According to a report posted at British SF site the SFX Network, one of their spies at Paramount has reported that preparations for Series V could kick into high gear as soon as next week.

According to the site, payroll for staff on the series will start on the 19th of February, even though that is also the President's Day holiday in the US. If true, this would mean development for the new series is now truly underway, as otherwise Paramount would not give it such an official status already. SFX is also reporting that space for the show is now being found on the "previously-thought-unavailable backlot" at Paramount, though it isn't clear why Series V wouldn't just take over the space used by Voyager now.

The original SFX report can be found here. As usual, please be aware that nothing of the above has been confirmed by Paramount, and it certainly shouldn't be regarded as official information on the next show.

Fortunately, some official information is also available, as Voyager's Delights has re-printed an interview with Star Trek Executive Producer Rick Berman.

"The studio has read two drafts of the script, and they are extremely excited," said Rick in the interview. "I would like to think that we would be getting involved in the pilot in March or April, but there's no way of knowing because of not really being certain how the studio is going to position itself vis-a-vis the strikes. And there are decisions about where it's going to end up - whether it's going to be on UPN, or whether it's going to live elsewhere - which are all in the hands of the executives at Paramount Television. When we're going to begin casting and pre-production is anybody's guess, but we are right now doing some design research, and unless the strikes prohibit it I'm pretty sure that the show is targeted for fall 2001."

Though the series is now apparently getting so close, Berman still wouldn't divulge much about what the series actually is about. When asked about the 'Birth of the Federation' rumour, he said, "I don't even want to comment on that! Nobody knows what this is about, except for a handful of people, and the concept has luckily not reached the Internet yet."

Still, he did provide a bit of general info on the series, saying it will include both "aliens that we have come to know and love" and "wonderful new aliens", and of course again saying the new show will be "dramatically different" from the previous shows, while still being Star Trek at the core. Click here to read it all.

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