Alright, before we get into this video, we've got a new crew member here on the channel, as Adam got promoted to Lieutenant, we've taken on a new Ensign!
Get ready to meet "Ensign Hamish", now it's his first video here on the channel and he is kinda new to recording, so give him a chance, here we go!
Captain Chakotay is returning to the Star Trek Universe, but what does that mean for our new animated trek show of Star Trek: Prodigy,
given that Kate Mulgrew’s Captain Kathryn Janeway is taking center stage.
Welcome to Trek Central! I’m your host, Ensign Hamish, and let’s get into it!
With the casting announcements of Robert Beltran reprising his role as Voyager First Officer Chakotay, as well as other casting announcements for Star Trek: Prodigy,
it’s tme to dive into our latest Star Trek Theory, and see how Chakotay could fit into the story of Prodigy, specifically how he could be involved with the USS Protostar.
Let’s dig not only into this casting announcement and what that might mean for the story of Star Trek: Prodigy going forward, but also some older information that is even more relevant as of late.
If you want to keep up to date on all the latest Star Trek news, lore and more, then make sure to hit that subscribe button to never miss a video from the team here at Trek Central! You can also follow us on social media for daily updates on the Stat Trek Universe!
Star Trek: Prodigy is a new trek animated show about a group of teenagers who find an abandoned starfleet ship in the delta quadrant, and with the help of a training hologram of Captain Kathryn Janeway, set out on a journey through the stars.
Well with the new casting announcements of the return of Chakotay, as well as our Federation species in Starfleet, we could be looking at our original crew of the USS Protostar,
forced to abandon ship for some reason or another in the Delta Quadrant, given we know the ship has some sort of advanced FTL technology, it could make sense that the original crew had to abandon ship.
Let’s take a look at these newly announced characters and their voice actors before we get into any serious theory crafting!
First up we have Captain Chakotay, voiced by Robert Beltran. If you are watching this video you probably know who Chakotay is, but let’s describe him a bit in any case.
Chakotay was a human of Native American descent who originally served in Starfleet but betrayed his uniform and joined the Marquis,
the group of freedom fighters who operated in the demilitarized zone between the Cardassian Union and the Federation, unhappy with the peace agreement between the two powers which gave away their colonies.
Chakotay became Captain of the Maquis raider the “Val-Jean”, because the Maquiss had a romantic view of les-miserables, viewing themselves as the heroes against the societal injustice of the Federation and Starfleet.
The Val Jean was tracked down by the USS Voyager, but both ships were transported to the Delta Quadrant, and had to band together to get back to the Alpha Quadrant.
Chakotay became the first officer to Captain Kathryn Janeway of the USS Voyager, and began their 7 year journey back to the Alpha Quadrant.
Is it not a spoiler to say... is it not?
(Jack - No, it aired over 25 years ago....)
It seems then by at least the year 2383, which is when prodigy takes place which is 5 years after the return of the USS Voyager,
Chakotay has been promoted to the rank of Captain. Considering Janeway as a vice admiral by the time of Nemesis, a single year after their return, it makes sense that most of the crew got a promotion upon their return, so there is still hope for Harry Kim to get past Ensign in rank!
As Captain, Chakotay might have been put in charge of the USS Protostar on its maiden voyage to test out its new prototype propulsion system, with a crew of Starfleet officers which we will go into now! We’ve also got another story for you all as well.
First up is Commander Tysess, voiced by David Diggs (dah-veed Diggs). This will presumably be the first in command to Captain Chakotay.
Tysess is an andorian! We have been getting more andorian characters in the new trek, from the new design in discovery, some classic andorians in Picard, and even Jennifer the Andorian in Lower Decks.
But having a more recurring Andorian character in a trek show will be great! Andorians are meant to be this great founding member species of the Federation, but so much of Trek forgets them, with none showing up in TNG or Deep Space 9.
And no we don’t count the green andorian that Data’s Daughter might have looked like!
