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Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Season 3 makes no delay in getting down to the origins of the franchise's history. Already in its second episode, Wedding Bell Blues brings back one of Star Trek's most baffling and over-the-top original characters, Trelane. No wink or winked implication. Trelane himself appears, this time brought to life by Rhys Darby, and his return is a straightforward visitation to canon. Even that.
Although there had been a rumor beforehand that this might be a nod, the episode and the writers spelled it out so that this intergalactic prankster is indeed the same Trelane of The Squire of Gothos, but with an earlier version and even greater messiness. In an interview with TVGuide, Strange New Worlds’ co-showrunner, Henry Alonso Myers, said,
"He wore the outfit perfectly, and it felt very Trelane. Rhys is just a delightful human being, a really good actor, and he brought a lot of sense of comedy and a slightly different perspective on how he could play the role."
He added,
"He could be both light and dark, and funny, all at the same time. And part of it was just like, 'What can we do that is surprising?' And he seemed to be a good example of that"
On Season 3 of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, Trelane is not mentioned on-screen, but the unmatched shenanigans, opera-like wardrobe, whimsical misuse of god-like powers, and melodrama of unbridled fascination with human tradition are all there. And that is only the beginning—the episode goes on and confirms a half-century-long fan speculation by directly connecting Trelane with the Q Continuum.
His father, whose voice is unmistakably provided by John de Lancie (Q himself), manifests as a glowing sphere and is the final puzzle to fit together what fans had been speculating since the '90s: Trelane is of the Q Continuum.
A full circle moment: Trelane's return in Star Trek: Strange New Worlds
Wedding Bell Blues, the second episode of Season 3 of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, concerns Spock and Chapel being drawn into a simulated wedding ceremony planned by a seemingly all-powerful entity.
The man, seemingly playing with time, space, and decoration like a child, is Trelane. He professes to be 8,000 years old, looks like an otherworldly ringmaster who has just learned about human romance customs, and perpetually balanced on the border of danger and hilarity. Ring a bell? That's because it does.
Trelane first materialized on Star Trek: The Original Series in the 1967 episode The Squire of Gothos as a dandyish monster who was fanatically fascinated with Earth history, specifically its warrior and aristocratic eras.
In that episode, Captain Kirk and his crew met Trelane as a young yet immensely powerful being who turned out to be a child of more advanced beings. That idea is extended further now in Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Season 3, where his origins are discovered and canonically connected to the Q.
Trelane and the Q Continuum: No longer just fan theory
One of the most lovely new revelations in Season 3 of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds is finally official word on Trelane's relationship with the Q Continuum. Fanon years ago theorized that Trelane is a Q—flying the flag because of his godlike tendency to behave arbitrarily, omnipotence, and interest in humanity as the giveaway signs.
This was argued ad nauseam in the forums and semi-canonical novels, but never once actually made official. No more.
The nod that makes it is when Trelane's father arrives as an orb and scolds him for his careless actions, an interaction that reminds one of the end of The Squire of Gothos.
But the voice here is clearly John de Lancie in Q mode. The message is as clear as it is deliberate: Trelane is a junior member of the Q Continuum, and Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Season 3 has officially made it so.
Why is this important to the Star Trek Universe?
This retroactive-but-necessary statement puts our understanding of both The Original Series and The Next Generation in a new light.
It sets a precedent that the Q Continuum was indeed a force to be reckoned with during the era of Kirk and Spock, and that Trelane's insane antics were not an isolated incident of alien unpredictability but an earlier harbinger of what Q would later become.
It also suggests that the Q are not only long-lived but can evolve through superior development processes, Trelane being an adolescent state of what Q is. By incorporating this episode as part of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Season 3, the show enriches canon, not on top of it.
This isn't an Easter egg to throw away; it's a bold bit of continuity storytelling recontextualizing the dynamic between two Star Trek generations. The show is honoring its legacy content and extrapolating on it, not only by revisiting Trelane, but by situating him within the larger cosmic universe of the franchise.
Rhys Darby's turn brings new life to Trelane
Rhys Darby's casting, too, is noteworthy. On Flight of the Conchords and Our Flag Means Death, Darby can bring his full self to playing the flamboyant thespian side of the character without losing the evil undertone that Trelane has developed. Darby's Trelane in Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Season 3 is not only flamboyant but also volatile, needy, and magnificently powerful. He mockingly taunts emotional stakes as he balances individuals' lives on a set of scales, a dichotomy that has always been pertinent to the Q.
His dialogue with Spock and Chapel is rife with farcical humor, but they also work to illustrate precisely how imbalanced and lethal Trelane is. The show is tone loosey-goosey, as is the character himself; he is quirky one moment, and unnervingly intense the next. It's a tone Strange New Worlds does well, particularly when tiptoeing along a perilously thin line between nostalgia and innovation.
With Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Season 3, Episode 2, the franchise has long at last fulfilled one of its most enduring questions on television: Trelane is a Q. His return, evil, unencumbered by law, and now fully integrated into the cosmic pecking order of the Star Trek universe, opens out a new direction in the narrative possibilities to come for the series.
It's a setup for future Continuum-based adventures and introduces us to a more sophisticated, more mature vision of a character who had originally seemed to be a one-off weirdo.
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And although the episode never actually says it, plot and performance alike make no doubt. In a universe full of godlike beings, one theatrical cosmic prankster just made his canonical return. Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Season 3 didn't feel quite so Trelane; it was Trelane.
Also read: Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Showrunners might keep telling Original Era stories
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