Ahead of the highly anticipated fourth season premiere of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, fans, media, and influencers gathered at Toronto’s Shangri-La Hotel for an exclusive Q&A hosted by Tanner Zipchen. Joining the event, on July 20, was none other than Captain Christopher Pike himself, Anson Mount, who took the stage to discuss the upcoming season, creative genre risks, and his real-life connection to outer space.

Here are some takeaways and quotes from the night’s conversation with Anson Mount.

On Bringing Nostalgia Back to the Enterprise

While modern sci-fi leans into sleek redesigns, Mount reflected on how Strange New Worlds deliberately taps into the classic aesthetic and audio design of TOS.

“When we shoot these things… we don’t get any of the sound effects. We’re in a loosely constructed set. So, when we see the edit… and see [and hear] all those sound effects and the atmosphere put in, that’s the first time we go, ‘Oh wow, this sound design is fantastic.’ It really brings you back to the Original Series.”

On Dinosaurs and Pushing Genre Boundaries

Season 4 kicks off in wild fashion with an episode featuring prehistoric life on Earth. Mount shared how the show’s collaborative writing environment under co-showrunners Akiva Goldsman and Henry Alonso Myers keeps the cast on their toes.

“We continue our love affair with genre. For whatever reason, that just became our shorthand with the writers… They would routinely come to actors’ holding when we were between setups and say, “What have you not done? You want to do anything?’ Genre became this vehicle that we would use to get the ‘Strange New World’ of whatever character moments need to happen. So, for instance, with the musical, that was an episode where the writers knew there was going to be a ton of emotional transition. You can either try to disguise that, or you can embrace it.”

On Meeting His Jim Henson Puppet Doppelgänger

One of the most talked-about upcoming episodes is the long-awaited puppet episode. Mount recalled the sheer excitement on set when the legendary Jim Henson Creature Shop delivered the cast’s felt counterparts.

“First of all, it was a tremendous honour knowing that Jim Henson Studios was making those puppets. When we got word that they had arrived at the stages, we all stop up, apologized to the first AD, and ran off to meet our puppets and the puppeteers. It was pretty wild. It was sort of like hearing yourself on an audio tape for the first time… like, ‘That looks like me?’

Watching those puppeteers rehearse is just next level. They pick up a dead piece of felt, and it’s crazy how they breathe life into those things.”

On First Contact and Real-Life Alien Signals

During the audience Q&A, a fan brought up Mount’s real-world seat on the Board of Directors for METI International (Messaging Extraterrestrial Intelligence). The actor passionately weighed in on whether humanity should be actively reaching out into the cosmos.

“The problem with the argument of keeping quiet is that we’ve been shouting to the universe for a century now… so I think it’s kind of a moot point. What we’re talking about doing [at METI] is specifically targeting and having a necessary thought experiment about how to introduce ourselves appropriately.

The thing we always talk about is the distance that we’re dealing with… but what we all too often don’t talk about is the scale of time and the likely survival rate of species. I do think intelligent life is out there – I just think it’s rarer than we have thought in the recent past.”

On Finding His Own Captain Pike

When asked about how much he studied previous iterations of Christopher Pike (such as Jeffrey Hunter’s original pilot performance), Mount revealed why he chose to forge his own path.

“I really took my cues from the writers on Star Trek: Discovery because they needed Pike to be a very specific thing. In my mind, ‘The Cage’ was the first act. We know the third act is Pike in ‘The Menagerie.’ My job was to come in and fill out the second act of Pike, which we didn’t have. So, I felt a lot of freedom to go in and discover the character that way.”

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds’ Season 4 premieres Thursday, July 23, on Paramount+. Stay tuned to The TV Watercooler for an exclusive interview with Anson Mount.