Next is Ensign Asencia, a Trill, voiced by Jameela Jamil. Definitely not a name I actually expected to come to the Trek Universe, but voicing a trill is really cool!
And apparently she has been a trekkie since The Next Generation! We don’t know if this Trill is joined with a symbiont or not.
If Asencia is her surname, which makes sense following them calling her “Ensign Asencia” then she would not be joined with a symbiont, as most symbionts have very short names of one or two syllables, from Dax and Tal, to Odan and Kahn.
Trill has been featured prominently in Discovery season 3, so seeing more trills during the 24th century will be very nice!
We have Jason Alexander returning to trek, previously having played the character of Kurros in the Voyager episode “Think Tank”, but he is playing a Tellarite character called Doctor Noum.
A Tellerite doctor is definitely something that would happen, but their bedside manner must be terrible, a species that argues all the time.
Not the smartest idea....
What is fascinating about Doctor Noum, is actually that his name was tied to Star Trek: Prodigy over a year ago from some leaks about the show,
and some characters. Considering that this turned out to be true, it adds some weight to these leaks so let’s look at them in more detail, now that we have this new info at our disposal.
Before we go ahead, I will just offer you a spoiler warning as we are going to be talking about leaks for Star Trek: prodigy which this news has partly confirmed. You have been warned!
So as stated, Doctor Noum’s name came up on an “The Illuminerdi” article about Star Trek: Prodigy last year, so credit to them for this exclusive reveal.
Doctor Noum is described as a Tellerite in his 30s, and that he enjoys arguing and he is dedicated to keeping his crew healthy. His bedside manner is described as “brusque”, which very much makes sense and what we predicted from a tellarite doctor, but that his medical expertise is infallible.
So not much can be gleaned from Doctor Noum’s description in this article than what was apparent from a Starfleet Tellerite doctor, but there were other crew members listed, some not included in this casting announcement.
We do have another Doctor listed, called Torgo. She is described as an eccentric alien geneticist in her 50s. “She chooses to operate outside the Federation to avoid having to follow their rules.”
Now this is interesting, because from this brief description, she doesn’t sound like she is part of Chakotay’s crew, so perhaps this is another character from around Federation space who has made it to the Delta Quadrant.
How so many characters have made their way to the Delta Quadrant is something which I am sure the show will address,
considering that two of the main cast, Jankem Pog and Rok-Tahk are alpha quadrant species, of a tellarite and a Brikar respectively.
She seems to be more than just a geneticist, but maybe even a eugenicist, which is outlawed by Federation Law, making sense why she operates outside of the Federation.
It is also said that “She strives to push the boundaries of scientific discovery, and make the body a patient dreams of, a reality, regardless of the risks.” so she definitely sounds like a eugenicist, but how she will come into the story is unknown.
Next up we have Barniss Frex, who is a male Denobulan in his 40s. Finally we get some good Star Trek: Enterprise representation.
Barniss is said to have spent years alone maintaining a Federation comms relay station, which definitely reminds us of the great Adita Sahil in Discoverys third season.
As we know from Enterprise, Denobulans are a very social species, with their families being massive from their polygamous relationships. Therefore it isn’t a surprise that from spending years alone, Barniss is thirsty for friends.
Physically Frex is described as a “Rambling, Portly Fellow” who is very welcoming, but it is also said that he is very welcoming until his visitors become suspicious. What this means, who knows, but it does conjure up some scary thoughts.
With both Frex and Torgo, it does pose the question of where this story happens. Both of these characters are in or close to Federation space.
So if this information is accurate, which it could not be, some of Prodigy’s story will take place in Federation space, and perhaps this is where Chakotay and his Crew are, starting in Federation space and looking for their lost ship as they travel towards the delta quadrant and the kids in the protostar.
The protostar could have been lost in an experiment and Chakotay and his crew are tasked with retrieving it. This is definitely a possibility, as I doubt the kids on the protostar will reach Federation space so quickly, especially with The Diviners forces on their tale, like Dreadnok
The final character which was reported by Illuminerdi was a character called “Vezria”, and is described as hunting for the protostar, but pretending to be an ensign in Starfleet. She is very intelligent and skilled at manipulating people.
