Summary

Collider’s Steve Weintraub talks with Star Trek: Starfleet Academy co-showrunner Noga Landau for an early screening of Episode 1, “Kids These Days.”

Landau discusses her connection to Star Trek, the legacy characters and nostalgia of Season 1, and how Holly Hunter and Paul Giamatti changed the show’s trajectory.

She also talks about what fans can expect going into Season 2 and more!

Following an advanced screening of Paramount+’s latest voyage into the final frontier, Star Trek: Starfleet Academy, Collider’s Steve Weintraub had the pleasure of moderating an exclusive Q&A with co-showrunner and lifelong Star Trek fan Noga Landau ahead of the series’ premiere, where fans got to see Episode 1, “Kids These Days,” in a theater before its official streaming debut. Alongside director and co-showrunner Alex Kurtzman, Landau is proudly ushering in what our own Samantha Coley calls “the best Star Trek series of the modern era,” and she couldn’t be more excited for longtime and new fans to see what the creators love so much about their newest addition to the Star Trek franchise. “I’ve only ever known how to make sense of the universe through the lens of Star Trek,” Landau says of this post-Burn 32nd-century series following a group of hopeful new students, guided by Starfleet’s best and brightest. Starfleet Academy picks up with the first crew of young cadets to grace the halls of the academy after over 120 years, led by Captain Nahla Ake, played by Academy Award winner Holly Hunter, who Landau calls a “genius” on set, “who brings creativity and specificity, and makes bold decisions.” The new generation consists of Genesis Lythe (Bella Shepard), SAM (Series Acclimation Mil), played by Kerrice Brooks, Darem Reymi (George Hawkins), a Khionian, Jay-Den Kraag (Karim Diane), a Klingon, and Tarima Sadal (Zoë Steiner), a Betazoid student. And woven into the intertwined romantic and emotional dynamics are the classic adventures and high-stakes Star Trek fans love about The Original Series and The Next Generation, as well as newer shows like Picard, with eccentric villains like Academy Award-nominated Paul Giamatti’s Nus Braka. In this conversation, which you can watch in the video above or read in the transcript below, Landau discusses all the nostalgia of Season 1, the characters we’ll follow, who we’ll be introduced to in the coming episodes, and which episode will give fans something they “have been waiting literally decades for.” She talks about bringing on stars like Hunter and Giamatti, and how the two of them changed the show for the better, as well as how certain characters changed from their original ideas, and what we can anticipate ahead of Season 2, which, at the time of filming, was only two episodes from wrapping.
Noga Landau Ranks Her Favorite Star Trek Shows

“I’ve only ever known how to make sense of the universe through the lens of Star Trek.”

Noga Landau speaking at the Star Trek: Starfleet Academy Q&A.Image via Trent Barboza

