Posted in: Paramount+, Star Trek, streaming, TV | Tagged: LeVar Burton, paramount, patrick stewart, star trek, Star Trek Picard, Star Trek: The Next Generation

Star Trek: Picard: Stewart on Final Film Bow; Burton on Geordi/#MeToo

Star Trek: Picard stars Sir Patrick Stewart & LeVar Burton on the idea of a final film chapter, addressing Geordi's #MeToo moment, and more.

The cast of Star Trek: The Next Generation is more than happy to quit while they're ahead, given the third and final season of Picard giving them the ending that wasn't afforded them in 2002's Nemesis. It's the type of do-over star Sir Patrick Stewart is interested in since he committed three more seasons as his signature character Jean-Luc Picard for a combined 10 seasons and four theatrical films. Stewart and co-star LeVar Burton, who plays Geordi La Forge in the franchise, opened up about their experience reuniting the TNG cast for the Paramount+ series with Indiewire.

Star Trek: Patrick Stewart & LeVar Burton on Proper Resolutions on Their Characters

"I think we could do a movie, a 'Picard'-based movie," Stewart said. "Now, not necessarily at all about Picard but about all of us. And to take many of those wonderful elements, particularly from Season 3 of 'Picard,' and take out of that what I think could be an extraordinary movie. I keep telling people and mentioning it, and so far, there's been no eager response, but it might well happen. And that would be, I think, a very appropriate way to say, 'And goodbye folks.'" Not that the TNG cast ever stopped being friends since their original final adventure with the Stuart Baird film.

When Picard originally premiered its first season, we already had a partial reunion with Jonathan Frakes (Riker) and Marina Sirtis (Troi). Brent Spiner (Data) played multiple roles as he did in TNG throughout all three seasons. Original cast member Wil Wheaton (Wesley Crusher) made a cameo in the season two finale but didn't join the cast reunion in the final season. "I think, for the most part, all of us feel the same way basically," Burton said of Picard's final season. "If this is indeed it, I don't believe we could have possibly gone out at a better moment for the crew — and as a family."

Stewart admitted he softened his stance upon his initial terms to front Picard. "When it was first pitched to me, I was very reluctant to go and join this plan of reviving 'Star Trek,'" he said. "With, at the beginning, some of the original cast. I think if anybody had said to me, 'And we're going to have this big reunion where everybody comes back,' I would have said then, 'Count me out; that's not what I want.'" The actor credits executive producers and showrunners Alex Kurtzman, Akiva Goldsman, and Michael Chabon to come around.

"'Look, guys, in the last 20 years, your lives must have changed. They've transformed. There've been excitements, there've been disappointments. There may even have been tragedies. But we don't know what those things are yet, so we have to explore and find out,'" Stewart said. Upon seeing Burton, "One of the things I'll never forget is the first time [LeVar was] on the set for that, and I looked at your face and went, 'My God, this is not Geordi. Something's happened here.' There was such an intense seriousness about you. Which there always had been, along with a twinkle in your eyes which never went away. But there was this solid, unmoveable feeling about you.'"

For Burton, there was one aspect he wanted to work on Geordi in the Paramount+ series. "I don't think any of us have been better," Burton said. "And I gotta say I think it's because we were invited into the process. When it began in earnest for me, it was with a call with [showrunner Terry Matalas], and he asked me, 'What would you like to see?' And I had one request: I want to rehabilitate Geordi's canon where relationships are concerned. That little stalkerish episode with Dr. Brahms (Susan Gibney) never sat well with me, and I never wanted that to be his legacy: 'He was a great engineer, but he had this one #MeToo moment, and he never experienced a consequence for that.' So I said, I want him to be a family man; I want him to have healthy relationships. And [Terry] went away and came back with the LaForge sisters. My children are 42 and 28, and I was then able to bring all of that depth, all of that weight, all of that anxiety that we feel as parents, all that gravitas… it was right for Geordi. It was right where I felt he needed to be."

For more, including Stewart's reaction to seeing Burton's daughter Mica Burton grow up and being on Picard, Burton on Geordi restoring the Enterprise-D, and coming back to the bridge, you can check out the interview here.

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