Posted in: Paramount+, Star Trek, TV | Tagged: star trek, strange new worlds

Strange New Worlds S04: Celia Rose Gooding on "Wacky" Puppet Episode

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds star Celia Rose Gooding previews what's in store with Season 4, including some "wacky" puppet antics.

It's hard to believe that after 60 years of Star Trek, Strange New Worlds is doing things no other franchise series has pulled off, like in season two's "Subspace Rhapsody," which finds the crew of the U. S. S. Enterprise and a Klingon ship trapped in multiple song-performing musical numbers in the face of an intergalactic threat. In season four, Paramount partnered with Jim Henson's Creature Shop, which created puppet versions of the crew, with the fifth episode directed by Jordan Canning (Fraggle Rock: Back to the Rock). Celia Rose Gooding, who plays communications officer Cadet Nyota Uhura, spoke with TV Insider to reflect on the show's whackier side and preview the season four puppet episode.

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Star Celia Rose Gooding on Unique Franchise Episodes, Including Season 4's Puppets

"We do some of the most insane things I think Trek has ever done in seasons that I cannot talk about," Gooding noted at the time, reflecting on the first out-of-the-box episode, Season 1's "The Elysian Kingdom" that found the Enterprise crew playing medieval characters in M'Benga's (Babs Olusanmokun) storybook. "I mean, we did a musical episode. I think a musical episode is a bit wackier than a fairytale medieval type of story because we've seen that in Trek before. I know we've never seen a musical episode before. I think we've done a lot of wacky stuff."

During SDCC 2025, fans got a first look at SNW season four, with the coup de gras being the introduction of Puppet Pike (voice of Anson Mount). "When I heard that there was going to be a pike puppet, that was probably a 10 out of 5" on the wacky scale, Gooding admitted. "I cannot believe we got away with the puppet episode. I think that I was so shocked, but we'd already done so many different types of insane genre flips that when I heard that we were doing a puppet episode, I was like, 'Oh, of course. Where are we going to go next? Underwater? What are we doing? What's the next crazy thing?' And so yeah, I was really excited by the idea of puppets, but it was definitely something that knocked the wind out of me for a second. And then I was like, 'This is Strange New Worlds. Of course, we're going to do something completely out of the ordinary."

Strange New Worlds, which also stars Ethan Peck, Jess Bush, Christina Chong, Melissa Navia, Rebecca Romijn, Martin Quinn, Paul Wesley, and Carol Kane, returns July 23rd on Paramount+.

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