We’ve seen Zachary Quinto and the late, great Leonard Nimoy suit up as the legendary Vulcan, but now, it’s Ethan Peck’s turn to play the role of Spock for Star Trek Discovery season 2.
After scouring the four corners of the galaxy – nay, the universe – for potential candidates, CBS has finally announced that Peck, best known for The Sorcerer’s Apprentice and 10 Things I Hate About You, has been chosen to play the half-human, half-Vulcan foster brother of Michael Burnham (Sonequa Martin-Green).
The USS Enterprise’s most famous science officer was first teased during Discovery‘s season finale, in which our crew encountered the Enterprise for the very first time. But there’s a twist; Spock has slipped off the radar to tend to his own personal journey, as if he’d run into a question he couldn’t answer, as Captain Christopher Pike (new series regular Anson Mount) infers.
So it looks like a Star Trek series will once again revolve around the search for Spock, but according to Trekverse architect Alex Kurtzman, Ethan Peck is the only man for the job, and his casting brings an end to the long and extensive search from CBS.
Through 52 years of television and film, a parallel universe and a mirror universe, Mr. Spock remains the only member of the original bridge crew to span every era of Star Trek. The great Leonard Nimoy, then the brilliant Zachary Quinto, brought incomparable humanity to a character forever torn between logic and emotion. We searched for months for an actor who would, like them, bring his own interpretation to the role.
Kurtzman continued:
An actor who would, like them, effortlessly embody Spock’s greatest qualities, beyond obvious logic: empathy, intuition, compassion, confusion and yearning. Ethan Peck walked into the room inhabiting all of these qualities, aware of his daunting responsibility to Leonard, Zack and the fans, and ready to confront the challenge in the service of protecting and expanding on Spock’s legacy. In that spirit, we’re thrilled to welcome him to the family.”
Said to be much lighter in tone than the opening season, the second installment of CBS’ Star Trek Discovery series is expected to drop early next year, when Ethan Peck will be joining Sonequa Martin-Green and Co. on the flight deck.