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Star Trek: The Next Generation - Full Cast & Crew

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• Drama, Fantasy, Action & Adventure, Science Fiction
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A new crew boards a revamped USS Enterprise in the first spin-off from the '60s cult classic.

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Sound effects, special effects, executive producer, co-producer, line producer, cinematographer, production company.

The Complete History of the Klingons in Star Trek's Next Generation Era

After the Star Trek heroes began the historical peace process, relationship of the Federation and the Klingons still weren't always allies or friends.

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The next generation introduced the klingon-federation alliance, deep space nine changed klingon and federation dynamics in an explosive way, the klingon and federation go to war against the dominion, the end of the 24th century brought a return to klingon and federation peace.

While Klingons are thought of as the biggest antagonists in the history of the Federation, the majority of Star Trek stories take place when they are at peace. The end of Star Trek: The Original Series era of films included the beginnings of an alliance initiated by Spock and Captain Kirk, though reluctantly. While peace was never easy or all that long-lasting, the Klingon Empire and Starfleet are just as often allies as enemies. Making peace with the Federation was always something controversial among the war-obsessed Klingons. Through multiple versions of treaties, alliances and agreements, some Klingon ship and its crew were always hassling some Starfleet or Federation target. However, the Romulan Star Empire's reemergence helped bring them closer together.

In 2344, a Klingon outpost on Narenda III was attacked by the Romulans. The USS Enterprise-C under Captain Rachel Garrett tried to help and was destroyed after a brief time-travel excursion changing Star Trek canon. This sacrifice led to very productive peace talks, which themselves came under attack by Romulans two years later. Ja'rod of House Duras betrayed the Klingons, but he blamed Mogh (Worf's father), whose son was sent away and was raised on Earth. Another prominent Klingon, Martok was given a field commission while fending off a Romulan attack. The most solid alliance between the Federation and Klingons came in 2349 when Riva (whose name came to mean "peacemaker") negotiated a lasting peace with Federation leaders, including Sarek, father of Spock.

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The treaty Riva negotiated led to a powerful political alliance between the Federation and the Klingons . The Empire was even described as being a tertiary part of the United Federation of Planets. However, errant Houses continued to attack Federation targets, and anti-alliance leaders like Korris emerged because they believed their leaders were traitors. Still, Starfleet and the Klingons participated in officer exchanges, and they even fought in some battles together, mostly against Romulans. Klingons assisted the USS Enterprise-D in trying to help Admiral Jarok defect, and provided a Bird of Prey for Picard and Data's covert mission to find Spock on Romulus.

Still, there were Klingons who chose the Romulans over the Federation. Ambassador Kell who worked with Sela (the daughter of an alternate timeline Tasha Yar ) to frame the Federation for the murder of a Klingon governor. While the peace with the Federation was maintained, it wasn't so for the Klingons themselves. A civil war broke out in the Empire deposing the longest ruler in Klingon history, K'mpec. Duras, son of Ja'rod, led a faction that wanted to break ties with the Federation and make the Klingons more warlike. He was killed by Worf in revenge for Mogh's death around 2367. After this, Worf's half-brother, Kurn, had to live in hiding as "Rodek"

Klingon women could not lead a house, so Duras's sisters Lursa and B'Etor put forth their half-brother Toral to stand against the more Federation-friendly successor to K'mpec, Gowron. However, the previous chancellor named Captain Picard as the "Arbiter of Succession," rejecting Toral's claim. The ensuing Civil War was fanned by Sela and her new Klingon Ally, General Movar. As the Enterprise and Starfleet tried to maintain a blockade of Romulan and Klingon space, quick-thinking by Data revealed the cloaked Romulan ships providing aid to House Duras. Gowron won the Chancellorship, and he was mostly friendly to the Federation .

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Under Gowron, the Klingons helped to engage the Borg, though it is unclear if they were aiding Starfleet or being attacked themselves. Also, in 2369 clerics at a monastery in Boreth cloned Kahless the Unforgettable , the legendary Klingon leader. This was to fulfill the prophecy that he would return from Klingon Heaven, Sto-va-kor. However, he became a "moral" leader while Gowron retained his position. When the wormhole to the Gamma Quadrant was discovered near Bajor and Deep Space 9, relations grew tense, especially once the Dominion became a threat.

Before the outbreak of open hostilities, the Changeling Founders replaced General Martok with an imposter, who forced Gowron to antagonize the Federation, even ending the alliance. At the same time, the Klingon Empire invaded the Cardassian Empire, which Starfleet and the Federation opposed. Captain Benjamin Sisko convinced Gowron to end his campaign, but the alliance was not restored. The phony Martok's influence created tension between Starfleet and the Klingons, but Gowron's desire to appear in complete control made them think he was the Changeling imposter.

Eventually, the Klingons declared war on the Federation over territory on the shared galactic border. The two forces battled for weeks until Starfleet revealed the Changeling infiltration and return the true Martok. At the same time, the Cardassian Empire joined the Dominion. These reinforcements almost decimated the Klingon Fleet. Gowron and the survivors travel to Deep Space 9, where he rejoins the Khitomer Accords and allies with Starfleet to fight the Dominion in 2373.

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The Federation and Klingon alliance was effectively based out of Deep Space 9, with Captain Sisko and General Martok leading the forces . Each had to answer to their respective superiors, but the two leaders formed a bond. A year later, the Romulan Empire joined the alliance , after Sisko aided the Cardassian spy and tailor Garak in framing the Dominion for the death of a Romulan ambassador. The three-way alliance turned the tide of the war and put the Dominion on the defensive.

Eventually, the Dominion recruited the elusive Breen species into their Empire, and with them a weapon that drained power from starships. The Klingon fleet was the first to adapt to this weapon. However, instead of helping their allies, General Martok led these forces on an ill-fated offensive against the Dominion. This was a ploy by Gowron to sully Martok's reputation, lest he become a political rival. If he won the war without the help of Starfleet or the Romulans, it was Gowron's plan. If he failed, then Martok took the blame and Gowron's position was safe. Martok didn't fail.

Gowron eventually took over the command of the Klingon forces at Deep Space 9, sidelining Martok. Worf, an adopted member of Martok's house and the first Klingon in Starfleet, challenged Gowron in a fight to the death for leadership of the Empire . Worf won the battle and named Martok as the Chancellor of the Klingon Empire. Under his leadership, the alliance defeated the Dominion in a decisive battle on Cardassia Prime.

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Since the end of the Dominion War, the Klingons have kept mostly to their own territory . Starfleet intelligence estimated the Klingons would take a decade or more to recover from their losses of people and material from the Dominion War. Worf took a leave of absence from Starfleet to work with Martok, though he did return for select missions on the USS Enterprise-E until it was destroyed. By the first years of the 25th Century, Worf was both a member in good standing of the Klingon Empire and working as an intelligence contractor for Starfleet.

In the late 24th Century, a group of Klingons was part of former Starfleet cadet Nick Locarno's plan to create his own fleet, complete with Genesis Device. Beckett Mariner and the crew of the USS Cerritos were able to stop him. Otherwise, the Klingons have kept mostly to themselves. If they are still traveling space and picking fights, but not with Starfleet. In the 32nd Century ( where the USS Discovery time-traveled to from 2258), the galaxy had been decimated by "The Burn." This cataclysm destroyed most of the dilithium in the galaxy, which powered warp drives for all species.

The crew essentially found a planet made of dilithium, and the space-faring civilizations of the Federation and its adjacent territories returned to normal. However, the USS Discovery has not encountered any Klingons in that time period. It's possible after the Burn, they resorted to war, both with other species and within the Empire, again decimating their population. If not, the Klingon Empire continues to keep to itself and stay out of galactic affairs .

The Star Trek universe encompasses multiple series, each offering a unique lens through which to experience the wonders and perils of space travel. Join Captain Kirk and his crew on the Original Series' voyages of discovery, encounter the utopian vision of the Federation in The Next Generation, or delve into the darker corners of galactic politics in Deep Space Nine. No matter your preference, there's a Star Trek adventure waiting to ignite your imagination.

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Star Trek has never known exactly what Klingons look like, until now (maybe)

As Strange New Worlds shows us, whatever you think Klingons look like, you’re wrong

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Apart from the benevolent pointy-eared Vulcans , there’s no fictional alien species more iconic than the Klingons — not only in Star Trek , but in pop culture at large. The spacefaring warriors have evolved over half a century from generic Cold War antagonists into a complicated and spiritual culture that evokes both medieval Vikings and feudal samurai. There is a complete, functional Klingon language studied and spoken by fans around the world, who routinely don the familiar armor and forehead ridges at fan conventions. Most people who are even casually familiar with Star Trek would recognize a Klingon should one pass by on the street ( perhaps in Las Vegas , this or any August), and even applaud the remarkable accuracy of their makeup and attire.

And yet, there is not, nor has there ever been, one definitive Klingon makeup design. Despite fan uproar practically every time a substantive change is made to the craggy foreheads and wispy beards of the space conquerors, their look has been in flux from the beginning, and will likely continue to evolve along with the production technology behind Star Trek itself . In honor of the return of a more familiar appearance in the season premiere of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds , we’ve taken a deep dive into the rocky history of science fiction’s most famous forehead, from 1966 to today.

The brownface era

The Klingons were introduced during the first season of Star Trek , in the 1967 episode “Errand of Mercy.” Writer/producer Gene L. Coon used the story’s conflict between the United Federation of Planets and the rival Klingon Empire over a non-aligned planet as an allegory for Cold War proxy conflicts, but — according to the exhaustively researched book These Are the Voyages: TOS, Season One by Marc Cushman and Susan Osborn — offered only the barest physical description for the new antagonists. In the terse and insensitive parlance of a 1960s television producer, Coon referred to the Klingons merely as “hard-looking Asian types.”