COLLIDER: I’ve got a million questions for you, but I really want to start with congratulations. So, I’m going to probably start with the most important question first, which is, how many times a day do people ask you if you’re related to Martin Landau? NOGA LANDAU: Well, everybody knows Martin is my father, and he raised me to love Star Trek. Or Space: 1999. LANDAU: If you ruin my internet legend that I’m Martin Landau’s daughter, I will never forgive you. It is completely untrue. I am not. There’s no relation. But in my real family, we like to joke that he’s like Cousin Martin. But no relation that I know of. How much do you consider yourself a Star Trek nerd or Star Trek fan? How deep do you go? LANDAU: I go very deep. My earliest memories — I must have been three or four — were sitting on the couch with my dad, watching Next Generation, and I was in love with Worf. He was my favorite. And to this day, I still have nightmares about Cardassians. Even though I now love Cardassians. But I don’t know what a world without Star Trek looks like. That’s the truth. I’ve only ever known Star Trek, and I’ve only ever known how to make sense of the universe through the lens of Star Trek. I asked this of Paul Giamatti. You’ve seen The Original Series? LANDAU: Not as much as the others. I blame my father, Martin, for it. He would always be like, “Okay, just don’t worry about this one. Wait for Captain Picard.” And I didn’t mean to, but he always raised me with this, like, “Just wait for Captain Picard” attitude. But then later in life, I really… I’m going to marry Spock. That’s my plan. My question is, you have The Original Series, you have Next Generation, and you have DS9. LANDAU: And Voyager. We can add Voyager in. How do you rank those shows? LANDAU: I’m sorry, TOS. It’s just that TOS didn’t raise me in the same way that the others did. I would say for me, it’s actually Voyager first, because of Kathryn Janeway. I just met Kate Mulgrew for the first time a couple of days ago, and, man, I was like an idiot. I just saw her on the red carpet, and I just held on to her. She’s a very dignified woman, and I was not dignified in the moment. But every time I’ve struggled in my life and every time I have needed answers in my life, I literally hear Captain Janeway’s voice in my head telling me what to do. So, Voyager is really important to me. Then next, this is awful because we do something so profound with DS9 in this show, so please, just hold my hand and trust me on this one, but for me, the ranking actually goes Next Gen and then DS9, and then TOS. By the way, there’s no wrong answer here. LANDAU: I think I just gave the wrong answer. No, I didn’t give Giamatti Voyager, I just had the first three, and he ranked it DS9, Next Gen, TOS. LANDAU: He did it correctly. He did it correctly.

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‘Starfleet Academy’s Paul Giamatti Ranks His Favorite Star Trek Shows: “Is That Crazy?”

The actor also reveals new details about Nus Braka, who he says is inspired by “old-school Star Trek villains.”

How the “Star Trek Girl” Became ‘Starfleet Academy’s Co-Showrunner

“There’s much voyaging and much exploration to come.”

Noga Landau speaking at the Star Trek: Starfleet Academy Q&A.Images via Trent Barboza

You never know how the show is going to be received when you’re working on something, but I believe you’re at 86% on Rotten Tomatoes, which is awesome to start a show off. What does it mean to you to have so many people, critics, being so high on the show? LANDAU: We’re in the middle of shooting Season 2 right now. We’re getting ready to shoot the last two episodes of Season 2, so there is a part of me that naturally wants to be like, “We did it! We’re so amazing! Celebrate us!” And then, of course, there’s a part of me that’s like, “Everybody, just hold steady. Keep going. Go to work every day. Push yourselves. Do your job.” I want to celebrate what our crew has done, what our actors have done, and what our writers have done, but I also don’t want to sit back and rest on our laurels. There’s much voyaging and much exploration to come. Talk a little bit about how you got involved in this. LANDAU: I’ve been lucky enough to be writing TV for years, and on every writers’ room I was in prior to this moment, all I did was talk about Star Trek. Every time I pitched a story, I was like, “Well, there’s this episode of Star Trek where they did…” and everything I’ve ever learned about storytelling, I learned from Star Trek. I was the Star Trek girl, and I probably annoyed everybody, but I don’t care. I never gave up. One day, I got a call from my agent, and he said, “They’re looking for a co-showrunner for Starfleet Academy, and they want to meet with you.” And I said, “That’s ridiculous, and I don’t want to do it.” I said no at first. I think it’s because when your lifelong dream just pops up one day, and you weren’t expecting it, I really freaked out. I was like, “I need to go to the field and tend my sheep. I cannot go to battle.” I was nuts. But they were very wise and patient, and they said, “Well, why don’t you just sit down and meet with the people? Why don’t you meet Alex Kurtzman and Aaron Baiers, who run Secret Hideout, and just look at them and see how you feel?” And the truth is that the second I saw them, and I saw the looks in their eyes, I knew I was going to make this show. I just knew it. It was an instant connection. You’re obviously introducing a whole new cast of students. How much did you guys debate how many quote-unquote students would be on the show, in terms of main players? LANDAU: It was really no debate whatsoever. It was always that core group of cadets. And if you keep watching, in Episode 2, there are even more new cast members who show up. I don’t want to spoil it, but it’s cool. It’s a species of Star Trek folks that you’ll be very excited to meet again. But I have to be honest, there’s only really one character iteration that shifted a lot. Initially, Lura Thock was two different characters. She was a cadet master. She was always half Jem’Hadar, half Klingon, and that was our cadet master. But then the number one of our ship was a totally different character, and I don’t want to say who we wanted to play him, because I actually want him to be on the show one day. So, I’m going to keep it a secret. But when push came to shove, we just realized that we weren’t going to have the bandwidth to really service this character the way that he would need to be serviced, and so we actually just merged the characters, and we made Lura both our cadet master and our number one, in the same way that Nahla is both our captain and our chancellor.
‘Starfleet Academy’ Takes a Page Out of ‘Deep Space Nine’s Book

