‘Star Trek: Discovery’ Creator Explains the Enterprise’s Role in Season 2

Last night’s season finale episode of Star Trek: Discovery, “Will You Take My Hand?,” featured the unexpected arrival of the Enterprise NCC-1701 with a sleek new look. Sow what does that mean for the show’s second season?

Star Trek: Discovery co-creator and executive producer Alex Kurtzman spoke to Variety to clarify the Enterprise’s role in the coming season. He made it clear that even with the Enterprise‘s presence this is still a show about the Discovery and its crew. The Enterprise will help get to the root of some fans’ concerns about Star Trek continuity.

“The show is called Discovery. It’s not Enterprise,” Kurtzman said. “So yes, the Enterprise will play a part of Season Two but it will absolutely not overshadow Discovery. And I think with Enterprise‘s arrival in the finale we recognize that the audience has a lot of questions about our synchronicity with the original series, which really means or synchronicity with canon. So the promise of the Enterprise holds the answers to a lot of those questions, including Spock’s relationship with his half-sister who he’s never mentioned. Which does not necessarily mean you’re going to see Spock, just that we owe an answer to that question.”

While fans will have to wait until next season for continuity clarification, this season’s finale went a long way to addressing concerns about how Star Trek: Discovery represented the themes of Star Trek. The finale saw Michael Burnham, Saru, and the rest of Discovery‘s crew threatening to mutiny rather than sacrificing Starfleet’s ideals for the wartime practicality that drove most of the series’ earlier episodes.

“Season One was really about the war and how the war tested our ideals as Starfleet,” he said. “It was very much about Michael’s story arc and her getting comfortable on Discovery. Fundamentally, it was really about bringing that crew together as a family. If you look at the crew in the beginning, they’re very separate and they’re not really connected yet. They are not sure of each other and their place on the ship. Over the course of the season, they really become a family.”

Star Trek: Discovery will return for a second season on CBS All Access.