Last week, Star Trek fans must have felt like they were slingshot-ing around the sun and headed back in time: acclaimed writer/director Nicholas Meyer is coming back to Star Trek! Bryan Fuller—the showrunner of the new CBS Star Trek TV show— has brought Nicholas Meyer—director of The Wrath of Khan & The Undiscovered Country— into the new Trek writer’s room.

Luckily, just days after this announcement, I was able to get Nicholas Meyer on the phone and grill him on his initial thoughts about being called back into service for Starfleet. Read on to discover which Star Trek film might be the touchstone for the new show, why Meyer came back, and what how he himself views his legacy and popularity.

Interviewer’s note: This interview took place over the phone on 2.27.2016. Mr. Meyer was at his home in Los Angeles.

Make no mistake: Nicholas Meyer is the reason why Star Trek made it out of the ’80s. Without his direction and writing of The Wrath of Khan, we could live in an alternate universe in which J.J. Abrams never makes 2009’s Star Trek, and, by extension, The Force Awakens never exists. I say this not only because Nicholas Meyer gave a very-young J.J. Abrams a copy of The Annotated Sherlock Holmes for his bar mitzvah, but because The Wrath of Khan revitalized the Star Trek brand for an audience beyond just Trekkies and science fiction fans.