“We really get into that classic episodic Trek feel.”

The cast of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine in a poster for the seriesImage via Paramount

We’ve all gone to school. Things change every year. New students come in, and some students leave. Real life happens. How much did you guys in the setup process say, “We want to make sure that there are students coming in and out every year,” and how much do you have to service the network who says, “We really like these five actors. They’re going to be on the show?” LANDAU: Well, we also happen to really like those five actors. We like them sticking around, as well. But without giving anything away, there are new characters who come in Season 1 and in Season 2 — new students. How does that work in terms of balancing? I’m not sure what the runtime is on the rest of the episodes, but assuming 50 to 60 minutes per episode, how much does that factor in when you only have so much screen time every season? LANDAU: That’s such a good question. I’ll tell you, as you get further into the series — I hope you all keep watching — you’ll see that we open with a bang, we open with a really fun action movie, basically, but as the show keeps going, we really get into that classic episodic Trek feel where this is Sam’s episode, this is Genesis’s episode, this is Darem’s episode, or we’re doing a two-hander now with a couple of cadets. The storytelling really does start to evoke the thing that we love most about classic Trek, while also building a serialized story over the course of the season that, in many ways, was really influenced by the storytelling style of DS9, where you had such amazing serialized stories that would take place over the course of many seasons, and you would just sit with those characters and learn from them and change with them. So, it’s a real hybrid in that sense. You obviously have a budget, and so this episode is very expensive. How much were you figuring out with Alex [Kurtzman], “So this is going to be where the transporter breaks, and we’re a flashlight episode,” figuring out where and when you can deploy those additional resources. Did you make conscious decisions to do it for the premiere, the finale, and maybe two other episodes that’ll go big, and bottle some of the others? LANDAU: I will answer several questions nested within that. The first is, I love that you think that this was super, super expensive. That’s what was our intention. We got very clever. I saw some people conjecturing online about what our budget is, and I was like, “Oh, I wish that was our budget.” So much of making Star Trek has always been, “We’ve got to get really clever because we don’t have as much as people think that we have.” That being said, we are so grateful for what we do have, and we squeeze out every penny that we can of it. I am not sure if this is an accurate statement, but is anybody here familiar with the term “bottle show?” Maybe you should explain it to people who don’t know. LANDAU: I would be happy to. Let’s pretend like it was invented on Star Trek, on TOS, which I don’t know if it actually was, but let’s just pretend that it was. That was the episodes that come up in the middle of a very long season, where suddenly the producers are like, “Oh shit, we’re out of money. What do we do?” And they’re like, “Okay, we’re just going to do a bottle episode. We’re going to do a ship in a bottle. Everyone’s just going to be on our sets. We’re not going anywhere. We just have to save our money and save money in all the various departments.” Star Trek has always been savvy about doing bottle shows, and we are no different than any other Star Trek show. We do a number of bottle shows, a number of very clever episodes that are driven not necessarily by huge spectacle, but by really fun, really cool Trek dilemmas, moral questions, crises that take place on the ship itself, and character moments between the people that we love.
‘Starfleet Academy’ Does Something Star Trek Fans Have Waited “Literally a Decade For”

“It’s going to really mean something for this fandom.”

