To put it lightly, this has been a very busy week for Magic: The Gathering. Despite players being busy digesting The Hobbit spoilers and gearing up for prereleases, there was an avalanche of new reveals. Not only were the new cards from Mystery Booster Commander Edition shown off, but Star Trek cards popped up out of nowhere, too.
Considering Wizards aims to slow down the MTG release schedule in 2026, this unexpected bombardment has unsurprisingly annoyed players. It seems the reaction was so severe, in fact, that MTG Designer Gavin Verhey had to release a video explaining the situation. While this has helped to quell some fears, it’s also revealed that we’re not quite done with Star Trek, either.
It Just Makes Sense
Given that prereleases for The Hobbit start today, many MTG players were wondering why Star Trek was even being discussed. This set isn’t even the next one to be released, after all, as we’ve got Reality Fracture in October next. With Star Trek not scheduled to be released until November 13th, calling these reveals early is an understatement.
As Gavin Verhey explains in his video, however, these cards were revealed because the Trek to Vegas convention is happening this week. With Magic: The Gathering sponsoring this Star Trek convention, Wizards wanted to give fans a proper taste of MTG. Subsequently, they brought the welcome decks to the event, encouraging would-be players to try out playing Magic.
Since it made sense to bring these decks, Wizards felt it was best to reveal them officially, too. Verhey noted that it would be great to have everyone at Trek to Vegas bound to secrecy, but realistically, that’s just not viable. As such, showing off the cards properly felt like the best call to avoid all the scuffed images that would otherwise flood social media.
While this did feel like the best call, Verhey did mention that the timing of this announcement wasn’t perfect. Even with MTG sponsoring the event, they couldn’t change when Trek to Vegas was happening. Thankfully, spoiler overlaps like this shouldn’t happen very often; however, Star Trek isn’t finished quite yet.
According to Gavin Verhey, Wizards is going to reveal even more Star Trek spoilers this Sunday at Trek to Vegas. Thankfully, for anyone drowning in all the spoilers, Wizards should only be revealing “a few” cards here. After that, we’ll supposedly be back to our regularly scheduled programming, with no new Star Trek cards until much closer to release.
The Universes Beyond of it All
As much as it makes sense for Wizards to reveal these Star Trek cards when they did, many MTG players still aren’t happy about it. On Reddit, for instance, there were tons of disgruntled players who didn’t accept Verhey’s explanation. While some of this is to be expected, as some players do just love complaining, these reveals hardly painted Star Trek in the best light.
Not only were the newly revealed Star Trek cards weak across the board, but they’re up against incredibly strong competition. With some of the best deep-cut flavor we’ve had in years, any Universes Beyond set would struggle against Mystery Booster Commander Edition. The fact that Star Trek has some ludicrous card names like Khaaaaaaaaaaaannn! certainly doesn’t help it be received any better.
While it’s easy to get uppity about this set and its unusual names, this is classic Universes Beyond. Unless it’s your favorite property getting a crossover set, every reference feels gaudy and out of place. For fans of the franchise, however, these cards often feel like a love letter and are hugely well received.
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