SPOILER ALERT: This story discusses plot developments in Season 3, Episode 9 of “Star Trek: Stranger New Worlds,” entitled “Terrarium,” currently streaming on Paramount+.
Although “Star Trek: Strange New Worlds” tracks the early days on the U.S.S. Enterprise for several of the franchise’s beloved characters like Spock (Ethan Peck) and Uhura (Celia Rose Gooding), one of the biggest fan favorites has been a character created specifically for the show: the Enterprise’s plucky helmsman, Erica Ortegas (Melissa Navia).
To the delight of many, in the penultimate episode of Season 3, Ortegas finally — finally! — gets her due with an episode dedicated entirely to her. It’s the culmination of an arc that started with the Season 3 premiere, when Ortegas suffers near-fatal injuries after she, along with a few other Enterprise crewmates, are captured by the reptilian aliens the Gorn. The experience haunts Ortegas through the season, affecting her morale and pushing her even into outright insubordination.
In “Terrarium,” Ortegas’ nightmare comes back to life. While flying a shuttlecraft, she gets sucked into a wormhole and crashes onto a barren moon. As the crew of the Enterprise scrambles to save her, an injured Ortegas must keep her wits while searching for food to stay alive — until she discovers a Gorn pilot is also stranded on the moon with her. Convinced the Gorn means to kill her, Ortegas is shocked when it saves her instead from the moon’s giant, centipede-like native species, and then shares its shelter with her. In classic “Star Trek” fashion, Ortegas learns how to communicate with the Gorn, whom she discovers is a female pilot, like her. They form a bond and work together to ignite the gases in the raging storm around them to signal their location to the Enterprise. When rescue arrives, they mistake the Gorn as an enemy and kill her, to Ortegas’ anguish and regret.
The episode is nothing less than a tour-de-force for Navia, who has to hold the story entirely on her shoulders for much of the episode. “The fans have been wanting more Ortegas screen time and a big story,” she says. “But I didn’t know that they were going to send the rest of my cast on vacation!” The actor talked about what it’s been like to have so many fans in Ortegas’ corner, the challenges — and benefits — of shooting against an actor in a giant Gorn costume, why making the episode was like preparation for a Marvel film, and how she feels as she is about to start filming the fifth and final season of the show.
Ortegas has had quite a story arc this season. Did you know the full extent of it from the start?
I knew about [Episode] 309. It was spoken about in whispers, you know, like nobody wanted to say too much, but they were like, “There’s this big episode coming.” I knew what was happening in the premiere of Season 3. I knew that it was going to be the first time that we saw Ortega broken and dealing with something that was not in her control. She’s this very capable, confident, cocky, cool, trustworthy helmsman, right? She gets you out of trouble. Even though she went through the Klingon war, what I brought into it was that this is the first time that she’s really almost died. So I knew about the start of what was happening [with her]. And then finally, toward the middle of the season, I got the full extent of what 309 would be, and that this would be her essentially grappling with the manifestation of her nightmare.
Had you been eager for Ortegas to finally get a showcase episode specifically about her?
Yes. It’s interesting. Season 1, it didn’t actually dawn on me that Ortegas does not have as much screen time as everybody else. She was an integral part of every episode. It was only when the fans responded to Season 1 — that they loved Ortegas, but there was not enough of her — that I think I started to think about it. I just trust our writers so much, and I understand the difficulties behind having this really fantastic ensemble show and giving everybody the story time when you have 10 episodes [per season]. I want to do what serves the story.
Ortegas does get a big moment in the Season 2 episode “Among the Lotus Eaters,” when she saves the Enterprise after everyone has lost their memories, but that wasn’t an episode solely dedicated to her.
That was her big “I fly the ship moment.” I remember I was telling fans, “More Ortegas is coming!” And then when I was doing the press for that episode, journalists were just like, “By the way, we loved everything about this episode, but this isn’t what you meant, right? There’s going to be a bigger episode?” And I’m like, oh my. It wasn’t like a big ask for me, that she should have this big, big episode.
