RELATED STORIES Star Trek: Picard Renewed for Season 2 Ahead of CBS All Access Premiere

Star Trek: Picard Renewed for Season 2 Ahead of CBS All Access Premiere Star Trek: Picard Brings Back a Much Different Hugh — 2020 FIRST LOOK

Jean-Luc Picard is reuniting with a lot of his old friends on Star Trek: Picard… and yes, that might eventually include a certain security chief with a few ridges on his forehead.

The cast and producers of CBS All Access’ hotly anticipated Trek sequel gathered at the Television Critics Association winter press tour on Sunday, and while Picard’s Enterprise shipmates Data, Riker and Troi all make appearances on the series, based on early trailers, there’s no sign of Michael Dorn as the Enterprise‘s Klingon security chief Worf. Some fans have speculated that’s because Worf looks so different from the Klingons seen on Star Trek: Discovery, but executive producer Alex Kurtzman tells TVLine that won’t stop them from bringing back Worf.

“It’s totally possible,” he says of a Worf and Picard reunion later in the series. “I think Worf is such an amazing character… We didn’t want to just throw people in because they were in Next Gen… We actually weren’t even thinking about bringing Marina [Sirtis] and Jonathan [Frakes] back until halfway through the season when, as we were breaking story, something came up that made it very clear they need to be in the story. So a deliberate reason is the bar, and if there’s a great reason to bring Worf in, anything is possible.”

So will Worf’s look on Picard more closely resemble Discovery‘s Klingons, then? “No, he’s got to look the same,” Kurtzman says. “We’re not changing that. It’s funny, because you’ll see by the time you get to [Picard‘s] third episode, there are different kinds of Romulans that look different, depending on their territories. You’ll see some Romulans that are just about the ears, you’ll see some with the ears and deeper ridges in their foreheads… so I have to believe that there are different iterations of Klingons, depending on where they are from.” (To be fair, Discovery did soften the look of its Klingons in Season 2 as well.)

Sir Patrick Stewart reprises his role as Next Generation captain Jean-Luc Picard and is joined by TNG co-stars Brent Spiner (Data), Jonathan Frakes (Riker) and Marina Sirtis (Troi). Star Trek: Voyager alum Jeri Ryan (Seven of Nine) is also in the supporting cast, along with TNG guest star Jonathan Del Arco (Hugh) and Trek newcomers Alison Pill (The Newsroom), Santiago Cabrera (Salvation), Michelle Hurd (Blindspot), Harry Treadaway (Mr. Mercedes) and Isa Briones (American Crime Story: Versace).

Picard debuts Thursday, Jan. 23 on CBS All Access — and has already landed an official renewal for Season 2. (Reporting by Matt Webb Mitovich)