Star Trek: Starfleet Academy lands on Paramount+ this week, the marquee arrival in a two-week stretch that also handed Netflix another Harlan Coben adaptation and gave HBO Max an A24 comedy that mostly did not land.
Between June 12 and 19, the major platforms added a broad slate. Paramount+'s Starfleet Academy takes the franchise back to school, with Holly Hunter as a starship captain and Paul Giamatti as a space pirate villain named Nus Braka, blending teen drama with science fiction in a mix the franchise has not tried before. Netflix added a fifth season of Sweet Magnolias, a true crime documentary called Maternal Instinct, the Mexican stop-motion film I Am Frankelda, and Sam Worthington in I Will Find You, a Coben adaptation described as addictive and ridiculous in equal measure. HBO Max debuted How to Make a Killing, an A24 remake of a 1949 British film with Glen Powell as a charming heir working his way up the inheritance line by eliminating the competition. Critics called it more bland than funny.
Starfleet Academy is Paramount+'s clearest push to widen Trek's audience beyond existing fans, pairing franchise brand equity with prestige casting as a hedge against limited reach. If it works, it becomes a template for a platform that has leaned heavily on one property. Netflix's Coben pipeline requires no such strategic justification. The books sell, the adaptations get watched, and the algorithm is satisfied.
Andrew Scott also appears this week as the Scottish meteorologist who helped plan D-Day in Pressure, which at least one reviewer compared to Conclave. Setting that expectation in writing seems optimistic.