Beaming into our hearts on May 5th is Celia Rose Gooding as Cadet Nyota Uhura. Star Trek: Strange New Worlds is ramping up the promotion for its new series with a character-focused promo that takes a closer look at Cadet Uhura.The Strange New World series debuts as the second season of Star Trek: Picard comes to an end on Paramount+, and the first teaser was recently released. The streamer has provided the following synopsis:

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds is based on the years Captain Christopher Pike manned the helm of the U.S.S. Enterprise. The series will feature fan favorites from season two of Star Trek: Discovery, Anson Mount as Captain Christopher Pike, Rebecca Romijn as Number One and Ethan Peck as Science Officer Spock. The series will follow Captain Pike, Science Officer Spock and Number One in the years before Captain Kirk boarded the U.S.S. Enterprise, as they explore new worlds around the galaxy.

However, today Trekkies got another look at the series when Star Trek on Paramount+ tweeted, "Cadet Uhura's future is hailing. #StarTrek#StrangeNewWorlds premieres May 5 on @ParamountPlus!"

Uhura is part of Star Trek's legacy, having appeared on the bridge on the bridge of the U.S.S. Enterprise in Star Trek: The Original Series. On TOS, the communications officer was played by Nichelle Nichols, whose work on Star Trek made her one of the first Black women to be featured in a major television series not portraying a servant. In fact, when Nichols considered leaving the show because of racism, Martin Luther King Jr. convinced her to continue with the series because of what she was doing for Black women in STEM.

Celia Rose Gooding is a Trans Ally

Celia Rose Gooding after a performance of Jagged Little Pill on Broadway in 2019.
Celia Rose Gooding after a performance of Jagged Little Pill on Broadway in 2019.

Gooding, a New York native with dance training from the prestigious The Ailey School, occasionally took leave from high school to do readings for a musical she was involved in developing, Jagged Little Pill, a rock musical based on the album of the same name by Alanis Morissette, with orchestrations by composer Tom Kitt, music and lyrics by Morissette and Glen Ballard, and a book by Diablo Cody. The musical was a hit, and she rose to prominence on Broadway for her role in Jagged Little Pill, Mary Frances "Frankie" Healy for which she won a 2021 Grammy Award for Best Musical Theater Album and was nominated for a 2020 Tony Award for Best Actress in a Featured Role in a Musical, making the bisexual actress one of the youngest Tony Award nominees in the category at age 20.

However, in 2021, Gooding took leave of the Broadway musical for the harm it had done to the trans and nonbinary community. Gooding tweeted a long statement on September 24, 2021, about the "harm to the trans and non-binary community both onstage and off," which included encouraging a nonbinary cast member to forgo necessary medical treatment for Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome, according to Deadline.