‘Star Trek: Discovery’ Showrunners Leave CBS All Access Series

CBS All Access series Star Trek: Discovery suffered a red alert earlier today with the exit of two showrunners, Aaron Harberts and Gretchen J. Berg, who also served as executive producers.

The report comes from Variety, who first broke the news and confirmed that Executive Producer and co-creator Alex Kurtzman will be taking over the vacant position.

Variety went on to say that a CBS Television Studios spokesperson said:

“We’ve made some producer changes at Star Trek: Discovery. The series continues under the creative vision and leadership of executive producer and co-creator Alex Kurtzman. ‘Discovery’ remains on course for season two in 2019 with new and continuing stories that build on its successful premiere season.”

The Hollywood Reporter claims the pair were fired by CBS, as well as the information that Akiva Goldsman, “right-hand man” to Kurtzman, is also not returning.

THR goes on to say that Star Trek: Discovery is nearing a “planned production hiatus after episode five” of the next season, which was obviously already on the slate. But then continue, saying that:

“insiders also stress that Berg and Harberts became increasingly abusive to the Discovery writing staff, with the latter said to have leaned across the writers’ room table while shouting an expletive at a member of the show’s staff.

Multiple writers are said to have been uncomfortable working on the series and had threatened to file a complaint with human resources or quit the series altogether before informing Kurtzman of the issues surrounding Berg and Harberts. After hearing rumors of HR complaints, Harberts is said to have threatened the staff to keep concerns with the production an internal matter.”

Rumors have abounded for some time that budget woes were a tribble-like plague for the series, second only to the Klingons in terms of possible disruption of daily Federation activities.

Deadline cites ‘operational issues’ more than creative problems, but all outlets seem to agree that something just wasn’t clicking.

Star Trek: Discovery is expected to return for season 2 sometime in 2019..