'Star Trek: Discovery' release date, cast, plot news: Why series chose to highlight the first officer

A "Star Trek Discovery" promotional poster. Twitter/startrekcbs

It will be well over a decade since the last "Star Trek" series concluded and now comes a new series that will come out in the fall with a different cast and fresh stories to tell.

"Star Trek: Discovery" will follow the general premise of all its other TV predecessors wherein the crew of its Starship will take on the special mission of exploring new worlds and civilizations.

The leading cast member in previous series was the captain but according to Entertainment Weekly, this one will highlight First Officer Michael Burnham (Sonequa Martin-Green). Based on her backstory, she was the first human to attend the Vulcan Science Academy.

Showrunners Aaron Harberts and Gretchen J. Berg expressed that the show will have two pilot episodes. In the first one, Burnham will be forced to make a decision on the Starship Shenzhou, which is captained by Philippa Georgiou (Michelle Yeoh).

The choice she makes will be influenced by Spock's father Sarek (James Frain) which will eventually lead her to a different ship. This Starship will be the USS Discovery captained by Gabriel Lorca (Jason Isaacs). Here is where the second pilot will begin.

Berg explained their decision to tell the story of Burnham and not the captain:

"The advantage to her not being in charge of the bridge right now is we get to tell stories from a very different point of view. It's a fresh feeling because we're not on the bridge all the time. We get access to more parts of the ship," he said.

The version of Spock in this series is Saru (Doug Jones) who will be the non-human member of the team and the first of his kind to enlist in Starfleet and voyage into Federation space.

"Star Trek: Discovery" will debut on Sunday, Sept. 24 on CBS. The remaining episodes will then air on CBS All Access.

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