Robert Picardo in ‘Star Trek: Starfleet Academy’Image via Paramount+

The first season is 10 episodes. Which is your favorite, or which is the one that you cannot wait for people to see, besides Episode 1? LANDAU: It’s 105. Is there a reason why? LANDAU: Yes. I’m not going to say anything. I really hope you all stick with us. At least get yourselves to 105, please, because we did something in 105 that I think people have been waiting, like, literally decades for, and you’ve all held your breath. When you finally get to see it, it’s going to really mean something for this fandom, and I’m so excited for everybody to see that episode. It’s a sequel to “The City on the Edge of Forever.” LANDAU: Yes! [Laughs] I got her to say it’s at least not that. So what do you think fans are going to say after they watch the season finale of Season 1? LANDAU: I hope they say, “Wow, I really want to keep going to Starfleet Academy,” because you all get to go to Starfleet Academy when you watch the show, but also, I hope they say, “I can’t wait for Season 2.” I think that the end of the season is really beautiful and really cathartic and really pays off a lot of threads. When you were making Season 1, did you know Season 2 was greenlit? When did you find out that Season 2 was greenlit? LANDAU: We were doing two seasons at once. I think we got greenlit for Season 2 when we were shooting. Gosh, I think we were shooting Episode 3 or 4. When you guys were first writing Season 1, how much did you and Alex, and whoever was writing, figure out, “Okay, if we get to make four seasons, this is our arc?” How much were you thinking about the full picture, and how much were you like, “We’ve just got to make the first season as awesome as it can be?” LANDAU: The truth is that we really have just taken it one season at a time, while also knowing the feelings and the arcs that we want to go to with our characters. I don’t want to give anything away. We don’t know exactly what’s going to happen in [Season] 3. We don’t know exactly what’s going to happen in [Season] 4, but I think that two seasons in, I can confidently say that we now are beginning to really know who these characters are and where their journeys could take them.
How Long Do We Have With Season 1’s Cadets?

“Anything can happen. It’s Star Trek.”

Jay-Den, Darem, Sam, Genesis and Sam smiling and walking together in their Starfleet uniforms.Image via Paramount+

How many years does a student go to Starfleet Academy for? LANDAU: Four. If the show is a hit and Paramount+ keeps making it, you get to Season 5, does that mean an all-new cast of the people that were in Season 1 would age out? LANDAU: If Alex were sitting here, he’d say, “Well, in Star Trek, things get really timey-wimey.” You never know when someone’s going to show up from the future or the past, or someone’s going to be 19 again, whatever. Anything can happen. It’s Star Trek. But I also think that, yes, new characters are coming in, so we all will take our time to fall in love with the younger people, the underclassmen who come in. A lot of shows have done this before. Friday Night Lights did it, went for a long time. You fall in love with the new folks and their relationships, but also, it’s very possible that a place like Starfleet Academy, a new ensign, would come back to teach a class, or to have an experience, or to be a bridge person. One of the strengths of a show, by introducing characters and removing characters, is that you form new relationships with different characters, and you open up new doors that would normally not be there. LANDAU: Totally. I agree with that. It’s like you know what happens on TV. What was the big lesson that you learned or the lessons you learned that really helped you with Season 2? LANDAU: God, so many. The first season of a TV show is like the first year of parenthood or the first couple of weeks of having a new puppy. You don’t know what hit you. You’re just trying to do your best. You’re trying to keep it all together and look like everything’s fine. Honestly, it does actually drive back towards bottle shows. There really was something beautiful that we learned in Season 1, which is that every episode doesn’t have to be an enormous epic story. Sometimes the best stories are ones that are so internal for our characters, seemingly small, but they can feel the biggest when you’re watching them. Some of the best stuff in Next Generation or DS9 is the characters that you love talking. The challenge, though, with a show like this is you don’t know the characters enough to care about them. You need to build to those conversations, if you know what I mean. LANDAU: Totally. And I think in the same way that it happens with every new TV show, including Next Gen, when it first comes out, people are like, “What is this? Do I care about them? I can’t tell yet.” And then, before you know it, that’s what it is to fall in love with a new show. Suddenly, you’re thinking about the characters, and you want more. I think that taking the time to get there is essential for any show.
‘Starfleet Academy’ Is Star Trek’s Largest Set Ever