It fell to makeup artist Fred Phillips and actor John Colicos (who had been cast as the episode’s lead Klingon, Kor) to decide what the character — and species — would look like. Colicos takes credit (or blame) for the Klingons’ original look, asking for a “vaguely Asian” makeup effect patterned after conqueror Genghis Khan. At Colicos’ direction, Phillips applied bushy eyebrows, a Fu Manchu, and a heavy layer of greenish-brown makeup to Colicos’ face to make him appear “not of this world.”

Though this became the accepted canonical 23rd-century “ TOS -era” look, the Klingons’ appearance actually fluctuated over the course of the series. In season 2’s Klingon stories, “Friday’s Child” and “The Trouble with Tribbles,” no false eyebrows or dark makeup were used on the (exclusively white) Klingon actors, only short beards, some of them very obviously prosthetic. The brown face paint would return in season 3, and all Klingons who appeared in its short-lived sequel, Star Trek: The Animated Series , would have a brown or orange hue to their skin. This includes individual Klingons who had previously appeared without dark makeup.

There are two major takeaways to any study of the early history of Klingon makeup design. First, that there has never been a point when the look of the Klingons wasn’t changing, and second, that we’re very lucky it did. Ardent Star Trek canonistas rail against any change to Star Trek as a production that cannot be easily explained in-universe, and for almost 40 years, the ever-changing Klingon forehead was exactly that. But maintaining the canon — either through offensive makeup or typecasting — is a dicey proposition.

In short: Change is good.

Enter the latex

When Star Trek made the leap to the big screen for 1979’s Star Trek: The Motion Picture , advances in makeup effects and a much larger budget allowed for the Klingons to receive a complete visual overhaul. Costume designer Robert Fletcher drew the first sketches of the new Klingons, adding a single knobby ridge that extended from the spine to the bridge of their nose. Fletcher wanted the Klingons to look as alien as possible, like a moloch lizard, but according to Fletcher, Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry strongly disagreed with this and wanted the Klingons to appear mostly human. The two came to a compromise, which Fletcher calls “a hairy crustacean.” Fletcher considered the Klingons’ forehead ridges to be the vestigial remains of a species that once had a rigid exoskeleton, a concept that was also incorporated into their costume design.

This concept was translated into a latex makeup design by Original Series makeup artist Fred Phillips and future Oscar-winner Ve Neill, along with a team that included makeup assistant Rick Stratton. By some accounts, it was Stratton who suggested that the Klingons should also have gnarly dental prosthetics, a suggestion that he claims was made mostly to assure himself an extra day’s paid work. Stained, jagged teeth would remain a constant.

Fletcher was called upon to further refine the new forehead design for Star Trek III: The Search for Spock . From here on out, rather than having the appearance of a single, thick spine that wrapped all the way up their necks and down to their noses, which obscured most actors’ faces beyond recognition, Klingons would appear to have a bony but less pronounced plate under their foreheads. The Search for Spock also established the idea of Klingon men growing out their hair.

This became the basic blueprint for the iconic Klingon, with makeup effects from this era being reused for years to come. But even during this era of limited revisions, there was a great deal of variation. According to Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stevens’ book The Art of Star Trek , Star Trek V director William Shatner encouraged makeup supervisor Richard Snell to make every featured Klingon’s forehead “as unique as a fingerprint.” As Star Trek had recently returned to television with The Next Generation and would continue to introduce new Klingons by the dozen, with the new set of forehead prosthetics designed and maintained by the legendary Michael Westmore. Westmore made an effort to create unique forehead ridge designs for every Klingon guest star, a decision he came to regret as more and more of them appeared on the show.

Over the next decade of stories, it became implied that forehead patterns were inherited traits, which reduced that workload somewhat. For instance, Worf, his brother Duras, and his son Alexander all share a similar set of forehead ridges, while the rival Duras family has their own unique “crest” of sorts. Westmore would remain in charge of Star Trek’s makeup effects department throughout the entire run of The Next Generation , Deep Space Nine , Voyager , and Enterprise , plus the four feature films released during this era, which cemented his version of the Klingon makeup design as the one most accepted by fans.

The Motion Picture ’s opening scenes introduced viewers to big-budget Star Trek, beginning with the new-and-improved Klingons. This radical redesign of The Original Series ’ most iconic villains was merely a consequence of this production’s superior resources, and was never meant to draw attention to itself. However, the rest of the film’s first act is preoccupied with the unveiling of the “almost entirely new” USS Enterprise, emphasizing that the characters are aware of the ship’s top-to-bottom, inside-out refit. Viewers were told to ignore the first aesthetic upgrade but to make a big deal out of the rest of them. This is arguably the moment that broke Trekkies’ brains forever.

For the next 17 years, Star Trek productions successfully evaded the “Klingon forehead problem,” continuing to treat their change in appearance as a retroactive, behind-the-scenes alteration rather than a canonical event. A 1994 episode of Deep Space Nine even brought back the three most popular Klingons from The Original Series , all portrayed by their original actors but sporting the modern craggy foreheads and long, wavy locks. The message was clear: This is how the Klingons look, and how they have always looked. Don’t worry about it.

In 1996, however, Deep Space Nine celebrated Trek’s 30th birthday with “Trials and Tribble-ations,” a comedic time-travel story in which the DS9 crew revisits the events of the 1967 classic “The Trouble with Tribbles,” splicing the modern crew into scenes Forrest Gump -style. By this point, Klingon Starfleet hero Worf had joined the DS9 cast, and since “The Trouble with Tribbles” employs Klingons as its central antagonists, this meant showing both TOS and TNG -era Klingons on screen at the same time. This would force the writers to acknowledge the discontinuity, which Deep Space Nine ’s writers weren’t interested in doing. Rather than make an issue of it, writers Ronald D. Moore and René Echevarria decided to play it for laughs, with Worf reluctantly admitting that yes, those are Klingons, there is a story behind why they look different, and no, he’s not going to talk about it. That’s because in the writers’ eyes, no story could have possibly made sense.

“There’s not a single explanation that is anything less than preposterous,” Moore said in a DS9 DVD featurette.

Eight years later, Star Trek: Enterprise dedicated two full episodes to a preposterous explanation as to why Klingons look different. From the very beginning of the prequel, set a century before The Original Series , Enterprise honored the new Klingon makeup effects, which had been in use for decades and were familiar to a new generation of fans. This was in line with an overall creative decision not to allow the limitations of a 1960s series to dictate how storytellers in the 2000s depicted the distant future. However, during Enterprise ’s fourth and final season, the show became more fixated than ever on the franchise’s past, leading to the two-part episode, “Affliction” and “Divergence,” in which a genetic augmentation turned virus mutates most Klingons to more closely resemble humans in both appearance and temperament. Only a handful of old-school, “mutated” Klingons appear in the episode, and though there’s no documentation on how it was applied, the makeup certainly looks faithful to the original (read: not great).

It is implied that the Klingons spend the next century working on a cure, after which they purge all evidence of this shameful event from their history. This two-parter would turn out to be the Klingons’ final appearance on Enterprise , as the series would be canceled shortly thereafter. All future Star Trek productions would employ some variation on the bumpy-headed Klingon design that Trekkies had come to know, though not all attempts proved to be very popular…

Baldly going

The cancellation of Enterprise in 2005 brought an end to the continuous 18-year run of Star Trek on television under executive producer Rick Berman, but the franchise was almost immediately revived under new management, with director J.J. Abrams and his Bad Robot production company at the helm. Now rebooted as a blockbuster feature film series, Trek once again received the benefit of a fresh start on the big screen, equipped with the latest production innovations and a new set of creative contributors. Though teased behind helmets that obscured their faces in scenes that were shot for 2009’s Star Trek that were ultimately cut for time, the next iteration of the Klingon makeup design was unveiled in 2013’s Star Trek Into Darkness .

This new design, created by makeup effects artists David LeRoy Anderson and Neville Page, had to hold up under the unforgiving eye of IMAX cameras. They were sculpted digitally and then 3D printed as reference for the final latex sculpts. While many of the background Klingons had long manes and beards under their helmets, their leader, portrayed by Sean Blakemore, is totally hairless. This allows him to show off not only a triangular ridged forehead but a central, spine-like ridge that wraps all the way from his brow to his back, harkening back to the original Motion Picture revamp.

Anderson and Page made one major addition to the Klingon aesthetic: scarification and ceremonial piercings, not only through the ears but through the forehead ridges themselves. In a featurette included with the Into Darkness Blu-ray, Page suggests that these piercings are akin to painting icons on the side of a warplane, with each one representing a victory. Apart from this ornamentation, Anderson and Page’s Klingons were not an enormous departure from what had been depicted before, though that hardly dissuaded canonistas — who generally reviled the Abrams films — from harping on the change.

However, criticism of the Into Darkness Klingons paled in comparison to the outrage that surrounded the next iteration of the Klingon makeup design, which debuted in the opening minutes of Star Trek: Discovery in 2017. The series, which would shepherd a prolific new era for the franchise on streaming television, was as bold an aesthetic departure from the TNG era as The Motion Picture had been from TOS . There were a number of canon-fudging new elements on Discovery , but none received quite as much hate as the new Klingons, or as haters on social media dubbed them, “Klingorcs.” Where Into Darkness had been an incremental change in the Klingon aesthetic, Discovery was a total overhaul designed by Neville Page and Glenn Hetrick of Alchemy FX Studios, based on the input of original showrunner Bryan Fuller.

According to a promotional interview with CBS News , Fuller mandated that the Klingons should be hairless, leading Page and Hetrick to consider what might have been hidden underneath the Klingons’ locks. They decided that Klingons’ famous head ridges would house sensory pits that grant them a greater ability to defend themselves from ambush, and that these ridges should continue along the entire circumference of their skulls. The skulls themselves were elongated, evoking the shape of the tall headdresses worn by some pharaohs of Upper Egypt. In a final touch, the new Klingons had a variety of grayscale skin tones not found in humans.

