Star Trek Icon Confirms He’s Never Retiring 

By Chris Snellgrove
| Published 16 seconds ago

Even before AI made things worse, the true scourge of the internet was fake news. You’d see announcements for things like upcoming films or games and get all excited, only to find out that none of it was really happening. That’s always disappointing, but every now and then, it happens in reverse. That is, you hear some depressing-sounding fake news and joyfully discover that you have nothing to worry about. Case in point: social media has been flooded lately with breathless announcements that Star Trek: The Next Generation icon Patrick Stewart will be retiring from acting after appearing in Avengers: Doomsday. 

Considering that the esteemed actor is 85 years old and has spent a lifetime on the screen and stage, he certainly deserves to retire. Selfishly, though, we fans always want more performances from the captain, whether he’s running the CIA in American Dad! or putting Starfleet in its place in Star Trek. Fortunately for everyone who loves this actor, the fake news is, well, fake! In a recent interview, Stewart hit back at the rumors with a bombshell announcement that he is never going to retire!

TFW They Say You’re Retiring

Recently, Star Trek legend Patrick Stewart offered an interview to TV Insider. They discussed many things, including how surreal it is that The Next Generation is about to celebrate its 40th anniversary. They also discussed how interesting it has been watching other actors become iconic Trek captains in the years since Picard first said “make it so” aboard the Enterprise-D. Eventually, however, the interviewer broached a topic that has had so many of Stewart’s fans on edge. Namely, when this beloved actor was planning to retire.

This began with a joking comparison to the late Leonard Nimoy, whom the interviewer noted was considered “the busiest retired man on the planet.” He then pointed out that Stewart has kept quite busy lately with everything from Avengers: Doomsday to voiceovers to an exciting Shakespeare sonnets project. At this point, the interviewer asked point-blank if the actor was retired or getting ready to retire. Stewart replied that because he keeps getting “interesting offers” and loves “being challenged by new work,” he “can’t imagine ever officially ‘retiring.’” In Picard-like fashion, he summed up his thoughts in a simple, eloquent way: “I’ll always and forever be an actor.”

Picard Returns To Shakespeare

Aside from Doomsday, where can we expect to see Patrick Stewart in the near future? In that same interview, he mentioned that he’ll be “voicing a pig’s head in Riz Ahmed’s brilliant new series Bait.” Additionally, he’ll be starring in the upcoming television series Barbaric, which features a barbarian cursed to do the right thing who must team up with a talking axe. Plus, thanks to a previous four-year renewal, American Dad! will be giving us new episodes until at least 2029, so we can expect to hear more of Stewart voicing Deputy Director Avery Bullock.

If you need more of Patrick Stewart’s dulcet tones, you can also download Patrick Stewart Performs the Complete Sonnets of William Shakespeare, an audiobook where he reads all of the immortal bard’s most famous poems. Straight from the captain’s mouth, this actor is never retiring, and we can look forward to many more years of amazing performances. So, now you know not to believe any fake news about this Star Trek icon leaving show business. If anyone tells you otherwise, just show them this article and do your best Stewart impersonation: “The first duty of every Starfleet officer is to the truth!”