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Which star trek shows & movies do the borg appear in.

As one of Star Trek's most iconic villains, the Borg have made many appearances in various franchise projects over the years since their introduction.

The Borg are one of Star Trek 's most iconic villains and have made many appearances in the franchise since their introduction. Although the Borg were created as a second-choice villain for Star Trek: The Next Generation after the Ferengi failed to resonate with audiences, they more than made up for the Ferengi's shortcomings and became one of the most terrifying adversaries in Star Trek history. A cybernetic, hive-mind species whose only goal was to assimilate as many people as possible into perpetual slavery in their collective, the Borg were immediately the stuff of nightmares for the Federation.

The Borg first came into contact with Captain Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart) and the crew of the USS Enterprise-D after Q (John de Lancie) flung them across the galaxy to teach them a lesson about just what kind of dangers they faced in space. After encountering the Enterprise-D, the Borg made it their mission to assimilate all of Starfleet for the betterment of their collective and demonstrated just how powerful they were in TNG episodes like "The Best of Both Worlds Parts I and II". Luckily, after TNG ended, Star Trek continued to bring the Borg back as antagonists in other shows and movies.

Related: Star Trek's Greatest Borg Battle Changed The Franchise In 6 Ways

1 Star Trek: The Next Generation

Given how popular they became, it is surprising that the Borg only appeared in six episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation . However, their appearances left a lasting effect on the franchise. Besides episodes like "Q Who" and "The Best of Both Worlds" which introduced the Borg and demonstrated just how formidable an adversary they were, TNG also began to explore the trauma that individuals taken by the Collective faced during and after assimilation. This was done mostly through Captain Picard, who was assimilated and briefly became Locutus of Borg, something that shaped his storylines for decades to come.

Star Trek: TNG 's other memorable Borg character was Hugh (Jonathan Del Arco), a drone rescued by the Enterprise-D who began to regain his individuality when he was separated from the Collective. Hugh helped Picard grapple with his prejudice against the Borg and was the first example of a completely assimilated drone being rehabilitated, offering the audience a glimpse into the fact that many Borg drones were victims of the Collective rather than willing participants. Although Hugh was forced to return to the Borg, he did eventually escape and his story was explored further in Star Trek: Picard .

2 Star Trek: First Contact

Star Trek: First Contact was the second franchise film starring the cast of TNG , and featured the Borg as its main antagonists. The plot revolved around Captain Picard and crew traveling back in time to stop the Borg from assimilating Earth in the past and thus preventing the birth of the Federation. Star Trek: First Contact was also the first project to introduce the Borg Queen (Alice Krige) as the Collective's leader, a decision that proved somewhat controversial. Despite First Contact retconning her into existence, the Borg Queen went on to have extensive appearances in the rest of the franchise and has become an important part of Star Trek lore.

3 Star Trek: Voyager

To date, Star Trek: Voyager is the series in which the Borg have made the most appearances, 23 episodes in total. Given that Voyager was set in the Delta Quadrant, the region of space where the Borg originated, their inclusion in the show only made sense. The Borg served as the main villains on Voyager from seasons 4-7 and were instrumental in the series finale where they unwittingly helped the crew return home. The journey of a drone regaining their humanity after being separated from the Collective was also once again explored through Seven of Nine (Jeri Ryan) .

4 Star Trek: Enterprise

Although Star Trek: Enterprise was set well before TNG in the timeline, the show still found a way to include the Borg. Season 2, episode 23, "Regeneration" featured the crew of the Enterprise NX-01 battling the two drones, part of the groups that had traveled back in time during First Contact. After being revived by an unwitting research team in the Arctic, the Borg attempted to escape back to the Collective. Captain Jonathan Archer (Scott Bakula) and the rest of Enterprise's crew were able to stop the drones, but the episode ended foreshadowing the Borg's 24th-century conflict with the Federation after a message was transmitted to the Delta Quadrant.

Related: Star Trek: Enterprise's Borg Episode Rewrote TNG History

5 Star Trek: Picard

Given Jean-Luc Picard's history, it isn't surprising that the Borg played a major role in all three seasons of Star Trek: Picard . Picard season 1 delved deeper into the plight of xBs, former Borg drones who had escaped the Collective, and reintroduced Seven of Nine to the franchise. Season 2 provided a significant update to the Borg with the development of a new Collective under the guidance of Agnes Jurati (Alison Pill), who had merged with a version of the Borg Queen from an alternate timeline and convinced her to help create a new species of Borg that agreed to act as allies to the Federation rather than enemies.

Star Trek: Picard season 3 , however, included arguably the most important Borg-related plot. After suffering a massive defeat in the finale of Star Trek: Voyager , the original Borg Queen intended on taking one final stand against the Federation and briefly managed to assimilate much of Starfleet with the help of Admiral Picard's DNA and his son, Jack Crusher (Ed Speleers). However, Picard and the Enterprise-D crew were able to rescue Jack and destroy the last remaining Borg cube, killing the Queen and effectively ending the Borg's reign of terror in the franchise, given that the only Borg remaining are Jurati's Collective.

6 Star Trek: Lower Decks

Star Trek: Lower Decks has featured the Borg in five episodes, but in three out of those five, the Collective was only holograms. Since Lower Decks is mostly a comedy and tends to poke fun and established Star Trek concepts, it's not surprising that the episodes featuring the Borg have used them in a humorous manner. The most Borg-heavy episode, season 2, episode 8, "I, Excretus", dealt with Ensign Brad Boimler (Jack Quaid) briefly becoming trapped in a Borg training simulation in which he was determined to get a perfect score. However, the episode did feature the return of Alice Krige as the Borg Queen, a great callback for viewers.

7 Star Trek: Prodigy

Star Trek: Prodigy has only had one episode that included the Borg so far. In Prodigy season 1 , episode 12, "Let Sleeping Borg Lie", the crew of the USS Protostar encountered a Borg cube which they infiltrated to try and find information on how to disable the Living Construct. However, the episode almost ended with the whole crew assimilated by the Borg after Zero (Angus Imrie) allowed themself to be taken over by the Collective in hopes of obtaining the information. While Star Trek 's Borg didn't play a huge part in Prodigy 's story overall, they certainly left a lasting first impression on the Protostar's crew.

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Star Trek: First Contact

Alice Krige, Brent Spiner, and Patrick Stewart in Star Trek: First Contact (1996)

The Borg travel back in time intent on preventing Earth's first contact with an alien species. Captain Picard and his crew pursue them to ensure that Zefram Cochrane makes his maiden flight ... Read all The Borg travel back in time intent on preventing Earth's first contact with an alien species. Captain Picard and his crew pursue them to ensure that Zefram Cochrane makes his maiden flight reaching warp speed. The Borg travel back in time intent on preventing Earth's first contact with an alien species. Captain Picard and his crew pursue them to ensure that Zefram Cochrane makes his maiden flight reaching warp speed.

  • Jonathan Frakes
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  • Patrick Stewart
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Star Trek: First Contact

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  • Trivia On account of budgetary restrictions, the crew of Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987) was never quite satisfied with the Borg sets and costumes as used during the series. However, the significantly bigger budget for this film finally allowed them to design the Borg in a way that was much closer to what they had intended. As a result, the suits and sets were reused extensively on Star Trek: Voyager (1995) .
  • Goofs When Geordi is asking Cochrane to look at the intermix chamber blueprints, he is wearing sunglasses, even though his artificial eyes don't require protection from the sun. The sunglasses are probably needed in case a local comes looking around. Only Cochrane and Lily knew about time travelers, and Geordi's futuristic implants could blow their cover. Geordi used dark glasses for the same purpose in Time's Arrow, Part II (1992) as well.

Captain Jean-Luc Picard : [Quoting "Moby Dick"] And he piled upon the whale's white hump, the sum of all the rage and hate felt by his whole race. If his chest had been a cannon, he would have shot his heart upon it.

Lily Sloane : What?

Captain Jean-Luc Picard : "Moby-Dick".

Lily Sloane : Actually, I never read it.

Captain Jean-Luc Picard : Ahab spent years hunting the white whale that crippled him, a quest for vengeance, but in the end, it destroyed him and his ship.

Lily Sloane : I guess he didn't know when to quit.

  • Crazy credits After 'Stunt Players' are listed, the 'Stunt Borg' are listed.
  • Connections Featured in Siskel & Ebert: Space Jam/The Mirror Has Two Faces/The English Patient/Breaking the Waves (1996)
  • Soundtracks Theme from 'Star Trek: The Motion Picture by Jerry Goldsmith

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  • November 22, 1996 (United States)
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  • $45,000,000 (estimated)
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  • Nov 24, 1996
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  • Runtime 1 hour 51 minutes
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The History of the Borg - Star Trek's Unstoppable Villains

From The Next Generation to Picard Season 3, the Borg are Star Trek's most insidious villains - born from equally epic behind-the-scenes battles.

Many of Star Trek 's most iconic species can be traced back to series creator Gene Roddenberry. However, the iconic and unstoppable Borg are the brainchild of one of his greatest on-set adversaries. Maurice Hurley was a new arrival on The Next Generation' s staff who didn’t see the future the same way Roddenberry did, but was bound to tell stories by his rules. Their conflict gave rise to characters who would help define the entire franchise.

When Roddenberry staffed The Next Generation , he brought many of the writers he worked with on The Original Series back. However, there was a new narrative edict. Starfleet in the 24th Century would've continued to evolve from Captain Kirk's era. He believed there would be no jealousy, tension or any interpersonal conflict within the crew. Roddenberry's lawyer Leonard Maizlish started acting as a de facto producer, allegedly responsible for hiring Hurley to enforce Roddenberry's strict rules. Yet the talented storyteller just didn't know what to do with no crime, conflict or any of the other storytelling staples he was used to from procedurals like Miami Vice and The Equalizer . In order to alleviate this problem in the second season, Hurley wanted to introduce a new kind of villain that couldn't be reasoned with or stopped.

RELATED: Star Trek: How Picard's Assimilation by the Borg Radically Changed the Franchise

Star Trek's Borg Were Originally Going to Be Insects

The central problem between Roddenberry and Hurley was that the latter didn't believe in what he was supposed to sell the other writers. In the documentary Chaos on the Bridge , Hurley called Roddenberry's ideas of the future "wacky doodle." Since he thought they were bad rules, he could only guide them in constructing "bad" episodes. Sometimes writers would even pull an end run and take a story to Roddenberry that bent or broke his rules. Hurley claimed he would "go ballistic" arguing Roddenberry's ideas back at him. Still, he wasn't setting out to make bad Star Trek , so he thought of a solution: insects.