Page credits the influence of H.R. Giger in creating this more alien and unsettling Klingon appearance. The new makeup effects employed the latest in available technology, including 3D sculpting and printing that allowed the makeup team to mass-produce forehead elements and mix and match them so that each character could have a subtly different design. The makeup was accompanied by a dramatically different costume design intended to distort the shape of actors’ bodies and imply additional organs inside their frame.

Honorable retreat

After the backlash against the new look (and the early departure of Fuller), the second season of Discovery immediately rolled back some of the show’s more aggressive changes to the Klingon design. To begin with, long hair was back in fashion (explained in-story by the end of their war with the Federation), but there were also more subtle changes, like the softening of some of the more pronounced alien facial features.

This design was better received, but the controversy seemed to make the producers of newer Star Trek shows nervous about including the Klingons in further stories. Animated shows Lower Decks and Prodigy employed the TNG Klingon designs, while the following five seasons of live-action Trek ( Discovery seasons 3 and 4, Picard seasons 1 and 2, and Strange New Worlds season 1) would feature no Klingons whatsoever. When the fan-favorite Worf returned for the final season of Star Trek: Picard , he appeared with his familiar “turtlehead” latex appliance, honoring current Trek executive producer Alex Kurtzman’s promise back in 2020 that, regardless of Discovery ’s Klingon redesign, Worf would always “look like Worf.”

Finally, later that year, the initial trailers for season 2 of Strange New Worlds signaled the return of the Klingons, back in the long-haired, craggy-headed flesh. Gone were the extra-bulky bodies, the implied sensor pits, and the inhuman flesh tones. The makeup itself is clearly new, but the aesthetic is unmistakably retro, reproducing the appearance of TNG -era Klingons with modern techniques and resources.

This likely signals the end of bold experimentation with the Klingon forehead. The fans have spoken, and while conceding to the demands of an audience that invariably demands more of what they already have can often be dangerous, few would argue that the online mob was wrong about this one. Still, it would be a mistake to characterize this design reversion as a return to the “real” Klingon forehead. There is no such thing, and there never will be. Like all ongoing fictional narratives (or even complete ones), Star Trek is always changing, as well it should. Attempts to innovate on established concepts and intellectual property should be applauded, even when they’re not entirely successful. Otherwise, we could end up staring into the mirror 50 years from now, embarrassed, with brown foundation and glued-on eyebrows on our faces.

Star Trek: Discovery is cracking open a box Next Gen closed on purpose

Star trek: discovery is finally free to do whatever it wants, the 10 horniest episodes of star trek, ranked by cultural impact, loading comments....

The Chase (episode)

• View history
• 1.2 Act One
• 1.3 Act Two
• 1.4 Act Three
• 1.5 Act Four
• 1.6 Act Five
• 2 Log entries
• 3 Memorable quotes
• 4.1 Production history
• 4.2 Story and script
• 4.3 Production
• 4.4 Cast and characters
• 4.5 Continuity
• 4.6 Reception
• 4.7 Apocrypha
• 4.8 Video and DVD releases
• 5.1 Starring
• 5.2 Also starring
• 5.3 Guest stars
• 5.4 Special appearance by
• 5.5 Co-star
• 5.6 Uncredited co-stars
• 5.7 Stand-ins
• 5.8.1 Other references
• 5.8.2 Unreferenced materials
• 5.9 External links

Summary [ ]

" How can I accept this? " " Graciously, Mr. Picard. You could accept it graciously. "

While the USS Enterprise -D is studying protostars in the Volterra Nebula , Captain Picard receives a call from Commander Riker , requesting that he join him in the observation lounge . When Picard enters the darkened room, he sees an object sitting on the lounge's table. Riker requests that the computer turn the lights up, revealing himself and an older man standing next to him to Picard as the room brightens. Picard has received an unexpected visit from Galen , a reclusive professor, and personal mentor of his, from Starfleet Academy . In the lounge, Galen gives the captain an extremely rare archaeological gift, an intact third-dynasty Kurlan naiskos , and encourages him to take a leave of absence from Starfleet to go on an expedition of vast importance to the galaxy .

Act One [ ]

Picard and Galen sit together at a table in Ten Forward . Galen urges him to accept, telling Picard that when he announces his findings, it will be heard across the galaxy. Picard asks the professor if he can sleep on it. " Dream not of today ", he tells the captain. Picard briefly mulls it over while talking to Dr. Crusher the next morning at breakfast, but knows that he can never leave the Enterprise , despite the tempting offer. He informs Galen that he cannot go with him, and receives a bitter rebuke from his former teacher, who immediately leaves on a shuttlecraft for his next destination.

Not long after, the Enterprise receives a distress call from Galen's shuttle, which is under attack from a Yridian vessel. Worf fires a single moderate phaser shot that should not have destroyed the ship, but somehow it does. They barely retrieve Professor Galen, but, unfortunately, he is dying in sickbay from a disruptor blast to his chest. Before he dies, Galen tells Picard with his last breath that his earlier rebuke had been too harsh.

Act Two [ ]

Data and Geordi La Forge discover that Galen tried to protect certain files in his computer system when the Yridians attacked. But the files only contain blocks of numbers, and without anything to narrow their search, it will be almost impossible to tell what they mean. Assuming that the Yridians were going to sell the information, Picard asks about where Galen was. Data says his course had taken him through a star system with no current inhabitants, but with a planet , Ruah IV , capable of sustaining life. Picard delays the ship's current diplomatic mission to the planet Atalia VII to follow the clues in the number blocks from Galen's database. It will take four days to get there.

When they arrive, they see that there are some proto-hominids , but no sign of previous civilizations. Picard recalls that Galen was planning to head to Indri VIII on his archaeological expedition. Picard believes there is some connection between the two planets and he intends to find it, though Riker reminds him of his diplomatic responsibilities. Later, Counselor Troi enters Picard's ready room and asks how he has been doing since Galen died. Picard tells her he has been staring at the number blocks displayed on his desktop monitor , hoping that if he looked at them long enough, he might be able to figure out what they mean. So far, he cannot determine what they represent. He begins to express his regret for not joining Galen on his expedition but Troi stops him, telling Picard that he must not blame himself for what happened to the professor. She reminds him that the conference of Altalia VII has been scheduled for six months in advance and that Starfleet is counting on his mediation efforts. Before she can continue, Picard angrily tells Troi that he is not taking the Enterprise on some wild goose chase around the galaxy to assuage his guilt over Galen dying. He announces that Galen's death will not be in vain and if it means inconveniencing squabbling delegates for a few days, so be it. Troi can see there is nothing more she can say, so she quietly leaves.

When the Enterprise arrives at Indri VIII, they find a process rapidly destroying the planet's atmosphere , killing all life there. Worf announces that the effect is global and cannot be stopped.

Act Three [ ]

In a science lab , Crusher and Picard discover that the number blocks from Galen's database actually represent DNA strands from nineteen different species from all across the Quadrant , each of which has existed in the lifeforms of these planets since the formation of life there. Crusher has all the DNA strands combined together by protein link compatibility. It forms a strange shape that Picard and Crusher cannot identify.

In engineering , Commander La Forge tells Picard and Crusher that it is not part of a natural design, but rather an algorithm , suggesting that it is part of some kind of program. Picard, Data, Crusher, and La Forge cannot determine what the purpose of the program is or why someone apparently designed it four billion years before. La Forge has tried every DNA material in the Enterprise 's database to run the program, but they cannot find any compatible protein combinations. Picard suggests that perhaps they should run DNA material from non-Federation citizens, seventeen individuals of which the Enterprise -D currently has as crew members. Crusher then leaves to collect samples from them. Picard muses on this computer program designed by an apparently advanced civilization four billion years ago. " Whatever information this program contains could be the most profound discovery of our time… or the most dangerous. The professor knew that. "

The Enterprise with the Maht-H'a , and two Cardassian ships in orbit

In Picard's ready room, he and Crusher are sitting at his desk looking at their PADDs . Crusher tells Picard that the samples from the seventeen various crew members all came out negative. Picard says that he can find no mention in Galen's published work to suggest where to head to next. Then, he remembers Galen telling him that he was in the neighborhood near Kurl . Crusher suggests he was in the Kurlan system collecting DNA samples. Picard, while looking through his PADD, finds that there is only one planet in the Kurlan system is capable of supporting life: Loren III . Picard has the Enterprise proceed to Loren III at maximum warp where they are immediately confronted by two Cardassian warships, prepared to attack in order to protect the planet for only their scientific mission. Immediately, the IKS Maht-H'a , a Klingon Vor'cha -class attack cruiser , decloaks , making the situation all the more tense.

Act Four [ ]

Picard decides to invite the commanding officers of each vessel to the Enterprise to discuss the situation and collaborate. Meeting the Cardassian Gul Ocett and the Klingon captain Nu'Daq , he plays his cards, relating that the Enterprise crew has determined that Galen's research leads them to believe that a computer program has been written and scattered on planets located throughout the galaxy, being stored in the genetic code of organisms on certain planets. An uneasy truce is forged between the three powers so as to share the data all three factions possess.

In the science lab, Ocett and Nu'Daq provide their samples. Combined, it appears there are still missing pieces. Picard supposes that there should be a pattern, for the designers would have wanted the code to be found. He has Crusher program the computer to use the locations of the samples to extrapolate where the missing DNA would be. It will take some time, so Ocett and Nu'Daq wait. Nu'Daq decides to use this time to seek out Data in Ten Forward and challenge him to the B'aht Qul challenge , unsuccessfully. He then attempts to bribe Data, telling him that a being of his abilities would go far in the Klingon Empire to get him to tell him the results first, also unsuccessfully.

