Paul Wesley will be Captain Kirk in the second season of the Paramount Star Trek: Strange New Worlds series: the announcement is official, and we already have the first image of the actor with the costume of the legendary hero of the universe created by Gene Roddenberry many years ago. Wesley, born in 1982, is best known for playing Stefan Salvatore in The Vampire Diaries series, for Medal of Honor and for Tell Me a Story. He also directed an episode of the Batwoman TV series.
We don’t know exactly what the story arc of this version of Kirk will be, but in the photo the actor is wearing one divided with the degrees of captain and is seated in a command post. We may therefore know more about his years as commander before the Enterprise; the alternative is that the Enterprise will see a change at the helm – in the first series (which has not yet been released) the commander is Captain Pike, played by Anson Mount.
Strange New World is one of the many expansion projects of the franchise carried out by Paramount and overseen by Alex Kurtzmann, who has been dealing with the Roddenberry legacy since 2009. Technically will be a Discovery spin-off and a prequel to the original series late 1960s, in which Kirk was played by William Shatner. The series, according to the official notes, will tell just about the exploits of Pike as commander of the Enterprise, which makes us lean more towards the first of the two theories on Kirk listed above, but you never know.
The first season will consist of 10 episodes: the first will arrive exclusively on Paramount Plus on May 5th, the following on a weekly basis until arriving in late July. As already happened for the Halo series, therefore, Paramount has confirmed a second season even before the release of the initial one. In fact, filming for the second season has even already begun last month. In addition to Anson Mount, the cast will include:
- Rebecca Romjin (best known for playing Mystica in the main X-Men trilogy and for dubbing Lois Lane in various DC / Superman animated content)
- Ethan Peck (will reprise his role as Spock after playing him in Discovery)
- Babs Olusanmokun (Dune, Black Mirror)
- Christina Chong (Black Mirror, Doctor Who)
- Celia Rose Gooding (will play Uhura)
- Jess Bush
- Melissa Navia
- Bruce Horak