The Ferengi were introduced in Season 1 as the "new Klingons," but they failed to land in that way with the audience. Hurley thought of insects as an unrelenting natural force, and believed that would make a good basis for an alien species to menace the crew all season. Insects proved to be impossible to create on a regular basis, so he instead went with the idea of cybernetic and organic lifeforms -- cyborgs. He dropped the "cy" from the name, and The Next Generation had its most memorable villains. Hurley planned to seed Season 2 with hints to the Borg until revealing them during October sweeps for the first time. However, the 1988 Writers Guild of America strike necessitated a new plan.

Eventually, Hurley used the popular character of Q to bring the Borg into contact with the Enterprise -D in The Next Generation Season 2, Episode 16, "Q Who?". However, they became a looming threat out in the galaxy rather than a regular villain, as the costuming for the Borg proved to be as difficult as crafting believable insects. Hurley envisioned the aliens being mostly disinterested in organic life, only concerned with Starfleet technology. This changed when the villains returned to assimilate Captain Jean-Luc Picard at the end of Season 3. By that time, Hurley had happily moved on from Star Trek .

RELATED: How Seven of Nine Was Rescued From the Borg on Star Trek: Voyager

The Borg Have Become Star Trek's Most Important Villain

Captain Picard and the Enterprise -D crew faced the Borg only nine times in 35 years, including in the film Star Trek: First Contac t and Picard Season 3. However, the Borg appeared in a whopping 23 episodes of Star Trek: Voyager -- in large part because of Seven of Nine, the former Borg turned Starfleet officer. The writers who succeeded Hurley worried that using the Borg too much would've curtailed their threat. Some fans did complain about the prevalence of the Borg in Voyager . Yet that allowed the Admiral Janeway from an alternate future to hobble the Borg Collective in Voyager 's series finale.

The Borg were mostly a thing of the past by the time Picard debuted, with a significant portion of the first season taking place on a "dead" Borg cube. By Season 2, the introduction of a new Borg Queen meant Picard had to again face a mini-collective. However, by then showrunner Terry Matalas and his crew of storytellers knew how to make Roddenberry's rules work. Hurley's unstoppable, unrelenting villains became provisional members of the Federation. Their collective was opt-in only, and their purpose was to stand by a tear in space-time that some future threat would emerge from. Picard could apparently negotiate peace with anyone.

Well, maybe not anyone . The Borg also made him and his son Jack Crusher time bomb for their last-ditch attack on Earth. When Picard faced the Borg Queen in the Picard series finale , he wasn't there to talk. The Borg were seemingly destroyed once and for all by the crew of the Enterprise -D. But Maurice Hurley's creations are too perfect to stay gone. He may not have known how to shape a season of Star Trek , but he inspired its most fascinating and enduring villain because of his frustration.

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“Star Trek: First Contact” is one of the best of the eight “ Star Trek ” films: Certainly the best in its technical credits, and among the best in the ingenuity of its plot. I would rank it beside “ Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home ” (1986), the one where the fate of Earth depended on the song of the humpback whale. This time, in a screenplay that could have been confusing but moves confidently between different levels of the story, the crew of the Enterprise follows the evil Borgs back in time to the day before mankind made its first flight at warp speed.

That flight, in 2063, was monitored by an alien race, the Vulcans, who took it as evidence that man had developed to the point where it deserved to meet another race. But now the Borgs, starting from the 24th century, want to travel back through a temporal vortex (how I love the “Star Trek” jargon!), prevent the flight and rewrite history, this time with Borgs populating the Earth instead of humans.

The latest edition of the starship is the “Enterprise E” (and there are plenty of letters left in the alphabet, Capt. Picard notes ominously). It is patrolling deep space when it learns the Borgs are attacking Earth. The Enterprise is ordered to remain where it is--probably, Picard ( Patrick Stewart ) notes bitterly, because he was a prisoner of the Borgs some six years ago, and “a man who was captured and assimilated by the Borg is an unstable element.” These Borgs are an interesting race. They are part flesh, part computer, and they “assimilate” all the races they conquer into their collective mind, which organizes their society like a hive. There is even a queen ( Alice Krige ), although she is not fat and pampered like an ant or a termite, but lean, mean and a student of seduction. One of the movie's intriguing subplots involves Data ( Brent Spiner ), the Enterprise's android, who is captured and hooked up to a Borg assimilating machine--which fails, because it can't crack his digital defenses. Then the Queen tries some analog methods all her own.

The central plot takes place as the Enterprise follows a Borg ship back through time to Earth, which, the Trekkers are dismayed to learn, is now populated by Borgs. To turn history around again, they need to be sure man's first warp flight succeeds. Earth is recovering from World War III, and a brilliant inventor named Cochrane ( James Cromwell , the tall farmer from “ Babe ”) has adapted a missile for this historic flight.

He leads a commune that seems to be part hippie, part survivalist, and spends much of his time listing to rock 'n' roll and drinking, to the despair of his associate Lily ( Alfre Woodard ). These two do not believe the weird story they get from the starship crew, and at one point Lily nearly fries Picard with a stolen gun. (He: “Maximum setting! If you had fired, you would have vaporized me.” She: “It's my first ray gun.”) The plot moves deftly between preparations for the Earth launch, Data's assimilation tortures on the Borg ship, and a fight against a Borg landing party on the Enterprise, which Picard personally directs, overruling doubts expressed by his second-in-command, William Riker ( Jonathan Frakes ) and their own assimilated Klingon, Worf ( Michael Dorn ).

Some of the earlier “Star Trek” movies have been frankly clunky in the special-effects department; the first of the series came out in 1979 and looked pale in comparison to “Star Wars.” But this one benefits from the latest advances in f/x artistry, starting with its sensational opening shot, which begins so deep inside Picard's eyeball, it looks like a star-speckled spacescape and then pulling back to encompass an unimaginably vast Borg starship. I also admired the interiors of the Borg probe, and the peculiar makeup work creating the Borg Queen, who looks like no notion of sexy I have ever heard of, but inspires me to keep an open mind.

“Star Trek” movies are not so much about action and effects as they are about ideas and dialogue. I doubted the original Enterprise crew would ever retire because I didn't think they could stop talking long enough. Here the story gives us yet another intriguing test of the differences among humans, aliens and artificial intelligence. And the paradoxes of time travel are handled less murkily than sometimes in the past. (Although explain to me once again how the Earth could be populated with millions of Borgs who are expected to vanish--or never have been--if the Enterprise succeeds. Isn't there some sort of law of conservation of energy that requires their physical bodies to come from, or be disposed of, somewhere, somehow?) “STFC” was directed by Frakes, who did some of the “ST Next Generation” shows for television, and here achieves great energy and clarity. In all of the shuffling of timelines and plotlines, I always knew where we were. He also gets some genial humor out of Cromwell, as the inventor who never wanted fame but simply enough money to go off to a “tropical island with a lot of naked women.” And there is such intriguing chemistry between Picard and the Woodard character that I hope a way is found to bring her onboard in the next film. “Star Trek” movies in the past have occasionally gone where no movie had gone, or wanted to go, before. This one is on the right beam.

Roger Ebert

Roger Ebert

Roger Ebert was the film critic of the Chicago Sun-Times from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, he won the Pulitzer Prize for distinguished criticism.

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Star Trek: First Contact movie poster

Star Trek: First Contact (1996)

Rated PG-13 For Some Sci-Fi Adventure Violence

112 minutes

Brent Spiner as Data

Alfre Woodard as Lily Sloane

LeVar Burton as Geordi La Forge

Marina Sirtis as Deanna Troi

Patrick Stewart as Jean-Luc Picard

James Cromwell as Zefram Cochrane

Alice Krige as Borg Queen

Jonathan Frakes as William Riker

Michael Dorn as Worf

Gates McFadden as Beverly Crusher

Directed by

  • Jonathan Frakes
  • Brannon Braga
  • Ronald D. Moore

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Physiology [ ]

The physiology of each Borg drone varied according to the species which it was assimilated from. ( Star Trek: First Contact ) Drones were typically humanoid, although the Collective demonstrated a willingness to assimilate non-humanoid lifeforms. ( VOY : " Scorpion ")

Borg implants closeup

A set of Borg implants after removal

Upon assimilation, a drone would cease to grow body hair and would develop a pallid skin coloration, differing from its original skin pigmentation. Cybernetic implants were either surgically attached to the body or grown internally by nanoprobes injected into the bloodstream; in certain cases these implants could cause severe skin irritation. ( TNG : " The Best of Both Worlds "; Star Trek: First Contact ) The nature of these implants varied from drone to drone depending on the drone's intended function, but the basic nodes of interlink for communications with the Collective and a myo-neural cortical array to control movements were implemented in every drone. In most cases, an eye would be replaced with an eyepiece that improved its vision and an arm would be amputated altogether to make room for a functional prosthetic; in tactical drones, a weapon would be included, and some drones had medical tools built in to heal drones who had minor injuries. ( VOY : " The Gift ", " Dark Frontier ") The implants of a fully assimilated drone allowed it to function for extended periods without shelter, food, water, or even air. A drone could even survive in the vacuum of outer space. Lily Sloane , a human observer local to the Earth of the 21st century , characterized Borg drones as "bionic zombies " after hearing a description of them, albeit before observing them directly. ( Star Trek: First Contact )

A drone's only requirement was a supply of energy to maintain the implants that in turn maintained its biological functions. This energy was supplied during regeneration cycles within a Borg alcove . Upon receiving damage, a drone would return to the alcove for assessment of the damage. Severely damaged drones were disassembled and scavenged for reusable parts. ( TNG : " Q Who ", " I Borg ")

Borg baby

Infant Borg

The Borg did not procreate; they would add to the Collective's population only by assimilation. ( VOY : " Drone ") Borg infants were not accepted to the collective until they matured to a certain age. Until reaching this age, assimilated infants and youths were placed inside maturation chambers . ( TNG : " Q Who "; VOY : " Collective ")

Borg drones were equipped with myriad technologies integrated into their bodies which enabled them to perform their duties within the Collective, several of which were universal to all drones. A neural transceiver kept them connected to the hive mind . ( VOY : " Scorpion, Part II ") A personal force field protected each drone from most energy-based attacks. ( TNG : " Q Who ") A drone was able to communicate with their ship by signals across a subspace domain, the basis of their hive mind, which Data likened to a transporter beam . ( TNG : " The Best of Both Worlds, Part II ") Each drone possessed a pair of assimilation tubules embedded in one hand for the purpose of instantly injecting individuals with Borg nanoprobes. ( Star Trek: First Contact ) A cortical processor allowed a drone to rapidly assimilate visual information. Borg drones were also equipped with a neural processor, which kept a record of every instruction that particular Borg receives from the collective hive mind. Captain Picard used one such processor to discover that the Borg were attempting to use the deflector dish of the USS Enterprise as an interplexing beacon to contact the Borg in 2063. ( Star Trek: First Contact )

Drones also contained fail-safe mechanisms designed to deactivate and even vaporize their own bodies, thereby allowing the Collective to eliminate damaged or dead drones without leaving their remains to be exploited by outsiders. ( TNG : " Q Who ") The captured drone Third of Five also made comments indicating that this vaporization may have been a form of resource re-absorption. ( TNG : " I Borg ") One of these fail-safes was also intended to deactivate drones automatically if they experienced strong emotional states, which the Borg interpreted as a sign of disconnection from the hive mind. ( VOY : " Human Error ")

The Borg typically operated in an atmosphere with a constant temperature of 39.1 °C (102.38 °F ), 92% relative humidity, an atmospheric pressure of approximately 102 kPa , and trace amounts of tetryon particles. According to Amina Ramsey , the Borg smelled like old trash bags . ( LD : " Much Ado About Boimler ").

