Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Star Paul Wesley Breaks Down Kirk's Power Struggle, Teases A 'Much More Serious' Final Season

Warning: This post contains spoilers for Thursday's "Star Trek: Strange New Worlds."

James T. Kirk still has a long way to go to become the Captain Kirk we know, but he made some significant progress this week on "Star Trek: Strange New Worlds."

Thursday's episode saw Kirk thrust into the position of first officer when Pike was busy on an away mission, with a cantankerous admiral named Reeger, played by "Scandal" alum Joe Morton, taking command of the Enterprise and leading it into battle with a cloaked Romulan vessel. Reeger was nursing a serious grudge against the Romulans and was determined to destroy an entire planet to take them out, and Kirk stood up to the admiral, doing everything he could to stop his mad quest for vengeance. (Reeger also served alongside Kirk's father George... and considered him a coward.) It was a big test of character for Kirk, who used a sly bluff to outsmart Reeger and save the planet, as well as restoring his father's legacy.

With this being a pivotal episode for Kirk, TVLine reached out to Paul Wesley, who called this week's installment "my favorite of the season." Read on to see what he says about Kirk's power struggle with Reeger, working with an acting pro like Morton, and what we can expect from the final season of "Strange New Worlds." (A big twist is coming for Kirk, Wesley teases: "People are going to be shocked.")

TVLINE | We know Kirk still carries some guilt from that episode last season when he destroyed a scavenger ship that had thousands of lives onboard. Did that guilt influence the way he approached the conflict with Reeger this week?
That's interesting. I'm going to be very honest: I thought about it a little bit, but I didn't apply it as much to the performance. It was more kind of sensing something was off about this guy, Reeger. Because, as Pike said, sometimes you make decisions and they may not be the right decisions, but you just have to trust your gut, and you have to live with them, and that's something that, unfortunately, is a byproduct of being a captain and in charge. It's war, right? Sometimes in war, there are casualties, as painful as they are. For this one, it was more that something was off about this guy, and he started thinking like, "Something's not clicking." Kirk is a very instinctive person, and he was just like, "My Spidey-sense is sensing something." And then I think subconsciously in the back of his mind, he doesn't know anything about his father. It's kind of this mystery. He knows a little bit, but there are so many blanks to be filled, and I think part of that was also one of the main catalysts of him questioning things, because he wanted to uncover the truth about his dad. But again, it comes back to Kirk's instinct, really.

TVLINE | Yeah, Reeger worked alongside Kirk's dad George and tells Kirk that his dad was kind of a coward, essentially, that he avoided combat. How does that line up with what Kirk knows about his dad?
I think he certainly didn't view his father as a coward, but he sort of felt like his dad never achieved what Kirk assumed he would. I think in many ways, if Kirk wants to be an eventual captain, he has to believe in himself, and he has to feel like he has it inside of him, almost like in his blood or in his genes, right? In some capacity. We can certainly defy our parents and be better or worse than them, but I think he looked at his dad and he goes, "I don't know if I can do this if my dad couldn't do it." So I think this gave him a closure and also a sense of confidence in, "Well, my father is actually a hero. He's an unsung hero, but he's a hero. So maybe I can be a hero. Maybe I can be a leader." So I think that was a big one. You know, the big arc with this character is: How does he become the "TOS" ["The Original Series"] Shatner Captain Kirk that we know, with such a bravado and such a confidence and such a way of moving where everyone's just like, "Whatever this guy says, we're gonna do"? And I think he just isn't there yet, and these are all small steps that sort of get him to that place.

TVLINE | He also has his brother Sam with him this week to bounce things off of. Do you think that helps him in this instance, to have somebody that knows him and knew his dad as well?
Yeah, Sam and Jim are very like oil and water, but they're still brothers. You know what I mean? They're yin and yang. Obviously, there's a shared sense of history, but I think Kirk is a little more suspicious, and Sam is a little more kind of accepting. I think Sam's not as ambitious as Kirk, frankly, and I think Kirk's ambitions make him want to explore things in a different way.

TVLINE | The great veteran actor Joe Morton plays Admiral Reeger, who Kirk butts heads with. What was it like going toe-to-toe with him in a scene, as an actor?
I mean, I knew when we did our table read, I was like, "OK, alright, I've got to really nail this." This guy is so locked in, a theater actor. You know he's going to show up. He's going to have his A game. There's going to be no B.S., and I'm not going to embarrass myself out there. I've got to get in there, and I've got to really do my work and know my place here, but also still be free and open to improvise with it. Yeah, he was exactly what I imagined, and a true professional. I mean, the guy came in so prepared. I never saw him look at his lines. He didn't look at his lines once. He was just locked in and knew what he wanted to do, and showed a real vulnerability as well. Because it's very easy to make that character a one-dimensional villain. But Joe brought a true kind of justification for his actions that you kind of empathize with. Christina Chong, she was saying, when we were watching the scene where he starts talking about his family and he's vulnerable and he's got tears in his eyes, you're kind of like, "Yeah, I'm with him. I understand why he wants to do what he wants to do." That's a great villain.

TVLINE | In their final standoff, Kirk tells Reeger that he adjusted the ship's phasers so that if they're fired, the whole ship will explode. We later find out he was just bluffing. Is that the classic Kirk we know coming to light a little bit, the daredevil?
Yeah, improvisation. He will do anything. It's like the Kobayashi Maru. He'll figure it out. When there's no way out, he's like, "How do I think differently? How do I look at it from a different perspective?" That's what we love about him: the fact that he can always look at something in a way that nobody else can and just figure it out, even if it's not necessarily the most traditional way of doing things.

TVLINE | So we have a final season of "Strange New Worlds" coming up, with just six episodes in it. What can you say about Kirk and his journey in those six episodes? How close do we get to the Kirk we know from the original series?
Very close. As you know, we're going to introduce Sulu and Bones, which is very special. I think some of the magic of "TOS" was the chemistry between [Leonard] Nimoy and all of them. You were watching something very special on screen, and I will say that I felt like I was a part of something special as well. It felt like, "Oh, I kind of want to watch these guys interact." There's going to be several events that occur. It's a much more serious season. It's very, very serious. It's very contained. We only have six episodes, so it's not like you're going to be doing these sort of fantastical, imaginative [stories]. It's very much like: This is the conclusion. This is the final chapter. And also, Kirk goes through something very important that allows us to understand why he is who he is. I can't possibly say what it is, because it's such a huge thing. But just suffice it to say that... people are going to be shocked.

Alright, Trekkies: Beam down to the comments to share your thoughts on this week's episode and what's on tap for the final season.