](/author/maggie-lovitt/)

Rob London

Maggie Lovitt

Published Sep 7, 2026, 8:00 PM EDT

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The Star Trek franchise can be a little intimidating for a newcomer. There are nearly a thousand episodes spread across a dozen TV series spanning sixty years, plus fourteen feature films. And that’s just for the viewer: to actually become a part of it is considerably more intimidating, as actor Ethan Peck found out when he joined the franchise in 2019. He recently discussed his Trek experiences with Strange New Worlds castmate Christina Chong at Tampa Bay Comic Con last weekend, at a panel moderated by Collider’s Maggie Lovitt.

Peck plays one of the more intimidating roles on Star Trek: Spock, the half-human, half-Vulcan science officer of the USS Enterprise. Leonard Nimoy’s interpretation of Spock was the only character who endured from The Original Series’ original pilot, and he went on to become an icon of the franchise. Peck began playing a younger incarnation of the character on the second season of Star Trek: Discovery in 2019, and was eventually spun off into Strange New Worlds, along with the rest of the *Enterprise *crew.

Luckily for Peck, he had a *Trek *legend to help ease him into the series: Jonathan Frakes. Peck discussed how Frakes has become a one-man welcoming committee to the franchise:

It’s really wonderful, because he actually directed me for the first time on Discovery, an episode of Star Trek: Discovery. For someone who’s brand new to the universe and to the character of Spock, it was really wonderful and comforting to have him there and kind of guide me into all of it, because he’s, you know, the mayor of Star Trek. He has been around for a good amount of time at this point, and he’s directed so much…he’s a lovely guy, I’m sure some of you have met him already. he’s just like really positive, and warm and friendly, and he’s like that on set, too. It’s really great to have that sort of, like, guidance coming into it.

It wasn’t just the on-screen aspects of *Trek *that Frakes counseled him on; he’s also been a valuable source of insight in regards to the fandom and the convention experience.

In fact, he’s like, ‘you know what you’ve gotten yourself into’, and you know what conventions are and you’ve been to them, and so he kind of got me into this world, as well, in a really wonderful older brother kind of way.

Chong interjected that Frakes was also “a lunatic on set”…but in a good way.

Frakes played intrepid USS Enterprise first officer William Riker on all seven seasons of Star Trek: The Next Generation and all four of its spin-off movies, and guested on Deep Space Nine, ***Voyager ***and Enterprise. In recent years, he reprised the role of Riker in Picard, which reunited the Next Generation cast, and the animated Lower Decks. Frakes has also become one of the most prolific Star Trek directors in history, helming episodes of almost every live-action *Trek *series, from The Next Generation to Starfleet Academy; he also directed two feature films starring the Next Generation cast, First Contact and Insurrection.

Season 4 of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds is now streaming on Paramount+. Stay tuned to Collider for future updates.

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