Discovery Will Be the First Star Trek Present in 50 Years to Finish With no Jonathan Frakes Look

While you consider an important individuals in Star Trek historical past, when it comes to actors no less than you would possibly look to the legacies of individuals like William Shatner or Patrick Stewart. However the true reply to that query is in all probability Jonathan Frakes, who has been part of just about all televised Trek because the ‘70s—and when Discovery ends in a couple of months, it’ll break the pattern of his affect, no less than in entrance of the digicam.

Since starring as William T. Riker in The Subsequent Era, Frakes has made a visitor look in virtually each Star Trek collection since, both as Riker or a facsimile of him, or his villainous transporter clone brother Thomas (answerable for the biggest pretend beard reveal in tv historical past, due to Deep Area 9). Simply three collection have gone with out an on-screen Frakes look to this point—Discovery, Prodigy, and Unusual New Worlds—and now we all know no less than considered one of them by no means will.

When requested by Den of Geek at a current look throughout SXSW whether or not or not Frakes would make an on-screen look in Discovery’s ultimate season, co-creator and producer Alex Kurtzman supplied a really resoundingly flat “No.” It’s not stunning contemplating that, as Discovery is now to this point into Star Trek’s future, Riker is extraordinarily lifeless at this level. At the very least it should all the time have a particular connection to Frakes via his position as a equally constant Trek director—Frakes has been frequently directing episodes of Discovery since its first season, and can direct the penultimate episode of the present in season 5. But it surely does certainly imply the top to a decades-long pattern of creating Frakes one of the constant Trek actors within the franchise historical past, and there’s one thing oddly unhappy about that.

Prodigy and Unusual New Worlds each nonetheless have time to have their very own Frakes appearances—Prodigy is about in 2385, whereas Riker was nonetheless in energetic service even after the beginning of his son Thaddeus, for whom he would step again from energetic obligation to try to assist deal with when he was recognized with mendaxic neurosclerosis within the run-up to the occasions of Star Trek: Picard. Unusual New Worlds (which like Discovery has a Frakes connection via directing; he shot the present’s improbable crossover with Decrease Decks, “These Outdated Scientists”) being pre-original Trek would make a Riker look very troublesome, however Frakes may nonetheless play some position, whether or not it’s an ancestor or a completely new character.

We’ll have to attend and see—and behold what Frakes cooks up as his parting present for Discovery—when season 5 begins streaming on April 4.

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