What is fascinating is that she is said to be determined to get revenge for her people, and destroy the Federation. What is her species you ask? Well she is said to be “Disguising her true Vau N’Akat Form.
This was reported before we knew who the Vau N’Akat were, and they are the species which Gwyn is a part of, which would also mean that The Diviner, Gwyn’s father is also Vau N’Akat.
Could this Vezria by a sister or relative of Gwyn who is hunting down the ship while pretending to be an ensign in Chakotay’s crew? And if so, what does that mean for the original ensign in Chakotay’s crew?
Maybe she is being held by the Diviner while Vezria masquerades as her? I guess we will find out.
But this does mean that she believes the Federation are responsible for something that happened to the Vau N’Akat.
Obviously Voyager affected the Delta Quadrant in numerous ways, from helping the Borg defeat Species 8472,
to unleashing the Vaadwaur back on the Galaxy. A member of Species 116, Arturis, wanted revenge on the USS Voyager using the USS Dauntless as a trap to send the Voyager crew into Borg space defenseless.
Now with Chakotay being a Captain, this links very much to the litverse and the Voyager Relaunch series of novels that cover the Full Circle Fleet.
We recently did a video on the Full Circle Fleet, so if you are interested in learning more about this fleet, check it out. But in basic form, this fleet was designed to further explore the delta quadrant, with a fleet of ships equipped with Quantum Slipstream drives.
The Quantum slipstream drive was seen in a couple of episodes of Star Trek Voyager, a means of propulsion that can transcend the standard warp barrier. The fascinating thing about this propulsion system is that, as expected, generating slipstream corridors requires more processing power than generating warp fields, and this computational power is directly related to the frontal geometry of a vessel. Therefore slipstream propelled ships are generally aerodynamic in shape, despite them being space vessels, due to the slipstream corridors offering resistance, compared to that of open space.
This is why ships like the USS Dauntless, a fake starfleet ship that was a trap for the USS Voyager, still was very aerodynamic.
The design of the USS Protostar is very narrow and compact with aerodynamic lines, so the design very much could hint at the Protostar being a prototype ship utilizing this Quantum Slipstream drive.
So why is this ship abandoned then, if we have now been told there is a Starfleet crew in this show. It seems reasonable to assume that during a test flight of this vessel, something went wrong and the crew had to abandon the ship.
How they might have abandoned the ship is anyone's guess, whether they used escape pods, shuttles, or beamed off the vessel. If the situation was so bad that the ship could not have simply been stopped, perhaps it was in a slipstream corridor?
The Vessel is found by the teenagers inside a planet, so it could have ended up here, but would a slipstream corridor allow you to pass through physical objects in real space. If warp is just warping space around you, is Slipstream entering a domain of subspace. If so this should allow you to go through objects in real space.
With this casting announcement letting us know that Chakotay and the rest of the crew are recurring characters, I wonder how we will see them. Will we spend some time with them also searching for the protostar? Or will they meet up with the kids early on during the show?
Considering that this cast announcement was made after the screening of the first episode at NYCC, we can safely assume that these characters will not be showing up in the first episode of Star Trek Prodigy.
That’s a wrap on our theory video for today! Heads up though, Star Trek: Prodigy will premier on the 28th of October 2021, streaming on Paramount+ and CTV Sci-Fi / Crave.
Regarding International viewing, we have no details as of yet. As always, let us know your thoughts down below in the comment section, because if you’re talking about Star Trek, then we want to hear about it.
If you want to keep up to date on all the latest Star Trek news, lore and more, then make sure to hit that subscribe button to never miss a video from the team here at Trek Central! You can also follow us on social media, or join our Community Discord Server!
For now, I’ve been Ensign Hamish, thanks for watching and we’ll see you next time! Live Long and prosper my friends!