10 Star Trek Characters Who MUST Return (2025)

6. Michael Burnham

It was largely thanks to the self-sacrificing efforts of the crew of the Discovery that there could be a Starfleet Academy in the 32nd century. It seems only fair that the one leading the charge to the far future should get to appear in the now eponymous series. Cut short by cancellation, Michael Burnham, like her colleagues, deserves more before the coda. The road to the future's future for Admiral Burnham need not remain untravelled.

Burnham is also used to giving speeches to young Starfleet hopefuls. In Kobayashi Maru, she addressed a small group of Academy cadets — the first ever since the Burn. The academic year of the upcoming series must need a commencement speaker, too. Admiral Picard had his turn centuries prior. Why not Burnham again, therefore?

"We could really use you at the Starfleet Academy," Tilly teased us to Burnham later in Whistlespeak. "Well, don't tempt me," Burnham replied tantalisingly. That might have been a hint at a professorship in xenolinguistics. Then again, it might just have been the whistle. Either way, Burnham does have a ship to command, all things considered. The Discovery itself is a character owed a return.