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Star Trek Day ’21 celebrates 55 years of Kirk and beyond with livestreamed event

Michileen Martin
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On September 8, 1966, The Man Trap — the first broadcast episode of Star Trek: The Original Series — aired on NBC starring William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, DeForest Kelley, and other faces that would soon become familiar to millions of fans as the iconic crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise. To celebrate the 55th anniversary, Paramount+ has just announced details for the Second Annual Star Trek Day, which will pay tribute to not only that milestone, but all that’s come since — and everything that’s on its way.

Per a Paramount+ press release, Star Trek Day will be a free livestreamed event held at 5:30 p.m. PT on Wednesday, September 8, and broadcast from the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles. Star Trek Day will be hosted by Star Trek: The Next Generation alum Wil Wheaton and actress Mica Burton (Critical Role), daughter of Wheaton’s co-star LeVar Burton. The event will include music from a live orchestra helmed by Jeff Russo, who composed the themes for both Star Trek: Discovery and Star Trek: Picard.

Star Trek Day 2021 | Celebrate 55 Years of Trek

The panels

Most of the event will consist of panels either about current and upcoming Star Trek series, or “legacy moments” that will focus on stories of past series be recounted by a member of each show’s cast.

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Voice actors Noël Wells and Eugene Cordero will be there for the Star Trek: Lower Decks panel. Discovery‘s panel features Wilson Cruz, Blu del Barrio, and Ian Alexander. Patrick Stewart and Jeri Ryan will be in attendance for the Picard panel, while fellow cast member Isa Briones will sing “Blue Skies” — the tune Data (Brent Spiner) sings in 2002’s Star Trek: Nemesis and is featured prominently in Picard‘s first season.

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The panels for both Discovery and Picard will hopefully give us insight into each series’ upcoming seasons. A teaser for Season 4 of Discovery — due out sometime this year — was released in April and focused on a massive gravitational anomaly threatening the galaxy. Meanwhile, we’ve gotten a couple of teasers for Season 2 of Picard, the latest of which features the return of John de Lancie in the role of the mischievous and seemingly all-powerful Q. We’ve also known since the day before the Picard series premiere in January 2020 that Whoopi Goldberg will be reprising the role of Guinan for the upcoming season, set for release next year.

For the upcoming series’ panels, expect to see Anson Mount, Rebecca Romijn, and Ethan Peck discussing Star Trek: Strange New Worlds and voice actors Brett Gray and Dee Bradley Baker talking about the new animated kids’ show Star Trek: Prodigy.

On hand to bring us behind-the-scenes details from back in the day will be George Takei from Star Trek: The Original Series, Burton from Star Trek: The Next Generation, Cirroc Lofton from Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Garrett Wang from Star Trek: Voyager, and Anthony Montgomery from Star Trek: Enterprise.

Roddenberry’s legacy

There will also be a “Roddenberry Legacy” panel to discuss arguably the most relevant legacy: That of late Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry, who would have just turned 100. His son. Rod Roddenberry. will be on hand. along with Gates McFadden, most notably of Next Generation fame, Burton, and Takei.

One subject sure to be brought up at the Roddenberry Legacy panel is the announcement earlier this month, per Variety, of the Roddenberry estate’s deal with tech company OTOY to create a digital archive that will include the production of NFTs and a public installation of a lifesize (as in 1:1 scale) holographic model of the original U.S.S. Enterprise featured in Star Trek: The Original Series.

How to watch Star Trek Day

Star Trek fans interested in tuning in have a few options. The event will be broadcast live on StarTrek.com’s Star Trek Day page, on Paramount+’s streaming service, and on the Paramount+ Twitch page. If you can’t watch it live, the recorded panels will be available on demand on Paramount+ and on the Paramount+ YouTube channel.

For more information, visit Star Trek.com’s Star Trek Day page. In the meantime, check out the Star Trek Day trailer featuring moments from past, current, and future Star Trekproductions.

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Michileen Martin
Michileen Martin
Entertainment Writer
Michileen Martin has written about pop culture in general and comics in particular for two decades. His work has appeared in…
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