History [ ]

Borg skeleton

A Borg skeleton on a ruined planet

The precise origins of the Borg were unclear. As of 1484 , they were reported as controlling only a handful of systems in the Delta Quadrant , but by 2373 , they had assimilated thousands of worlds. In addition to this stronghold in the Delta Quadrant, the Borg also dispatched vessels throughout the galaxy via transwarp conduits . ( VOY : " Dragon's Teeth ", " Scorpion ", " Endgame ")

A Borg vessel traveled back in time from 2373 in an unsuccessful attack on Earth in 2063 . ( Star Trek: First Contact ) Drones which survived this defeat were discovered and reactivated by Human scientists in 2153 , and transmitted a subspace message to Borg space before being destroyed by Enterprise NX-01 . ( ENT : " Regeneration ")

The Borg entered the home system of the El-Aurians at some point in their mutual history, swarming through it, scattering its native inhabitants and leaving little to nothing of the El-Aurians in their wake. ( TNG : " Q Who ", " I Borg ") In 2293 , the Federation offered aid to the El-Aurian refugees fleeing the Borg. ( Star Trek Generations ) These refugees included Guinan , who would later provide secondhand knowledge of the Borg invasion of the El-Aurian system to the crew of the USS Enterprise -D during an encounter in the 24th century. ( TNG : " Q Who ", Star Trek Generations ) However, these earlier incidents contributed almost nothing to the Alpha Quadrant 's awareness or understanding of the Borg Collective.

By the 2340s , rumors of an alien race called "The Borg" had reached the Alpha Quadrant, inspiring exobiologists Magnus and Erin Hansen to set out in search of them. Their research took them all the way to the Delta Quadrant, before they and their daughter Annika were assimilated in 2350 . ( VOY : " The Gift ", " The Raven ", " Dark Frontier ") Borg activity in the Alpha Quadrant, including the assimilation of the USS Tombaugh in 2362 and assimilation of outposts along the Romulan Neutral Zone in 2364 , were complete mysteries to Starfleet. ( VOY : " Infinite Regress "; TNG : " The Neutral Zone ")

The Collective's true nature was finally revealed to the Federation in 2365 when Q took the USS Enterprise -D to meet a Borg cube near the J-25 system . ( TNG : " Q Who ")

In late 2366 , a Borg cube invaded Federation space and assimilated Jean-Luc Picard , whose tactical information contributed, along with the Borg's own vastly superior power, to Starfleet 's disastrously one-sided engagement with the cube, the Battle of Wolf 359 . A fleet of forty starships assembled to combat the cube. All but one of these Federation ships were destroyed, while the cube itself remained intact, damaged but healing rapidly. ( TNG : " The Best of Both Worlds ", " The Best of Both Worlds, Part II "; DS9 : " Emissary ") The Enterprise -D recovered Picard and used his connection to the hive-mind to disable the cube before it could attack Earth. ( TNG : " The Best of Both Worlds, Part II ")

During the 2370s , the Borg were beset by several major setbacks in the Delta Quadrant, as witnessed by the crew of the USS Voyager .

The Borg-Species 8472 War decimated the Collective from 2373 - 2374 . ( VOY : " Scorpion ", " Scorpion, Part II ") Voyager 's liberation of Seven of Nine allowed Unimatrix Zero to create an active resistance movement in 2377 . ( VOY : " Unimatrix Zero ", " Unimatrix Zero, Part II ")

In 2378 , a crippling blow was delivered to the Borg when Voyager discovered one of their transwarp hubs and destroyed it, killing the Borg Queen (again) and devastating the Unicomplex in the process. During this battle, the Borg were infected with a neurolytic pathogen , which was carried by an alternate future version of Admiral Janeway and designed to disrupt the hive mind, to 'bring chaos to order'. It was this pathogen that killed the Borg Queen and allowed Voyager to destroy the transwarp hub. ( VOY : " Endgame ") The pathogen decimated the Borg Collective, leaving them reduced a handful of drones slowly cannibalized to sustain the Queen's last remaining body by 2401 . ( PIC : " The Last Generation ")

In 2384 , a Borg cube rendered dormant by the neurolytic pathogen was encountered by the USS Protostar . The crew proceeded to venture into the cube in order to access the vinculum to gain information on how to remove a weapon called the living construct from their ship. When the Medusan Zero volunteered to be assimilated to get the information, this act caused the cube and the drones aboard to wake up. The crew barely managed to escape as they helped Zero to break free from the Collective, who then managed to put the Borg back to sleep. ( PRO : " Let Sleeping Borg Lie ")

Borg Queen's cube

The Borg emerge from Jupiter on Frontier Day, 2401

The Borg Collective was still believed to operate as late as 2399 . ( PIC : " Maps and Legends ") On Frontier Day in 2401, this was confirmed after discovery that the main faction of the Borg were working with the rogue Changelings in a plot to assimilate the Federation via a different means than normal. With the Changelings infiltrating the Federation and spreading Picard's Borg-altered DNA through the transporter system, the Borg were able to quickly gain control over 339 starships, and their crews with only those over 25 years old being immune to their takeover. ( PIC : " Võx ") This proved to be the last stand for the original Borg with the Cube, the Queen and all of her remaining drones being destroyed by the rebuilt USS Enterprise -D , presumably bringing an end to the Borg threat. ( PIC : " The Last Generation ")

In the far future , extant Borg assimilated into galactic society, with Borg children learning side-by-side with children of other species. ( LD : " Temporal Edict ")

Alternate timelines [ ]

Confederation of earth [ ].

Borg Queen's ship

Borg Singularity in 2401

In 2401 , an atypical Borg Queen reached out to Admiral Jean-Luc Picard seeking membership in the Federation. Much to the Federation's confusion, this Borg Queen was vastly different to the Queen that had been encountered before and her Collective wasn't nearly as outwardly hostile. However, once aboard the USS Stargazer , the Queen began assimilating the ship and through it, the Stargazer's fleet. In response, Picard activated the ship's auto-destruct , stopping the assimilation. ( PIC : " The Star Gazer ")

In that moment, Q had removed Picard, Agnes Jurati, Seven, Raffaela Musiker, Cristóbal Rios, and Elnor from this timeline, and placed them in an alternate 2401. In this timeline, the Borg had been hunted to extinction by the Confederation of Earth , leaving only the Borg Queen . ( PIC : " Penance ")

Singularity and Starfleet deflect energy burst

The Singularity and Federation vessels deflecting the energy burst

After being returned from 2024 to 2401 by Q , Picard deactivates the auto-destruct, having deduced that the strange Borg Queen was actually the Queen from this timeline that had merged with Dr. Agnes Jurati in 2024 and had set out to create a different Collective, one based on mercy and choice. These Borg had sought out the Federation's help to stop an energy wave that threatened countless lives and by combining the shields of the Federation fleet and the Borg ship, the two former mortal enemies were able to stop it. However, the Borg didn't know the source of the energy wave or the massive transwarp conduit that emerged from it, only that it was a threat to everyone. Picard granted the Borg Queen's request to grant the Borg provisional membership in the Federation so that the Borg could be "the Guardian at the Gates" watching out for whatever this new threat was. ( PIC : " Farewell ")

Parallel universes [ ]

Picard's death [ ].

In one alternate quantum reality , Captain Jean-Luc Picard was lost in the Battle of Wolf 359 and William T. Riker succeeded him as the captain of the Enterprise -D with Worf as his first officer . ( TNG : " Parallels ")

Victory over the Federation [ ]

Riker gone mad

A disheveled Riker of a Borg controlled quantum reality

In another alternate quantum reality, the Borg, after emerging victorious at Wolf 359, successfully conquered the Federation. A battered Enterprise -D, which was likewise under Riker's command, was one of the few remaining Starfleet ships by 2370 . The Riker from that reality was desperate not to return to his universe once all of the Enterprises began spilling into a single universe from a quantum fissure .

After the present reality's Enterprise -D fired lightly upon the other ship to draw the alternate reality crew's attention away from that crew's attempt to prevent the closing of the fissure, the heavily damaged ship was accidentally destroyed when its shields collapsed and their warp core overloaded , due to having a weakened warp containment field , as Riker presumed, from fighting with the Borg. ( TNG : " Parallels ")

Borg-Earth [ ]

Earth assimilated

Borg-assimilated Earth

In another alternate timeline, the Borg were successful at preventing First Contact in 2063 and had assimilated the Earth. In 2373 , the assimilated Earth had an atmosphere containing high concentrations of methane , carbon monoxide , and fluorine . It had a population of approximately nine billion Borg drones . ( Star Trek: First Contact )

Culture [ ]

Borg trio

A trio of Borg drones, including one of Klingon origin

The Borg Collective was made up of, at the very least, trillions of humanoids referred to as drones. ( VOY : " Dark Frontier ") Through the use of their cybernetic implants, the Borg interacted by sharing one another's thoughts in a hive mind . Upon assimilation, these trillions of "voices" would overwhelm the drone, stifling individual thought and resistance to the Collective's will. ( TNG : " Family ") To some drones these voices could eventually become a source of comfort, and their absence a source of pain. ( TNG : " I Borg "; VOY : " The Gift ")

Borg philosophy was governed by a primary directive to add the biological and technological distinctiveness of other species to that of the Borg. In this manner, the Collective sought to achieve its definition of perfection; all other pursuits were deemed irrelevant including commerce and trade. Accordingly, Borg drones did not engage in any activities except their duties and regeneration . ( TNG : " Q Who ", " The Best of Both Worlds "; VOY : " Scorpion, Part II ") Individual drones have demonstrated puzzlement at other species' unwillingness to be assimilated, the drones believing in the superiority of their way of life.

