They don’t get away from it.
Paramount+ appears to have used generative AI to generate the thumbnails Star Trek II: The Wrath of KhanAccording to a report by Kotaku. The image shows Captain Kirk, played by William Shatner, wearing a business suit. Cancer never wears a business suit Wrath of KhanOr any other time during Shatner’s decades of portraying the character. He once wore a flannel shirt and jeans during a trip to 1930s Earth.
Paramount+ wanted to use the image on the left as a poster for The Wrath of Khan, so they used everyone’s least favorite technique to create the rest of the image.
– Ryan Estrada (@ryanestrada.com) 2026-05-28T23:57:45.992Z
I’ve watched every episode of a dozen Star Trek shows and other than the occasional appearance on the holodeck, I’m not even sure business suits will exist in that far-flung future. There is no money so there is not much need for business.
This forces us to ask why Paramount+ and its little AI friend decided to cast Starfleet’s most iconic captain in a button-up shirt and tie. We don’t know exactly what happened, but artist Ryan Estrada has an idea. He notes that the actual image is of Kirk Wrath of KhanTaken from a scene in which the Captain is getting a retina scan to access a computer file. It’s not a particularly exciting scene, and he’s wearing a Starfleet uniform.
Estrada speculates that Paramount+ connected with the image of Kirk getting a retinal scan and wanted to highlight it more by making it a thumbnail. However, the film image is a close-up of Shatner’s face, so generative AI was used to place Kirk’s head inside a fake body and put that body in a business suit. His hair also looks very fake and weird as the original frame gets cut to his forehead. Long live AI Slope Kirk.
Kotaku has confirmed that the thumbnail is still up on the streaming platform, as do people on the internet. Paramount boss David Ellison recently told cnbc The company is “using technology to transform every single aspect of this business.” If that thumbnail is a harbinger of things to come, Trek fans should probably start stocking up on the Blu-ray.
As a lifelong Star Trek fan, it’s sad to see the property modernized by Paramount. After surprisingly canceling Stellar, the company has virtually ended the franchise for the time being Starfleet Academy and production has stopped strange new world.
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