The newest “Star Trek” show in the galaxy, “Strange New Worlds,” debuted on May 5, 2022, and it kicked off with a spiffy, goosebump-inducing main title sequence bolstered by top-notch visual effects, a superb theme by composer Jeff Russo that incorporates elements of the original Alexander Courage music, and a heartfelt reading of the iconic “Space, the final frontier…” introduction first delivered by William Shatner for “Star Trek: The Original Series.” At the “Strange New Worlds” red carpet premiere, held April 30, 2022, in New York City, series star Anson Mount and executive producers Alex Kurtzman and Henry Alonso Myers spoke exclusively with Heavy on Star Trek about creating the memorable main title sequence.
“It was one of the highlights of my career,” Mount said. “To be entrusted to say those words… That speech is one of the pillars of American television. There are a few things that are more iconic than that speech. It’s funny; I was recording that from the basement of my home in Connecticut. Our technical directors were in New York and our host team was in Los Angeles. We’re all networking and working on it, trying to get it right. This was back in October ( 2021). At one point I stopped and I said, ‘Guys, can we just take a moment and acknowledge the fact that we’re gonna remember this for the rest of our lives? That there are very few people who are entrusted to do this? Everybody agreed. ‘Yeah, this is so cool.’ There was a pause. Then I realized, and I said, ‘Of course, William Shatner is in orbit right now.’ It was a remarkable moment.”
The ‘Strange New Worlds’ Main Title Sequence
Kurtzman cited the contributions of Picturemill, which, according to their website, is “A story-based motion design and content studio” with a “team of designers and filmmakers who have crafted some of the most memorable sequences in history.” Their site references their work on “Star Trek: Discovery,” “Winning Time,” “The 100,” “Succession,” “The Hate You Give,” “Wonder,” “The Greatest Showman,” “Ted 2,” and “The Wolverine,” among many other credits.
“They’re an amazing company, and I’ve worked with them for a very long time,” Kurtzman said. “We wanted to harken back to ‘TOS,’ obviously, but we also wanted to feature the strange new worlds behind the Enterprise in a way that felt unique, interesting, special, and worthy of what visual effects can do these days. Again, we wanted it to be an adrenaline shot of nostalgia but with a modern, contemporary feel. Hopefully, it’s telling an interesting story about the worlds that it travels through while also presenting the Enterprise. The details of the Enterprise that we knew as we were building it, there were going to be a lot of conversations online about whether or not we were technically accurate in the placement of the windows and everything. We tried to be as accurate as possible. There may be some changes that came along the way, where there were gray areas for interpretation — if you didn’t necessarily look at the manual — but it was a fun and long process.”
‘The Original Series’ Main Title Sequence
Myers also mentioned Picturemill, but noted that the “Strange New Worlds’ main title sequence started with the score by Jeff Russo. “We wanted to do something that sounded like the original, but was also its own thing, and build on it,” he said. “I feel like that’s almost a metaphor for what we’re trying to do with the show. What I mean is to take a show, something like it was, but what would they do if they did it now? Which is to say that we’re not so stuck on all of the things they did in the past that we won’t play a character differently. We’re inspired by the past, and we’re like, ‘Okay, if (Gene) Roddenberry were doing this now he would probably have a more diverse crew. He would probably think about women differently. The effects would be amazing. The approach to a character might be a little bit different.
“One of the things we borrowed from ‘The Next Generation‘ was that thing where they would iris in on different characters for each episode,” he continued. “We have this wonderful ensemble that we wanted to zero in on and give everyone that moment. That’s one of the things you can do in an episodic story. You can go in and say, ‘Oh, well, this is an episode about Uhura, Spock, or M’Benga. You asked me about the title sequence. What we’re trying to do is be like, ‘Okay, this feels like your dad’s ‘Trek,’ but it’s not.’”
“Star Trek: Strange New Worlds” is streaming now on Paramount+.
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