A New Star Trek Animated Series Is Streaming For Free, And It Raises All Kinds Of Questions

On September 8, 2025, a new "Star Trek" series launched, and no one noticed. There were no previews, no ads, and only a very, very brief mention of it way, way at the bottom of a Paramount press release. The show is not available on Paramount+, where most of the "Star Trek" franchise lives, nor has it been licensed to Netflix (the way "Star Trek: Prodigy" was). It can only be found on YouTube. But even then, it's not on the official YouTube "Star Trek" channel, nor does it have a channel of its own. Rather, it exists on the YouTube channel for the Canadian animated series "Blaze and the Monster Machines," a show about anthropomorphic monster trucks who solve math problems.

The series is "Star Trek: Scouts," and it's the strangest thing to ever enter the franchise. And this is a property that already included a musical episode.

"Star Trek: Scouts" is an animated series for toddlers. Its character design is round and approachable, and the "Star Trek" gadgets are all colorful and kid-friendly, looking like Fisher Price toys. Each episode is only about four minutes long, and the conflicts are of the gentlest nature. The main characters are three five-year-olds who live in some kind of planet-bound observation station and have been left to operate it, unattended. They have three pets, including a Klingon targ named Bubbles, a horned dog named Zips, and a turtle-like creature named Star. The animals resemble the big-eyed stuffies put out by Ty Toys.

JR seems to be the captain of the three kids, as he wears the red command uniform and sits in a captain's chair. He looks like a Kindergarten version of Chris Pine. Roo is the science officer, and she seems to be the one who activates all the machines. Finally, Sprocket is a Vulcan engineer with a bionic arm. He doesn't behave particularly Vulcan, other than to be the most scientifically curious. When Bubbles belches up her macaroni and cheese, he's the one to sniff it out of curiosity.

Episodes of "Star Trek: Scouts" begin and end with the slogan "Discover, Grow, and Boldly Go," implying that it's meant to be an educational series. While an educational "Star Trek" show for kids about the basics of astronomy would have been a fine idea, the series itself is disappointingly frivolous. In the first episode, an asteroid is hurtling straight for the characters' station. The asteroid resembles a bar of soap. The three kids have four items they can transport into the soap's asteroid's path, and the show stops while an off-screen narrator spins a wheel to choose which item will be jettisoned. The Romulan rubber ducky doesn't work, and the targ eats the mac'n'cheese, so the characters go with option #3: a tub of water. The asteroid becomes bubbles, and the station is saved.

In the second episode, the same crisis is repeated, only this time the asteroid is a giant meatball. It's defeated with a fork of spaghetti. Each time JR launches an attack, he says his catchphrase, "It's asteroid-blasting time." As mentioned, each episode is only four minutes, so there's not a lot else to explore.

It's important not to delve too deeply into a show like "Star Trek: Scouts," as it is meant for pre-schoolers. It's bright, chipper, playful, and bland. "Scouts" is wholly appropriate for really little kids and has no connection whatsoever to the franchise's greater lore other than some iconography and proper nouns. As far as I can tell, "Scouts" is a series about three five-year-olds who have been left unattended in a holodeck, tasked with entertaining themselves in a make-believe "Star Trek" office. Perhaps their parents are Starfleet officers and were too busy to find daycare.

Fans of "Blaze and the Monster Machines" might dig "Scouts." It's not quite as high-octane or toyetic as "Paw Patrol," and it features no villains; Admiral Humdinger is nowhere in sight. (Although, what's Oscar Isaac up to?) More characters may be introduced later in the series, but only two episodes are currently available.

Still, the introduction of a "Star Trek" show for toddlers raises some concerns about the property as a whole. The "Star Trek" franchise is certainly pliable, of course. Many Trekkies may recall watching a "Star Trek" series in their early years, so making a "Star Trek" show that can be enjoyed by children is not an issue. Heck, I was watching "Star Trek: The Original Series" reruns at age six or seven. But at the same time, it suggests the property at large no longer has a sense of direction. "Star Trek: Scouts" exists in the same universe as the ridiculous, violent action movie "Star Trek: Section 31" that released back in January. It's also part of the same franchise that gave us the 2009 "Star Trek" film and the Dominion War on "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine."

This means that the "Star Trek" property has entered that dangerous commercial headspace where it is trying to be all things to all people. The current handlers of the franchise want to create a "Star Trek" project for every demographic, turning it into a Swiss Army knife of entertainment. If you want sex and violence, watch "Star Trek: Discovery." If you want snuggly blue pigs burping bubbles, watch "Scouts." And when a franchise tries to be all things to all people, it also tends to lose its shape, direction, tone, or central message. It instead becomes a merchandise empire or a business model. The "Star Trek" property, for the most part, has long held on to an underlying notion of utopian ideals, all told through a peaceful military-like organization and the miraculous ships they operate. What's the message with "Scouts?" Is there one?

The show talks about discovering and growing, but the stories about meatball asteroids kind of undercut that thesis.

Ultimately, though, the current handlers of the "Star Trek" franchise want it to be something else. First, they took an ordinarily stuffy, thoughtful, philosophical property and layered in lots of firefights and death, turning many of its new shows into action series. But now, with "Scouts," they only seem to be making creative decisions for mercenary, commercial purposes.