However, chief engineer La Forge discovers that the Enterprise 's defensive systems have been tampered with – rightfully anticipating deception on the part of the Cardassians. Secretly, Picard and Nu'Daq decide to tamper with their data a bit prior to the meeting. All three factions meet back in the science lab to view the star chart inferred from the data points. Immediately, and as predicted, Ocett transports off of the Enterprise and begins firing on both the Maht-H'a and the Enterprise .

Act Five [ ]

The Enterprise makes a good show of being damaged, and the Maht-H'a actually is slightly damaged. To save time, Nu'Daq stays on board the Enterprise as it heads to the true coordinates, the planet Vilmor II .

Once there, they transport to the surface to take tricorder measurements of lichen growing in an ancient seabed. They don't get too far before Ocett and a team beam down next to them. Then, suddenly, a team of Romulans appear as well, insisting that everyone else leave. They reveal that they have been monitoring communications since Galen's shuttle was intercepted. The Cardassians threaten to destroy what they all came for. While they argue with the Klingon and Romulans, Dr. Crusher covertly takes readings of the lichen. The program then begins to reconfigure the tricorder, using the emitter diode to project something.

The argument is silenced when the tricorder begins projecting a holographic image of a humanoid . She explains that her civilization existed alone in the galaxy, billions of lonely years before any of the others developed. They decided to spread their genetic material to other planets, in the hopes of creating a rich ecosystem of humanoids who could fulfill the joys of finding and integrating with alien cultures that these first beings never had. The Klingons and Cardassians are disgusted at the thought of a common progenitor.

Back on board the Enterprise , Picard is in his quarters talking with Crusher. He tells her that he is pleased at solving the mystery, but wishes that Galen was alive to see it, and that the message had not fallen on such deaf ears. After Crusher leaves to begin her shift in sickbay, Picard receives an unexpected message from the Romulan commander. In light of the recent events, he expresses his opinion that Humans and Romulans are not so dissimilar after all, in both their hopes and dreams. The Romulan hopes that one day, the two powers could stand together in friendship.

Log entries [ ]

• " Captain's log, Stardate 46731.5. We are in the midst of the Volterra nebula, a stellar nursery. Our three week mission is a routine analysis of several dozen protostars in various stages of development. "
• " Captain's log, supplemental. It's been over thirty years since I last saw my archaeology professor. His presence has taken me back to a time when I had considered a very different career. "
• " Captain's log, supplemental. We have completed our mission in the nebula and are en route to a diplomatic conference on Atalia Seven. I must admit I've lost my enthusiasm for those proceedings. "
• " Captain's log, supplemental. It seems that we have not one, but two competitors in our attempt to complete Professor Galen's puzzle. I have prevailed upon the Cardassian and Klingon captains to meet with me. "
• " Captain's log, stardate 46735.2. Our frequent use of high warp over the last few days has overextended the propulsion systems. We are finishing minor repairs before returning to Federation territory. "

Memorable quotes [ ]

" When finished… and I announce my findings, it will be heard halfway across the galaxy. "

" Dream not of today. "

" If I go, I go for good … and it's not something that I'm prepared to do. "

" Will you come with me? " " …I can't. " " Then I'll be going. "

" Jean-Luc… I was too harsh. "

" This is not part of a natural design, captain. This is part of an algorithm coded at the molecular level. " " An algorithm? Are you saying that these DNA fragments are elements in some kind of computer program? " " I know how it sounds, but there's no way this could be a random formation. This is definitely part of a program. " " This fragment has been part of every DNA strand on Earth since life began there and the other fragments are just as old. Someone must've written this program over four billion years ago. " " So…four billion years ago someone scattered this genetic material into the primordial soup of at least 19 different planets across the galaxy? " " The genetic information must have been incorporated into the earliest lifeforms on these planets and then passed down through each generation. " " But why would anyone do this in the first place? " " And what was this program designed to do? " " Well, we couldn't know that until we assembled the entire program and ran it. We've tried all of the DNA material in the Federation computer but we haven't been able to come up with any compatible proteins. " " Then, they must be from worlds outside the Federation. "

" Until we assemble it, we will never know its purpose. " " He's right. As far as we know it might just be a recipe for biscuits! " " Biscuits? If that's what you believe, then go back to Cardassia, I will send you my mother's recipe. "

" My upper spinal support is a polyalloy designed for extreme stress. My skull is composed of cortenide and duranium. "

" A being of your abilities would go far in the Empire. " " You are attempting to bribe me. "

" That's all!? If she were not dead, I would kill her! "

" It would seem that we are not completely dissimilar after all; in our hopes, or in our fears. " " Yes… " " Well then perhaps, one day… " " …one day… "

Background information [ ]

Production history [ ].

• Final draft script: 4 February 1993 [1]
• Premiere airdate: 26 April 1993
• First UK airdate: 22 November 1995

Story and script [ ]

Jonathan Frakes directs Norman Lloyd

Frakes with the alien actors between takes

• "The Chase" was inspired by Carl Sagan's novel Contact , in which clues to the nature of the universe are discovered in a long calculation of π (pi). ( Star Trek: The Next Generation Companion  (2nd ed., p. 243))
• Ronald D. Moore remembered, " Joe Menosky was intrigued with this notion of why there's a common humanoid ancestry for all the bipedal races we've encountered in Star Trek . Why was the show filled only with people with bumps on their foreheads? We looked to give that an answer. And I was fascinated with the notion of something being written into the very fabric of their genes, that there was a code in there waiting to be established. " ( Star Trek: The Next Generation 365 , p. 302)
• It took over a year for Menosky and Moore's premise to be written into a workable script. Early drafts were in the manic mood of It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World , but were shelved for being "too cartoony". The original story involved a Vulcan scientist not personally involved with any of the characters. Along with the Klingons and Romulans, this version also included the Ferengi. As Moore recalled, " Riker beams over into this cramped little tiny shuttle, where everyone's yelling and trying to find things and the guy's dead. And then they zip away, and we're off an running with It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World . It would have been a lot more comedic. " Michael Piller and Rick Berman felt this lacked sufficient character – that there was no real motivation for Picard to join in the chase. It was only with the addition of the death of Picard's mentor that Piller and Berman were sold on the idea. ( Star Trek: The Next Generation Companion  (2nd ed., p. 243); Captains' Logs: The Unauthorized Complete Trek Voyages , p. 276)
• Menosky and Moore divided the task of writing the teleplay. Menosky commented, " I took the scenes between Picard and his old professor. I based them on my memories of the complicated emotions I'd observed between students and mentors in college. I think those scenes had a kind of 'emotional truth' to them. " ( Star Trek: The Next Generation 365 , p. 302)
• Moore stated that he'd considered, but intentionally did not specify, that the Ancient humanoids were the Preservers from TOS : " The Paradise Syndrome ". He added, " but this could be them and be internally consistent. " ( Star Trek: The Next Generation Companion  (2nd ed., p. 244))
• When it appeared that the episode would run short, Ronald D. Moore added a scene in which Mr. Mot is tested by Dr. Crusher as one of the seventeen crew members said to come from non-Federation worlds, but this was cut from the final episode. This scene would have thus established that Bolarus IX is not a Federation member. ( Star Trek: The Next Generation Companion  (2nd ed., pp. 243-244)) The script for this episode, including the deleted scene, can be found here . The scene was also included as a bonus feature on the TNG Season 6 Blu-ray .
• The final episode contains no explanation for the destruction of the Yridian ship attacking Galen's shuttle following a single phaser blast from the Enterprise . However, the original teleplay contains a line by Data immediately following the ship's destruction that explains this (" The Yridian vessel was overloading its power generators . That, combined with the phaser blast, caused it to explode "). [2]

Production [ ]

• Director Jonathan Frakes was disappointed at not being able to shoot outside. " I think it does look like ' Planet Hell ', but that's the way it goes. The money was being spent across the street [at Deep Space Nine ]. I don't think it's a secret. " However, set designer Richard James noted that it was impossible to shoot outside, as the crew had been unable to find a salt flat without vegetation, as the episode demanded. ( Captains' Logs: The Unauthorized Complete Trek Voyages , p. 277)

Cast and characters [ ]

• Salome Jens went on to play the recurring role of the Female Changeling in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine . John Cothran, Jr. went on to play Telok in DS9 : " Crossover " and Gralik Durr in ENT : " The Shipment ".

Continuity [ ]

• Several sources, including the Star Trek: The Next Generation Companion  (2nd ed., p. 243), state that this episode marked the first appearance of a Cardassian female on Star Trek . This had already occurred in " Chain Of Command, Part II ", where Gul Madred 's daughter, Jil Orra , appeared. Ocett is, however, the only female with a rank of Gul ever mentioned or seen in any episode of any Star Trek series.
• As noted in the Star Trek: The Next Generation Companion  (2nd ed., p. 243), this episode marks the first time that Humans , Klingons , Romulans , and Cardassians appear in the same episode.
• Despite Picard's obvious delight at being given the Kurlan naiskos in this episode, he casually discards it among the wreckage of the Enterprise -D in Star Trek Generations , in favor of the Picard family album . In PIC : " Remembrance ", the naiskos was shown to be stored in Picard's vault at the quantum archive of the Starfleet Archive Museum . Later, in PIC : " The Star Gazer ", it was shown to have been moved to a hallway at Château Picard .
• The Cardassian transporter effect from Star Trek: Deep Space Nine is used.
• This episode is the first to mention one of Deep Space 9 's sister deep space stations, in this case Deep Space 4 .
• This episode reveals that seventeen people aboard the Enterprise are from non-Federation planets.