Having no regard for individuality, Borg drones were identified with designations rather than names. A drone's designation typically described its position within a group, e.g. " Third of Five ." To identify a drone more specifically, its function could be appended to this designation, for example " Seven of Nine , Tertiary Adjunct of Unimatrix 01 ." In the same manner, the Borg referred to alien species by number rather than by name. ( TNG : " I Borg "; VOY : " Scorpion ")

If a drone was sufficiently injured or otherwise in distress, other drones would offer assistance. ( TNG : " I Borg "; VOY : " Dark Frontier ") However, if a drone was deemed irreparable by the hive-mind, the Borg would deactivate it and redistribute any salvageable components throughout the Collective. ( TNG : " Q Who ")

Borg drones ignored alien species until they demonstrated the potential to be a threat, or to be a suitable candidate for assimilation. This indifference even extended to their attitude to people boarding their vessels; the drones went about their business as long as the intruders did not interfere. When addressing a small number of individuals, drones would simply attempt to assimilate them without comment. Before assimilating a larger population, such as a starship or an entire culture, the Borg would collectively transmit a standard announcement of their purpose and the futility of resistance. ( TNG : " Q Who "; VOY : " Dark Frontier "; Star Trek: First Contact ) Species which the Borg found unremarkable or detrimental would be deemed unworthy of assimilation. As of 2374 , the Borg considered the Kazon beneath their notice, and by 2376 , they only took interest in the Brunali if they detected sufficiently relevant technology. ( VOY : " Mortal Coil ", " Child's Play ")

Even examples of civilizations which had previously been targeted for assimilation could be passed over; while moving to engage the dire threat to the Borg presented by Species 8472 , a group of Borg ships encountered Voyager , but, while one ship did pause momentarily to scan the Federation vessel, the Borg ship and its companion ships quickly moved on without attempting to attack or assimilate the interloper in their space. ( VOY : " Scorpion ")

Locutus of Borg and Borg Queen

Representatives of the Collective: Locutus with the Borg Queen

On the rare occasions that the Borg were willing to open any dialogue with individuals, they would choose a single drone to speak for the Collective. Jean-Luc Picard was assimilated and given the name Locutus in the misguided assumption that such a representative would lower the Federation's resistance to assimilation. ( TNG : " The Best of Both Worlds ")

Seven of Nine confronts Chakotay

Seven of Nine speaks for the Collective

Omega Molecule

The Omega molecule

When Kathryn Janeway successfully negotiated a truce with the Borg and refused to discuss the terms via a neuro-transceiver , the Collective agreed to communicate via Seven of Nine. ( VOY : " Scorpion, Part II ")

The Borg Queen also spoke for the Collective, acting not as a mere liaison, but as a physical manifestation of the hive mind. The exact nature of her role is unclear. ( Star Trek: First Contact )

The Borg possessed a near-reverence for particle 010 , which they considered to be an expression of perfection. The Collective's fascination with assimilating this molecule has been compared to a religion. ( VOY : " The Omega Directive ")

Tactics [ ]

The Borg had a tendency to "scoop" all machine elements from a planet, leaving great rips in the surface where remaining sections of the road system suggested a city had once been. ( TNG : " The Neutral Zone ", " Q Who "; VOY : " Child's Play ")

The Borg were known to retrieve their own damaged technology, including nonfunctional Borg cubes. However, when a cube underwent submatrix collapse , the collective would immediately sever its link to the afflicted population, considering it dead. ( VOY : " Unity "; PIC : " Maps and Legends ")

Technology [ ]

Borg technology was a combination of technologies assimilated from other cultures, and technology developed within the Collective itself, in order to overcome obstacles to its goals. When confronted by a problem it could not solve with its existing resources and/or configuration, the entire Collective would work in concert to consider all possible solutions, and implement the one determined to be the most efficient. By applying the unique skills of each drone to a task, the hive mind could engineer new technologies and solutions at a pace that would astound an individual. ( TNG : " Q Who ", " The Best of Both Worlds, Part II ")

The Borg were usually exceedingly quick to adapt; their shields would often nullify nearly any energy weapon, and their weapons could usually penetrate nearly any shield or defense, within minutes. ( Star Trek: First Contact )

Spacecraft [ ]

Borg armada without voyager

Borg cubes, arguably their most iconic ship design

Borg vessels were highly decentralized, with no distinct bridge , living quarters, or engineering section. Each ship was collectively operated by its complement of drones, under the general direction of the hive mind. Owing to the Collective's disregard for aesthetic considerations, the architecture of Borg ships took the form of basic shapes such as cubes and spheres and were made from a tritanium alloy. Borg ships were capable of regenerating from damage. ( TNG : " Q Who "; VOY : " Endgame ")

Each Borg spacecraft was equipped with a vinculum to interconnect its crew, which was in turn connected to a central plexus that linked the ship to the Collective. ( VOY : " Infinite Regress ", " Unimatrix Zero ") In addition to warp drive , vessels were fitted with transwarp coils that could achieve even greater speed by opening transwarp conduits . ( TNG : " Descent "; VOY : " Dark Frontier ") When critically damaged or otherwise compromised, a Borg ship would self-destruct to prevent outsiders from studying Borg technology. ( TNG : " The Best of Both Worlds, Part II ") In other situations, only the valuable technology would self-destruct, such as the case of the crew of Voyager's first attempt to steal a transwarp coil. USS Voyager encountered several damaged Borg vessels, notably including the cube carrying Icheb , Mezoti , Azan , and Rebi , and a sphere carrying a transwarp coil, which Voyager stole. ( VOY : " Collective ", " Dark Frontier ")

Infrastructure [ ]

Borg structures were located in deep space, in planetary systems, or on planets themselves. Each planet that the Borg modified showed a typical climate and assimilated infrastructure adapted from the previous inhabitants. ( Star Trek: First Contact ; VOY : " Dark Frontier ", " Dragon's Teeth ")

Their buildings consisted of simple shapes, similar to their geometrical ships, and rather than being single structures they were annexed together and added to when needed. By joining the new structures to existing ones, they would form a uniform complex. These buildings were gargantuan in scale, with structures so big that they could house Borg spheres which would dock inside. ( VOY : " Dark Frontier ")

The Borg also constructed structures that had specific functions, such as the transwarp hub . There were six such known hub locations in the galaxy that allowed Borg vessels to deploy rapidly to almost everywhere within it. These transwarp hubs had many structures for opening portals on them, and inside their corridors were interspatial manifolds which supported the transwarp conduits . Several of these manifolds that led to the Alpha quadrant were destroyed by Voyager via transphasic torpedos and collapse of the conduit itself on the vessel's return to the Alpha Quadrant . ( VOY : " Endgame ")

The Borg Unicomplex in deep space at Unimatrix 01

Appendices [ ]

See also [ ].

  • Borg Collective
  • Borg language
  • Borg philosophy
  • Borg spatial designations
  • Borg species
  • Borg species designations
  • Borg starships

Appearances [ ]

Borg in voyager database

A Borg in the database of Voyager

  • " The Best of Both Worlds "
  • " The Best of Both Worlds, Part II "
  • " Descent "
  • " Descent, Part II "
  • DS9 : " Emissary "
  • Star Trek: First Contact
  • " Blood Fever "
  • " Scorpion "
  • " Scorpion, Part II "
  • " The Raven "
  • " The Killing Game "
  • " Living Witness "
  • " Hope and Fear "
  • " Infinite Regress "
  • " Dark Frontier "
  • " Survival Instinct "
  • " Tinker Tenor Doctor Spy "
  • " Collective "
  • " Child's Play "
  • " Unimatrix Zero "
  • " Unimatrix Zero, Part II "
  • " Imperfection "
  • " Flesh and Blood "
  • " Shattered "
  • " Endgame "
  • ENT : " Regeneration "
  • " Remembrance "
  • " Maps and Legends "
  • " The Impossible Box "
  • " Broken Pieces "
  • " The Star Gazer "
  • " Penance "
  • " Assimilation "
  • " Watcher "
  • " Fly Me to the Moon "
  • " Hide and Seek "
  • " Farewell "
  • " The Last Generation "
  • " Envoys " (holograms)
  • " Temporal Edict "
  • " Crisis Point " (hologram)
  • " I, Excretus " (holograms)
  • " wej Duj "
  • PRO : " Let Sleeping Borg Lie "

Background information [ ]

Concept and development [ ].

The conceptual genesis of the Borg, who were intended to replace the Ferengi as Star Trek: The Next Generation ' s main villains in its second season, was as a race of insectoids , an idea that would ultimately require modification due to the series' budgetary constraints. As Maurice Hurley explained in the March 1990 issue of Starlog (#152, p. 33): " What we really wanted to do, but couldn't because of money, was create a race of insects...insect mentality is great because it is relentless. The Borg are a variation of an insect mentality. They don't care. They have no mercy, no feelings toward you. They have their own imperative, their own agenda and that's it. If all of them die getting there, they don't care. We needed a villain who could make you dance, and the Borg could do it! "

Hurley made it a plot point in " The Neutral Zone " that Federation and Romulan starbases along the Romulan Neutral Zone had been mysteriously wiped out, having been "scooped off" the face of the planet in the same way that would later be referenced in " Q Who " and shown in " The Best of Both Worlds ". Intentions to lay more extensive groundwork for the Borg's introduction were frustrated by the Writer's Guild strike of 1988 . By the time of their first appearance in "Q Who", the species had been changed from insects to their more budget-friendly cyborg form. ( Captains' Logs: The Unauthorized Complete Trek Voyages , pp. 169 & 180)

The Star Trek Encyclopedia  (3rd ed., p. 52) stated: " Writer Maurice Hurley derived the name Borg from the term cyborg (cybernetic organism), although it seems unlikely that a people living on the other side of the galaxy would know of the term. "

