The upcoming Star Trek: Starfleet Academy welcomes four legacy characters from past Star Trek series to its cast. Set in the 32nd century, Star Trek: Starfleet Academy is a spinoff of Star Trek: Discovery that includes Star Trek: Lower Decks‘ Tawny Newsome as a writer. The new Star Trek series will follow new cadets and instructors as they rebuild Starfleet Academy after the Burn decimated the United Federation of Planets in the 31st century. Naturally, Star Trek: Discovery characters were expected to be part of Star Trek: Starfleet Academy, but none were named in Starfleet Academy‘s first casting announcements.

Instead, Star Trek: Starfleet Academy built hype for new fans by announcing award-winning actors Holly Hunter as the Academy’s Chancellor and Captain, and Paul Giamatti as Starfleet Academy‘s villain. More recent announcements named Kerrice Brooks, Bella Shepard, George Hawkins, Karim Diané and Zoë Steiner as the Academy cadets that Star Trek‘s first YA series focuses on. San Diego Comic-Con’s Star Trek panel finally confirmed that there will be characters from Star Trek: Discovery in Starfleet Academy after all, as well as one unexpected Star Trek: Voyager alumnus.

4 Mary Wiseman as Lt. Sylvia Tilly

Star Trek: Discovery’s Cadet Turned Academy Instructor

It’s no surprise that Mary Wiseman will return as Star Trek: Discovery‘s Lieutenant Sylvia Tilly in Star Trek: Starfleet Academy. Tilly left the USS Discovery to pursue a career as a Starfleet Academy instructor in Star Trek: Discovery season 4, which naturally set Tilly up to join the Starfleet Academy series. No doubt Tilly will be our introduction to Star Trek: Starfleet Academy, as a character that we’re already familiar with, and as someone whose own journey from Cadet to instructor can be a blueprint for the potential character arcs of Starfleet Academy‘s young students.

Star Trek: Starfleet Academy is going to be a great fit for Sylvia Tilly, who is at her best when allowed to guide others. Tilly’s aptitude for bringing disparate people together is first demonstrated in Star Trek: Discovery season 4, episode 4, “All is Possible”, when Academy cadets who neither knew nor liked each other much have to survive a crash landing on a hostile moon by cooperating. After continuing to mentor Ensign Adira Tal (Blu del Barrio), Tilly ends Discovery spearheading a mentorship program at the Academy, inspired by Adira as well as Captain Michael Burnham (Sonequa Martin-Green) and Commander Rayner (Callum Keith Rennie).

3 Oded Fehr as Admiral Charles Vance

Starfleet’s Commander-in-Chief Is A 32nd-Century “True Believer”

Oded Fehr as Admiral Charles Vance is a welcome addition to the cast of Star Trek: Starfleet Academy. Fehr’s Admiral Vance gained popularity in Star Trek: Discovery as a Starfleet flag officer who defies the unfortunate trope of Star Trek Admirals being “badmirals”. Instead of being antagonistic simply because the plot needs a force for Starfleet captains to push against, Vance is driven by his protective nature and desire to hold Starfleet together. As the commander in chief of Starfleet, Admiral Vance is likely to have a strong influence on Starfleet Academy’s policies, which could provide some healthy friction with Holly Hunter’s Chancellor or other Academy higher-ups.

Admiral Vance is also likely to be Lieutenant Tilly’s ally at Federation HQ, should the need for one ever arise. In Star Trek: Discovery season 4, Vance and Tilly became friends while working together to fend off the pending threat of the Dark Matter Anomaly, and nearly faced their deaths together. That bond meant Vance was willing to trust Tilly with sensitive information in Star Trek: Discovery season 5, and is likely to do so again in Star Trek: Starfleet Academy.

2 Tig Notaro as Commander Jett Reno

Star Trek: Discovery’s Underutilized Engineer Gets Another Chance

It’s great that Tig Notaro’s Commander Jett Reno is coming back to Star Trek.Star Trek: Starfleet Academy will offer more opportunities for the fan-favorite Commander Jett Reno to turn up, especially since Star Trek: Discovery often underutilized Reno. After the USS Discovery rescued Commander Reno from the wreckage of the USS Hiawatha in Star Trek: Discovery season 2, Reno became one of Discovery’s engineers and occasionally popped up to lighten the mood or provide an out-of-the box solution. Like Lieutenant Tilly, Commander Reno is originally from the 23rd century and stayed with the USS Discovery crew when Commander Michael Burnham orchestrated Discovery’s jump to the future.

What Commander Reno will be doing on Star Trek: Starfleet Academy hasn’t yet been confirmed, but it almost doesn’t matter. More of Tig Notaro in Star Trek is never a bad thing, and Reno will almost certainly integrate really easily with the lighter atmosphere that Star Trek: Starfleet Academy promises. After the USS Discovery kept coming up against life-and-death situations of galactic proportions, Commander Reno could decide she’s done with all of that, and start working at the Academy instead.

1 Robert Picardo as The Doctor

Starfleet Academy’s Wild Card Pick From Star Trek: Voyager

The most surprising choice of Star Trek legacy characters in Star Trek: Starfleet Academy is Robert Picardo as Star Trek: Voyager‘s Doctor. It’s possible this version of the Doctor will be related to the backup version of the Doctor’s program from Star Trek: Voyager season 4, episode 23, “Living Witness”, which sees the Doctor reactivated 700 years in the future to give a firsthand account of the USS Voyager’s involvement in a conflict between two neighboring species, the Kyrians and Vaskans. This places the Doctor in the 31st century, very close to the time of the Burn, and about 100 years before Star Trek: Starfleet Academy.

The capability of the USS Voyager’s EMH to go beyond his initial programming means the Doctor could be teaching any number of subjects at Starfleet Academy. History, command training, holographic ethics, and even music appreciation are all possible areas of expertise for the multifaceted Doctor. Medicine is, of course, the obvious choice, because the Doctor continued to practice medicine for the Kyrians and Vaskans before charting a path back to the Alpha Quadrant in “Living Witness”. It’ll be interesting to see if the Burn affected the Doctor’s journey to Federation Headquarters, if Star Trek: Starfleet Academy is, in fact, picking up this loose end from Star Trek: Voyager.

With these legacy Star Trek characters, the cast of Star Trek: Starfleet Academy has characters from each of Star Trek‘s main storytelling eras, effectively tying the whole franchise together in a single show. Perhaps the inclusion of these four legacy Star Trek characters will even inspire new fans who are introduced to Star Trek through Starfleet Academy to check out Star Trek: Discovery and Star Trek: Voyager. Either way, the knowledge and experience from such a breadth of characters can really only benefit the next generation of cadets in Star Trek: Starfleet Academy, who will go on to shape the future of Star Trek‘s 32nd and 33rd centuries.