Every DS9 Fan Is Worried About 2 Huge Tragedies In Star Trek’s Next Show

Star Trek: Starfleet Academy's eye-popping teaser trailer contains Easter eggs with worrying hints about two tragedies from Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. Executive produced by Alex Kurtzman and Noga Landau, Star Trek: Starfleet Academy stars Academy Award-winner Holly Hunter as Captain Nahla Ake, the Academy's Chancellor, with Academy Award nominee Paul Giamatti as the villainous Nus Braka.

Set in the late 32nd century after the end of Star Trek: Discovery season 5, Star Trek: Starfleet Academy takes place over 800 years after the end of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. Star Trek's 24th century is represented by The Doctor (Robert Picardo), as Star Trek: Voyager's Emergency Medical Hologram survived to become an instructor at Starfleet Academy centuries later.

Star Trek: Lower Decks' Tawny Newsome, who played Lieutenant Beckett Mariner in Mike McMahan's animated comedy, was a writer in Star Trek: Starfleet Academy season 1. Newsome is a lifelong DS9 fan and was considered the Starfleet Academy writer's room "continuity cop." Perhaps Newsome contributed to how Starfleet Academy wove in the following potential tragedies from Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.

Captain Sisko May Never Have Returned From The Prophets After Star Trek: DS9

Did Sisko Never Fulfill His Promise?

Star Trek: Starfleet Academy's teaser trailer contains a shot of one of the cadets, Sam (Kerrice Brooks), studying a screen displaying "The Fate of Benjamin Sisko, Emissary of the Prophets." The lesson speculates whether Sisko died in the Fire Caves of Bajor or if he never returned from the Celestial Temple, the home of the Prophets of Bajor. This hints that it's possible the answer isn't known 800 years later.

Captain Benjamin Sisko (Avery Brooks) was born to a human father and a mother named Sarah, who was a Prophet. Essentially a demigod, Sisko fulfilled his destiny as the Emissary of the Prophets by saving Bajor from Gul Dukat (Marc Alaimo) and the Dominion. Thanks to Sisko's leadership, the United Federation of Planets won the Dominion War.

When Sisko joined the Prophets at the end of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, he promised his pregnant wife, Kasidy Yates (Penny Johnson Jerald), "Maybe a year. Maybe... yesterday. But I will be back." Star Trek: Starfleet Academy's ambiguity eight centuries later hints that Captain Sisko never did return, which would be a tragedy for Kasidy, his son, Jake Sisko (Cirroc Lofton), and Ben's child with Kasidy.

What Happened To Nog & Why Is The Ferengi Only A Lieutenant After Star Trek: DS9?

Nog Has A Starship Named After Him

One of the most thrilling Easter eggs in Star Trek: Starfleet Academy's teaser trailer is a shot of cadets in front of a wall emblazoned with the names of dozens of Starfleet heroes from years past. Names of characters like Captain William T. Riker (Jonathan Frakes) and Lt. Julian Bashir (Alexander Siddig) share the wall with real-life Star Trek creative talent who are now canon, like "Admiral Tawny Newsome."

One name, however, stands out for Star Trek: Deep Space Nine fans: Lt. Nog (Aron Eisenberg). The fact that Nog is canonically cataloged as merely a Lieutenant 800 years after DS9 is alarming, despite the honor of Nog being recognized. Nog only rising to the rank of Lieutenant hints that something tragic happened to the first Ferengi in Starfleet. (Aron Eisenberg sadly passed away in 2019).

In Star Trek: Deep Space Nine's documentary, What We Left Behind, DS9's writers speculated that Nog was Captain of the USS Defiant in their theoretical Star Trek: Deep Space Nine season 8 (although Nog's seeming death kicked off their story). Star Trek: Discovery season 3 established that there is a 32nd-century starship, the Eisenberg Class USS Nog, named after the heroic Ferengi.

Nog's rise in Starfleet being canonically halted at the Lieutenant rank creates all kinds of questions, and some sad possibilities. However, it's uncommon for a Starfleet ship to be named after a mere Lieutenant, so whatever did happen to Nog, which Star Trek: Starfleet Academy will hopefully reveal, could, at least, detail why the Ferengi hero was honored with the USS Nog.

Starfleet Academy Also Reveals What Happened To Star Trek: DS9's Jem'Hadar

What Happened To The Founders?

Star Trek: Starfleet Academy introduces Lura Thok (Gina Yashere), the First Officer of the USS Athena and Starfleet Academy's Cadet Master. Lura is a half-Klingon and half-Jem'Hadar hybrid, which hints at what happened to the villains from Star Trek: Deep Space Nine's Dominion War.

The Jem'Hadar were the Founders' formidable genetically-engineered soldiers and the backbone of the Dominion. However, the Jem'Hadar's weaknesses were a short life span and a dependence on the drug Ketracel-white. Although 800 years have passed between Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and Starfleet Academy, Lura Thok seems to answer two big questions about the Jem'Hadar.

It's evident in Star Trek: Starfleet Academy that the Jem'Hadar found a way past their genetically-engineered lifespan limits, perhaps through breeding with other races like the Klingons. In What We Left Behind, DS9's writers posited that the Jem'Hadar broke free of their Ketracel-white addiction and became followers of the Prophets of Bajor. Lura Thok is proof positive that the Jem'Hadar evolved.

The presence of a Jem'Hadar hybrid in Star Trek: Starfleet Academy also begs the question of what happened to the Founders of the Dominion. A Changeling was seen in Star Trek: Discovery season 4, and rogue Founders allied with the Borg to attack the Federation in Star Trek: Picard season 3's early 25th century.

Hopefully, Star Trek: Starfleet Academy will contain answers to the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine mysteries it created, and that those revelations won't be too tragic for fans yearning for canonical updates about Captain Benjamin Sisko, Lieutenant Nog, and the Dominion.