According to Michael and Denise Okuda in their Star Trek Chronology  (2nd ed., p. 290), there had been plans to connect the parasitic beings from " Conspiracy " to the Borg, but these were ultimately abandoned: " At the time the episode was written, this was apparently intended to lead to the introduction of the Borg in Star Trek: The Next Generation' s second season. The Borg connection was dropped before 'Q Who?' (TNG) was written, and the truth about the parasites remains a mystery. " They also noted that, following production of the latter episode, it was "half jokingly speculated" by Gene Roddenberry that the machine planet encountered by Voyager 6 , leading to its transformation into V'ger , "might have been the Borg homeworld." ( Star Trek Chronology  (2nd ed., p. 23))

Borg insignia, 2365

A Borg insignia

The Borg insignia, which first appeared in "Q Who", was described on its own Star Trek: The Next Generation - Inaugural Edition trading card (82-A) as " Resembling a great red claw over a background of circuitry, the symbol of the Borg is as mysterious as the race it represents. The Borg symbol may possibly define an amalgam of living tissue with computer circuits... " [2]

Tim Trella, Borg drone makeup review

Westmore's Borg make-up is reviewed for "Q Who"

Michael Westmore revealed that the Borg actors were glued into their suits, and had to be unglued if they needed to use the bathroom. [3]

The idea for the sound of the Borg's multiple voices speaking in unison was thought up by sound editor Bill Wistrom and co-producer Merri Howard . After experimenting with different techniques, they discovered a way to lay multiple voices over one another and "make it sound like it was 8 million people," explained Wistrom. ( Star Trek: Communicator  issue 147 , p. 32)

Chronologically, the first known in-universe appearance of the Borg to Humanity was in the 1996 motion picture Star Trek: First Contact , in which the Borg traveled back to the year 2063 to enslave the Human race. The writers of the Star Trek: Enterprise episode " Regeneration ", Michael Sussman and Phyllis Strong , stated, in the audio commentary on the ENT Season 2 DVD release, that it was their explicit intent to have the episode deal with the consequences of events depicted in Star Trek: First Contact , the Borg wreckage encountered in that episode being the debris of the Borg sphere destroyed by the Enterprise -E in that movie.

While it is not explicitly stated in "Q Who", Q implies that the sole focus of the Borg is on the technology of the USS Enterprise -D, and the Borg show no interest, in that episode, in the crew (although the segment of hull that the Borg remove from the ship apparently contained several crew members). By their next appearance, "The Best of Both Worlds", the Borg's objectives had changed to the assimilation of lifeforms, and this change of premise was referenced in dialogue. Subsequent episodes ignored the change in premise entirely.

Director Cliff Bole , who directed the "Best of Both Worlds" two-parter, thought highly of the Borg. He enthused, " The Borg are like Klingons. You can do anything you want with them. They're fun and a real expensive thing to play with. With them, you can do a big production value [...] The Borg allow you to have fun with the camera, the lighting and everything else. They challenge the imagination. " ("Cliff Bole – Of Redemption & Unification", The Official Star Trek: The Next Generation Magazine  issue 17 , p. 31)

Through the course of Star Trek history, further retroactive continuity changes appear to have been made in respect of the Borg. As of "Q Who" and "The Best of Both Worlds", it appeared that Starfleet had never heard of the Borg. Subsequently, Star Trek: Voyager s " Dark Frontier " and Star Trek: Enterprise s " Regeneration " showed that not only was Starfleet previously aware of the existence of the Borg, Federation scientists actually pursued them – even if they were considered mere rumor. Further, although Guinan indicates in "Q Who" that her people were attacked by the Borg, it is implied that Starfleet was not aware of the threat. However, it was later revealed in Star Trek Generations that Starfleet, in fact, rescued the El-Aurian survivors of the Borg attack including Guinan, and it seems unlikely that Starfleet would not inquire as to the cause of their plight.

The existence of the Borg Queen was a controversial change made to the Borg during the writing of Star Trek: First Contact . While the writers had intended to stay true to the original concept of the Borg as a collective hive, they found it difficult to maintain the dramatic impact of villains without having a central face. Thus, they created the Queen. In the film, she claimed to have been present during the events of " The Best of Both Worlds ", which in retrospect would appear to have negated the reason for Picard's assimilation in that episode (it was claimed that the Borg needed a single representative to speak for them). While the Queen appeared to be killed at the climax of First Contact , she apparently survived unaffected by the Borg's next appearance in Voyager 's " Scorpion ". While many fans have attempted to reconcile this, there has never been an official explanation for her survival (save for an enigmatic comment by the Queen), and the appearance of relatively identical Borg Queens in later episodes. Some, though, have theorized that the Borg Collective contained many queens that served as focal points to different branches of their society. Still another explanation is that the Borg were in possession of innumerable copies of their Borg Queen, and that the superficial death of one version simply resulted in the activation of a similar version to take her place, in a similar fashion to the Vorta . The latter theory was corroborated by Rick Berman in an interview in Star Trek: Communicator . ( Star Trek: Communicator  issue 121 )

Impact and legacy [ ]

The Borg were considered as an enemy for the Deep Space 9 crew (along with the Klingons , Cardassians , and the Romulans ) when Star Trek: Deep Space Nine was in development. Rick Berman later commented, " The Borg are not the kind of bad guys that are practical to use on a regular basis. " Whereas the Cardassians were eventually chosen for the main villain role, the Borg made no further appearances in Deep Space Nine after " Emissary ", although they were mentioned in episodes such as " The Storyteller ", " Playing God ", " The Search, Part I ", " The Way of the Warrior ", " For the Cause ", " Let He Who Is Without Sin... ", and " In Purgatory's Shadow ". ( Star Trek - Where No One Has Gone Before ) According to Robert Hewitt Wolfe in a tweet dated 28 January 2019, following the premiere of Star Trek: Voyager , a mandate was passed to the writing staffs of both Deep Space Nine and Voyager that the Borg (along with Q, following his single appearance on Deep Space Nine ) were only to be used on Voyager while Deep Space Nine retained creative control over the Alpha , Beta , and Gamma Quadrants , which Wolfe called "a fair trade." [4]

The Borg were considered by some commentators to be the greatest villains of Star Trek: The Next Generation . However, they were featured in only six episodes throughout its seven-year run. The creators have stated that this was due to the fact that the Borg were so powerful, and so it was not easy to come up with solutions for beating them. However, as time passed and future series went into production, the concept of the Borg evolved to include inherent flaws that could be exploited in many different ways – leading them to appearing in nineteen episodes of Star Trek: Voyager (although in only a fraction of these appearances were the Borg the primary villains; many episodes had them in supporting or otherwise non-antagonistic roles). This generous use caused many fans to complain that the Borg were being used too often on Voyager . TNG, DS9, and one-time VOY writer Ronald D. Moore once said of their perceived overuse, the Borg had been defeated so many times, that they had "lost their teeth." ( citation needed • edit )

Following "Regeneration" and the season it was in, ENT Season 2 , Brannon Braga stated, " We have no plans to see the Borg ever again. " ( Star Trek: Communicator  issue 145 , p. 30)

In 2006 , the Borg were honored with their own DVD box set Star Trek: Fan Collective - Borg , featuring a number of their more memorable appearances in the Star Trek universe.

In an interview with StarTrek.com published on 1 April 2019, the actor Alan van Sprang , who played Leland in Star Trek: Discovery , echoed fan speculation regarding a potential connection between Control and the origins of the Borg: "I think it's very intriguing. When I first read the script I thought, 'Oh, is this the making of the Borg? Is that how it happens?' We're as much in the dark as anybody else, but as soon as I saw that, I thought, 'This is like The Borg.' The Next Generation' s Borg episode just blew my mind [when I watched it originally], let alone when Picard became Locutus . That's the first thing I thought of, which kind of tickled me to no end. 'Wow, I'm just going to milk this for all it’s worth.'" [5]

In an interview with TrekCore.com published on 19 April 2019, Michelle Paradise , then writer and co-executive producer of Discovery , clarified: "It's interesting — we weren't thinking Borg at all. I mean, we talked about all sorts of different things in the room, but there was never any intent on our part to parallel that in any way. I can certainly understand why people started to think we were going in that direction, but it was never where we intended to go with it." [6]

In an Instagram story dated 12 March 2020, Michael Chabon , then showrunner of Star Trek: Picard , opined of the same theory: "It has the virtue of making sense. But I don't think it's much fun." [7]

Apocrypha [ ]

The absence of the Borg from Deep Space Nine was explained in the novel The Siege , when a Borg cube tries to pass through the Bajoran wormhole and is destroyed by subspace compression; Sisko concludes that this event will cause the entire Collective to believe that the wormhole is unstable and would now avoid it.

In the alternate timeline seen in the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine book series Millennium , the Borg forged an alliance with the Federation to defeat Weyoun . The entire Borg Collective was destroyed along with the universe. This entire timeline was later reset thanks to Benjamin Sisko.

In an alternate timeline in the game Star Trek: Armada , the Borg succeed in conquering the Alpha Quadrant. Using a clone of Locutus, the Borg manage to assimilate Spock , kill Worf, and assimilate Earth. The timeline was reset thanks to Jean-Luc Picard and the crew of the Enterprise -E, who travel back in time with the aid of a ship from the future to prevent Spock's capture.

In the game Star Trek: Legacy , an alternate explanation was given to the creation of the Borg which states that the probe V'ger created the Collective to serve as its heralds in its search for knowledge. However, the creation of the Borg Queen resulted in the creation of an entity that abandoned the original intent of V'ger . This is also similar to the Shatnerverse version of events.

In the current volumes of the Next Generation Relaunch series of novels, the Borg have been driven to near extinction as a result of the Starship Voyager 's destruction of the Queen and the transwarp conduit network. However, they begin to reconstruct the Collective by building a massive cube in the Alpha Quadrant, in order to launch a vengeful new offensive against the Federation; their first strike results in the assimilation of Admiral Janeway and the destruction of Pluto before the Enterprise -E manages to destroy the cube with the original Doomsday Machine .

In Star Trek: Destiny a history of the Borg was presented. They were survivors of the Caeliar Gestalt and the crew of the Earth ship Columbia NX-02 thrown back in time and into the Delta Quadrant following an attack on a Caeliar city ship. The Caeliar forced the Humans into a perverted form of their Gestalt (a mental linking of the Caeliar) based upon the will of the last surviving Caeliar and not the whole. They launched a final attack of Federation space with over 7,000 cubes at their disposal; however, they were stopped after the Caeliar were made aware of their responsibility for the Borg's actions. The Collective was dismantled, and the assimilated Borg drones were accepted into the Caeliar's gestalt. Former drones fully regained their individuality (as evidenced by Seven of Nine's remaining implants dematerializing). This was followed up in the novel Full Circle . Q later noted that this timeline's invasion was provoked by Admiral Janeway's trip to the past in " Endgame ", reflecting that, if she had done nothing, the Borg would have eventually launched a massive assault on the Milky Way galaxy centuries in the future that would have completely assimilated all other life. The Voyager relaunch novel Unworthy explores the aftermath of the destruction of the Borg, including some Federation scientists trying to harness remaining Borg technology and Voyager encountering a vast fleet called the "Indign" consisting of species who actually wanted to be assimilated but were considered unworthy of that "honor" by the Borg.

