It’s Jeri Ryan! You might remember her from such shows as Star Trek: Voyager, Star Trek: Picard, Boston Public, Leverage, AMC’s Dark Winds, and more!

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover: my wife Anne and I are big fans of geek/comic/entertainment conventions. Anne’s first con was November 30, 1991; years later she introduced me to that world. Our hometown of Indianapolis would host a modest Star Trek-themed con every Thanksgiving weekend (and still does!). We attended several of them together, back when those were the only game in town for years. As we’ve expanded our travel capabilities over time, the past decade’s Midwest comic-con boom has afforded us far more options for geeking out together and in large crowds. We’re the Goldens. It’s who we are and what we do.

The last Trek-themed show we attended was 2022’s Star Trek: Mission Chicago, a joint production between Paramount Pictures and ReedPOP (the producers of C2E2) that was meant to be the first in a series of large-scale gatherings celebrating the universe that Gene Roddenberry and his successors built. We attendees were impressed with the results; sadly, due apparently to insufficient attendance as measured by the unseen tricorders of The Powers That Be, plans for future installments were canceled.

Two years later, here we go again! Creation Entertainment, one of America’s longest-running convention companies, runs an annual Trek gala in Las Vegas that invites scores of Trek cast and crew members to mingle with fans at Vegas prices and at a considerable remove from more than a few states. As a sort of outreach to us faraway fans, in 2024 Creation has launched a “Trek Tour” comprising much smaller versions of that vaunted Vegas show on the other side of the Rockies. Two weeks ago they brought the fan-magic to Nashville; forthcoming stops are scheduled in New Jersey and Dallas. This past weekend it was Chicago’s turn. The location was convenient and the guest lineup included so many missing names on Anne’s Trek-actor checklist, we did something we haven’t done in ages: we attended all three days, from the opening minutes Friday morning to the very end of the final panel Sunday night.

Before we get into the anecdotes and the panel rundown (which was a lot), we begin with all the actors we met. Longtime MCC readers know we’ll shell out for photo ops with actors from our favorite movies and TV shows. If they’re amenable and don’t mind taking posing suggestions from a pair of eccentric middle-agers shaped like two lumpy bags of potatoes, our favorite theme is jazz hands. We’re not dancers and we’ve only attended two Broadway shows so far, but we love the idea of sharing a moment of unbridled joie de vivre with anyone who’s game. It’s silly, but it’s our thing.

As it happens, every single photo-op guest that we asked graciously humored us this time. Voila:

Anthony Rapp! A.K.A. Mark Cohen from the original cast of the Broadway smash Rent; Lt. Commander Paul Stamets, our favorite character from Star Trek: Discovery; or you might have seen his most well-known child-actor part in Adventures in Babysitting.

Marina Sirtis! Counselor Deanna Troi from Star Trek: The Next Generation and Picard. Anne met her at an early-’90s con before the invention of photo ops.

Michael Dorn! TV’s Worf himself from The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, and Picard. We missed out on a previous chance for a pic together.

We’ve already done jazz hands with John de Lancie, the vain and powerful Q from five different Trek shows and in a radically altered form on My Little Pony, but Anne likes to get updated pics every time he just so happens to be at a show we’re attending. This is the ninth such show for her.

Dominic Keating and Connor Trinneer! The erstwhile Malcolm Reed and Trip Tucker from Star Trek: Enterprise, which Anne finally finished watching but I still haven’t. Today they’re a Trek-podcasting team whose latest show is called The D-Con Chamber.

At Mission Chicago I met a trio from Star Trek: Lower Decks led by comedian Tawny Newsome, who voices LTJG Beckett Mariner. My ST-CHI follow-up brings in two more costars: Dawnn Lewis (voice of Captain Carol Freeman), known to us Gen-X-ers from A Different World; and Eugene Cordero (Ensign Rutherford), also from Marvel’s Loki.

We love the purple backdrop their photography team chose.

Most of the autograph tables were located in the vendors’ hall. Over there we caught a few additional actor pics to go with the autographs Anne wanted:

Cirroc Lofton! Best known as Deep Space Nine‘s Jake Sisko, teenage son of Captain Benjamin Sisko, he was one of the show’s only two main cast members we hadn’t met. It’s still our all-time favorite Trek series.

We’ve already done jazz hands with John de Lancie, the vain and powerful Q from five different Trek shows and in a primordial form on Days of Our Lives, but Anne likes to get updated pics every time he just so happens to be at a show we’re attending. This is the ninth such show for her.

Anne missed the Lower Decks op due to a scheduling conflict, but wanted to catch up with Dawnn Lewis and add to her collection of Starfleet captain autographs. Lewis is holding up Anne’s Captain Freeman pin.

To be continued! Other chapters in this very special miniseries:

Part 2: Cosplay!
Part 3: Friday!
Part 4: Saturday!
Part 5: Sunday!
Part 6: And the Rest!