Star Trek: Discovery's Ryn Actor Had An Alternate Ending In Mind For The Character

The character of Ryn (Noah Averbach-Katz) was a tragic figure in "Star Trek: Discovery." Ryn was an Andorian who had signed a lifetime contract with a dangerous capitalist syndicate called the Emerald Chain, effectively meaning he was enslaved for life. He was kept in line by his vicious boss, the Orion Osyraa (Janet Kidder), by a bomb that she implanted in his neck. There was a time when Ryn dreamed of escaping and even staged an uprising against Osyraa. His rebellion, however, eventually ceased and he was forced back into servitude. His antennae were chopped off as punishment and he was thereafter tasked with implanting bombs in the necks of other enslaved individuals.

Osyraa and the other enslaved beings all hated him. Ryn didn't feel too positively about himself, either.

Ryn didn't achieve any hope until a visit from the U.S.S. Discovery, a ship that had just traveled through a time portal from 930 years in the past. The crew of the Discovery, being displaced in time, didn't have any knowledge of the Emerald Chain, Osyraa, or the great mercantile system that had come to replace the Federation in the distant future. All they saw were enslaved individuals that needed freeing. Ryn ended up helping with another uprising, fleeing Osyraa with a revealing secret: she was running out of resources.

Sadly, Ryn wasn't able to stay with the crew of the Discovery. Osyraa found him, recaptured him, and executed him. Ryn only appeared in three episodes of "Discovery."

That didn't mean that Averbach-Katz didn't picture a better story arc for his character. In 2021, the actor engaged in a Reddit AMA where he stated that he'd envisioned a future for Ryn where he not only survived, but got to have his own love story.

Before Ryn was re-captured by Osyraa, he managed to tell his dark secret to First Officer Tilly (Mary Wiseman) on the Discovery. It seems that the emotionally wounded Ryn could bond more closely with the nervous Tilly than with the other members of the crew. The short moments they had together inflamed Averbach-Katz's imagination. He pictured a future where he and Tilly might dare to foster a romance. When asked what might happen if Ryn had survived, the actor was sure to bring up his idea right away, responding:

"Man, if [Ryn] stuck around, the only arc I wanted for him was a Ryn/Tilly Love story. So maybe a bunch of Andorians could have rejoined the Federation so they could make our wedding."

In the mythology of "Star Trek," the blue-skinned Andorians were one of the four founding species of the Federations (along with humans, Vulcans, and Tellarites). The third season of "Discovery" (the one Ryn appears in) takes place in the very distant 32nd century after the Federation was forced to go underground after a galaxy-wide cataclysm wiped out every single one of its starships. As such, the Andorians were no longer members of the moribund organization and had fallen in with the Orions to help them run the Emerald Chain.

Hence, Averbach-Katz's mention of Andorians rejoining the Federation.

Tilly, meanwhile, hadn't had any romantic partners on "Discovery" at that point, other than a passing mention that she's into musicians and soldiers. Ryn wasn't a soldier, but he displayed battle acumen during his uprising. Also, Tilly has grown up a lot since the early days of the show, and could easily find herself attracted to Ryn. 

But this is all academic; in the end, Ryn was executed. So it goes.