In the Star Trek: The Original Series short story "The Trouble with Borg Tribbles" from the anthology book Strange New Worlds V , a Borg cube encountered a pod full of Tribbles which had traveled through a micro-wormhole from the Alpha Quadrant in early 2268 . This was the Borg's first contact with life from that part of the galaxy. The Borg assimilated the surviving Tribbles, only to find that their instinctive drive to eat and procreate was starting to overwhelm the hive mind, causing a widespread series of malfunctions.

The comic book series Star Trek: Countdown shows that Nero 's ship, the Narada , was enhanced with a mixture of Romulan and Borg technology. The sequel miniseries Star Trek: Nero has the Borg, the Narada and V'ger originating from an unknown civilization on the " machine planet " that was seen inside V'ger in Star Trek: The Motion Picture .

The Star Trek: The Manga story "Side Effects" in Shinsei Shinsei provided a different story to the creation of the Borg, with an experiment gone wrong to save a race through the daughter of one of the 1,000 or so survivors. Cybernetic implants, along with DNA from nine different species designed to keep a disease from spreading caused the girl to go insane and gain a twisted idea of saving her people. However, the intervention of Captain James T. Kirk made the situation even worse, as the laboratory where she was augmented collapsed and was sucked into a black hole . But an escape pod with the girl was launched, and apparently catapulted far into the past by the slingshot effect , where her cybernetic implants and DNA evolved to where she became the very first Borg Queen.

In the game Star Trek Online , the Borg have resurfaced after thirty years and have conquered several Federation sectors, including the Mutara sector . The Borg of 2409 look much more like zombies, with some of their cybernetic implants looking like bones coming out of their bodies.

Cybermen and Borg

The Cybermen and the Borg

The comic book crossover series Star Trek: The Next Generation - Doctor Who: Assimilation² involves a plotline in which the Cybermen of the Doctor Who universe alter time and space in order to form an alliance with the Borg. The united cyborg force proves to be a devastating threat to the Federation, but the two races end up turning against each other, with the Cybermen going to war with the Borg and forcing the crew of the Enterprise -D and the Eleventh Doctor and his companions to ally with the Borg to restore the Collective and vanquish the Cybermen. At the end of the series, the Borg start to investigate time travel in order to find a way to assimilate the Doctor.

In The Delta Anomaly , a book set in the alternate reality created by the Romulan Nero 's attack on the USS Kelvin , the serial killer known as The Doctor ( β ) is suggested to be related to the Borg. This therefore establishes an earlier contact with Earth than in the prime reality.

Borg (alternate reality)

The Borg of the alternate reality

In Star Trek: Boldly Go , a comic series also set in the alternate reality and after the events of Star Trek Beyond , the Borg make an appearance as the villain in the first arc of the series, seeking the Narada due to their awareness of its ties to the Borg. They attempt to assimilate Spock , but the primitive assimilation of this era is unable to cope with his hybrid DNA. The shock of his escape and the retrieval of other near-assimilated officers enables the Federation and the Romulans to destroy the Borg.

External links [ ]

  • Borg at Memory Beta , the wiki for licensed Star Trek works
  • Borg at Wikipedia
  • 3 Ancient humanoid

The Borg Were The Best Star Trek Villains – Until They Weren't

Star Trek: The Next Generation Borg

On "Star Trek: The Next Generation," the Borg were first introduced in the second season episode "Q Who" (May 8, 1989). In the episode, the malevolent, all-power space imp Q (John De Lancie) offered his magical powers to Captain Picard (Patrick Stewart), knowing that Starfleet will likely encounter things that his puny human mind couldn't handle. When Picard politely refuses, Q throws the Enterprise-D thousands of lightyears away, landing it right in the path of a mysterious and enormous cube-shaped spacecraft. This was a ship belonging to the Borg, a species of cyborgs that share a single consciousness. The people inside have no free will and operate in service of the collective. They have been augmented with machinery and do not speak. When one dies, another merely takes its place. The Borg can travel at unbelievable speeds and can steal and incorporate technology into themselves. As Q describes them, they are the ultimate users. They see nothing in the galaxy but raw materials to steal and exploit.

Like slasher movie villains, the Borg couldn't be reasoned with. They had no negotiable agenda. And, also like a slasher movie villain, they sustained injury and kept on moving forward. They were unfazed by pain. What was their origin? What was their goal? These were mysteries that Picard and his crew would never uncover. After a few failed attempts to communicate, and losing lives to the Borg attack, Picard fled. He admitted that he needed Q's help. The Borg were too much.

Picard ultimately found the encounter to be a reminder not to be complacent. There are going to be terrors in the galaxy no one will be prepared for. It's a chilling episode and one of the best from "The Next Generation." The Borg were Michael Myers by way of H.R. Giger.

And it was good for a moment

The Borg were so terrifying in "Q Who" that the writers of "Star Trek: The Next Generation" would have to bring them back eventually. "Q Who" ended with the implication that the Borg, while thousands of lightyears away, were going to be traveling to get the Enterprise and complete its job of assimilation. The specter of the Borg hung over the series for a while. Then, at the end of the show's third season, audiences were treated to "The Best of Both Worlds" (June 18 and September 24, 1990), perhaps the show's most famous installment. In the cliffhanger two-part episode, Picard was kidnapped and assimilated by the Borg. His knowledge was siphoned out of his brain, and the Borg used it to attack Earth. Captain Riker (Jonathan Frakes) underwent a career crisis as a result, having to take command of the Enterprise. Thousands of lives were lost before Picard could be rescued and the Borg stopped. 

After that, it seemed like the show was done with the Borg. The unstoppable threat had been stopped, but many died and Picard was forever traumatized. In the show's following episode, "Family," Picard admitted to his brother that the Borg hurt him more deeply than anyone can imagine. Picard broke down, something he rarely did. It seems that the trauma lingered. 

But the writers couldn't stay away from the Borg, and in many ways, it's been downhill ever since. With every new reappearance of the famed "Star Trek" villains came a twist in their ethos, an alteration or expansion of what was known before. And each new twist made the Borg less threatening.

Yes, I am an old Trekkie shaking his fist at a cloud, but one could argue that the Borg were never more threatening than they were 33 years ago.

I, Borg and Descent

The Borg returned in an episode called "I, Borg" (May 10, 1992). It seems a small Borg ship carrying only five drones crashed on an uninhabited planet. One drone survived and the Enterprise took it on board to study it. They find that the drone (Jonathan De Arco), once separated from its central collective, begins to regain its sense of individuality. Not his identity prior to assimilation, mind you, but a new sense of self-awareness. Geordi ( LeVar Burton ) names the drone Hugh. The Enterprise finds a way to implant a program into Hugh's brain that, when reintroduced to the collective, would destroy them. This becomes unethical, however, in light of Hugh's rediscovered sense of agency. Hugh chooses to be re-assimilated, but a last-minute twist reveals that the Borg are unable to re-assimilate him.

This twist would lead directly into the tiresome two-parter "Descent" (June 21 and September 20, 1993) when Hugh's individuality spread to other drones, leaving them aimless and in need of a leader. Lore (Brent Spiner) stepped in to form a Borg cult. It's a bad episode. Also, if the Borg can assimilate people with free will, why can't they re-assimilate drones with free will? Certainly, a hard reboot is part of their program?

The notion that the Borg could be rescued from assimilation by merely isolating them made their mysterious culture of ultimate consumption less permanent and hence less threatening. It also cheapened Picard's survival. If anyone can survive, then rescuing Picard became something easily replicated. That Lore could then step in and manipulate the Borg meant they had no real motivation to attack. As villains, they lost a lot of their edge.

First Contact

Then, in 1996, the Borg were dealt what was, to my mind, their death blow. Jonathan Frakes' feature film "Star Trek: First Contact" featured a Borg ship that traveled back in time to the eve of Earth's First Contact in 2063. First Contact with the Vulcans was a monumental occasion for Earth and the catalyst that would usher in planetary change toward peace centuries later. The Borg, rather confoundingly, decided that they wanted to halt the formation of the Federation. Their motivation for halting this particular event is never explained. If it was assimilation and destruction they wanted, why not go back to 1940? Or, heck, why not 2.4 million years ago? Assimilate humanity when they were still proto-human? By choosing this date in particular, the Borg suddenly had a purpose, a scheme. A scheme indicates that the Borg is calculating. And if they can calculate, their motives are negotiable.

Additionally, "First Contact" introduced the notion of a Borg Queen (Alice Krige), a free-willed commander for the Borg. She is a very human character who has desires and motivations. She seduces Data (Spiner) and claims to want Picard as a mate. The idea that the Borg were a soulless race of all-consuming machines is now long gone, having been replaced by something more wicked and malevolent. Even the design of the Borg changed into something more sinewy and less mechanical. The Borg ships are now warm, steamy places, and the Borg themselves are veiny and scowly. "First Contact" turned them into action movie terrorists. What a snore.

From there, it's been a gradual softening of the Borg to the point where they are a mere inconvenience, rather than an unstoppable threat.

Voyager and beyond

The Borg played a major role in "Star Trek: Voyager," as the titular ship found itself needing to travel through Borg-owned space. That the Borg would have their own territory handily contradicts what had been known about them up to that point. Did they negotiate a treaty? Surely the Borg wouldn't care for property, but merely travel out and assimilate, right? No, it seems that ownership of certain technologies is important to them. At the end of the third season of "Voyager," Captain Janeway (Kate Mulgrew) would actually negotiate with the Borg (!) to assure her safe passage. A Borg drone called Seven of Nine (Jeri Ryan) was assigned to the Voyager before eventually separating from the collective and joining the crew. Seven became the most important character on the show.

The Borg can now be hoodwinked and negotiated with. In the episode "Unimatroix Zero" (May 24 and October 4, 2000), Janeway and the crew even allowed themselves to be assimilated, knowing they could eventually escape. It seems that assimilation ain't no thing. Being a Borg is now avoidable, or undoable.

