There’s only one person that makes sense for another time travel Star Trek: Strange New Worlds episode

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds brought the future to them in season two, but any future time travel episodes should be focused on the past.

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds did a crossover episode with the crew from Star Trek: Lower Decks, bringing two of their characters back in time to meet the crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise. It was a big hit with fans and has become the basis of a lot of articles online. Nerdist, for example, listed the other crews in Trek’s lore that the crew should meet.

And they listed some interesting names and crews. They look at the Kelvin timeline, which would be a neat little send-off for the Kelvin crew after the repeated failures of getting the fourth film off the ground. They look at the Enterprise-B crew, under John Harriman, and a presumably returning Alan Ruck.

And while they are all good ideas, only one name really matters; Jonathan Archer.

The only name that matters is Jonathan Archer

Pike has a reverence for history. He’s someone who sees the specialness in big moments. While Star Trek Generations tried to establish a bit of a historical connection between Jean-Luc Picard and James T. Kirk, Strange New Worlds could arguably do that better with Pike and Archer.

The way Pike celebrates the momentous would allow him to almost be giddy in the presence of a battle-tested and worn-out Archer. Obviously, this idea would see Pike going to the past to meet Archer 20 years after the Romulan War, or it could be the 20-year post-war Archer arriving in Pike’s time period. Either way works, but if you go back in time, you could also bring people like T’Pol or Shran back as well.

Fans want more Enterprise, anyway they can get it, so if this is how they bring Archer and of course his actor Scott Bakula back to the franchise, then awesome. But do it well. Showcase just how much respect Pike has for Archer and how much of a visionary he should be seen as.

Doing this right may be the biggest crossover episode of all time for Trek.