The Star Trek: Section 31 streaming movie starring Michelle Yeoh debuts on Paramount+ in just over a couple of months, on Friday, January 24. To get you ready, Paramount has created a “quick guide” video primer all about Section 31.
Section 31 history lesson
Paramount has sent out a brand new video for viewers to “learn about Starfleet’s covert division that has existed in the shadows since the beginning of the Federation.” The 2 1/2 minute video features footage from Deep Space Nine, Enterprise, Discovery, Picard, and even from Star Trek Into Darkness. It’s all woven together with a narration that attempts to explain how Section 31 has evolved over the centuries, leading up to the new streaming movie set in the “lost era” of the early 24th century.
For more details check out our Section 31 category covering recent updates, including our NYCC interviews with the cast and director.
Section 31 movie in January
Star Trek: Section 31 will premiere on Friday, January 24, 2025, exclusively on Paramount+ in the U.S. and international markets where the service is available. In the movie, Michelle Yeoh reprises her Star Trek: Discovery role as Emperor Philippa Georgiou who joins Section 31, a secret division of Starfleet. According to the brief synopsis: “Tasked with protecting the United Federation of Planets, she also must face the sins of her past.”
Section 31 also stars Omari Hardwick (Power), Kacey Rohl (Hannibal), Emmy® winner Sam Richardson (Ted Lasso), Sven Ruygrok (One Piece), Robert Kazinsky (Pacific Rim), Humberly Gonzalez (Ginny & Georgia) and James Hiroyuki Liao (Barry). Miku Martineau (Kate) portrays a young Philippa Georgiou.
Keep up with news about the Star Trek Universe at TrekMovie.com
Good video that made sense of the frequently inconsistent Section 31.
It didn’t…
Something Everybody knows of doesn’t just fades away.
Remember: federation is a sophisticated, educated society. They have History books and super advanced universitys.
But sure, an Organisation everyone knows of turns into an Organisation No one knows of in barely 100 years…. Suure… BS!
It does when the federation writes the history books
“Something Everybody knows of doesn’t just fades away.”
History is filled with examples of that happening.
Section 31 – apparently the worst kept secret in the Federation
When they constantly tell everyone who they are and what they do, it’s really not much of a secret anymore.
It’s not like Section 31 was public knowledge in Pike’s time. He and the crew of Discovery — who were ALSO part of a secret project, btw — knew about it, but the average folk did not.
Even the criminals in the 2. Pilot knew about it …
What is it you think they knew? It’s not like they said “those dudes with the black badges are Section 31!”
Except they ran around with their own black badges.
Aboard their own ship and Discovery, which itself was a secret project.
The black badge thing was another really silly idea. I loved that LDS called it out.
Better summary:
Watch Sloan et al S31 if you appreciate nuance, clever writing and subtlety.
Watch DISCOverse S31 nonsense if your guilty pleasure is crayoning and the odd lobotomy or two.
LOL, couldn’t have said it better myself.
Use lots of black,red and yellow crayons for the pew pews, and splosions!!
LOL!
Yeah, you’re not wrong. DS9’s writers were a far more talented bunch.
Unfortunately, I have to agree with you. Even though Discovery as a series wasn’t bad per se, it wasn’t really good either. But especially as far as Section 31 is concerned, I liked their portrayal in DS9 much better.
I liked that video and the explanation that Section 31 became more of a myth, rather than a known division of Starfleet, by the 24th century.
Hopefully a trailer will follow with the same tone. If they have any footage that allows for a change in tone.
You mean they are riffing on, The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn’t exist?
That’s along the lines I thought they might go, where you systematically purge and alter records so there are no breadcrumbs for historians to chase up, just isolated instances and dead ends. It was how I envisioned ‘killing’ Kirk in the early 90 (pre-GEN), staging a public assassination that was actually a beam-out, then tucking him away as a secret weapon, only to have covered tracks so well that nobody remembers that they did it which I thought would provide a good ironic spin on the scheme.