By the time audiences reached "Star Trek: Picard," the Borg were more or less through as villains. In the first season, Hugh returned to reveal a massive de-assimilation project. Season 2 saw Dr. Jurati (Alison Pill) being assimilated ... but to form a newer, gentler Borg. By the time it was revealed that Picard's son (Ed Speleers) had an X-Men-like Borg gene in his brain and the Borg wanted to infiltrate humanoid minds merely to blow up the Earth, it was all so tiresome and silly. The big Borg twist at the end of the third season of "Picard" felt so boring. The Borg were in season finales too often.

Could the Borg have been salvaged?

By "Picard," it was extremely difficult to care about the Borg and their evolution from cold machines into dupes.

Could the Borg have been salvaged? Perhaps the twist in "Picard" would have been stronger if they hadn't been seen at all on "Star Trek: Voyager." That is, if they had stayed a mystery and were absent for a long time. The return of a long-lost villain is more exciting than the return of a villain that always returns. 

Of course, there is an interpretation of the Borg that makes their eventual arc and softening more dramatically satisfying. If the Borg were once described as the ultimate users, they might be seen as a symbol for the modern human tendency to over-consume. They are the ideal consumer society, buying up and using everything in their path, needed or not. Their need to consume, however, led to increasingly desperate tactics. Escaping consumerism leads to manipulation by darker, political powers. A leader (namely, a queen) is eventually needed, telling them how to consume. Gradually, it becomes an advertising game, hoping that others can be convinced to join the consumption collective. By "Picard," their last-ditch mind-invasion game failed and the Borg were revealed to be completely ruined. They ultimately consumed themselves, with only one queen and a few drones left.

While this may make them less interesting as villains, it does lend the Borg a tragic air. In the end, their desire to consume everything ruined them. It was a self-defeating system all along. If the Borg showed up in "Picard" and the characters all rolled their eyes in exasperation, it might have been the more appropriate response.

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star trek films borg

The Borg in ‘Star Trek,’ explained

Matthew Doherty

Described by Captain Jean-Luc Picard as “ utterly without mercy ,” and “driven by one will alone: the will to conquer,” the Borg are a cybernetic hivemind with devastating technological superiority to the Federation, and one of the most feared factions in all of Star Trek . Their goal is to “assimilate” other races and civilizations into their own Borg Collective, and in doing so attain “perfection.” Picard concluded that any Borg Drone still connected to the Collective was “beyond redemption, beyond reason.”

Early encounters

star trek films borg

First introduced in the season 2 Next Generation episode “Q Who?,” the Borg’s initial encounter with Starfleet was terrifying. The Enterprise, under Captain Jean-Luc Picard, was thrown into the Delta Quadrant of the galaxy by the powerful being known as Q. Here, they encountered Borg Cubes, giant cube-shaped ships. All attempts at peaceful communication failed, and the Enterprise crew watched helplessly as part of the ship’s hull was cut away and taken over to the Cube, resulting in the loss of eighteen crewmembers.

The Enterprise’s best efforts to resist were fruitless. A boarding party led by Commander William Riker was able to enter the Cube on foot, but the horrors they saw forced them to retreat. The situation became dire, and the Enterprise was only saved when Picard begged Q for mercy, who agreed and returned the ship to its home quadrant.

But the Borg, having now encountered a Federation vessel, set their sights on Earth. A full-scale invasion was soon launched, during which the Borg carved through some of Starfleet’s best ships at the infamous Battle of Wolf-359, in which a single Cube destroyed 39 starships, resulting in the loss of approximately 11,000 lives (one of whom was Jennifer Sisko, wife of future Deep Space Nine Commander Benjamin Sisko). During the invasion, Picard was abducted by Borg drones and assimilated into the Borg Collective.

The invasion was narrowly thwarted only by the quick thinking of the android Data, who was able to turn the Borg’s assimilation of Picard against them by using him to send a command which neutralized the Cube. Picard would physically recover, but go on to have lifelong PTSD from the experience.

Moral dilemmas

star trek films borg

For a time after this, the Borg made no reappearance in the Alpha Quadrant until some years later the Enterprise again encountered the Collective, discovering a crashed Borg ship surrounded by dead drones with only one survivor. Picard ordered that the drone be brought aboard the Enterprise, and that research begin into a way to use the drone as a living weapon so that he could be returned to the Borg fleet with a virus that would destroy them all.

Several of the Enterprise crew ordered to work on the mission began to doubt the ethics of their assignment, especially when the drone began to exhibit signs of sentience and independence after being severed from the Collective. Picard’s past experience with the Borg made him hardened against these objections, but the interjection of his trusted friend Guinan – herself a victim of the Borg – forced him to reconsider. It was determined that the drone, named Hugh by the crew, was now an independent lifeform and that the original plan could not go ahead. Hugh ultimately volunteered to sacrifice himself by returning to the Collective in order to protect the Enterprise.

The Borg would be encountered once or twice more, but largely remained at home in the Delta Quadrant, where they were an immense force. In the year 2371, the USS Voyager , commanded by Captain Kathryn Janeway , was unexpectedly thrown 70,000 lightyears away into the Delta Quadrant during its very first mission. Despite the danger posed by the Borg and the impossibility of ever getting home, Janeway decided to voluntarily strand Voyager and its crew in this distant region of space in order to save a helpless alien species from destruction. Voyager thus began its journey home , which would eventually take them deep into Borg space.

Voyager’s saga

star trek films borg

After some terrifying initial encounters, Voyager eventually fully entered Borg space. The Borg, however, were already at war: Species 8472 , a near-immortal alien species from a completely separate region of space, were invading Borg space and proving more than a match. As it seemed the only way through, Janeway made the incredibly high-risk decision to forge a temporary alliance with the Borg, with the full expectation of being betrayed. When this betrayal came, Voyager was ready, and managed to extricate itself from the battleground. One Borg drone, who had been sent to oversee the alliance, was left behind on Voyager during the confusion. Severed from the Collective, she began to redevelop her personality just as Hugh had, and took the name Seven of Nine .

Seven proved invaluable during Voyager’s subsequent skirmishes with the Borg, her knowledge of their technology and tactics allowing the crew to remain one step ahead of the omnipresent Borg threat. During their adventures, the Voyager crew came to realize that the Borg may not be “beyond redemption,” as Picard had believed, and that de-assimilation was in some cases possible. The crew were even able to liberate a small group of children who had been assimilated.

Around this time, the Borg attempted another invasion of Earth, this time by rewriting Earth’s history. The invasion was once again thwarted by the Enterprise, who followed the Borg to the past to ensure that history would remain unaltered. During this, the crew encountered the Borg’s apparent leader, named the Borg Queen.

Final defeat and future of the Borg

star trek films borg

Later, Voyager was offered an unexpected shortcut home – another Kathryn Janeway arrived from decades into the future. Her plan was to allow herself to be assimilated, as she carried a custom-made neurolytic pathogen in her blood. Upon assimilation, the virus caused anarchy among the Borg drones, while Voyager hijacked the Borg’s transportation network to shoot themselves home. In the process, the hub was destroyed in an explosive chain reaction, cutting the Borg off from the Alpha Quadrant and stranding them 70,000 light years from Earth.

But the saga did not end with the heroic exploits of Janeway and her crew. Star Trek: Picard ‘s third season saw the Borg return with a vengeance. This time, under the direction of the Borg Queen, their plan was more subtle. They sought to covertly assimilate all younger Starfleet personnel at once, and have them turn on their older colleagues. Fortunately, Picard and his old Next Gen shipmates were unaffected. They managed to steal the Enterprise-D (by then sitting as a relic in a fleet museum), and foil her sadistic plan.

An enemy as well-crafted as the Borg will always have a chance of returning in future iterations of Trek . As a hive mind, they appeared to be a monster of unspeakable menace. Yet, as episodes like “ I Borg ” and “ Survival Instinct ” showed, inside each drone was an individual screaming to get out. This left Captains who confronted the Borg with a serious moral dilemma, and a level of nuance which future writers would do well to explore.

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7 best Star Trek villains, ranked

Joe Allen

Thanks to its more than 50 years of continued existence, Star Trek   has produced just a lot of stuff. That stuff includes several great TV shows, more than a few outstanding movies, and perhaps most importantly of all, some genuinely great villains.

4. The Klingons

3. the borg queen, 2. gul dhukat.

Because Trek has always concerned itself with the politics of the stories it tells, the series has also introduced some genuinely nuanced bad guys. There are plenty of great villains of the week, to be sure, but there are also legendary villains who have made their way onto this list. These are the seven best Star Trek villains, ranked.

Say what you will about  Star Trek Into Darkness , but J.J. Abrams’ first Star Trek effort was a rousing success. Among its many feats was its introduction of a totally new villain in the form of Nero, a vengeful Romulan who blames Spock for not preventing the death of his family.

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Eric Bana’s performance in the role is transformative, but what really sells the whole endeavor is the sense of grandeur and scale that’s on display. Nero is filled with rage, and it’s that rage that has driven him to where he is now.

We’ve had plenty of great villains from across the many Trek shows, but Deep Space Nine ’s Weyoun was among the most beloved, in part because he was an ideal foil to the show’s cast. As the mouthpiece for the Dominion and a Vorta himself, Weyoun always delivered his message with a smile, but that rarely meant that he actually had the best of intentions.

In fact, Weyoun was in many ways your typical slimey politician, and that was undoubtedly a huge part of what made him so appealing to fans of  Deep Space Nine every time he was killed off and then inevitably returned to the show.

An omnipotent being that is a reminder of how far  Star Trek  characters can come, Q was first introduced as an ominous presence but became something much sillier as he became more familiar to Star Trek fans.

It was Q’s actions that ultimately resulted in the introduction of the Borgs to the universe, and he was also the one who charged Picard with the crimes of humanity. In spite of his power, Q is ultimately not the worst perpetrator of evil in the world of Star Trek, even though he certainly could have been.

In many ways the primordial Star Trek villain, the Klingons have shown up in a number of different villainous guises over the course of the franchise’s long and storied history. In the show’s original configuration, they existed as a foil to the Federation — the USSR to the Federation’s America.

Of course, Trek never expressed any idea quite that simply, and the Klingons were always humanized, even as they often opposed what the Federation was doing. You understood that they had their reasons, even if you weren’t always supposed to be sympathetic to them.

The Borg, in general, is a major menace to the crew of Star Trek: The Next Generation . Operating as a hive mind with the goal of assimilating all other living things into them, part of the point of the Borg was that they were everywhere and nowhere.

