike and concurrent 2023 SAG-AFTRA strike, producing director Chris Fisher and the series' Toronto-based producers developed a rolling plan that would allow production on the season to begin within a few weeks of both strikes ending. Pre-production on the season resumed on November 13 after the Writers Guild strike ended in September and the SAG-AFTRA strike ended in early November.
Goldsman said the series would continue to "genre hop" with each episode in the third season, and the writers had settled on the 10 episode ideas for the season before the Writers Guild strike began in May 2023. The season includes several ideas that could not be used in the second season due to the 10 episodes-per-season limit. Myers said the delay caused by the strikes could lead to some changes being made to their plans, including for how they intended to resolve the second season's cliffhanger ending. The season includes a murder mystery episode.
Anson Mount, Ethan Peck, and Rebecca Romijn star in the series as Captain Christopher Pike, science officer Spock, and first officer Una Chin-Riley / Number One, respectively. Also starring are Jess Bush as nurse Christine Chapel, Christina Chong as chief security officer La'an Noonien-Singh, Celia Rose Gooding as Ensign Nyota Uhura, Melissa Navia as helmsman Erica Ortegas, and Babs Olusanmokun as Dr. Joseph M'Benga. Following the second-season finale, the showrunners said Martin Quinn would return as engineer Montgomery Scott after he was introduced in that episode, and Quinn was made a series regular for the third season.
Paul Wesley, who replaced The Original Series star William Shatner as James T. Kirk for the series, said in February 2024 that he would again have a recurring role in the third season. That July, Carol Kane was confirmed to be reprising her role as Pelia from the second season, while Cillian O'Sullivan was announced to have a recurring role as Roger Korby, who was portrayed by Michael Strong in The Original Series.
Pre-production work designing for the series' virtual technology, which is used to display digital backgrounds on an LED video wall during filming, had been completed for the first seven episodes when production was delayed by the Writers Guild strike. Fisher said the crew had become confident with using the technology during the second season and would use it for every episode of the third. A new science lab set was built for the season that has a transparent floor, revealing a pool of swirling water under the central workbench.
Before the Writers Guild strike began, filming was expected to take place from May 2 to September 28, 2023, at CBS Stages Canada in Mississauga, Ontario, under the working title Lily and Isaac. Fisher had storyboarded the first episode and the cast was one day away from flying to Canada for filming when production was delayed. Cast and crew began moving to Toronto when pre-production restarted in November 2023.
Filming began on December 11, 2023, with Fisher directing the first episode. Following a break for the Christmas and New Years holidays, filming resumed in the second week of January. Filming for the second episode, directed by Jordan Canning, ended on January 24. Frequent Star Trek director Jonathan Frakes helmed the murder mystery episode, and was filming it in early February. Dan Liu also directed an episode. Valerie Weiss started directing an episode on March 7, and Sharon Lewis directed the seventh episode which was filmed from March 20 to April 10. Canning returned to direct the eighth episode, which completed filming by April 25. Andrew Coutts, an editor on the series, made his directorial debut with the ninth episode which had begun filming by then, while Maja Vrvilo was preparing to direct the season finale. Filming for the finale episode was completed in May along with additional filming for earlier episodes. Frakes returned for additional filming on his episode in the week of May 13. Mount announced that filming for the season wrapped on May 24.
Kurtzman, Goldsman, Myers, Romijn, and Peck promoted the season during a "Star Trek Universe" panel at San Diego Comic-Con in July 2024. A first-look clip from the season was shown and the casting of O'Sullivan as Roger Korby was announced. Gizmodo listed the series as one of five "losers" at the convention, criticizing the comedic clip that was shown as an awkward first impression of the season.
The season is expected to premiere in 2025 on the streaming service Paramount+ in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Latin America, Australia, South Korea, Italy, France, Germany, Switzerland, and Austria. It will run for 10 episodes. The series is released in New Zealand on TVNZ, in India on Voot, and in other European countries on SkyShowtime (a combination of Paramount+ and the streaming service Peacock).