So what was your reaction when you realized so much of this episode was going to be focused solely on you?
Our producer-director, Chris Fisher, at the start of the episode, he was just walking by, and he’s just like, “You’re going to be able to shoot a Marvel film after this.” I didn’t fully understand what he meant until we got to the end of the episode, when I had done everything. You know, we had had the explosions, we had had the dirt, the debris, the madness. I knew it was going to be a challenge, but I wanted every bit of it.
Marni Grossman / Paramount+
What was it like to be the only actor on set?
I did laugh that my cast was on vacation. Some of them actually went home — like, far away. And so coming to set every day, there with 150 crew members, who I’m always in awe of, I felt that responsibility. It felt like every day, we were up against the clock.
What surprised you during the shoot?
In order to simulate the storm, even though we were on an AR wall — we have this multi-million dollar technology, but you still need giant, metal, rusty, old fans. Almost every day that we shot, it was a battle. The sound — bless their hearts, they tried every day to get the best sound possible. We had to do a lot of ADR work. But I had to relearn how to do certain things when you can’t hear yourself speak or even think because it was so loud. There were all these elements that every day. I felt like I was learning how to do things for the first time.
How was it working with Warren Scherer, the actor who played the Gorn?
I thought that was going to be the hardest. It was not. The special effects, the puppetry, everything that they put into the Gorn was so incredible and lifelike. The suit was so heavy and it was so sweaty in there — Warren had a fan inside — that we were always on a timer when he was in the suit. So a lot of my close ups were opposite our [assistant director], or a stone, or just the head without Warren in it. So that was very difficult, because the Gorn wasn’t speaking. So you have to have a real confidence in what you do, in the story and in what’s underneath to make that work.
How did you approach the scenes before the Gorn shows up, where it’s just you?
When we did the table read, I joked that everybody had come to watch my one-woman show. So much of it is also dependent on the physicality of the moment. So, for example, when she’s first crashed, and she wakes up and she’s bleeding, and she needs to make it all work, so much of it was the feeling that you’re not going to be able to pull this off. What is it like when you create water for the first time?
It reminded me, too, so much of space travel. As a “Star Trek” actor, we get to do so much with the space community if we want to, and everything about space travel is solving every problem. You have really big goals, but everything is just a little thing right in front of you. So I thought about that very purposely. I’m not even going to think about what’s going to happen tomorrow. What are we doing in this moment? What everybody loves about Ortegas is that can do mentality and also that cockiness. All right, this is the worst possible situation, but we’re gonna do this.
What do you think this experience is going to mean for Ortegas?
In the premiere of episode, she’s broken. It almost takes her out, her literal nightmare. We see that in [Episode] 302, when she has that great scene where her friends are dancing, but she can’t join — which I know I’ve experienced — we see what what her nightmare is in the in the background there. So to turn an enemy into a friend and then to find out that it was all out of her control, just the ramifications of that are massive. I think it gives her peace that she cannot control everything. We hear more about her backstory; she got into Starfleet because it was something that she could control. There’s a piece in knowing that there are certain things that are beyond you. I wish we could see more — and maybe we will — but in this episode after Uhura leaves the room, how is she dealing with that? I’m hoping — and I’m saying this knowing that we’ve shot Season 4 — is that it’s something that grounds her in a new way. She’s just had to figure it out on the death moon.
You’re about to shoot the final season, which the producers have said is going to end with the beginning of the Kirk era. We know that Ortegas is not on the Enterprise when Kirk takes over as captain. Do you have a sense of what’s going to happen with the character and where she might be going?
My answer to that is yes and no. I know bits of what’s coming. I’m hearing what the fans are saying. There’s this concern that everybody loves this crew so much, and we’re just going to leave this crew behind. What I just want everyone to know is we’re going into Season 5, and even though there’s a lot of talk about going into Kirk’s Enterprise, for me, I am still fully in “Strange New Worlds.” We’re still fully in this crew. We still have a lot of “Strange New Worlds” to come.
This interview has been edited and condensed.
