This year WonderCon will again be a virtual event and today Comic-Con International announced the full schedule for their two-day WonderCon@Home event which will be held online via YouTube on Friday, March 26 and Saturday, March 27. There isn’t going to be a big Star Trek Universe panel this year, but CBS is putting on a panel on TV science moderated by Discovery star Anthony Rapp which will include Star Trek’s science advisor. There are also panels for the Voyager documentary and a celebration of the 20th anniversary of Star Trek: Enterprise.
We have curated a list of panels that may be of interest to Star Trek fans. You can click the title links for more info or add to your Google Calendar. Each link also includes an embedded YouTube video for when the panel goes live. All the virtual panels are free.
Friday, March 26th
3:00 pm: The Bright Legal Future of Star Trek
Star Trek has inspired lawyers and judges for decades. It has shown a future with equal protection under the law with every generation having at least one trial episode, and addressed the goal of having a just society. Our panel will explore the issues of the rule of law seen in Star Trek: Discovery, the rights of refugees in Star Trek: Picard, and the many legal issues from Star Trek: Lower Decks. We’ll take on issues explored throughout each generation of Star Trek with circuit judge John Owens (9th Circuit Court of Appeals), Steve Chu (DOJ), Bethany Bengfort (Durie Tangri), and Nari Ely (US Courts). Moderated by Joshua Gilliland (The Legal Geeks; Greenan, Peffer, Sallander & Lally).
4:00 pm: Star Trek & Mental Health: 2020 TV Lessons for a Better 2021
The past year has felt like we were all banished to the Klingon penal colony of Rura Penthe—but Picard, Lower Decks, and Discovery all had their share of uplift as well as darkness. “Dr. Trek” Larry Nemecek (Portal 47) and psychologist Dr. Ali Mattu (The Psych Show), your hosts of Life Support Live, explore how the mental health lessons of Star Trek 2020 can help us all to boldly go in 2021 and beyond.
5:00 pm: Voyager 25th Anniversary Documentary Team
David Zappone (co-director), Kevin Layne (co-director), Joseph Kornbrodt (producer,) and Lolita Fatjo (producer) are joined by special guest Garrett Wang (Ensign Harry Kim of Star Trek: Voyager) discuss the crowdfunded untitled Voyager Documentary currently in production. The team will partake in a Q&A session moderated by “Dr. Trek” Larry Nemecek.
Saturday, March 27
1:00 pm: Rhapsody PR’s 13th Annual Behind-the-Music Panel
Watch a behind-the-scenes discussion with the talented music creators to some of the most popular sounds from series and films today. Featuring Jeff Russo (Star Trek: Picard), Ruth Barrett (Bloodlands), Jake Monaco (Flora & Ulysses), Amanda Jones (Adventure Time: Distant Lands’ special Obsidian), Anthony Willis (Promising Young Woman), and Sean Callery (The Marksman). Moderated by actress Emily Coutts (Star Trek: Discovery).
2:00 pm: The Science of Smart TV
It takes great brain power to think like MacGyver or Sheldon Cooper or come up with the plausible scientific theories in the Star Trek universe. Moderated by Anthony Rapp (Lieutenant Commander Paul Stamets on Star Trek: Discovery), the panel talks with the incredible minds behind the actual science for hit CBS Original Series Young Sheldon and MacGyver and the ever-expanding Star Trek universe exclusively on Paramount+: David Saltzberg, technical advisor for Young Sheldon and UCLA professor; Rhett Allain, technical consultant for MacGyver and associate professor of physics at Southeastern Louisiana University; and Dr. Erin MacDonald, sci-fi and technical consultant for the Star Trek universe.
4:00 pm: Is Star Trek Fandom’s Division Just the Generations Talking?
Star Trek’s fandom, as well as many others, seems more and more to suffer fissures that fall along generational lines. But is it the Trek that divides, or just a result of the culture—tech-savvy, media access, comfort zones with social media, the representation revolution—that seems to be constantly shifting, even turning over every decade (or faster)? Noted Trek pundits and podcasters join host “Dr. Trek” Larry Nemecek (Portal 47) to take a broader look at the bigger Trek landscape: Kennedy Allen (Women At Warp), Ryan Britt (Luke Skywalker Can’t Read), John Champion (Mission Log Live) and Aly Martinez (Towel Talk Tuesday).
5:00 pm: The Companion: Star Trek: Enterprise 20th Anniversary Celebration
Legendary Star Trek journalist Ian Spelling takes WonderCon@Home 2021 back to the dawn of Starfleet to celebrate the broadcast of the two-part pilot “Broken Bow” 20 years ago this September. This intimate conversation with the episode’s director James L. Conway and Star Trek: Enterprise regular Dominic Keating (Lt. Malcolm Reed) discovers how Scott Bakula’s hair angered an executive and college football killed their ratings.
SDCC going virtual too
Last week Comic-Con International also confirmed that San Diego Comic-Con 2021 will also be a free virtual event, just like 2020. Comic-Con@Home will run for three days from July 23-25, 2021. However, CCI is planning on doing a smaller in-person convention in November in San Diego.
For more information visit comic-con.org.
Find more news and reports about Star Trek events at TrekMovie.com.
My gosh, it feels just like yesterday that both Voyager and Enterprise debuted. I remember the hype surrounding both shows so clearly. Time really flies and waits for no-one….
“Science” in this context needs the quotation marks – Trek is science fiction, with pretty heavy emphisis on the fiction.