Star Trek: Starfleet Academy has already assured itself and Trekkies that the upcoming show will feature a worthy adversary for the new cadets and their chancellor/captain, Nahla Ake (Holly Hunter) to face off against. Casting Paul Giamatti as the first season’s primary antagonist, Nus Braka, was already a stroke of genius.
However, who knew that Giamatti was letting legendary Trek villains from the past inform his performance as the half-Tellarite, half-Klingon menace. The Oscar-nominated actor made the revelation while visiting Sao Paulo, Brazil to promote the upcoming Star Trek streaming show, Starfleet Academy. Giamatti said (via TrekMovie.com):
“I think I probably had in my head a lot of different villains. I probably had some Khan. I had sort of [General] Chang and Gul Dukat, these kind of guys who love the sound of their own voices. These guys who love to kind of ‘blahblahblah,’ just bull[expletive]ing, constantly. I thought of the chaoticness of Q and stuff like that.” (Continued...)