What Star Trek: Discovery's Saru Looks Like In Real Life

Saru might have been the best character on the five-season TV series "Star Trek: Discovery." He not only had the most personality, but he also had the most fascinating character arc over the course of the series. The Kelpien once assumed that when he reached a certain age, he would mutate and become a vicious killer (he was left generally ignorant about his own biology and lifecycle). When this proved to be untrue, Saru developed a new lease on life and became a more forthright, assertive leader overall. In the later seasons of the series, he spoke with wisdom and confidence, and was able to serve as the captain of the U.S.S. Discovery for a spell. Still later in the series, Saru even began to fall in love for the first time, forming a very sweet — and very proper — relationship with the Vulcan T'Rina (Tara Rosling).

Saru was played by prolific actor and well-known creature performer Doug Jones, a frequent collaborator with Guillermo del Toro. Doug Jones stands six-foot-three and is incredibly thin, making him appealing to casting directors looking for aliens and monsters. He also is well-trained in mime and worked as a contortionist, allowing him to give very expressive physical performances. He is rarely seen without masks or makeup. But his face has been clearly visible in many of his performances, so we know what he looks like.

You have likely seen Jones more times than you realize. He played one of the Penguin's army of clowns in Tim Burton's "Batman Returns," and set young Millennial hearts aflame as the mostly mute zombie Billy Butcherson in the 1993 horror/comedy "Hocus Pocus." And that's just for a start. His creature career is long and prolific.

Children of the 1980s first saw Doug Jones perform in a series of well-known McDonald's commercials wherein he played Mac Tonight, a piano-playing lounge singer with a giant cartoon moon for a head. He got to play a mime on a 1991 episode of "In Living Color," and a contortionist on an episode of "Tales from the Crypt." In 1995, he played one of the Rippers, a kangaroo-like soldier being, in the movie "Tank Girl." Incidentally, he played a kangaroo man a second time in the 1997 fantasy film "Warriors of Virtue." If his career had ended there, he would still be deeply beloved by a certain age bracket. 

But Jones eventually fell in with filmmaker Guillermo del Toro, appearing in the filmmaker's 1997 film "Mimic." Jones returned to play the underwater humanoid Abe Sapien in del Toro's "Hellboy" in 2004 (although David Hyde Pierce provided the character's voice). Jones used his own voice for the sequel, "Hellboy II: The Golden Army" (in which Jones also played multiple other creatures). Jones played a very similar fish-like man in del Toro's Best Picture-winning film "The Shape of Water," and the two of them work together very often. He played both the central faun and the terrifying Pale Man in del Toro's classic "Pan's Labyrinth," as well as some ghosts in "Crimson Peak." 

Jones wasn't always playing monsters, though. In 1999's underrated "Mystery Men," he had a cameo as the superhero Pencilhead. In the 2002 film "Adaptation.," he played an explorer named Augustus Margary in a flashback sequence. 

Jones even got in on the superhero game again later on, playing the Silver Surfer in "Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer," as well as playing the villain Deathbolt in The CW's Arrowverse.

Doug Jones got many makeup-free close-ups in Don Coscarelli's bizarre interdimensional freakout flick "John Dies at the End," and often played comedic waiters and/or other slapstick characters in comedy TV shows; he was a waiter in "Keenan & Kel," and played a slapstick performer in "The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles." One of his most prolific acting jobs (prior to "Star Trek: Discovery") was playing the role of Cochese in the final three seasons of "Falling Skies." He appeared in 28 episodes.

"Discovery," however, has been Jones' highest-profile job to date. He appeared in 58 episodes of the series over its five seasons, and got to lead Saru through a vast and inspiring character arc. At the beginning of the series, Saru was fearful and cautious, having been raised as livestock for another species, and by the end, the character was resolute and loving. Jones appeared out of his Saru makeup on the connected "Star Trek" chat programs "After Trek" and "The Ready Room," so one can see him in his natural state without too much hassle. 

"Discovery" ended in 2024, but Doug Jones continued to work during and after the series. In 2019, he began appearing on the comedic vampire series "What We Do in the Shadows," playing Baron Afanas, ultimately turning up in 15 episodes. (That show is also now over, having provided three finales.) He played a vampire again in a little-seen remake of "Nosferatu," and returned to the role of Billy Butcherson for the late-stage sequel "Hocus Pocus 2" in 2022. Jones is 65, but he still seems to be accepting roles in genre films, eager to ply his talents in perpetuity.