Warning: SPOILERS for Star Trek: Discovery Season 5
Star Trek: Discovery season 5 will present the first wedding of major Star Trek characters in 22 years. Written by showrunner Michelle Paradise and directed by Olatunde Osunsanmi, Star Trek: Discovery season 5, episode 1, “Red Directive,” centers on Captain Michael Burnham (Sonequa Martin-Green) hunting for an ancient power belonging to the Progenitors, who were introduced in the classic Star Trek: The Next Generation season 6 episode, “The Chase”. Meanwhile, Captain Saru (Doug Jones) and President T’Rina (Tara Rosling) take a major step in their relationship.
Star Trek: Discovery season 5’s premiere is a crossroads for Captain Saru. Although the Kelpien loyally serves his dear friend, Captain Michael Burnham (Sonequa Martin-Green), as First Officer of the USS Discovery, Saru receives an intriguing job offer to become an Ambassador for the United Federation of Planets. This dignified new position means leaving Discovery, but with the benefit of Saru getting to spend more time with his love, T’Rina, the President of Ni’Var. At the end of Star Trek: Discovery‘s season 5 premiere, Saru took the Ambassador position, and T’Rina surprisingly proposed marriage. It’s safe to say Saru said “yes.”
When Ambassador Saru and President T’Rina tie the knot in Star Trek: Discovery season 5, it’ll be the first wedding between two major Star Trek characters in 22 years. The last significant Star Trek wedding was in 2022’s Star Trek: Nemesis when Commander William T. Riker (Jonathan Frakes) married Counselor Deanna Troi. On the TV side, both Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and Star Trek: Voyager featured marriages between lead characters. Lt. Commanders Worf (Michael Dorn) and Jadzia Dax (Terry Farrell) got hitched in DS9 season 6, and Captain Benjamin Sisko (Avery Brooks) married Kasidy Yates (Penny Johnson Jerald) in DS9 season 7. Lt. Tom Paris (Robert Duncan McNeill) wed Lt. B’Elanna Torres (Roxann Dawson) in Voyager season 7.
In the case of Riker and Troi and Paris and Torres, their actual wedding ceremonies took place off-screen. Meanwhile, Worf and Dax and Sisko and Yates’ weddings were shown on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, as was the Star Trek: The Next Generation wedding of Chief Miles O’Brien (Colm Meaney) and Keiko Ishikawa (Rosalind Chao). If Star Trek: Discovery season 5 shows Saru and T’Rina’s wedding ceremony – a historic Star Trek first as a Kelpien and a Vulcan have never married before – it’ll be the first time a major Star Trek wedding will be shown since Captain Sisko and Kasidy Yates’ in 1999’s Star Trek: Deep Space Nine season 7, episode 18, “‘Til Death Do Us Part.”
Although a handful of big-name Star Trek characters got married, weddings for major characters are still a rare sight in the franchise. Captain James T. Kirk (William Shatner) married two USS Enterprise crewmen in Star Trek: The Original Series season 1’s “Balance of Terror”, but the ceremony was interrupted, and the groom was later killed. This set a precedent so that Star Trek didn’t see a wedding until Star Trek: The Next Generation season 4, 25 years later. Spock (Leonard Nimoy) and T’Pring (Arlene Martel) voided their betrothal in TOS, and neither he, Captain Kirk, Captain Jonathan Archer (Scott Bakula), nor Admirals Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart) and Kathryn Janeway (Kate Mulgrew) got married as Captain Sisko did.
The life of a Starfleet Officer doesn’t preclude being married or raising a family, but many Star Trek Captains seem to follow Kirk and Picard’s lead and dedicate their life to the service, and the loneliness that comes with it. This is why it’s refreshing to see Saru shed his Captaincy and embrace his loving future with T’Rina. Hopefully, Star Trek: Discovery season 5 will make Ambassador Saru and President T’Rina’s nuptials a true celebration, and perhaps Captain Michael Burnham and Cleveland Booker (David Ajala) won’t be far behind.
Star Trek: Discovery season 5 is streaming on Paramount+