Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Video Spotlights Khan's Relative
A new video for Star Trek: Strange New Worlds puts the spotlight on the series' surprise Khan relative, La'an Noonien-Singh. Premiering in May, Strange New Worlds is the third live-action Star Trek series to debut on Paramount+. It's a spinoff of Star Trek: Discovery season 2 and follows the galactic adventures of the USS Enterprise. Strange New Worlds looks to harken back to classic Star Trek, particularly through its premise and characters. Captain Christopher Pike (Anson Mount) leads the intrepid crew, and he's joined by fellow Discovery transplants Number One (Rebecca Romijn) and Spock (Ethan Peck).
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds further fleshed out its cast last fall, revealing the additions of those like a younger Nyota Uhura (Celia Rose Gooding) and Doctor M'Benga (Babs Olusanmokun). The character that most surprised fans, though, was La'an Noonien-Singh, to be played by Christina Chong. As many Trekkies realized from the mere mention of her last name, La'an is a relative of notorious Star Trek villain Khan. Played by both Ricardo Montalban and Benedict Cumberbatch, the genetically engineered genius is one of the Enterprise's biggest enemies.
Fans can learn a bit more about Strange New Worlds' newest addition to the Noonien-Singh family with a recent video shared on the Star Trek social media page. The new bit of footage spotlights La'an, who is the Enterprise's chief of security, and her tragic backstory. It seems likely that Strange New Worlds will dig into that as its first season progresses.
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Strange New Worlds co-creator Alex Kurtzman did confirm that La'an has a familial connection to Khan, but wouldn't say much else. At this point in the timeline, Spock hasn't even met James T. Kirk, much less Khan, so he would hardly view La'an as an enemy. The new video actually hints Spock and La'an will form a unique relationship, or at least a meaningful rapport. What this means for Spock's future with Khan is unclear. Her presence on Strange New Worlds leaves many questions, and the powers that be seem very interested in keeping all their answers a secret until the series begins.
Still, audiences should definitely expect to see this Khan connection get explored. Khan won't be showing up any time soon, but it has been confirmed that Strange New Worlds will really dig into Star Trek canon. The already-confirmed season 2 will introduce Kirk (played by Paul Wesley), so it stands to reason that the iconic villain could appear much farther down the line. There's some concern that La'an's role will create some plot holes when it comes to Khan, but with so little having been revealed about her, anything can happen. At this point, it's better to sit back and watch it all unfold.
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds premieres Thursday, May 5 on Paramount+.
Source: Star Trek on Paramount+/Twitter