Warning: SPOILERS for Star Trek: Section 31Star Trek: Section 31‘s exact placement in Star Trek‘s timeline is now clear, and here’s what it means for Star Trek: The Next Generation. Directed by Olatunde Osunsanmi and written by Craig Sweeny, Star Trek: Section 31 is now streaming on Paramount+. Headlined by Academy Award winner Michelle Yeoh, who is back as her fan-favorite anti-heroine, Emperor Philippa Georgiou from Star Trek: Discovery, Section 31 is the first Star Trek movie in 9 years and the first Star Trek movie made for streaming on Paramount+.

Emperor Philippa Georgiou’s last appearance was in Star Trek: Discovery season 3, when the Guardian of Forever (Paul Guilfoyle) judged whether the former despot of the Mirror Universe’s Terran Empire had sufficiently changed. The Guardian of Forever sent Georgiou to an unknown destination where the Prime and Mirror Universes were more closely aligned, as they were broken apart in Star Trek: Discovery‘s 32nd century. Georgiou reappeared somewhere in the mid-24th century “lost era” of Star Trek. Thankfully, Star Trek: Section 31 wastes no time defining when, exactly, the movie takes place.

Star Trek: Section 31’s Exact Stardate Explained

Section 31 Is Smack Dab In The Middle Of Star Trek’s Lost Era

Star Trek: Section 31 establishes that its main story takes place on Stardate 1292.4. On the Gregorian calendar, this converts to April 17, 2324. This means Section 31 is set 40 years before Star Trek: The Next Generation, which begins in 2364 with its two-hour premiere, “Encounter at Farpoint.” Star Trek: Section 31 is also the first full-length Star Trek adventure set in the 24th century “lost era,” which TNG has only referenced a handful of times with flashbacks and in the Star Trek: The Next Generation classic season 3 episode, “Yesterday’s Enterprise.”

However, Star Trek: Section 31 also contains flashbacks to the Mirror Universe of the early 23rd century. Given that Star Trek: Discovery establishes that Emperor Georgiou lost control of the Terran Empire and jumped to the Prime Universe in 2257, Star Trek: Section 31‘s flashbacks to how the young Philippa Georgiou (Miku Martineau) became Emperor take place sometime in 2210s or early 2220s if Georgiou is in her 50s as an adult and young Philippa is in her late teens.

Star Trek: Section 31‘s main story takes place over the course of one day since Control (Jamie Lee Curtis) establishes that Section 31’s Alpha Team led by Alok Sahar (Omari Hardwick) had 24 hours to recruit Emperor Georgiou and find and capture the Godsend weapon. Finally, Star Trek: Section 31‘s epilogue flashes forward to three weeks later, where Georgiou reveals that she received an offer to formally rejoin Section 31, and Control gives them marching orders for the team’s next mission.

Where Is Jean-Luc Picard During Star Trek: Section 31?

Picard’s Starfleet Career Is Just Beginning

Jean-Luc Picard is arguably the most important Starfleet figure of 24th century Star Trek, and the future Captain of the Enterprise is definitely alive during Star Trek: Section 31. Jean-Luc Picard was born in 2305, and he joined Starfleet Academy in 2323 to pursue his dream of exploring the stars and to escape the childhood trauma of his broken home as established by Star Trek: Picard season 2. In Star Trek: Section 31‘s 2324 time frame, Jean-Luc Picard is a 19-year-old sophomore at Starfleet Academy.

Virtually all of the established canon of Jean-Luc Picard’s Starfleet career is still to come after Star Trek: Section 31. Picard will be stabbed through the heart in a bar fight with Nausicaans and receive an artificial heart, Jean-Luc will become Captain of the USS Stargazer, and Picard will become legendary for commanding the USS Enterprise-D and E. Star Trek: Section 31 never references Jean-Luc Picard, but Star Trek fans know Captain Picard will eventually meet one key Star Trek: Section 31 character.

How Section 31 Connects To Star Trek: The Next Generation

Section 31 Hints At Lt. Rachel Garrett’s Future

Star Trek: The Next Generation begins 40 years after the events of Star Trek: Section 31, but the two Star Trek sagas are bonded through Lieutenant Rachel Garrett (Kacey Rohl). Garrett is a Starfleet Science Officer ᴀssigned to Section 31 to ensure that the black ops team “doesn’t commit murder.” Although, Section 31 also alludes to darker aspects of Garrett’s personality that make her a good fit for intelligence work. Star Trek: Section 31 doesn’t shy away from foreshadowing Garrett’s desire to become a Starfleet Captain.

Of course, Lt. Rachel Garrett is destined to become Captain Rachel Garrett (Tricia O’Neill) of the USS Enterprise-C. Star Trek: The Next Generation‘s “Yesterday’s Enterprise” establishes that Captain Garrett and the Enterprise-C are caught in a temporal rift while defending a Klingon outpost from Romulans. The Enterprise-C is trapped in a time loop in 2344 – 20 years after the events of Star Trek: Section 31. It’s also unclear whether the Ambᴀssador Class USS Enterprise-C has launched in Star Trek: Section 31 or if the Starship Enterprise in active service is the Excelsior Class USS Enterprise-B.

Why Section 31 Doesn’t Have Star Trek: TNG’s Starfleet Look

Section 31 Is “A New Flavor Of Star Trek”

Despite Star Trek: Section 31 being set in 2324, there are no visual ties to the established look of Starfleet and its uniforms from Star Trek’s 24th century “lost era,” and this can be disappointing to longtime Trekkers. Star Trek: Section 31 continues the visual overhaul of Star Trek that Star Trek: Discovery began. The first Star Trek streaming movie takes advantage of being geographically set outside the United Federation of Planets, and the fact that Section 31 is an underground black ops agency, so that the movie’s optics have no obvious ties to Starfleet beyond Starfleet’s delta insignia.

Sadly, hopes that Star Trek: Section 31 will contain characters like Lt. Rachel Garrett wearing Starfleet’s famous “monster maroon” uniform are dashed. When not donning outlandish undercover outfits, Garrett wears a black tactical uniform in Star Trek: Section 31, and most of the other members of the team wear variations of that gear. Just watching Star Trek: Section 31, there aren’t a great deal of visual cues that indicate when and where the movie takes place in Star Trek‘s timeline, outside of the тιтle card establishing Stardate 1292.4.