Star Trek: 10 Controversies Behind Discovery’s Troubled Early Seasons

Following Bryan Fuller's dismissal from Star Trek: Discovery in the Fall of 2016, CBS hired Gretchen J. Berg and Aaron Harberts (who had previously collaborated with Fuller on Wonderfalls and Pushing Daisies) to keep the show moving forward. Despite their close association with him, Berg and Harberts nevertheless dumped many of Fuller's concepts and production design choices and moved away from Fuller's "more heavily allegorical and complex storyline" ideas.

However even under his leadership, what became Star Trek: Discovery was never Bryan Fuller's favored approach. According to Entertainment Weekly:

The Hannibal and Pushing Daisies showrunner initially wasn’t envisioning a single Trek series, but multiple serialized anthology shows that would begin with Star Trek: Discovery (a prequel to Star Trek: The Original Series), journey through the eras of Captain James T. Kirk and Captain Jean Luc Picard, and then go beyond to a time in Trek that’s never been seen before.

Fuller himself described his original vision as doing "for science-fiction what American Horror Story had done for horror. It would platform a universe of Star Trek shows."

CBS likely shot Fuller's anthology concept down simply due to the expense, an issue that cropped up later when Fuller and the network battled over Discovery's massive per episode budget.

Still, in hindsight, Fuller's concept isn't unlike how the franchise has unfolded in the intervening years, with the various spin-offs characterized by their varying tonal approaches and settings under the now trademarked "Star Trek Universe" umbrella.