Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Poster Shows Off, Well, A Strange New World

The next phase of "Star Trek" is almost upon us ... and it's a somewhat familiar one. Almost every era in the history of the "Trek" franchise is accounted for at this point throughout the various shows and movies, even accounting for the divergent timeline created by the J.J. Abrams' and Justin Lin reboot/prequel/side-quel(?) movies. However, one interesting period within the original timeline has mostly flown under the radar to this point. Of course, fans are well aware that "The Original Series" kicked off the franchise by exploring the many adventures of Spock (Leonard Nimoy), Captain Kirk (William Shatner), and the rest of their legendary crew while embarking on their five-year mission into the deepest reaches of space. But even that show could've turned out very differently, had the original pilot featuring a very different captain not been scrapped and reworked into a later episode of "The Original Series."

That pilot featured a certain Christopher Pike as the Captain of the USS Enterprise and as the lead of the episode, along with Spock as his ever-reliable science officer. The scene-stealing introductions of Anson Mount's Pike, Ethan Peck's younger Spock, and Rebecca Romijn's Number One/Una Chin-Riley (whose name was finally revealed for the very first time) in the second season of "Star Trek: Discovery" immediately drove fans wild and they made calls for a spin-off series of their very own, giving viewers a never-before-seen look at a previously unexplored period in franchise history. Though invested fans know how Pike's adventures ultimately end, we've never actually witnessed the majority of the missions he and his crew experienced while on a deep-space mission of their own. That changes with the imminent premiere of the perfectly-titled "Star Trek: Strange New Worlds," which promises to serve as a throwback to the kinds of episodic exploits that Kirk and his crew would make famous.

After months and months of waiting, we now have our official first look at "Strange New Worlds" in the form of a brand-new teaser poster. Check it out below.

"Strange New Worlds" has set itself up to be all about the "new." Though even the most casual fans know how important and influential Spock's presence is, Ethan Speck's pointy-eared Vulcan is surrounded by fairly lesser-known characters in the canon of "Star Trek." Anson Mount quickly endeared himself to fans as the no-nonsense Captain Pike (portrayed in the "Kelvin timeline" movies by Bruce Greenwood) while Rebecca Romijn accomplished much the same as Number One. The rest of the Enterprise will be filled out with a whole array of characters with (mostly) no connections to previously established "Trek" history, allowing the series to flourish and carve out its own identity however the creative team sees fit — no small feat in a franchise as expansive as this one.

But the biggest ace in the hole this series boasts remains the Enterprise herself, boasting a classic design that follows the "Even a child should be able to draw its outline" rule of visuals. The newest poster for "Strange New Worlds" (revealed on Twitter) wields this iconography to evocative effect, allowing the gorgeous starship to dominate the background of the poster in front of a very Western-tinged setting. Take a gander at it yourself!

Paramount+

The tagline, "The Frontier Is Waiting," sets exactly the right tone for a series that'll ostensibly follow in the footsteps of "The Original Series" and prioritize exploration and discovery above the more action-packed serialization of other recent "Trek" shows. "Strange New Worlds" will begin streaming on the Paramount+ streaming service on May 5, 2022.