Star Trek: Picard Season 3 Teaser: The Final Season Brings Back Familiar Faces

"Star Trek: Picard" has dropped the trailer for its third and final season, which will bring an end to the Paramount+ adventures of Patrick Stewart's beloved character, Jean-Luc Picard — at least until they decide to digitally recreate his face by superimposing it over that of a mo-cap performer.

Actually, that's "Star Wars" that does that, not so much "Star Trek." Either way, Stewart is now 82 years young, and considering the fact that he will have played this character across a whopping ten seasons of television and four films when all is said and done, no one can fault him for wanting to retire from the role and go spend time in his vineyard. Stewart and producer Akiva Goldsman have confirmed that he will do just that (minus the vineyard part, most likely), with "Picard" season 3 putting a cap on his voyages through space and time on the USS Enterprise and other starships.

The first time we said goodbye to Jean-Luc, it was on television in the series finale of "Star Trek: The Next Generation" in May 1994. The title of the episode, "All Good Things," was a nod to the idea that all good things must come to an end. Depending on how you feel about three of the four "Next Generation" movies that followed (all except "First Contact," which usually ranks high on the list of best "Star Trek" films) as well as the first two seasons of "Picard," maybe all good things Jean-Luc-related already did come to an end back in 1996 (or thereabouts).

Those less cynical and more hopeful and humanistic about the past and future of "Star Trek," per the franchise ethos, will definitely want to check out the "Picard" season 3 trailer below.

The second season of "Picard" just concluded this May "with the clumsy agility of a gazelle on NyQuil," according to our spoiler review. However, Stewart's co-star, Jeri Ryan, who reprised her "Star Trek: Voyager" role as Seven of Nine in "Picard" season 2, revealed on social media in March that the show had already wrapped production on its third season. A teaser trailer in April unveiled Levar Burton, Michael Dorn, Jonathan Frakes, Gates McFadden, Marina Sirtis, and Brent Spiner as names who are "joining the cast for season 3," making it a full-on "Star Trek: The Next Generation" reunion.

I'm behind on "Picard" and haven't seen season 2 yet, but I've heard mixed things about it compared to "Strange New Worlds," which ran off with all the buzz this year. We're getting to the point now where there are so many "Star Trek" shows amid the flood of other streaming titles in the Peak TV era that it seems impossible to keep up with them all unless you're a hardcore Trekkie. One thing that might make "Picard" less daunting to catch up on in the future compared to other "Trek" shows is that it will require less of a time commitment overall, since it's going out after three seasons — just like the original "Star Trek" series back in the 1960s.