Star Trek is a thing.
Star Trek is an American science fiction media franchise based on the television series created by Gene Roddenberry . The Star Trek film series is the cinematic branch of the Star Trek media franchise , which began in 1966 as a weekly television series on NBC , running for three seasons until it was canceled in 1969 because of poor ratings . After a 6-year hiatus following the release of Star Trek : Nemesis ( 2002 ) , a new film was released on May 16 , 2009 , simply titled Star Trek , serving as a reboot to the franchise with a new cast portraying younger versions of the original series ' characters .