It turns out a dream crossover between two of sci-fi's most iconic franchises very nearly became a reality. In a recent interview, Star Trek: Strange New Worlds co-showrunners Akiva Goldsman and Henry Alonso Myers have revealed that discussions about a Doctor Who and Star Trek mashup took place.
Talking to Awards Radar (via SFFGazette.com), Goldsman confirmed that he, Myers, and former Doctor Who showrunner Russell T Davies went back and forth on the idea for a significant period, only for it to ultimately never come to fruition.
"We were trying with Russell to do a crossover," Goldsman explained. "We were for years. Again, these are the near misses, but we got not unclose and we had some really cool conversations about it. And so, certainly in our view, I mean, Pelia traveled in the TARDIS. Why not?"
While we don't know how close this Star Trek/Doctor Who event actually came to happening, the idea clearly excited those on both sides.
The notion of blending the Star Trek universe with the timey-wimey chaos of Doctor Who is undeniably enticing, so why didn't it get any further than these discussions? For starters, any such crossover is likely to have been bogged down in complicated rights issues had it got any further than these talks, with Disney+—which funded Davies' last stint in the TARDIS—no doubt uninterested in teaming with a rival streamer.
Of course, hints of an overlap between the two franchises have already made their way into Strange New Worlds. In the 2025 season finale, titled "New Life and New Civilizations," chief engineer Pelia (Carol Kane) casually references a long history of time-travelling adventures involving a "certain" Doctor, strongly implying that she's crossed paths with the Time Lord.
Myers said of the long-lived Lanthanite, "Long history. She’s done many things. She’s had many adventures," with Goldsman adding, "That’s right," when the idea of Starfleet existing within the Whoniverse was put to the duo.
It's worth noting that, in the episode titled "The Sehlat Who Ate Its Tail," the Doctor’s TARDIS is shown trapped alongside the USS Enterprise within a star-consuming entity. It was only a playful Easter Egg for eagle-eyed fans, but enough to tease us with what might have been. The divisive "Space Babies" episode also referenced the Star Trek franchise.
While no live-action crossover has ever materialised, the franchises have technically crossed paths in another form. In July 2024, at San Diego Comic-Con's "Intergalactic Friendship Day" panel, Davies and Kurtzman announced two official mobile game crossovers produced by East Side Games, marking the first sanctioned collaboration between the two sci-fi giants.
Alas, with Doctor Who now put out to tender and set to be on the shelf for the foreseeable future, a crossover isn't likely. At the same time, Paramount is looking to wrap up Star Trek's time on streaming, bringing it back to theaters and ending Kurtzman's time in charge of the property.