Why Detmer & Owosekun Were Missing From Star Trek: Discovery Season 5 Explained By Showrunner
Why Detmer & Owosekun Were Missing From Star Trek: Discovery Season 5 Explained By Showrunner
In Star Trek: Discovery season 5, episode 5, "Mirrors", Detmer and Owosekun were assigned to pilot the Mirror Universe's ISS Enterprise to Federation HQ by Captain Michael Burnham (Sonequa Martin-Green). This explained Detmer and Owo's absence for the rest of Discovery season 5.
However, Detmer and Owo do appear in Star Trek: Discovery's epilogue scene, and they were a sight for sore eyes.
I barely even noticed they got replaced. They never got to have any story involvement or character development, just like most of the rest of the bridge crew in Discovery.
These two had the misfortune of being in the grey zone between background and supporting characters. It's fine for a show not to focus on the bridge crew (who's at the helm on the Cerritos?) but Detmer and Owosekun got a raw deal because sometimes it seemed like they were gonna have some character development. Like in season 3 that Detmer had this bizarre beef with Stamets out of nowhere, and that was probably the only episode where she got more than a couple of lines.
I'm not surprised that the actresses chose their other projects (they were probably at the bottom of the totem poll of the show in terms of pay).
I probably wouldn't have noticed they were missing, but in episode 3 Michael introduced Rayner to the crew and said "You'll meet Owosekun, Detmer and the rest of the crew in a little bit", and then later Tilly said "I'll send Commander Owosekun in", off screen of course. Lame.
I think it was a worthy experiment - take the nameless, silent extras that populate the bridge on the older shows and give them a little more to do.
But I think it created some unintended and unfortunate audience expectations. Maybe a failed experiment.
I would imagine none of those actors were under contract.
I guess I shouldn't be surprised, but I didn't realize there were conspiracy theories floating around about them being fired or some nonsense. I figured the actual reason was probably pretty benign.
Yeah, I never thought it was anything deeper than that they're working Canadian actors who probably had other projects. I looked both of them up because someone in another group I frequent was chirping about it, and Emily Coutts recently wrote and directed her own short film, and Oyin Oladejo got to play the lead in an indie thriller.
I missed them. :(
That explains the story they used to explain in universe, but not why they chose not to have them on the final season.
@Hobbes Click through to the story, where Michelle Paradise says “They had other projects during that time so we got them when we could.”