She’s the captain now.
Alabama native Sonequa Martin-Green takes the big chair in Season 4 of “Star Trek: Discovery.” starting on Nov. 18.
A trailer for the new season of the TV series was released today by Paramount+. Martin-Green, as Capt. Michael Burnham, is large and in charge throughout the 2:11 clip.
The actress, born in Russellville, has starred in the series since its debut in 2017, but her character made the leap to captain at the end of Season 3. Burnham, initially assigned to the U.S.S. Discovery as a science specialist, is a human who’s been trained in Vulcan disciplines and the adopted sister of Spock, a legendary figure in the “Star Trek” pantheon.
Burnham, a courageous but conflicted character, has struggled to balance her bold, impetus spirit with the logic and dispassionate decision-making at the core of her Vulcan training. Over the course of three previous seasons, she made her way from specialist to commander to captain.
In the trailer for Season 4, Martin-Green’s character and her crew are faced with a mysterious and deadly space anomaly.
“Today, we seek to understand a threat like none our galaxy has faced before,” Martin-Green says in the trailer. “With so much at stake, countless lives, futures ... Once we enter the anomaly, we are going where no one has gone before.”
That’s a direct pull, of course, from the voice-over introduction to the original “Star Trek” series, an iconic TV program that first aired in the 1960s and spawned an entire universe of sci-fi content. As Burnham, Martin-Green is the first Black woman to have the lead role in a “Star Trek” series.
In the trailer, Martin-Green appears entirely at her ease as an action hero, facing immense danger in the 32nd century.
“What I love about the sci-fi genre is that the prevailing themes and truths that are presented in sci-fi stories – because the circumstances are so fantastic – I think it allows people to suspend their disbelief much more readily, which then allows them to receive what the underlying message is much more easily,” Martin-Green said in a 2019 installment of The Reckon Interview.
“And, and so that’s why you find so much diversity in these stories. A lot of them are set in the future, a lot of them are set in these really dark times these times where things have been wiped out,” she continued. “And whatever the circumstance is for the story, it’s become a great equalizer, right? And people are now concerned more about what’s really important.”
The actress, 36, is a University of Alabama graduate who previously appeared on TV shows such as “The Walking Dead,” “Once Upon a Time” and “The Good Wife.” Martin-Green has several movie credits, and starred with LeBron James and Don Cheadle in “Space Jam: A New Legacy,” released in July.
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