“We ate it with the set. We went for it.”

A wide shot of the bridge in Starfleet Academy.Image via Paramount+

I’m not sure how many of you guys realize that the biggest Star Trek set that’s ever been built is for this show. Do you want to mention to people the set that you guys built? LANDAU: We have this incredible set on the largest stage in North America. It’s in Toronto. The set, the ship, everything you saw was designed by this team that delivers unbelievable stuff on a daily basis. It’s mind-boggling. It’s led by Matthew Davies, who’s our production designer. This is his first Trek show, too, and it’s incredible. The set is enormous. The first time you step into that atrium, it really takes your breath away. It’s the largest set I’ve ever been on, and it’s the largest set, I think, virtually everyone has ever been on. It’s multiple stories up. It’s wide. If you tried to sprint across the set, as I’ve seen Bob Picardo do at 3 a.m. with a pack of 21-year-olds, it takes a full minute just to sprint across the whole set. It’s so big. It’s gorgeous. One of the things about this episode, specifically, is when Holly Hunter and a student come in through the corridor, when they first arrive, and they get off the shuttle, and they’re coming into the set, the camera sort of pulls back through the whole set. It’s crazy. LANDAU: Yeah. It’s enormous. We showed off a lot in the first couple of episodes. All credit to Alex, who directed the hell out of them. But we do that multiple times with these big cranes that we put on the set where you start on one level, and then you swoop down to another level, and then a bunch of aliens come by, and then suddenly you’re going off in another direction, and there’s a pond, and there’s a fish. We ate it with the set. We went for it. When I spoke to Alex at Comic-Con, he mentioned you were working on Season 2 and were about to start filming in a month. He said you guys had ideas for Season 3. I know everyone at Paramount over there is like, “What the hell are you talking about? It hasn’t come out yet,” but I’m still going to ask: Where are you? Because Season 2 is about to wrap. You have two episodes left. I don’t know what the status is beyond. How much is the network waiting to be like, “Let’s see how it does before we’re even thinking about Season 3?” LANDAU: Actually, I wish I could say something, but I don’t know anything at this point, besides the fact that we’re all just smiling at each other right now. Everyone’s just having a really good time. I feel, as a person, very optimistic, but we’ll see. One of the problems with streaming shows is that the first season comes out, and then it’s like 16 years later for Season 2. That’s a slight exaggeration, but not by much. One of the reasons I’m so excited about Starfleet Academy is that you guys are about to wrap on Season 2, which is crazy. So, is the plan in an ideal world that every 12 to 15 months there’s a season? LANDAU: I hope so. I know that we’ve got an incredible writers’ room and everybody’s in the wings waiting to go. I mean, that would be ideal. We’ll see what happens. The world as it is, you never know what’s around the corner. But that would be wonderful.
All That Glitters Is Not Gold

“I just kept texting Frakes gifs of glitter, and I will continue to do so forever.”