S31 wasn’t a myth for Bashir they believed wasn’t a thing.
They just didn’t know about it all.
This Video and all of S31 in Disco+ is just BS
Was Section 31 ever in PIC? Unless I’m mistaken, season 3 at least — to its considerable credit — didn’t so much as mention it, referring instead, exclusively, to Starfleet Intelligence (even when discussing Project Proteus, which FWIW I understood to be separate from the stuff Sloan was involved with in DS9’s final season).
Picard season 31 involved Section 31.
Picard Season 31 was so boring. We get it, he hates the Borg. It was mildly entertaining when they destroyed his second body (leaving him as a furious brain in a jar) and in return he threw a sun at them.
I think Daystrom Station was run by Section 31, but I may be mistaken. I will have to go back and watch. Also I assume it was Section 31 who was experimenting on the Shapeshifters in Picard. They were willing to carryout genecide in DS9, so in their opinion, what’s a little medical experimentation.
Daystrom Station does appear in this video, so I’d say it’s probably run by Section 31.
You can’t sanewash that NYCC trailer. Anymore than you can convince me that whoever conceived of this TV movie knew who Sloan is. If the TV movie lives up to any of Sloan’s appearances in any way, I’ll eat my hat.
Nice video, but the movie’s trailer still looks excruciatingly bad though.
When you watch both videos back to back the Section 31 in the trailer feels nothing like any of the versions in the video, but more like the 24th century version of the A-Team. The movie itself will hopefully feel closer to the original organization but everything about it just feels so ridiculously off.
Yeah I was skeptical from the initial conception of the series or movie, but have come around to be cautiously optimistic. Unfortunately, that initial trailer hasn’t helped, but we shall see what comes out in January. Man, that will be here before we know it.
Yeah it will be here very soon. And of course I do want to love it like I want to love everything, but yeah very nervous this may turn out bad. I just don’t think I have ever been this turned off by a Star Trek trailer before. Fingers crossed.
If nothing else it will be a lot of fun to talk to you and others about it! :)
I agree on all points.
It’s telling that someone decided that they needed a primer for the uninitiated. It’s a standalone film that can’t stand on its own without knowing the backstory. They should have gone with an origin story.
I took it as it’s more for those who are intimately familiar with the franchise and may not be up to speed. Michelle is the big draw here, especially with her being in Wicked right now.
Yeah, I’ve watched the trailer once and I’m content with that. And this is coming from somebody who is actually looking forward to the film.
I am staying open minded for the actual movie, but yeah the trailer didn’t help.
Hey, don’t insult the A-Team like that!
LOL!
Agreed. I am glad that there is some good Star Trek yet, like Lower Decks. This S31 movie is just weird that it exists, like why?
They also got these basic facts about Section 31 wrong:
1. S31 is not part of Starfleet at all, as many of us here keep saying. At least, it definitely was not by the time of DS9. There are literally lines of dialogue (Sloan and, later, Bashir) where this is stated directly.
2. S31 gained its official designation via the relevant part of Starfleet’s Charter *after* the founding of the Federation, but ENT directly showed that the organisation already existed long before that.
Either someone at Paramount hasn’t done their homework, or someone is repeatedly trying to retcon this stuff despite how much it contradicts facts that were emphasised on-screen in the earlier shows. It wouldn’t be surprising if the movie has “explanations” in the storyline to reinforce the retcons.
You’re wrong. S31 comes directly from Starfleet charter, that already existed on Enterprise. Starfleet preceeds the Federation. But they indeed committed an error in the video. They say the First Klingon War took place in the mid-22nd century. It was the 23rd.
Carol Marcus (ST2:TWoK): “Starfleet has kept the peace for 100 years. I cannot and will not subscribe to your interpretation of this event.”
TWoK is in the 23rd century, so by Carol’s line, the war would had to have happened in the 22nd century.
