How Star Trek: Strange New Worlds' Ethan Peck Felt Filming The Series Finale

Even the greatest of journeys must eventually come to an end. "Star Trek: Strange New Worlds" is sticking to the in-universe theme of a five year mission and concluding with Season 5, which had already finished filming ahead of Season 4's recent premiere. In fact, fans have known that "Strange New Worlds" Season 5 would be the last since before the third season had even premiered. That's the kind of advance warning that's nearly unprecedented in TV.

It also gave the cast and crew of "Star Trek: Strange New Worlds" a lot of time to come to terms with the show's end. That might be why star Ethan Peck (who plays Spock) gave a serene and succinct answer when asked, during a panel at San Diego Comic-Con 2026, how it felt to finish filming on the last day of "Strange New Worlds" Season 5. 

"Beautiful, hopeful, and triumphant," said Peck. "I feel so proud to advocate for love, curiosity, and logic." 

(You can't forget logic — or at least, Spock can't.)

"Star Trek: Strange New Worlds" went right back to the start of the franchise — or rather, to slightly before where the story began. It's a prequel series centred on the Enterprise crew led by Captain Christopher Pike (Anson Mount), the immediate predecessor to Captain Kirk (played in the original series by William Shatner, and in "Strange New Worlds" by Paul Wesley). Ethan Peck plays a younger iteration of Spock who, over the course of the series, gradually grows into the Spock that fans first met in "Star Trek: The Original Series."

Season 5 feels like not just the end of the show, but the end of an era. "Star Trek" had a continuous run of shows between 1987 and 2004, but then took a long hiatus from episodic TV in the wake of "Star Trek: Enterprise" wrapping up. That hiatus came to an end in 2017 with the arrival of "Star Trek: Discovery," and Trek became a flagship franchise for Paramount as the studio entered the streaming wars with a flurry of shows including "Picard," animated comedy "Lower Decks," and the recently launched (and even more recently canceled) "Starfleet Academy."

For many fans, "Strange New Worlds" is the best of the current Trek era, taking them back to the values that first made them obsess over the world of Starfleet — and the worlds Starfleet explores. If, as it seems, Paramount is preparing to pack up its Trek toys and put them back on the shelf for a while, a final message of "love, curiosity, and logic" would be a fine one to usher in the next hiatus.

New episodes of "Star Trek: Strange New Worlds" release Thursdays on Paramount+.