Warning: SPOILERS For Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Season 3Star Trek: Strange New Worlds is heading into its final two seasons, and the last 16 episodes must deliver something that Star Trek: The Original Series ever did. Although the recently ended Star Trek: Strange New Worlds season 3 was divisive, seasons 4 and 5 are on their way to Paramount+.

Surprisingly and pleasingly, Star Trek: Strange New Worlds boasts an abundance of Kirks. Star Trek: Strange New Worlds‘ series premiere ended with the surprise introduction of Lieutenant Sam Kirk (Dan Jeannotte), a friend of Captain Christopher Pike (Anson Mount), who is a xenobiologist on the USS Enterprise.

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds season 1’s finale introduced Lieutenant James T. Kirk (Paul Wesley), although he was initially just a file on Pike’s screen. Paul Wesley played two alternate reality versions of Jim Kirk before Star Trek‘s Prime Timeline Lt. James T. Kirk beamed aboard the Starship Enterprise.

Sam and Jim Kirk have only had a couple of interactions in Star Trek: Strange New Worlds seasons 2 and 3, and even more of them referencing each other to other characters. Star Trek: Strange New Worlds has to give us the ultimate Kirk brothers story.

A Kirk Brothers Team-Up Must Happen In Star Trek: Strange New Worlds’ Final Seasons

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds seasons 4 and 5 only have a combined 16 episodes left, and one of them has to include Lt. Commander James T. Kirk and Lt. Sam Kirk finally teaming up and working together.

Sam’s dynamic with his younger brother has revolved around jealousy. Jim is the favored star of the two brothers, who is more closely following in their father, Lt. George Kirk‘s, Starfleet footsteps. When he was promoted to First Officer of the USS Farragut, James broke George’s record as Starfleet’s youngest Number One.

Sam does have bragging rights of his own, however. The mustachioed Kirk secured a coveted spot as a xenoanthropologist aboard the USS Enterprise. Sam’s one big thing he can lord over his little brother, Jim, is that he’s serving aboard the flagship of the United Federation of Planets.

Sam and Jim shared the screen in Star Trek: Strange New Worlds season 2, episode 6, “Lost in Translation,” and that ended in hard feelings. Star Trek: Strange New Worlds season 3’s finale, “New Life and New Civilizations,” saw Sam offer Jim a glass of whiskey as an olive branch, and the Kirks drank together like brothers should.

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds‘ final two seasons must team Sam and Jim Kirk together on a mission, so we can finally see the Kirk brothers work together for the first time since Sam was introduced in Star Trek: The Original Series 58 years ago.

Perhaps Sam is temporarily transferred to the USS Farragut and placed under his younger brother’s command. Star Trek: Strange New Worlds can finally tell the story of why Sam chooses to leave the USS Enterprise when Captain James T. Kirk takes over rather than serve with him.

Why Sam & James T. Kirk Could Never Team-Up In Star Trek: The Original Seasons

George Samuel Kirk appeared only once in Star Trek: The Original Series, and he was already dead. Before Star Trek: Strange New Worlds reintroduced him, Sam was played by William Shatner (wearing a mustache) in Star Trek: The Original Series season 1‘s final episode, “Operation – Annihilate!”

Since Sam Kirk was essentially a cameo in Star Trek: The Original Series, William Shatner was cast to play his own recently deceased older brother.

There was never an opportunity in 1960s Star Trek to develop Sam Kirk outside of what “Operation – Annihilate!” revealed about him, much less team up Jim and Sam Kirk.

Sam Kirk was an afterthought for 55 years and was not mentioned outside of Star Trek novels and ancillary materials before he resurfaced aboard the Starship Enterprise in Star Trek: Strange New Worlds’ series premiere.

Strange New Worlds Can Also Solve Another Kirk Family Mystery

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds seasons 4 and 5 must not only take advantage of this golden opportunity to team up Sam and Jim Kirk, but the prequel saga could also answer even more questions about the Kirk family.

James and Sam’s father, Lt. George Kirk, has not appeared in Star Trek‘s TV series canon. George Kirk was played by Chris Hemsworth, and his wife, Winona Kirk, was portrayed by Jennifer Morrison, in J.J. Abrams’ Star Trek (2009).

Interestingly, George and Winona Kirk in Star Trek (2009) technically count as taking place in Star Trek‘s Prime Universe canon, since they existed when Nero (Eric Bana) time-traveled from 2387 aboard the Nerada, and the Romulans destroying the USS Kelvin is what created the alternate Kelvin Timeline.

However, Star Trek: Strange New Worlds has the unique opportunity to recast George and Winona Kirk and establish the entire Kirk family together. Perhaps George and Winona will appear at the end of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds when James becomes Captain Kirk and takes command of the USS Enterprise.

Curiously, Star Trek: Strange New Worlds has also not mentioned the fact that Sam Kirk is already married and has young sons. There is plenty of opportunity for Star Trek: Strange New Worlds’ final 16 episodes to fully round out the Kirk family legacy.

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds‘ executive producers and co-showrunners, Akiva Goldsman and Henry Alonso Myers, hope to continue Captain Kirk’s Starship Enterprise in a spinoff dubbed Star Trek: Year One. But by then, Sam will have already exited the Enterprise, and it will be too late for Sam to team up with Jim.

Release Date

May 5, 2022

Network

Paramount+

Showrunner

Henry Alonso Myers, Akiva Goldsman

Directors

Dan Liu, Amanda Row, Maja Vrvilo, Akiva Goldsman, Dermott Downs, Eduardo Sánchez, Jeffrey W. Byrd, Jonathan Frakes, Jordan Canning, Leslie Hope, Valerie Weiss, Sydney Freeland, Christopher J. Byrne, Rachel Leiterman

Writers

Onitra Johnson