I’m curious how Season 1 changed in the editing room in ways you didn’t expect. Did it change at all? And did you pick up shots making Season 2 for Season 1 because you had the cast and you could fix things? LANDAU: I think at one point we thought about doing that, but we realized we really didn’t need to do it. But there’s this adage in TV writing, which is that you actually write the show three times. First, you write it as a script, then you write it in production, and finally, you actually write it in post, also. Because when you’re in post, you can redo the entire structure of an episode. You can write new dialogue. There’s so much you do in post. There are so many tricks you can do, and we definitely employed those on this show. Although I think that if the scripts ever do come out for Season 1, you will see that they’re actually very similar to what’s on the screen. The two pieces that really came in post are Stephen Colbert, who is our digital dean of students, he’s voicing every announcement that you hear on the ship, and then Brit Marling, who voices the ship’s computer on the bridge. I’m a big fan of both. LANDAU: They’re incredible. Incredible. Did you end up with a lot of deleted scenes in Season 1? LANDAU: No, shockingly. Shockingly, no. I’m really thinking. I don’t think we deleted any scenes. I actually think we used everything. I think a lot of people here realize that Paramount has a new owner. Have you heard if David Ellison is a fan? LANDAU: [Laughs] I’ll text him now. I’ll be like, “Hey, Dave, you will never believe what I’m doing right now!” Yeah, I’ve heard he’s a fan of Star Trek. I know he’s a super fan. My questions, because he ultimately now has the keys to the Ferrari, what does David want to do? LANDAU: I don’t know. Let’s all go to his house and knock on his door. I don’t know. What I can tell you is right now Alex is… He’s asleep right now, but he’s directing. He’s getting ready to direct our Season 2 finale, and his head is really down. His head is really in the sand with that. Eventually, once he surfaces back to real life again, I’m sure that he and David will chat. I know Jonathan Frakes directed an episode in Season 1. Was it one or two episodes? LANDAU: It was one, and we love him so much.

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“I Hope That’s Not a F—ing Secret”: ‘Starfleet Academy’ Gets an Out-of-This-World Update from Jonathan Frakes [Exclusive]

The new series is set in the future established in ‘Star Trek: Discovery.’

What do you want to tease about his episode, if anything? LANDAU: Oh, gosh, I don’t know if it’s been announced which episode he did yet. It’s later in the season. I’ve got, actually, a really good detail for Frakes’ episode. This is funny, I hope he watches this. Don’t ask me why, the episode involves a moment where I was like, “We need glitter,” and Frakes was like, “Okay.” He was like, “Really? You really want glitter? You sure?” And I was like, “Yes!” Nobody wanted glitter, and I was losing my mind because at the end of the season, you kind of go crazy as a showrunner anyway, it always happens, and our very nice props masters was like, “I promise you don’t want glitter in the scene.” And I was like, “You’re right. You’re absolutely right, Mario [Mareira]. Absolutely right.” So as a result, I just kept texting Frakes gifs of glitter, and I will continue to do so forever.

What do you think would surprise people to learn about the making of Starfleet Academy? LANDAU: Sorry, this is so random. This is something that I don’t know if most people who don’t make TV know, but the way that a TV schedule works, so many of the scenes you watch where people are running around, and the sun is shining, and kids are playing, those were shot at, like, 2:00 in the morning. No one ever talks about the incredible amount of work that a film crew does, and they do it often in the middle of the night because of how schedules work on a film set. Every time I rewatch an episode in particular of this pilot, I think of something I really learned with this crew in particular, watching them work and execute this incredible thing, oftentimes into the wee hours of the morning, watching Holly Hunter just bring it every take. When you work with a crew that’s been making Star Trek, these people have all been making Star Trek with each other for close to 10 years at this point, it doesn’t matter what time of day it is, it doesn’t matter how tired everybody is, what matters is, “Is this magic?” And it’s this magic that I think we were able to successfully capture in this show. It’s just this exuberance and this energy that is so hard to make happen, and they did it.
Holly Hunter and Paul Giamatti Changed the Trajectory of ‘Starfleet Academy’

“There is this chemistry that was just wild.”