Reception [ ]

• The production staff dubbed this the most " Roddenberry -esque" TNG episode. ( Star Trek: The Next Generation Companion  (2nd ed., p. 243))
• Jonathan Frakes remarked, " The speech that Salome Jens makes at the end would make Roddenberry very proud I think. It's a great cast and it's wonderful to have all those villains and aliens in one place. " ( Captains' Logs: The Unauthorized Complete Trek Voyages , pp. 276-277) Frakes nominated the opportunity to work with Norman Lloyd as a highlight. " He was a wonderful storyteller and a brilliant actor. We were so lucky to have this guy on our show. " ( Star Trek: The Next Generation 365 , p. 302)
• However, Rick Berman was not overawed by the finished episode. " Conceptually, it's very interesting. I always had some problems with dealing with the whole idea of these kind of prehistoric creatures who are the fathers of us all. It's not Roddenberry-esque, it's very sixties Roddenberry-esque. " ( Captains' Logs: The Unauthorized Complete Trek Voyages , p. 276)
• The episode was previewed at the 1993 StarFest Convention in Denver, Colorado, to generally favorable reaction.

Apocrypha [ ]

• A playable level with this same title and similar theme is featured in the video game Star Trek: Encounters , only involving USS Voyager racing Culluh for the answer to the genetic puzzle. The humanoid does not appear.

Video and DVD releases [ ]

• UK VHS release (two-episode tapes, CIC Video ): Volume 73, catalog number VHR 2731, 22 November 1993
• As part of the TNG Season 6 DVD collection

Links and references [ ]

Starring [ ].

• Patrick Stewart as Capt. Jean-Luc Picard
• Jonathan Frakes as Cmdr. William Riker

Also starring [ ]

• LeVar Burton as Lt. Cmdr. Geordi La Forge
• Michael Dorn as Lieutenant Worf
• Gates McFadden as Dr. Beverly Crusher
• Marina Sirtis as Counselor Deanna Troi
• Brent Spiner as Lt. Commander Data

Guest stars [ ]

• Salome Jens as ancient humanoid
• John Cothran, Jr. as Nu'Daq
• Maurice Roëves as Romulan captain
• Linda Thorson as Ocett

Special appearance by [ ]

• Norman Lloyd as Professor Galen

Co-star [ ]

• Majel Barrett as Computer Voice

Uncredited co-stars [ ]

• Romulan officer
• Steven Boz as operations ensign
• David Paul Christian as Ten Forward waiter
• Tracee Lee Cocco as Jae
• Debra Dilley as command ensign
• Inez Edwards as sciences officer
• Star Halm as Ten Forward waitress
• Grace Harrell as civilian
• Christie Haydon as command ensign
• Kerry Hoyt as operations ensign
• Gary Hunter as sciences officer
• Kathy as Towles
• Michael Moorehead as sciences ensign
• Keith Rayve as civilian
• S. Reed as Burton
• Sissy Sessions as operations officer
• Leatrim Stang as Romulan officer
• Oliver Theess as command officer ( citation needed • edit )
• Ken Thorley as Mot ( deleted scene )
• Cardassian officer
• Command ensign (voice)
• Female buck-toothed alien ( deleted scene )
• Female civilian
• Female sciences officer
• Klingon officer (voice)
• Operations officer
• Transporter chief
• Transporter officer (voice)

Stand-ins [ ]

• David Keith Anderson – stand-in for LeVar Burton
• Debbie David – stand-in for Brent Spiner
• Michael Echols – stand-in for Michael Dorn
• Nora Leonhardt – stand-in for Marina Sirtis
• Lorine Mendell – stand-in for Gates McFadden
• Richard Sarstedt – stand-in for Jonathan Frakes
• Dennis Tracy – stand-in for Patrick Stewart

References [ ]

4.5 billion years ago ; 12,000 years ago ; 2309 ; 2339 ; Al-Leyan transport ; ability ; Alpha Quadrant ; ancient humanoids ; ancient humanoid homeworld ; animal life ; archaeological expedition ; archaeologist ; arboretum ; Atalia VII ; Atalia system ; attack cruiser ; B'aht Qul challenge ; battle station ; Beta Quadrant ; biological database ; biosphere ; biscuit ; bribery ; Caere ; Cardassia ; Cardassian ; Cardassian war vessel ; career ; centurion ; class M ; command ship ; companionship ; datastream ; deciduous ; Deep Space 4 ; dilettante ; DNA ( deoxyribonucleic acid ); dozen ; Earth ; earthworks ; emitter diode ; Federation ; Federation territory ; fellowship ; Fifth Dynasty ; final exam ; flight log ; Galen's children ; Galen's planets ; Galor -class ; generation ; genus ; geometric pattern ; goose ; high orbit ; high warp ; Indri VIII ; Indri system ; inertial damper ; information dealer ; jigsaw puzzle ; Klingon ; Klingon Empire ; Klingonese ; Kurl ; Kurlan ; Kurlan naiskos ; Kurlan system ; L-class ; land mass ; level 3 diagnostic ; level 4 security ; lichen ; " long shot "; Loren III ; Loren system ; Loren system sector ; IKS Maht-H'a ; M'Tell ; Master of Tarquin Hill ; medical tricorder ; micropaleontology ; Milky Way Galaxy ; monument ; Non-Federation ; number one ; Ocett's war vessel ; Ocett's sister ship ; offensive systems ; orbit ; path ; Picard, Maurice ; plasma ; protein ; primitive culture ; proto-hominid ; province ; pupil ; quadrant ; Rahm-Izad ; Rahm-Izad system ; Roman ; Roman Empire ; Romulan ; Romulan command ship ; Romulan disruptor rifle ; Romulan space ; Romulus ; Ruah IV ; Ruah system ; Satarran ; Schliemann, Heinrich ; scholar ; science laboratory ; scientific research ; Sector 21459 ; short-sightedness ; Sothis III ; standard orbit ; staring ; stomach ; Subsector 3383 ; summer ; surrender ; tractor beam ; transporter ; Transporter Room 1 ; tricorder ; Troy ; Type 7 shuttlecraft ( Galen's shuttlecraft ); Vilmor II ; Vilmoran system ; vital sign ; Volterra Nebula ; Volterra Nebula planets ; Vor'cha -class ; Vulcan transport (aka Vulcan ship); workshop ; Ya'Seem ; Yash-El ; Yridian ; Yridian destroyer

Other references [ ]

USS Enterprise Personnel Database : Aaamazzara ; Alpha Carinae V ; Alpha Cygnus IX ; Blackman, Robert ; Braga, Brannon ; Chattaway, Jay ; Courage, Alexander ; Curry, Dan ; Echevarria, Rene ; Eminiar VII ; Fukai, Arlene ; Gamma Trianguli IV ; Goldsmith, Jerry ; James, Richard ; Johnson, J. Lowry ; Mees, Jim ; Neuss, Wendy ; Regulus V ; Rigel VII ; Selcundi Drema ; Sherman's Planet ; Simmons, Adele ; Sigma Draconis VI ; Surma, Ron ; Talos IV ; Taurus II ; Therbia ; Triacus ; Triskelion Prime ; Tucker, Steve ; Tycho IV ; West, Jonathan ; Xendi Sabu IX ; Yacobian, Brad

Starship mission status : Ajax , USS ; Alderaan ; Alpha Laputa IV ; Ambassador -class ; Apollo -class ; Aries , USS ; Beta Cygni system ; Bradbury , USS ; Bradbury -class ; Charleston , USS ; Constellation -class ; Excelsior -class ; Fearless , USS ; Goddard , USS ; Hood , USS ; Korolev -class ; Merced -class ; Merrimac , USS ; Monitor , USS ; Nebula -class ; New Orleans -class ; pulsar ; Renaissance -class ; Repulse , USS ; Romulan Neutral Zone ; sector ; Sector 21396 ; Sector 21538 ; Sector 22358 ; Sector 22846 ; Sector 22853 ; Sector 23079 ; Starbase 134 ; Starbase 434 ; Thomas Paine , USS ; Trieste , USS ; Victory , USS ; Vulcan Science Academy ; warp drive ; Zhukov , USS

Spacecraft Systems Status : Bussard collector ; captain's yacht ; class M ; gross vehicle mass ; impulse engine ; main shuttlebay Mars ; navigational deflector ; observation lounge ; phaser bank ; service docking port ; shuttlebay 2 ; shuttlebay 3 ; torpedo launcher ; umbilical connect port ; Utopia Planitia ; warp nacelle

Unreferenced materials [ ]

Aolian Cluster ; Earl Grey tea ; Kea IV ; macchiato ; nail polish ; power generator

External links [ ]

• " The Chase " at Memory Beta , the wiki for licensed Star Trek works
• " The Chase " at Wikipedia
• "The Chase" at StarTrek.com
• Observations in TNG: "The Chase"  at Ex Astris Scientia
• "The Chase" HD Screencap & Image Gallery at TrekCore
• "The Chase" script  at Star Trek Minutiae
• " The Chase " at MissionLogPodcast.com , a Roddenberry Star Trek podcast
• " The Chase " at the Internet Movie Database
• 2 ISS Enterprise (NCC-1701)

• More to Explore
• Series & Movies

Published Aug 4, 2023

Dynamic Duos: Lursa and B'Etor Duras

Dive in the sinister Klingon sisters' delicious history!

StarTrek.com

Who doesn’t love a good villain? Or in this case, a pair of villainesses? The Duras sisters — Lursa and B’Etor — may not be the first characters to come to mind when one thinks of Star Trek ’s dynamic duos, but while they might be a less obvious choice, they’re certainly among the franchise’s most delightful pairs.

Lursa and B’Etor first appeared in the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode “ Redemption, Part I ” to challenge the Klingon Leader of the High Council, Gowron. Their brother, Duras, had previously tried to claim the position but died in disgrace after his and his family’s corruption was exposed. Lursa and B’Etor aren’t willing to give up so easily, though.

