My Favorite New Star Trek Character Fixes A 17-Year Klingon Problem

Only three episodes in, Starfleet Academy has already brought plenty of great characters into the Star Trek fold. Holly Hunter's Nahla Ake is unlike any Starfleet captain before her, SAM represents an exciting evolution of Star Trek's EMH trope, and Paul Giamatti's Nus Braka provides a genuinely unlikable antagonist. The core group of students, meanwhile, are rapidly developing a strong chemistry that signals good things for the episodes ahead.

Even at this early juncture, however, a favorite is steadily emerging. It's a character who is ever-present, but hasn't yet been given the spotlight, and their scenes have promised great potential nevertheless. Most intriguing of all, this welcome new addition to Star Trek finally breaks down a wall the franchise has been hitting its head against for 17 years.

Modern Star Trek Has Struggled To Introduce A Great Klingon Character

Alongside Star Trek's movie series, it was The Next Generation that took the concept of Klingons and evolved it into a key part of Gene Roddenberry's mythology. Through Michael Dorn's Worf, the race became a rich and vividly colorful culture, and that development continued into both Deep Space Nine and Star Trek: Voyager.

Star Trek's modern era, on the other hand, has struggled to introduce a new Klingon character on that level. The Kelvin timeline movies included Klingons, but only in a minor capacity, and often behind helmets. There was enough potential to do something truly great with the new-look villains, but nothing came of it.

Star Trek: Discovery's Klingons represented a stark departure from their depiction in previous shows. L'Rell proved to be a solid character, but possessed few common traits with past Klingons, while Ash Tyler literally erased his Klingon heritage as a method of going undercover.

Strange New Worlds' timeline made Klingon appearances rare by necessity, and while Lower Decks offered some hilarious Klingon gags, they were largely limited to cameos or supporting parts. Star Trek: Picard had a brilliant Klingon chara- no, wait, that's Worf again.

Jay-Den Kraag Can Be Modern Star Trek's First Great Klingon Character

Karim Diané's Jay-Den Kraag breathes new life into Star Trek's Klingons with the fascinating twist of maintaining the important Klingon tradition of honor while abstaining from the equally-important Klingon tradition of violence and bloodshed.

Like Worf before him, Jay-Den carries a heavy burden of duty, but remains conflicted between duty to his people and duty to himself. As a younger Klingon, however, Jay-Den is also beset by self-doubt and moments of paralyzing uncertainty. That makes Jay-Den the most complex and layered of Starfleet Academy's main students, but also the character most entrenched within Star Trek lore.

Jay-Den is a pacifist in a body built for war, creating an unease. Watching Jay-Den attempt to work through that unease makes him immediately endearing, but as Starfleet Academy continues, his resolve to avoid dishing out an old-fashioned Klingon beating will inevitably be put to the test. Surely, Jay-Den will at some point be forced to choose between abandoning his principles or abandoning his friends, and that will open up an entirely different chapter for Karim Diané's character.

Jay-Den also brings great comedy to Starfleet Academy. Watching his terrible attempt at creating a diversion in episode 3, it's impossible not to feel sympathy for the Klingon. His plight will be painfully relatable to anyone who has desperately tried to fit into an unfamiliar environment.

But the best thing about Jay-Den is the classic Star Trek debate his presence looks set to ignite. Can a Klingon ever truly move away from violence and battle? Or is it futile trying to defy centuries of biological nature? Are Jay-Den's moral absolutes possible in the real world? Or can he find a balance between his calling as a medical officer and his ability to tear folk limb from limb?