Remembering Manny Coto, 1961 – 2023

StarTrek.com is deeply saddened to report the passing of the Emmy Award-winning writer/producer/director Manny Coto, who passed away on July 9, 2023, at the age of 62.

Fans of Star Trek knew him best for penning several episodes for the third season of Star Trek: Enterprise, before assuming the role of showrunner for the series’ fourth and final season. Coto wrote or co-wrote the stories/teleplays for 14 episodes across both seasons. The series’ fourth year was widely considered its best, reinvigorating the fanbase.

Born June 10, 1961, in Havana, Cuba, Coto’s love of Star Trek: The Original Series would lead him to pursue a career in Hollywood, with his earliest works spanning the realm of science fiction and horror, including Alfred Hitcock Presents, Tales from the Crypt, and The Outer Limits. Prior to his work on Star Trek: Enterprise, he created, wrote, and directed the series Odyssey 5. Coto’s most notable works includes 24, Dexter, 24: Legacy, American Horror Stories, and American Horror Story.

Speaking to StarTrek.com in 2014, as a lifelong Star Trek fan, Coto recalled his personal mission following Brannon Braga and Rick Berman’s promotion of him to executive producer for the fourth season, “I wanted to tell more complex stories. One of the first things I wanted to do was tell stories in three-episode arcs where we could actually create little min-feature films…. And I wanted to tell more sweeping tales that tied into The Original Series because Enterprise was a prequel and I felt that, at a certain point, the show should begin to tack towards things that we remembered from The Original Series. I thought it would be nice and fun and tremendously rich to explore facets of The Original Series and of the Star Trek universe that were there but had not been fleshed out.”

In the same interview, Coto regarded his first work with the franchise, the episode “Similitude,” with pride, “I thought it presented a fascinating dilemma and a great opportunity for drama. Also, that was very sentimental for me because if was the first episode of Star Trek that I’d written, and I was very pleased with the way it came out. The entire experience on that was incredibly magical.”

The entire Star Trek family sends their condolences to Coto’s family, friends, loved ones, and fans around the world.