"Redemption"

Through their recurring appearances on The Next Generation , Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and Star Trek Generations , they doggedly pursue power over the Klingon Empire by any means necessary, with actors Barbara March and Gwynyth Walsh joyously chewing the scenery with every memorable appearance. They also become a recurring nemesis for Picard, who’d been named the Arbiter of Succession for the council and who’d rejected the House of Duras’ claim to leadership, and Worf, who’d killed Duras in a duel after the latter murdered Worf’s mate, K’Ehleyr.

While the Klingon civilization is built around ideals of honor, Lursa and B’Etor embrace corruption to achieve their goals by any means necessary. And boy, is it fun to watch them at their worst! Shamelessly scheming, cheating, and plotting, Lursa, with her snarling power hungriness, and B’Etor, with her unabashed use of her sexuality as a weapon, embody a rejection of what a Klingon woman should be. It makes them villains, sure, but it also frees them from the constraints of their society.

"Firstborn"

For all its futuristic technology, the Klingon Empire is decidedly retrograde in its views toward females. Klingon women may be strong, powerful and sexually liberated, but they’re ultimately still treated as second-class citizens compared to the men. The Duras sisters encounter this old-fashioned bias firsthand in their attempt to take over the Empire. After their brother’s death, they have no choice but to pursue power through another male relative, a teenaged illegitimate nephew, Toral, who was made the head of House Duras and inherited his father’s claim on the leadership position solely for being born male.

After that last attempt to claim power in an (at least nominally) legitimate way failed, it’s little surprise that Lursa and B’Etor turned to increasingly unsavory ways to seize power. Though their actions are despicable, I found it hard not to root for them a little. In a world where even powerful women are expected to be subservient to men, the Duras sisters embraced their independence in all its glory and weren’t afraid to use men as tools to get what they wanted. They let nothing hold them back — not circumstances, not morality, not traditions, and certainly not the odds. Their scheming may have been undone in each episode (and in the film) they appeared in, but they never let that stop them or even slow them down.

Star Trek Generations

It was refreshing to see a pair of women in positions of power working together to achieve a common goal, even if that goal made them the bad gals. As I’ve written about before, female friendships have historically been underrepresented on-screen (something Star Trek ’s been rectifying since Deanna and Beverly started hanging out in the late ‘80s). The Duras sisters may have antagonized the Federation, the Klingon Empire, and the-Prophets-know-who-else, but they were always in sync with each other.

Lursa and B’Etor’s dogged, whatever-it-takes approach to their pursuit of power and revenge — and their brazen willingness to wreak havoc along the way — ultimately proves to be their undoing. But let’s not mourn them as just another set of villains brought down by the good guys of Star Trek . Let’s celebrate them for the strong-willed, clever, relentless and delightfully wicked rebels that they were.

This article was originally published on January 21, 2019.

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Mary Fan is a sci-fi/fantasy writer hailing from Jersey City, NJ. She is the author of the Jane Colt sci-fi series, which comprises ARTIFICIAL ABSOLUTES (2013), SYNTHETIC ILLUSIONS (2014), and VIRTUAL SHADOWS (2015), and STARSWEPT (2017), and FLYNN NIGHTSIDER AND THE EDGE OF EVIL (2018), a YA dark fantasy and the first novel of the Flynn Nightsider series. Due out in 2019 is STRONGER THAN A BRONZE DRAGON, a YA steampunk fantasy. Check out her official page at www.maryfan.com.

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Star Trek: Strange New Worlds EPs Explain Why Their Klingons Look Different From Those in Discovery

Keisha hatchett, staff editor.

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The following contains spoilers from Star Trek: Strange New Worlds ’ Season 2 premiere. Proceed accordingly.

In Star Trek: Strange New Worlds ’ Season 2 premiere — now streaming on Paramount+ — Spock & Co. absconded with the Enterprise to a mining planet on the edge of Klingon space, where they prevented an extremist group from instigating a war with the Federation.

Strange New Worlds co-showrunner Henry Alonso Myers acknowledges that the Discovery team took a big swing with their version of the Klingons, also noting that Strange New Worlds opted for a more classic look.

“[The Discovery crew] were really excited. They had these big, intense ideas. They bent the Klingons a bit,” Myers tells TVLine. “As we were starting our season — we’re working with a lot of folks in our production who are from Discovery — we were trying to find something that spoke to the old-school Klingons from [the original Star Trek series], from the movies, but that also didn’t speak against the ones that happened on Disco v ery . This is just what they look like right now.”

With the Klingons’ finalized look in Strange New Worlds , Myers says they “wanted them to feel like Klingons.” Additionally, the slight redesign was due to “some things that made it easier for producing. It just made our lives slightly easier to do that because we wanted to have them come back in some ways and see them a bit more.”

Co-showrunner Akiva Goldsman , who also executive-produced Discovery , boils the Klingon differences down to both shows having their own unique vibes.  

Plus, the makeup for Discovery ’s Klingons was hard to work with. “That application was so difficult and really slows down shooting,” Goldsman shares, “and we have a lot of Klingons.”

Myers adds, “Honestly, I like to imagine that Klingons are a diverse species, and that means there are many different looks the Klingons have. It’s that simple.”

How are you feeling about the Klingons in Strange New Worlds ‘ Season 2 premiere? Grade the episode below, and then share your thoughts in the comments.

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32 comments.

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The Klingons should look like Worf and the TNG ones. Just a better look.

The klingons in this episode were a vast improvement from discovery. They may not have much stock in the federation. With Spock drinking them down with bloodwine, they respected him enough not to go to war with the federation.

This says the Klingons in this episode are meant to look like those in the original series, but this design for Klingons is from Next Generation which would set how they look for the rest of the franchise. Klingons in the original series didn’t quite look like this yet.

Agreed! I remember Worf speaking of the appearance of the Klingons changed in TNG. If I remember correctly it was an embarrassment.

He mentioned it in DS9 “Trials and Tribilations” also there was the Enterprise 3 part episodes in season 4 where there was a virus or the treatment for the virus caused them to loose their ridges.

Yep. Plus enterprise gave an explanation to why Klingons looked the way they did in the original series. It’s not the best story from season 4 but it’s still decent.

That episode can be use to explain everything. That the Klingons didn’t listen to phlox and kept on tinkering with their genetic makeup, with many different attempts having many different outcomes. Until a proper fix post TOS is found.

In Star Trek TMP, they first appeared as they do in TNG, DSP, VOY, SNW, etc.

A good sign that at least in this series, the producers learn from their mistakes. Something which couldn’t be said about Discovery.

All Klingon heritage questions can be answered by reading John Ford’s novel, Final Reflection. Almost forty years later and it’s the one source I always return to when I want to refresh myself on Klingon culture/heritage.

I’m glad they changed it. The Discovery Klingons’ makeup made speaking very hard for the actors. They all did a good job with it, but the mouth prosthesis were super clunky.

“Everyone, and I do mean EVERYONE, hated the way the Klingons looked on Discovery so we decided not to double down on a bad decision.” There, I saved you all some time. . And thank god for it, too.

How could anyone downmark that!

Now there could have explained away the Discovery Klingons by saying it was some sort of plastic surgery they did to get back the ridges at first then went crazy with it or this is how the virus explained in Enterprise effected this group. One or 2 sentences would’ve done it.

Let’s be honest. One of the biggest screwups in television history was the way Discovery bungled the Klingons. It was one part arrogance, one part stupidity, and one part sheer incompetence

This is what Discovery Klingons should have looked like.

I hope ST:SNW will take the opportunity to explain the ST:D Klingons in some way so that ST canon can be restord somehow.

Whoever made the decision to change the Klingons in Discovery to the nonsense they became should never work on a Star Trek series again.

Yea, Bryan Fuller. He was let go.

As producer, but he has writing credits on all 55 episodes.

It was a good episode, but my one complaint is that it’s the season premier and we got two seconds of Captain Pike. Also, it seems like almost everything I read about SNW is about Kirk, or the promo pic is Kirk. I’m a fan of Paul Wesley in general, but this irritates me. It’s Pike’s show, not Kirk’s.

Unless they are leaving it for the next episode, I don’t understand how they had Pike leave to help Number One and then we don’t see him again.

Wesley Crusher, I mean Wil Wheaton, had a clip for next week’s show on his YouTube show, The Ready Room, and it appears it might be Pike heavy.

Terrific episode, and the discussion is about what the Klingons looked like? . I was surprised by how well it worked. No, they weren’t going to kill off two of their main characters that way, and we knew Nurse Chapel survived in any case. But Spock didn’t know that, and he had to make the decision to possibly kill the woman he loved in order to avert a war. Ethan Peck absolutely sold that, and Spock’s confusion about what he was feeling. . Similarly, no real suspense about whether the Enterprise was going to fail to stop the war, but the way that the situation got resolved, and the way it made the Klingons more three dimensional, was a nice touch. That’s what SNW seems to be going for in general, and it’s nice to get away from forced drama in favor of something relatable. . Every member of the cast seems happy and alive. I found myself missing Christina Chong, as who wouldn’t, and actually worried about La’an getting back aboard the Enterprise. No real suspense there either, but still. And now there’s Carol Kane, too.

A 20 minute meaningless hand to hand fight scene was needed to cover a weak script. Pelia (sp?) Needs to go back to the academy, give us scotty.

This was the weakest show out of all of them. I hope the rest of the season isn’t like this show.

Star Trek fans like worldbuilding and continuity. Disco tried to break all that with its “aesthetic” and it didn’t line up. Had they just based the show beyond TNG from the start and not back in the past near TOS, much of the controversy would not have existed as you’d have nothing to compare it against set in the future. Their Klingons could have been an evolution.

all that yadda yadda and none of them acknowledged that one of the reasons must have been how much the majority of the star trek fandom revolted against the disco klingons look.

AFAIC Secret Hideout Trek isn’t canon anyway. Everything post 2005 is glorified fan fiction of the worst kind.