Kurtzman-Trek messed things up. Including the need to try and fix his mistakes with Section 31 to make it better align with what was already established on DS9 and Enterprise.
TNG also backed up that continuity with the Klingons when Picard said in First Contact (the episode) that first contact with the Klingons went badly that lead to decades long conflicts with them. And that became the reason why they started implementing the process they had back then when engaging with a new species.
But to be fair, it really was Enterprise itself that went against that canon first since we saw first contact with the Klingons and obviously they didn’t fall into a war over it. But I have seen people over the years say just because they didn’t declare war with the Federation in Broken Bow doesn’t mean they wouldn’t eventually get into a major conflict down the road. And that we saw tensions between Klingons and Archer throughout the show so it was there, but probably didn’t build into a full on conflict until later. I can kind of buy that regardless it’s all been retcon now.
Actually it was stated in DS9 that Section 31 started with the beginning of Starfleet and before the Federation. So Enterprise got it right. But yeah, it’s Discovery that got their portrayal very wrong.
And it’s always great to see you Jai! :)
“The Star Trek: Section 31 streaming movie starring Michelle Yeoh debuts on Paramount+ in just over a month, on Friday, January 24”
Maybe I’m missing something but isn’t that 2 months away?
Is this the same PR dept that said of STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS that Khan arranges to ‘detonate the fleet’
This was painfull to watch…
Stupid glorification and justification of stupid Organisation.
No guys. S31 ist not to cool to be legal.
It is so uncool, it needs to be illegal.
And this ist what they don’t get.
never glorification of s31.
it is always shown as wrong in its aims/lack of morals and usually fails to meet its objectives.
the notorious s31
To be honest, I was already skeptical when Michelle Yeoh stated that it would be a mix of ‘Guardians of the Galaxy’ and ‘Mission Impossible’. Both have very little to do with Star Trek. But let’s wait and see how it turns out in the end.
I would very much prefer to see a film about Sloans’ Section 31 instead of Disco’s. The latter didn’t really appeal to me.
desilu produced both the OS and M:I in the 60s.
Is Section 31 an agency of Starfleet or the Federation? — The story given by different Trek series is inconsistent and I suspect a root cause is that the TV writers commonly conflate the two entities, ascribing to Starfleet functions and authority that should belong to the civilian Federation government.
That is, we only rarely see UFP entities (the President, Council, diplomats, the Federation News Service) so we know there’s *some* distinction, but we don’t know its full extent or if it’s constant over time. It’s not like we’ve ever seen an org chart and if there’s an informational vacuum, then we shouldn’t necessarily fill it with US, UN or EU precedent. (FWIW, most of the time it *looks* like the major UFP entities are just *Earth* entities operating under UFP authority. Worlds join to be under the Starfleet defense umbrella, and conform their laws to UFP standards, but we don’t know what resources they contribute. Dilithium? Asteroid mining rights? Mutual-aid emergency stockpiles?)
Let’s say United Earth (or whatever nations dominated its) established a dirty tricks office after First Contact; more likely, borrowed agents, expertise and budget from existing intelligence agencies. The opinion of leaders about its proper role could have changed repeatedly, and it got swapped to different points in the budget upon the creation of Earth Starfleet then Federation Starfleet. It was bigger during DSC (when it had a whole fleet of ships) and by DS9 evidently decided that smaller/clandestine/autonomous was useful.
IMO part of the fun of thinking about canon is that you have to reckon with the parts that you don’t love conceptually or didn’t totally work dramatically. They’re still part of the darn thing!
The Disco version of 31 is hard to reconcile with the DS9 one, but this video made a good go at it. They also did a good job of aesthetically integrating clips from the various versions.
Has anyone ever suggested that 31 was involved in “The Enterprise Incident”? That’s got to be one of the shadier bits of spycraft we’ve ever seen Starfleet officers do.