Star Trek Starfleet AcademyImage via Paramount

Speaking of Holly Hunter, it’s pretty crazy that you got her, but it’s also crazy that you got Paul Giamatti. It’s bananas. When did you first hear that Paul Giamatti wanted to be on the show? I think it was his choice to do all that makeup. LANDAU: Oh my God, yeah. He was doing press for The Holdovers, and he gave an interview where someone was like, “What’s your dream role?” And he said, “I want to play a Klingon on Star Trek,” and Alex and I looked at each other, and we were like, “Is he for real?” We’re like, “I don’t know. Let’s just call his agent and be like, ‘Are you for real?’” And that’s what we did. He immediately responded, we got on a Zoom, and he was like, “No, I am for real. I’ve always wanted to be on Star Trek.” Like so many of us in this room, he grew up watching Star Trek with his dad, and it meant so much to him, and it’s all he’s ever wanted. We went to him, and we said, “You can play this guy in this one episode. You could play this guy in this other episode.” And he was like, “I don’t want to do just one episode. I want to do a ton of episodes, and I want to be the bad guy.” We were like, “Yes, please! You can be half Klingon, half Tellarite, half human, half whatever you want. We’ll give you anything you want.” Then he said, “I want a lot of prosthetics.” And he got it. You never really know how a villain is going to be played. Like, will it be a quiet villain, an over-the-top villain? How did that get worked out, the level he was going to play this character? LANDAU: There were conversations early on where he said, “I feel like Nus Braka could be really piratey, and I think he could be really crass, and I think that he can be kind of vulgar in some ways.” Then, not to give anything away, but there’s a real energy between him and Holly that started to grow in the most interesting way. When you take two actors who are like the best on the planet at what they do, and you put them in a room together for the first time, there is this chemistry that was just wild. It’s coming later in the season, where sometimes he’s flirting with her, and you’re like, “I don’t want that,” but it’s so interesting that you can’t take your eyes off of it. A lot of that was Paul. A lot of that was him being like, “I just want to have fun.” And I’ve never seen an actor have more fun on a set before, honestly. He just delighted in every moment of it.

Close-up of Nus Braka in a gold embroidered outfit, pointing toward the camera in Season 1.Image via Paramount+

So you get Paul, and he wants to be in a bunch of episodes. How did that impact the writers’ room in figuring out how to bring this character back multiple times, but make it realistic that he would be coming back multiple times? LANDAU: I think we showed up in the writers’ room, and we were like, “Stop the presses! Paul Giamatti said yes!” It was a big moment for us and a big opportunity for us. The truth is, by the time he signed on, we already knew that we needed bad guys in the first season anyway. And even, I think initially knew Nus Braka was kind of written to be a one-off, but we realized we could really use him to tell a pretty crazy story that unfolds later on in the season. I definitely want to touch on Holly Hunter and landing her for the series, which is fantastic. There’s a shot in this episode where, unlike all the other captains, she curls up in this interesting way on the chair because she’s not tall and can do that. Was that in the script? Was that her? How did that little moment come about? LANDAU: I remember I was in Toronto and someone called me from set, and they were like, “Holly’s doing something in the chair. Can you please come down here? We don’t know what to do.” And Holly rehearses extensively, so it’s not like we didn’t know this was coming, but yeah, the first time I saw it, I was like, “Everybody’s gonna just have to get on board with this because it’s amazing.” We really fell in love with it because she’s 400 years old. She’s sat in more chairs than anyone can fathom. I’ve been sitting in this chair for five minutes, and I want to, like, freak out. I get it. If you’re 400 years old and you’re done and you’re just tired of sitting in a chair in a boring old way, of course you’re going to do that. But that’s also Holly. Holly is a genius who brings creativity and specificity and makes bold decisions, and that’s why you work with her, and that’s why you want her to be the captain, because she’s always going to be interesting, and she’s always going to come from a place that actually makes a lot of sense for this character.
What Can Fans Expect in ‘Starfleet Academy’ Season 2?