Is this star trek strange new worlds or star trek women dominate .to many women in this show .i dont have any against women but omg the entire bridge of the enterprise is full of women i cant stand the character of sighn and the character if ortegas.im barely able to watch I’m sorry this show its not like the original star trek

Are you sure you don’t have anything against women?

it’s pretty simple. the discovery redesign didn’t go well with fans and it was more costly and more time consuming to put on.

Please don’t call STD “the parent series” of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds. I can’t wait for STD to be forgotten – it’s atrocious and should have never existed. Pure garbage with “Star Trek” in the name – and that is the ONLY thing that is Star Trek about it.

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Robert o'reilly's 4 star trek roles explained.

Robert O'Reilly played one of Star Trek's most memorable Klingons in Chancellor Gowron, but he also appeared as three other Trek characters.

• Most famous as Chancellor Gowron, Robert O'Reilly has played four different Star Trek characters.
• Gowron was Chancellor of the Klingon Empire in TNG and DS9 until he was killed by Worf.
• O'Reilly also played Scarface in TNG, an accountant on DS9, and Kago on Enterprise.

Robert O'Reilly may be most known for playing the Klingon Chancellor Gowron on Star Trek , but he also appeared as three other characters across the franchise. O'Reilly first appeared as Gowron in Star Trek: The Next Generation season 4, but the actor had previously made a brief appearance in TNG season 2, episode 19, "Manhunt," as a gangster character on the holodeck. Gowron went on to become Chancellor of the Klingon High Council, and he appeared in four episodes of TNG and eight episodes of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. O'Reilly also portrayed a human accountant in an episode of DS9 and an alien bounty hunter in Star Trek: Enterprise .

Robert O'Reilly has had a long career in film, television, and theater. Throughout the 1980s and '90s, he appeared in numerous popular television shows, including CHiPs, The Incredible Hulk, Hill Street Blues, Knight Rider, MacGyver , In the Heat of the Night, and Dallas . O'Reilly often played antagonistic characters and had a distinctive, piercing gaze, he once referred to as "that crazy loon eyeball thing." O'Reilly was first cast as Gowron by Star Trek actor and director Jonathan Frakes for Star Trek: The Next Generation season 4, episode 7, "Reunion." Robert O'Reilly has since retired from acting.

How To Watch All Star Trek TV Shows In Timeline Order

Star trek: the next generation season 2, episode 19 - "manhunt", star trek: the next generation.

In Star Trek: The Next Generation 's "Manhunt," the USS Enterprise-D is ordered to transport several dignitaries, including Betazoid Ambassador Lwaxana Troi (Majel Barrett) , to an important conference. When Lwaxana makes romantic advances towards Captain Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart), Counselor Deanna Troi (Marina Sirtis) informs the captain that her mother has entered a Betazoid stage in life known as "The Phase." Because of this, her sex drive has drastically increased, and she is searching for a husband among the Enterprise crew.

To avoid Lwaxana Troi, Captain Picard retreats to the holodeck to take on the role of his favorite hardboiled detective, Dixon Hill. Picard struggles to settle on the story he wants to experience, telling the computer: "It's much too violent. I'm here to relax, not to dodge bullets." Within this holodeck simulation, Robert O'Reilly plays one of the gangsters, identified only as Scarface, who barges into Dixon Hill's office to forcefully recruit him for a job.

3 Replacement Accountant

Star trek: deep space nine season 7, episode 15 - "badda-bing, badda-bang", star trek: deep space nine.

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine's "Badda-Bing, Badda-Bang" is a Star Trek holodeck episode following Dr. Julian Bashir (Alexander Siddig) and Chief Miles O'Brien (Colm Meaney) as they recruit their fellow DS9 crew members to save Vic Fontaine's (James Darren) Las Vegas lounge. The crew of DS9 have visited Fontaine's bar on numerous occasions, but this time a mobster named Frankie Eyes (Robert Miano) bursts in and takes over the lounge.

When Bashir and O'Brien realize they cannot delete Frankie Eyes from the holodeck program, they plan a heist to steal from him and hopefully get him removed from the program. As part of the heist, Ezri Dax (Nicole de Boer) poses as a waitress and plans to drug the accountant watching the safe with the money, so he will leave the safe unattended. On the night of the heist, a different accountant is present, played by Robert O'Reilly, which puts a wrinkle in Ezri's plan, but she still succeeds in getting him to accept the drugged drink.

To hide the fact that Robert O'Reilly was the same actor who plays Gowron, he was credited as Bobby O'Reilly, a name the actor had used in the early 1960s.

Best Star Trek: DS9 Episode From Each Of The Show’s 7 Seasons

Star trek: enterprise season 2, episode 25 - "bounty", star trek: enterprise.

In his last Star Trek appearance, Robert O'Reilly portrayed Kago, a bounty hunter hired by the Klingon Captain Goroth (Michael Garvey) to bring in Captain Jonathan Archer (Scott Bakula) . Star Trek: Enterprise's "Bounty" begins with Captain Archer being kidnapped by a Tellarite bounty hunter named Skalaar (Jordan Lund), who plans to turn him over to the Klingons. Having been promised a hefty reward by Captain Goroth, Kago attacks Skalaar, but Skalaar is able to disable his ship with help from Archer.

Kago is forced to make an emergency landing on a nearby planet. As Kago works to repair his ship, Commander Trip Tucker (Connor Trinneer) contacts him from the Enterprise NX-01 searching for Archer. Kago informs the Enterprise crew of the bounty on Archer's head and tells them that he is probably headed toward Klingon space. Meanwhile, Skalaar delivers Archer to the Klingons, but when Goroth short-changes him, Skalaar tells the Enterprise where to locate the Klingon's ship.

Star Trek: The Next Generation & Star Trek: Deep Space Nine

First introduced in Star Trek: The Next Generation's "Reunion," Gowron was initially an outsider when it came to Klingon politics but eventually became Chancellor of the Klingon High Council, with help from Lt. Worf (Michael Dorn). Later, in the TNG two-part episode , "Redemption," Lursa (Barbara March) and B'Etor (Gwynyth Walsh) Duras challenged Gowron's authority, leading to a Klingon Civil War. Gowron eventually emerged victorious, thanks to some help from Worf and the Federation.

On Star Trek: Deep Space Nine , as the Cold War between the Alpha Quadrant and the Dominion began to escalate, Gowron launched an invasion of the Cardassian Union. Gowron had recently appointed Klingon General Martok (J.G. Hertzler) as a military advisor, unaware that Martok had been replaced by a Changeling. Martok's influence on Gowron led to war with the Cardassians and conflict with the Federation.

Worf killed Gowron in one-on-one combat.

When the Dominion War began in earnest , the Klingon forces were driven out of Cardassian space, and Gowron reluctantly assisted Captain Sisko (Avery Brooks) in a battle against Dominion forces. The real Martok proved crucial to the war effort and came to be regarded as a hero to the Klingons. Feeling threatened, Gowron attempted to undermine Martok, but Worf later challenged Gowron on Martok's behalf. Worf killed Gowron in one-on-one combat, and named Martok as the new Chancellor. With his distinct appearance and memorable personality, Gowron remains one of Star Trek's most famous Klingons.

Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, & Star Trek: Enterprise are available to stream on Paramount+.

One Star Trek: The Original Series Episode Had The Cast Swimming In Their Sweat

Vasquez Rocks is located in the northern part of Los Angeles County about 25 minutes away from Downtown L.A. via the 14 freeway. It's close enough to the city to be easily accessed by car, but far away enough to look like a remote wilderness. The park's celebrated rock formations look eerie, ancient, and alien from certain angles, making it a popular place for film and TV productions going back to the 1930s.

Trekkies likely recognize Vasquez Rocks as an oft-reused filming location, serving as a variety of alien worlds for various "Star Trek" projects . The park was featured in the "Original Series" episodes "Shore Leave" (December 29, 1966), "Arena" (January 19, 1967), "The Alternative Factor" (March 30, 1967), and "Friday's Child" (December 1, 1967). Later, Vasquez Rocks would serve as Vulcan "Star Trek III: The Search for Spock" and "Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home," released in 1983 and 1984 respectively.

Fans of "Star Trek: The Next Generation" would recognize Vasquez Rocks from the episode "Who Watches the Watchers?" (October 16, 1989), and the park would later be seen playing alien worlds in the "Star Trek: Voyager" episodes "Initiations" (September 4, 1995) and "Gravity" (February 3, 1999). It was in the "Enterprise" episode "Unexpected" (October 12, 2001). "Star Trek" characters wouldn't visit Vasquez Rocks on Earth — that is, the park wouldn't play itself — until the "Star Trek: Picard" episodes "Maps and Legends" and "The End is the Beginning," both from 2020. No natural monument is more closely tied to the franchise.

And what was shooting at Vasquez Rocks like? Horrible. In a 2013 interview with StarTrek.com , actor Michael Dante recalled playing the part of Maab in "Friday's Child," and he only remembered that Vasquez Rocks reached 117 degrees the day of filming.

Michael Dante vs. Vasquez Rocks

"Friday's Child" sees Captain Kirk (William Shatner) traveling to the planet Capella IV to negotiate a mining contract with the violent, but honorable, locals. Kirk has to convince the Capellans to give their ore to the Federation and not to a visiting Klingon (Tige Andrews) who would use it for nefarious purposes. During the negotiations, a civil war breaks out, with Maab (Dante) killing the Capellan leader and usurping the throne. Maab also wants to kill the pregnant queen Eleen (Julie Newmar) , forcing Dr. McCoy (DeForest Kelley) to protect her. The episode features a lot of outdoor fighting, silly regal costumes, and over-the-top acting. Eleen eventually names her child after Kirk and McCoy.

