A longtime member of the “CSI” crime procedural franchise, Paul Guilfoyle took a brief gig in the legendary sci-fi universe of “Star Trek” as an all-powerful being.
Outside of his tenure as Jim Brass in “CSI: Crime Scene Investigation” and its spinoffs, Guilfoyle appeared in two episodes of “Star Trek: Discovery” Season 3 in 2020, playing a character initially known as Carl. At first, he looks like an ordinary man wearing a suit and top hat, but Carl is actually the Guardian of Forever — an ancient portal through time found on the snowy planet Dannus V. It’s not known who created the Guardian of Forever or why they did so, but its power currently manifests itself in the form of Carl.
The two-part “Terra Firma” story arc, taking place in Episodes 9 and 10 of “Star Trek: Discovery” Season 3, sees Guilfoyle’s Carl cross paths with Michael Burnham (Sonequa Martin-Green) and Philippa Georgiou (Michelle Yeoh) on Dannus V. Experiencing time sickness from excessive time traveling and universe jumping, Georgiou is offered a solution by the Guardian of Forever. She survives by traveling through the portal to a time before the Prime and Mirror Universes diverged.
The Guardian of Forever was introduced before Star Trek: Discovery
The Guardian of Forever didn’t begin with Paul Guilfoyle’s Carl in “Star Trek: Discovery.” The sentient gateway actually makes its first appearance in “Star Trek: The Original Series” Season 1 — where it looks like a glowing, irregularly shaped donut. In “The City on the Edge of Forever,” Captain Kirk (William Shatner), Spock (Leonard Nimoy), and the crew of the USS Enterprise encounter the Guardian of Forever (voiced by Bartell La Rue) amid the ruins of an uninhabited planet and use it to travel back in time to 1930s New York City. Here, the Guardian reveals that it is greater than 4 billion years old.
Carl is merely the modern version of the Guardian of Forever created to disguise itself from opposing factions looking to abuse its power during the Temporal Wars. “Star Trek: Discovery” marked the third on-screen appearance of the Guardian of Forever, following its brief return in “Star Trek: The Animated Series” in 1973. The episode “Yesteryear” depicts the Guardian of Forever (voiced by James Doohan) as a giant green rock with a hole in the middle. Spock walks through the portal to prevent his death in an alternate timeline on Vulcan.
It’s not certain when or if other “Star Trek” characters will stumble upon the Guardian of Forever’s time-traveling abilities, but the famed sci-fi franchise has always made it possible for the Guardian of Forever to come back into the narrative.
