In her 25-plus-year career, actor Michelle Hurd has played dozens of memorable television roles, from early stints on New York Undercover and Law & Order: SVU to modern-day genre series like Ash vs. Evil Dead and Netflix’s Daredevil, and network procedurals like NBC’s Blindspot and CBS’s Hawaii Five-0.

Now Hurd, 53, is setting sail into outer space, where she’ll debut as former Starfleet officer Raffi Musiker in Star Trek: Picard, joining Jean-Luc Picard and crew of the La Sirena on their new mission.

We caught up with Michelle Hurd at the Star Trek: Picard press tour earlier this month to learn more about Raffi, her thoughts on joining the legendary franchise… and what it’s like to see herself in the pages of a comic book.

“Raffi had a prior relationship with Picard after the time of Next Generation,” Hurd told us, “but they had a falling out. She is a security analyst and a hacking genius. She’s really sarcastic…. but she also is haunted by some decisions that she made in the past, and has a really complicated and challenging relationship with the Federation.”

Readers of the Star Trek: Picard — Countdown prequel comic series will know more about Musiker’s connection to Jean-Luc Picard, as she served with him during the development of the Romulan evacuation project — before the Federation scrapped their rescue efforts after the rogue synth attack on Mars.

“That was crazy, right? I didn’t know nothin’ about it!,” she laughed, recalling the moment she learned she was part of the Picard prequel comics. “Jonathan Del Arco actually sent me a text [letting me know.] I with my nephews and I was like, ‘Oh my god, you guys, look! I’m in a comic book!’

Then, my oldest sister, who is a total Trekkie, went to four different comic book stores. They all sold out in like, hours – she told all the owners, ‘When you get another copy, call me! My sister’s Raffi!'”

While earlier times between Musiker and “J.L.” Picard — the character’s nickname for the Admiral — may have been pleasant, the former Starfleet officer’s life hasn’t exactly worked out for the best after leaving the interstellar service.

“She’s damaged, [and] she is an addict,” Hurd shared, “but there are reasons behind that – as there is always, for people who have that demon on their shoulder. I really appreciate to be able to tell that story because I think it affects a lot of us, whether you’re talking about some addiction to some substance or an addiction to other things – shopping, working out — the things that we do to avoid the issues that we should face.”

“I said to [Star Trek: Picard showrunner] Michael [Chabon] that it was imperative that she not be, you know, just ‘a drunk’ or ‘a druggie’ or whatever,” she continued. “She’s using these vices to actually get up out of bed, and to put one foot in front of the other to get through the day.”

“She’s haunted,” Hurd said. “There are a lot of people are haunted by decisions made in the past. How do you work through that? How do you deal with it? Some people don’t have to do anything to deal with their problems. Other people need to have help. And I think you see that Raffi needs help, and she’s doing the best she can.”

Star Trek cast members have plenty of stories about how they landed their roles in the franchise, and Hurd’s pathway to Picard began with a last-minute remote audition that even she wasn’t sure was going to work.

“I was in New York, and I put myself on tape,” she explained. “It was one of those things where it’s like, ‘Hi honey, do you mind? Like, next day, we really need it.’ It was 11 pages, like a five minute scene – it was insane. I thought, ‘Let’s be a good actor…’ and I read a little bit more of it. The character breakdown was so complete, like a real, thought-out, fleshed-out human, something I could really sink my teeth into. Not just another cop!”

“My husband [Garrett Dillahunt] is an actor, he’s standing there filming me with an iPhone, while I had like sweatpants on and my hair up, and some makeup slapped on. I was just like, you know, this is not going to happen,” she confessed with a shake of her head.

“I sent two takes — I liked the beginning of one, I didn’t like the end of the other. I was like, ‘Fuck it, just send it. We’ll see what happens.’ Then I booked it from that!”

After landing the role of Raffi Musiker, she shared the news with her Trek-loving family, and explained how becoming part of a franchise so well-known for its diversity efforts — dating back to the Original Series in the 1960s — means so much to her on a personal level.

“When I told my sisters, they lost their cookies,” she shared. “It’s a show that we grew up on, you know, I back in the day. I’m biracial, and my father was a black actor, and it was one of the only shows that we were encouraged to watch together because it had us — it was representing people who were not all the same. So I’m ecstatic.”

“It’s really important,” Hurd stressed. “Incredibly important. We, as adults, can say that. We’ve got to have our kids represented; people need to see themselves on television. It seems silly to say that, or extreme, or whatever, but we need to see ourselves, you know?”

“And I think we’re changing,” she continued. “I think things are happening, and that we’re seeing more diversity on television. Our show is really diverse — I mean, look at Evan [Evagora, who is of Maori descent], Isa [Briones, who is part Filipino], and Santiago [Cabrera, who is Venezuelan].”

“I was saying to my husband — who’s white — we were watching a show and a commercial came up, and there’s a mixed couple. My husband said, ‘It’s so good that we’re seeing that more,’ and I said, ‘The only thing that gets me worried is the faction of people who will see that couple and say, ‘Goddammit, another one!’”

“How do we get past that?” she asked. “How do we do that? In a weird way, the world of sci-fi is like, everybody can get on board. It’s make-believe, so you can be green and red and blue and black and purple and it’s okay. And they don’t realize that we’re telling the story. We’re telling our stories; we’re talking about immigration; we’re talking about other-ism; we’re talking about inclusion and exclusion; we’re talking about occupying and taking.”

“I think that in Picard,” Hurd said, “We tackle that, and we’re striving for solutions to that. We are holding on to hope, which I think is really important right now.”

Hurd makes her first Star Trek: Picard in this Thursday’s “Maps and Legends,” the second episode of the season, after nearly seven months of international touring to help promote the show, starting with San Diego Comic Con in July and spending the fall jumping from one convention panel to another around the globe.

After all that, we had to ask: is Michelle Hurd ready for her first Star Trek convention?

“I’m so excited,” she said with a laugh. “I can’t wait to see a bunch of Raffis running up at me with their curls!”

Portions of this interview have been condensed or edited slightly for clarity.