Even now, with production on ‘Star Trek: Discovery’ well underway and the show inching ever closer to its eventual premiere, the cast continues to be filled out. While we’ve been getting casting announcements for about a year now, the more recent ones have tended to announce sizeable chunks of the cast in a single go. As we’ve noted previously, ‘Discovery’ looks to be splitting its narrative between a pair of Federation starships and a Klingon vessel. Accordingly, this latest wave of announcements appears to be focused on filling in the Klingon side of the cast, though a few Starfleet crew members are included as well (presumably to keep things from getting boring.)
The latest casting announcement for the series includes the following five performers, along with (as has become typical for ‘Discovery’) only the barest minimum of information about their characters:
- First, we have Shazad Latif. You may recognize his name from the last time he was added to the cast of ‘Discovery’. As much an announcement as an update, Latif (who was previously set to play Klingon Commander Kol) has now been recast in the role of Lieutenant Tyler, “a Starfleet officer in the Federation”. Descriptive.
- Next up is Rekha Sharma, best known for her performance as Tory Foster on ‘Trek’ alum Ronald D. Moore’s acclaimed reimagining of ‘Battlestar Galactica’. Here, Sharma will play Commander Landry, the security officer aboard the Discovery.
- And now we get to the Klingons. First and foremost, we have ‘Jericho’ star Kenneth Mitchell stepping into the role of Kol.
- Up and coming actress Clare McConnell has also joined the cast as Dennas, “a leader in the Klingon Empire”. By far the freshest face on the cast, McConnel’s debut feature ‘Dim the Fluorescents’ is set for release this fall.
- The final announcement from this batch is Damon Runyan. Runyan, who fans may recognize from his appearances on ‘Smallville’ and ‘Supernatural’, will be playing Ujilli. Like McConnell’s Dennas, Ujilli is described only as “a leader in the Klingon Empire”.
‘Star Trek: Discovery’ is currently expected to premiere later this year on the CBS All Access streaming service, though a specific date has yet to be announced. In addition to the newcomers detailed above, the series confirmed cast includes Sonequa Martin-Green, Doug Jones, Jason Isaacs, Anthony Rapp, James Frain, Michelle Yeoh, Terry Serpico, Maulik Pancholy, Sam Vartholomeos, Chris Obi, Mary Chieffo, and Rainn Wilson.
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