Season 1 of Star Trek: Discovery didn’t feature any of the franchise’s most iconic characters, but it did hint at some connections with them through Lieutenant Michael Burnham, who was revealed to be the hitherto-unknown adoptive human sister of Spock. Now, season 2’s going to bring the Vulcan on board the U.S.S. Discovery, with Ethan Peck set to be the third actor to play the Enterprise’s science officer.
He’ll soon be introduced to Trekkies as the fresh-faced Spock of CBS’ hit show and frankly, we couldn’t be more excited. The world-famous Vulcan is the kind of character who transcends Star Trek to become something else entirely – a legend – and it seems that season 2 of Discovery will tell us the unwritten chapter of his story.
Speaking at a panel during New York Comic Con, showrunner Alex Kurtzman explained that the Spock we’re about to see is not the Spock we know from The Original Series.
“What gets me so excited about the story that we get to tell with Spock this season is that it’s the unwritten chapter of Spock. This is not the Spock that you know from the beginning of TOS, this is pre-TOS. He is not that formed Vulcan yet. His experience with the Red Angel and the signals has fried his logical brain. He cannot make sense of it.
And he is emotionally ill-equipped to deal with it. So both logic and emotion are failing him, totally. And he is totally unsure of himself and trying to figure out how to make sense of the mystery and where he fits into the world. And it’s through his complicated relationship with his sister that he’s able to figure out how to become and actualize himself as the Spock that we know from TOS. And that’s really exciting to us because it in no way violates canon, it just builds on what’s been set before.”
Continuing on, Kurtzman also touched on how this next run of Discovery will tie in with “The Cage,” which was the pilot for The Original Series.
“We are going to bring everything into alignment at the end of the season, and ‘The Cage’ will be touched on, but in ways that I think are hopefully surprising and unexpected. I think one of the things that I’ve really enjoyed in my time working on Star Trek is looking at stories that have been told but then really examining them for the gray areas, the areas where certain things can be filled in or built on, without violating canon. So that’s a big part of what we’re doing this season.”
Of course, other Trek canon connections that fans can look forward to this year include the arrival of Anson Mount’s Captain Pike and Rebecca Romijn’s Number One, who both featured in “The Cage.” Kurtzman has teased that’s just the beginning of the classic characters making their way to Star Trek: Discovery this season, too, so be sure to keep your eyes open for more when it returns to our screens in January 2019.
