Uhura joins Captain Pike, science officer Spock and Number One on the USS Enterprise’s latest mission
Picking up after the events of Star Trek: Discovery season 2, new spin-off series Star Trek: Strange New Worlds will follow the missions of Captain Christopher Pike, Lt Spock and Number One on board the USS Enterprise – a decade or so before Kirk takes the helm for the famous five-year mission of the original series. As well as appearing in Discovery, Pike, Spock and Number One all date back to the earliest days of boldly going in the 1960s, having appeared in original unaired Star Trek pilot ‘The Cage’. While their names are familiar, however, we know little about their pre-Kirk exploits. Indeed, as executive producer Alex Kurtzman told StarTrek.com when Star Trek: Strange New Worlds was announced in May 2020: “These iconic characters have a deep history in Star Trek canon, yet so much of their stories have yet to be told. The Enterprise, its crew and its fans are in for an extraordinary journey to new frontiers in the Star Trek universe.” The Star Trek Day event on September 8,2021, revealed that they’ll be joined on their adventures by other familiar faces from the 1960s, including Nurse Chapel, Dr M’Benga and – most excitingly of all – the legendary Uhura, who’ll be a cadet on the Enterprise in this prequel to the original series. Another member of the crew, La’an Noonien-Singh, has a surname with special resonance for Star Trek fans… While plot specifics are currently scarce, the writers are promising a more episodic approach to storytelling than we’ve seen in the show’s more serialised stablemates, Discovery and Picard. So, with principal photography now wrapped and a likely 2022 airdate, here’s everything we know so far about Star Trek: Strange New Worlds. What is it? A Star Trek: Discovery spin-off following the adventures of Captain Christopher Pike, Science Officer Spock and first officer Number One on the USS Enterprise, a decade before James T Kirk takes command. Release date: Star Trek: Strange New Worlds is expected to release some time in 2022 – we’d guess at a spring debut, after Star Trek: Discovery season 4 and Star Trek: Picard season 2 have aired. Cast: Alongside its familiar trio of lead characters (still played by Discovery’s Anson Mount, Ethan Peck and Rebecca Romijn), six new crew members will be taking their places on the Enterprise bridge. Read more about them below. Having been held up by coronavirus delays, Star Trek: Strange New Worlds belatedly went into production in Toronto in March 2021. According to the City of Toronto website, the season will run for 10 episodes. Star Anson Mount later revealed that filming wrapped up in late July 2021, with some reshoots still planned. Paramount Plus is yet to confirm a launch date, but seeing as Trek shows are traditionally effects-heavy and require a long time in post-production, we don’t expect the Star Trek: Strange New Worlds release date to come before 2022. In fact, now that Star Trek Day has confirmed that Star Trek: Discovery season 4 will debut on November 18,2021, and that Star Trek: Picard season 2 will leave Spacedock in February 2022, we don’t think we’ll see Star Trek: Strange New Worlds until May 2022. That’s simply because the streaming service is unlikely to have two shows from its flagship Star Trek franchise airing simultaneously – instead, they’ll probably air the three shows one after the other. While we know Strange New Worlds will stream on Paramount Plus in the US, it may vary depending on where you are. The streamer is set to launch in the UK in 2022 – we’d expect to see Strange New Worlds appearing on there, especially if existing contracts mean Discovery and Picard have to stay on Netflix and Amazon Prime Video, respectively. Disappointingly, we didn’t get a full Star Trek: Strange New Worlds trailer at Star Trek Day.
