Former Star Trek executive producer Rick Berman said that he is having a hard time saying farewell to the franchise for which he worked for nearly 20 years, though he also felt some relief after passing the franchise to J.J. Abrams.

"I'm not going to say never, but I assume that I have produced my last Star Trek, especially with the interest that Paramount has gotten from J.J. Abrams to do another movie," Berman told Star Trek Magazine (via Sci Fi Pulse). He expected that if Star Trek XI became successful, Abrams would likely end up in charge of a new Star Trek television franchise.

Involved for nearly two decades with the spinoffs from the original series, Berman was unhappy about Enterprise's premature cancellation but remains very proud of his work. "We created 624 hours of television and four feature films and I think we did a hell of a job," he stated. "I'm amazed that we managed to get 18 years of the kind of work that everyone involved managed to contribute to, and its certainly more than anyone could have asked for."

Though he is working on other projects for Paramount, including "a number of shows...that have slight elements of the supernatural or science fiction, but none of them have spaceships", Berman admits that saying farewell to Star Trek is "not an easy task...on the other hand, I have nothing to be ashamed about."

The full interview with Berman can be found in the most recent Star Trek Magazine. These excerpts are from Sci Fi Pulse.

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