Paul Giamatti Joins Star Trek: Starfleet Academy as Season 1’s Big Bad

Paul Giamatti is joining the Star Trek universe with a key role in Season 1 of the forthcoming Paramount+ series Star Trek: Starfleet Academy .

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The Billions vet has boarded the live-action series as a recurring guest star, TVLine has confirmed. He’ll play Season 1’s as-yet-unnamed villain, “a man with an ominous past connected to one of our cadets.” He joins previously announced cast member Holly Hunter , who will star as the captain and chancellor of the titular Starfleet Academy.

“Sometimes you’re lucky enough to discover that one of the greatest actors alive is also a huge Star Trek fan, and meeting Paul was one of those miraculous moments for us,” co-showrunners Alex Kurtzman and Noga Landau said in a statement Tuesday. “The sheer delight with which he dove in on Starfleet Academy is only surpassed by the gratitude we feel about him joining our incredible cast.”

Starfleet Academy marks the fifth live-action Star Trek series (and seventh Trek series overall) to debut on the streamer, following Star Trek: Discovery, Star Trek: Short Treks, Star Trek: Picard, Star Trek: Lower Decks, Star Trek: Prodigy and Star Trek: Strange New Worlds . Production is set to begin later this summer.

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As previously reported, Star Trek: Starfleet Academy will introduce viewers to a “young group of cadets who come together to pursue a common dream of hope and optimism,” according to the official logline. “Under the watchful and demanding eyes of their instructors, they discover what it takes to become Starfleet officers as they navigate blossoming friendships, explosive rivalries, first loves and a new enemy that threatens both the Academy and the Federation itself.”

Your thoughts on Giamatti’s new role at Starfleet Academy ? Drop ’em in a comment below.

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