“Let Season 2 just sweep you away in the next chapter.”

This series is not only designed to entertain Star Trek fans, but also bring in new Star Trek fans. You cast Becky Lynch from the WWE, and the WWE has a lot of fans, and I’ll bet you a lot of them have never seen Star Trek or have never cared about it. How much was casting her like, “Not only do we want her for her, but she can help us reach this massive other audience?” LANDAU: Honestly, like most of our casting, she just seemed like she should be on a bridge. She’s funny, too, by the way. Really funny as an actor. You’ll see that more in the show. But we just looked at her, and we were like, “She should probably be tactical on the bridge.” And she’s amazing at throwing herself over things. I think it’s really cool that she brings in a whole other audience that really loves her. I don’t know if you saw this, but when she won her…Championship belt, we made her a Star Trek uniform to wear for that. It’s a yellow ops uniform, and she looks amazing. So, she loves it. Again, Star Trek needs to bring in new fans. It’s very important. LANDAU: I agree. How much did you guys debate what was going to be the opening of a new Star Trek show, like having a narration or having just whatever it may be? Talk a little bit about those conversations. LANDAU: The main conversation was, “Do we explain to the audience what the Burn was, or do we just let them kind of go in there and figure it out?” And ultimately, obviously, the decision was just go in there, figure it out, and listen to Holly’s voice. She’s Elastigirl, you’re going to love it. I actually love how we open the show because it feels like Star Trek. It sounds like Star Trek. It’s not about this bad thing that happened. There is wonder and hope, no matter who you are, where you are in time.

holly-hunter-starfleet-academy-season-1-episode-1Image via Brooke Palmer/Paramount+

How would you describe Season 1 to Season 2, in terms of, is Season 1 a lot of setup? What’s the difference when we watch it as fans? Is there a difference between 1 and 2? LANDAU: There is, I think. In Season 2, we go deep with the characters, no matter what, and you’ll see that really in a big way oce we hit the stride of Episodes 4, 5, and 6. We love to go deep with our characters. I think that the difference in Season 2 is that we realize how much we love to go deep, in that we just want to keep going deeper and deeper with them, really. I think that that’s the difference between Season 1 and Season 2. I would say that in order to enjoy Season 2, you probably want to watch Season 1 first. Let Season 1 let you fall in love with these folks and the show, and let Season 2 just sweep you away in the next chapter, sophomore year. Does the ship have a Holodeck, and how much will the Holodeck be a part of this series? LANDAU: That’s such a good question. In the 32nd century, there are Holodeck capabilities that can be done remotely. So even though there isn’t a particular room to do it in, we do Holodeck stuff. I like the way you worded that very carefully. We’ve all seen Star Trek, and we know Holodecks go wrong, especially when you need to bottle an episode.
Star Trek Legacies Will Return in Season 2

“That’s the point.”

One of the things about the show is that you have characters from previous Star Trek’s. How much in Season 2 do you feel like, “We can pull back and maybe introduce this other character from Star Trek in the Holodeck situation?” How much is there a nod to the previous Treks, and how much do you want to do that very sparingly? LANDAU: We love doing nods to the other Star Trek. That’s the point. It’s 60 years old. Some of the best stuff that we do this season is the nods to the legacy shows and are the legacy characters. We hit it in a really meaningful and big way in Season 1, and we really just keep it up in Season 2. I want to tell you who shows up in Season 2, and I can’t, but we get to see things that are very familiar that we haven’t seen in a while. I like the smile because I know you’re a hardcore Star Trek fan, and I know it means that it’s going to probably be awesome. New episodes of Star Trek: Starfleet Academy drop every Thursday, exclusively on Paramount+.

Release Date

January 15, 2026

Network

Paramount+

Showrunner

Alex Kurtzman, Noga Landau

Directors

Alex Kurtzman

Writers

Gaia Violo, Gene Roddenberry