Dante had to wear an outsize blonde wig to play Maab, as well as an uncomfortable-looking headpiece that covered his neck and ears (see above). The regal costumes looked to be made of disused theatre curtains and wool. As itchy as they appear, however, Dante said they were also filled with sweat:

"The weather [stands out]. It was 117 degrees at Vasquez Rocks, where we were filming. The outfits we had, they couldn't breathe. There weren't any openings in the clothing. They were all tight, with boots. I was 180 pounds at that time — and I'm still 180 pounds, which I'm very proud of — but I lost seven pounds in one day. I literally lost muscle. I looked at myself in the mirror when I got home and I said, 'I can't believe what happened.'"

Sweating too much doesn't actually reduce muscle mass, but one can indeed lose several pounds of water a day if they don't rehydrate in a hot climate. Keep the canteen full, kids.

As one can see in the above picture, Dante also had to wear giant furry boots, which are not ideal for desert hiking. What's more, the boots he wore weren't porous or vented, allowing them to catch every drop of Dante's sweat. "It was just so hot. The water was oozing out of us. Every time I'd take a step in my boots, there'd be a swooshing sound, and that was perspiration that went down to my boots," he recalled.

"Friday's Child" was written by longtime "Star Trek" luminary D.C. Fontana, who said that she wanted to write a character like Eleen who didn't want to have children. Such a conceit would have been novel on 1960s TV, and Fontana's script was kept largely intact for filming. Other writers added the Klingon character, but Eleen remained the same. Weirdly, there is a dark moment in "Friday's Child" when Dr. McCoy realizes that he needs to be more forceful and angry with Eleen in order to gain her respect. Her species values aggression, and McCoy was too gentle. To show his strength, he smacks Eleen across the face. It might be the only instance in "Star Trek" of a main character punching a pregnant woman. Perhaps ickily, it worked.

Regardless, Datne said he has rewatched his episode since the 1960s and feels that, dramatically, it holds up pretty well. He was told "Star Trek" was just a Western in space , and he played Maab accordingly. Dante retired from acting in the late 1980s and hosted a syndicated interview radio show from 1995 until 2007. He is still alive and well at 92. 

• Cast & crew
• User reviews

Heart of Glory

• Episode aired Mar 19, 1988

The Enterprise searches for answers as to why three Klingon warriors were the only survivors aboard a freighter just inside the Neutral Zone which was seemingly attacked by a Ferengi ship. The Enterprise searches for answers as to why three Klingon warriors were the only survivors aboard a freighter just inside the Neutral Zone which was seemingly attacked by a Ferengi ship. The Enterprise searches for answers as to why three Klingon warriors were the only survivors aboard a freighter just inside the Neutral Zone which was seemingly attacked by a Ferengi ship.

• Gene Roddenberry
• Maurice Hurley
• Herbert Wright
• Patrick Stewart
• Jonathan Frakes
• LeVar Burton
• 20 User reviews
• 12 Critic reviews

• Captain Jean-Luc Picard

• Commander William Thomas 'Will' Riker

• Lieutenant Geordi La Forge

• Lieutenant Natasha 'Tasha' Yar

• Lieutenant Worf

• Doctor Beverly Crusher

• Counselor Deanna Troi
• (credit only)

• Lieutenant Commander Data

• Wesley Crusher

• Cmdr. Korris
• (as Charles H. Hyman)

• Cmdr. K'Nera

• (uncredited)
• Operations Division Lieutenant
• Command Division Officer
• Maurice Hurley (showrunner)
• All cast & crew
• Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

Did you know

• Trivia Michael Dorn was pleased with the outcome of this episode as he felt it showed the producers that the fans were just as interested in his character as the others in the main cast. He felt that it could have been taken further and wanted there to be an epic battle at the end of the episode.
• Goofs When Korris is in engineering, Worf continually calls the weapon that Korris is holding a phaser. The Klingon weapon equivalent to a phaser is called a disruptor.

Lieutenant Worf : You look for battles in the wrong place. The true test of a warrior is not without, it is within.

[he thumps against his chest]

Lieutenant Worf : Here, here is where we meet the challenge. It is the weaknesses in here a warrior must overcome.

Captain Korris : No.

Lieutenant Worf : You have talked of glory and of conquest, and legends we will write.

Captain Korris : Yes. The birthright of every Klingon.

Lieutenant Worf : Yet in all you say, where are the words 'duty', 'honor', 'loyalty'? Without which a warrior is nothing!

• Connections Featured in Star Trek: The Next Generation: Shades of Gray (1989)
• Soundtracks Star Trek: The Next Generation Main Title Composed by Jerry Goldsmith and Alexander Courage

User reviews 20

• Oct 25, 2017
• March 19, 1988 (United States)
• United States
• Official site
• Paramount Studios - 5555 Melrose Avenue, Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, USA (Studio)
• Paramount Television
• See more company credits at IMDbPro

Technical specs

• Runtime 46 minutes
• Dolby Digital

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I'm Glad Star Trek: TNG Never Did A Mirror Universe Episode

• TNG's moral crew would clash with a dark Mirror Universe, making an episode feel out of place.
• Mirror Universe concept worked for TOS but wouldn't fit TNG's serious and optimistic tone.
• TNG found other ways to explore alternate realities without resorting to Mirror Universe episodes.

Star Trek: The Next Generation never did a Mirror Universe episode, and that ultimately worked in the show's favor. Star Trek's Mirror Universe first debuted in the classic Star Trek: The Original Series episode, "Mirror, Mirror," in which Captain James T. Kirk (William Shatner) and some of his crew find themselves in a dark alternate universe that mirrors their own. In the Mirror Universe, the ISS Enterprise serves the Terran Empire instead of the USS Enterprise as part of the United Federation of Planets' Starfleet. Crew members are tortured when they make a mistake and the chain of command is often determined by officers murdering their superiors.

Despite the divergence of events in Star Trek' s Prime Universe and the Mirror Universe, many people ended up in the same place in both realities. For example, the entire crew of the USS Enterprise was the same in both universes, but their personalities were drastically different. Simply put, t he Mirror Universe is a world of opposites , although Spock (Leonard Nimoy) is logical in every universe. While the Mirror concept worked well for a one-off story with Captain Kirk and his Enterprise crew , the Mirror Universe would have felt out of place on Star Trek: The Next Generation for a number of reasons.

In Star Trek: Picard season 2, Q (John de Lancie) altered the past of the Prime Universe, which resulted in the

Confederation of Earth, a "xenophobic authoritarian regime" much like the Mirror Universe.

Star Trek 10s Best Mirror Universe Variants

Why a star trek: tng mirror universe episode wouldn't have worked, the mirror universe clashes with the tone of tng and its characters..

Captain Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart) and the cast of Star Trek: The Next Generation represent the most moral Star Trek crew, and "evil" versions of those characters would have felt cartoonish. The Mirror Universe worked with the campy tone of Star Trek: The Original Series and Kirk was already an emotional Captain, so it wasn't that hard to imagine an evil version of him. TNG , on the other hand, had a more serious and optimistic tone, and an evil Captain Picard would have likely been either too dark or too over-the-top. TNG did tell alternate universe stories, such as "Yesterday's Enterprise" and "Parallels," but they did it in a way that was new and unique rather than rehashing TOS ' Mirror Universe concept.

Although Star Trek: The Next Generation had some callbacks to Star Trek: The Original Series in its early seasons, Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry wanted to distance TNG from TOS . "Mirror, Mirror" is generally regarded as one of classic Star Trek's best episodes, and it would have been difficult for any TNG episode to live up to that. Despite not doing a Mirror Universe episode, TNG found other ways to allow its actors to play different, and even evil, versions of their characters. Lt. Commander Data (Brent Spiner), for example, faced off against his evil twin brother Lore more than once, and multiple characters were possessed by alien entities.

Various non-canon tie-in novels and comic books have told Mirror Universe stories with Star Trek: The Next Generation's characters, beginning with Diane Duane's novel Dark Mirror in 1993.

Some Star Trek Shows Overused The Mirror Universe

The mirror universe began as a good concept but offers diminishing returns..

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine had five Mirror Universe episodes, beginning with DS9 season 2, episode 23, "Crossover." This episode revealed that Mirror Universe Spock had reformed the Terran Empire after Captain Kirk and his crew visited there in "Mirror, Mirror." Although his reforms initially proved successful, they led to the occupation of the Empire by the Klingon-Cardassian Alliance, which then became the dominant power. In the Mirror Universe, Terok Nor (space station Deep Space Nine) was commanded by Intendant Kira Nerys (Nana Visitor) , and Nana Visitor clearly had fun playing an evil version of Kira. However, with its overly sexualized characters and general campiness, the Mirror Universe storyline offered diminishing returns after the novelty wore off.

Star Trek: Enterprise's two-part "In a Mirror, Darkly" faired a bit better than DS9's Mirror Universe adventures, as it presented a self-contained story that took place entirely in the Mirror Universe and connected with TOS.

The Mirror Universe made more sense combined with the darker tone of Star Trek: Discovery , but it sometimes felt like too much for a Star Trek show. Still, the Mirror Universe of Discovery did provide the characters of Captain Gabriel Lorca (Jason Isaacs) and Emperor Philippa Georgiou (Michelle Yeoh), two of Star Trek's best new villains. After its appearance in multiple Star Trek shows, the Mirror Universe began to feel too much like a gimmick. It's a concept that works better when used sparingly, and it would have felt tonally out of place on Star Trek: The Next Generation.

Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Star Trek: Enterprise, & Star Trek: Discovery are available to stream on Paramount+.

Star Trek: The Next Generation

Cast Michael Dorn, LeVar Burton, Brent Spiner, Wil Wheaton, Jonathan Frakes, Patrick Stewart, Marina Sirtis, Gates McFadden

Release Date September 28, 1987

Showrunner Jeri Taylor, Michael Piller, Rick Berman

Where To Watch Paramount+