One of the familiar characters on the upcoming series Star Trek: Starfleet Academywill be The Doctor fromStar Trek: Voyager(andProdigy), with Robert Picardo reprising the role. The first season wrapped up filming in February and Picardo is now talking more about what we can expect from the Doctor in the 32nd century, following the events of Star Trek: Discovery.
Picardo tells his former captain about his new future
The closing panel at Trek Talks 4 this year—an all-day Star Trek telethon that benefits the Hollywood Food Coalition—was a conversation between Kate Mulgrew and Robert Picardo, longtime friends as well as costars onStar Trek: Voyager andStar Trek: Prodigy.The delightful chat covered a wide range of topics, and then made its way to Picardo’s role on Starfleet Academy. He described this particular revisiting of The Doctor as an “interesting challenge,” and Mulgrew asked how he was feeling about it. He expressed concerns about damaging the legacy of the character, especially because of the arc he had on Voyager:
“… he started with nothing. The Doctor had an extraordinary arc over the seven years, and brick by brick building a character that was quite human-like from something that had no personality or affect at the start. … This much has been said in the press about the show, Starfleet Academy is set in the far distant future in the 32nd century. Starfleet, which basically fell apart in this future tragedy called ‘the Burn,’ has been reconstituted, and this is the first entering class at Starfleet Academy in more than a hundred years. And my character is teaching there. And I think that frankly, at least according to our producer, who we both know well, Alex Kurtzman, he said that that seeing the doctor teach cadets on Prodigy, his exact words, that it made complete sense, that he would be teaching cadets in Starfleet Academy in the future. So I really do think that my stint on Prodigy helped open, that.. [door].
Robert Picardo as The Doctor in Star Trek: Prodigy
Mulgrew told her friend that Kurtzman has been a fan of his since day one, and asked if this version of The Doctor is “fully formed.” He replied:
“That was another thing I thought about deeply. How is he different? What does it mean to be a 900-year-old, continuously activated artificial intelligence? What is 900 years of digital memory? Digital memory is not like human memory. If we have a memory from five, six, eight years old, and looking back decades of that memory, it’s not like having a memory of something that happened a year ago or yesterday. Its digital memory is completely clear, which means that a beloved colleague, like Captain Janeway, for The Doctor, you are as present in his memory, 900 years on, as when he was working with you in the 24th century.
So what does that mean? What does that do to a consciousness? It’s seeing 36 generations of organic colleagues grow old and die around you. It does not necessarily predispose you to making close personal relationships, let’s put it that way. So there’s a lot of stuff to think about that’s a little mind-bending, and that’s what’s wonderful about science fiction to begin with. You have to ask questions that are huge extensions of the questions you have in a single human life. You have to project out and use your imagination. It’s well beyond the human experience, and that’s both challenging, but also what makes science fiction fun, you know, really fun.”
Robert Picardo and Kate Mulgrew speak during Trek Talks
Mulgrew pointed out that “some of these questions are simply unanswerable” and asked if this version of The Doctor is irascible:
“I would say that The Doctor is as we remember him, but deeper. The way he was, but more so, if that makes sense. He still certainly has his sense of humor, but there’s a depth to him now, from that incredible sense of immortality, I think we would all agree it would be a blessing and a curse.”
Robert Picardo as Dr. Lewis Zimmerman and The Doctor in Voyager‘s “Life Line”
The two actors then had an entertaining exchange about The Doctor’s age:
Kate: “So the doctor is now, did you say 900 years old?”
Robert: “900, yes.”
Kate: “I must say, you’re looking well.”
Robert: “Thank you. That’s very kind. You know, Yoda, I think, was 900 when he finally died. So I do think of myself as the Yoda of the Star Trek franchise. And look, it could be worse, I could be short and green and made out of rubber. So I think I do look pretty good.”
Watch Mulgrew and Picardo talk Academy, Voyager and more…
You can watch the full panel below (and cued up), as well as the entire Trek Talks telethon, here:
Star Trek: Starfleet Academy opens for classes in 2026
The first season of the series will consist of 10 episodes and is expected to premiere on Paramount+ some time in 2026. A second season is already being written, and co-showrunner Alex Kurtzman told TrekMoviehe expects it to go into production by mid-year.
The series has an extensive cast led by Oscar winner Holly Hunter. Oscar nominee Paul Giamatti plays the main villain for the first season in a recurring role and Emmy winner Tatiana Maslany also has an unnamed recurring role. There are several legacy Trek actors in the cast in addition to Robert Picardo: The cast includes three Discovery stars reprising their roles: Tig Notaro (Jett Reno), Oded Fehr (Admiral Vance) and Mary Wiseman (Sylvia Tilly). They are all joined by the young actors playing cadets: Sandro Rosta, Kerrice Brooks, Bella Shepard, George Hawkins, Karim Diané, and Zoë Steiner. WWE champion Becky Lynch also has a recurring role.
The first season has completed production with work underway already for season two, which is expected to go into production this summer. Paramount+ has not yet set a release date for Starfleet Academy, but it has been hinted at by Alex Kurtzman and Robert Picardo that the series will debut in 2026.
Academy cast and producers at the Star Trek Stage (Paramount+)
About Hollywood Food Coalition
The mission of the Hollywood Food Coalition is to feed and serve the immediate needs of the hungry every day of the year so they can build better lives. You can see some of the great work Hollywood Food Coalition is doing on theirYouTube channelin videos like this one:
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