That’s why many were so worried by the introduction of the Borg Queen, but they didn’t have any reason for concern. The Borg Queen totally works, in large part thanks to Alice Krige’s memorable, sensual performance in the central role.

Gul Dukat was the best version of the authoritarian mode of Star Trekvillain. A character so villainous and tyrannical that you wanted nothing more than his ultimate defeat, even if you also found him compelling.

A Cardassian war criminal who ruled over Bajor as a complete totalitarian, what made Dukat so remarkable was that you could understand that his actions were heinous, even as you found yourself drawn into his world. Many argue that Gul Dhukat is the finest villain Star Trek has ever produced, and we think that’s pretty close to being on the money.

A name memorably screamed not once but twice in Star Trek movies , Khan is most remembered today for killing Spock in  The Wrath of Khan , widely regarded as the best of the  Trek  movies for a reason.

Although Khan was just a villain-of-the-week in the original series, in Wrath of Khan , he is elevated to a devious mastermind, capable of taking down and outsmarting even Kirk, Spock, and their crew. Ricardo Montalbán’s performance made the role one of the most important in the history of the franchise. As for Benedict Cumberbatch’s reprisal of the character? Well, the less said about that, the better.

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If you grew up loving great action movies from the 1980s and 1990s, there's a good chance you've seen a fair number of Jean-Claude Van Damme movies. While he never quite managed to become the kind of A-lister that Schwarzenegger and Stallone were, JCVD was a major star through the early 1990s and has continued to make compelling action movies even up until today.

As we look back at his long career, we've identified seven of his very best movies that you should definitely check out. 7. The Expendables 2 (2012)

So far, Doctor Who fans have only seen Ncuti Gatwa's 15th Doctor in a cameo appearance in the final 60th anniversary special and in a single Christmas special last year. While it's too early to say what kind of Doctor that Gatwa will be, he sure has a winning smile in the new trailer for Doctor Who season 14. The latest preview from the upcoming season is very light on story details, but off the charts in terms of the chemistry between the Doctor and his new companion, Ruby Sunday (Millie Gibson). Ruby seems a lot like the Doctor's previous companions Rose Tyler and Amy Pond. But if these clips are any indication, Ruby's going to grow into the role.

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For 40 years, Tom Cruise has been one of Hollywood's biggest movie stars. From heartbreaking monologues to death-defying stunts, Cruise has been lighting up the big screen since he slid across the floor in Risky Business. At 61, Cruise has no plans of slowing down, with Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part Two hitting theaters in 2025.

Cruise went from budding star to acting icon in the 1990s as he starred in nine films from 1990-1999. Several of Cruise's films during the 1990s feature some of the actor's finest work, and he even scored two Oscar nominations. From charming dramedies to action tentpoles, Cruise did it all in the 1990s. Below, we rank Cruise's seven best films of the decade. 7. Days of Thunder (1990)

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Paramount Pictures Officially Confirms Star Trek Origin Movie For Its Upcoming Film Slate

star trek films borg

| April 11, 2024 | By: Anthony Pascale 190 comments so far

Today, the road to the next Star Trek feature film took a small but significant step towards becoming reality.

Paramount makes it official

Earlier this year, it was reported that Paramount Pictures was developing a new Star Trek feature film in parallel development to the “Star Trek 4” sequel to 2016’s Star Trek Beyond . Today the studio made the reports official as they announced their slate of films for 2025 and 2026, an official list which includes what Paramount is now calling “Untitled Star Trek Origin Story.” The studio also confirms the previously reported details: The film is “set decades before the original 2009 Star Trek film.” Toby Haynes ( Andor , Black Mirror “USS Callister”) is directing based on a screenplay by Seth Grahame-Smith ( The Lego Batman Movie ), with J.J. Abrams returning as producer.

The Star Trek movie was just one of many the studio confirmed as part of their 2025/2026 slate at their CinemaCon presentation today. Paramount Pictures CEO Brian Robbins led the studio’s presentation at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas. This is the first time Star Trek has been part of the studio’s annual CinemaCon event since Robbins took over in 2021.

The “Star Trek 4” sequel to Beyond was not part of today’s CinemaCon presentation, presumably because with the recent hiring of a new screenwriter , that film would not be ready for theaters by 2026. It has also been reported that the origin story movie is set to start filming by the end of the year. There are no details yet on the plot, specific time setting, or cast. If Paramount can move fast enough they could get the origin movie into theaters by 2026—in time for Star Trek’s 60th anniversary.

Find more news and analysis on  upcoming Star Trek feature films .

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Fool me once … ( also I want a movie but until someone gets a set built I’m not holding my breath )

I’m not pre-ordering my tickets…..

You would need a title and a premiere date to order tickets. This film has neither.

I’d wait to believe it until you actually see a movie trailer for it. Noah Hawley was in the casting stage when they cancelled his Trek movie. They might have even started on the sets.

The film is on Noah’s IMDB Credits list…

Yep. I heard ferries exist too!

Car ferries?

Even now, it potentially doesn’t matter. They could pull a Zaslav and shelve the film after it was all but released.

I won’t believe it until my butt is in the theater seat and the film starts playing.

We don’t need the origin story. We have it already. It was called “Enterprise”.

I didn’t realize there was such a large interest in a Star Trek origin movie. It’s their money to burn.

I still believe this is their way of rebooting the “prime” universe from the beginning and remaking it in a new image. I see no other point of doing an origin movie. First Contact and Star trek: Enterprise were origin enough IMO.

I don’t quite get it either. We already got that with First Contact and Enterprise. What else is there that could interest the general public.

Yeah, and for me, the period between First Contact and Enterprise just doesn’t seem that exciting. The period between Enterprise and the Nero incursion would be more interesting, I guess.

They wrote that the origin film would be “set decades before the original 2009 Star Trek film”. That film (in-universe) is set in 2233 (Nero incursion) and 2258 (main plot) respectively. So “decades before” would be after Enterprise, probably after the formation of the Federation, most probably before the Nero incursion, maybe around the turn of the century.

It’s just odd they are calling it an “origin” movie if it happens after Enterprise.

I’m curious what they mean by “origin”. The origin of Starfleet would be before Enterprise and the origin of the Federation would be after.

Also, the origin of Star Trek would have to be before the events of First Contact.

…assuming there is a concern about canon whatsoever, of course.

Many assumptions to be made at this point for sure.

Assuming this announcement doesn’t get added to the pile of previous unmade-movie announcements.

They’re calling it an origin movie to appeal to newcomers and casual fans.

Maybe we’ll see the founding of the Federation?

We already saw that in the infamous final episode of Enterprise. If they revisit that, they’d have to include the NX-01 crew and do a *lot* of deaging. 😉

They could show the first year of the Federation or something.

The obvious way to go is just do the Romulan war which leads into the founding of the Federation and what Enterprise was supposed to do.

That’s really the only thing fans actually want to see in terms of a prequel story.

Which was already scripted for Berman nearly 20 years ago by the band of brothers screenwriter.

Yep. I heard that’s what they were considering doing until the Kelvin movie got greenlit instead.

Overall the Kelvin movie was probably the better choice in terms of box office but I probably would’ve preferred the Romulan war idea because it did sound more original and different.

Couldn’t they just carry on from the end instead of squeezing more new shows in between what we already have?

For how little Trek lore has fleshed out that imaginary bit of history, do we really need to be putting some detail to how we went from post-apocalyptic hellhole to utopian paradise in fifty years? Maybe some enterprising human stole a replicator off a Vulcan ship and reverse engineered it? Seeing the sausage being made may not be a great on screen adventure…

Eastern Europe isn’t the best example – while they’ve done okay extricating themselves from the communist wasteland, it was (and is) without its setbacks.

that’s what makes me so crazy. Discovery was the chance to reboot the “prime” universe but they have stubbornly stuck to this quisling versio

Not only that, they already did a Star Trek origin movie. Star TRek 2009. But sure lets put more money in it, have it fail, and then blame the box office on why we will never get more trek. Thats a great idea!

First off do we even know what they mean by “origin”?

Could be about the founding of the federation, the Romulan War, or the early days of starfleet pre-Enterprise.

It may have nothing to do with Kirk and Spock, the Enterprise, might not be any kind of reboot or reset.

My gut says it’s set in the Kelvin timeline and it takes place post USS Kelvin but pre-2009 Trek. And I’m fine with that.

They already said it will be based in the prime universe, not the Kelvin. I don’t know why they framed that press release that way but I guess since the Kelvin movies are the current movies they wanted to make clear to people this movie is before all of that I guess.

And obviously will have nothing to do with Kirk and Spock because it will be before they were even born.

These announcements feel like Groundhog Day, don’t they? Maybe that’s the story they should tell.

A feature length version of Cause and Effect…

I’m guessing Romulan Star Empire Wars era setting.

Yeah, maybe it’s the concept Rick Berman pitched: a Romulan War film where the NX-01 is off vacationing at Risa.

How about Star Trek: Federation . Founding of the Federation, which is immediately followed by a crisis requiring the urgent launch of USS Federation (NCC-01). Scott Bakula has a cameo appearance as President Archer.

Here we go! :D

Star Trek Origins: The Future Begins

Yeah but it’s not as exciting when we literally have a thousand years of that future now.

This is why prequels bore so many people when we already know so much about the future it’s setting up.

At least with the Kelvin movies they were smart to not make it a traditional prequel and people still hated those too.

I will never understand the obsession of going backwards when you have a fanbase that is constantly begging to go forward and prequels don’t attract new fans at all because they are made for oddly old fans in mind. You only cared about how Anakin became Vader in the prequels if you watched the OT.

We really know almost nothing (in canon) about the entire century that elapses between Enterprise and Discovery , though. I would have preferred Kelvin Movie 4 or even a post-TNG original movie (maybe with Patrick Stewart making a cameo) but I could get behind a canon treatment about the first years of the Federation.

If it’s really something good or interesting fine. If it’s just ‘this is how the Federation was formed” we already got that already.

Now if it’s the Romulan war or something then that’s at least something people can get excited about. But yeah we already know how it ends so maybe that won’t be it either.

I just can’t really get to excited about a prequel movie.

Yeah, I think the Romulan war would be a great premise for a movie, BUT according to TOS the battles were fought with “primitive atomic weapons and in primitive space vessels which allowed no quarter, no captives, nor was there even ship-to-ship visual communication; therefore, no human, Romulan or ally has ever seen the other.”

In other words canon would have to be completely ignored – we all know Enterprise completely disregarded the TOS take of the war as the NX-01 had visual comms, phase cannons and photonic torpedoes. If the story is a good one, I am totally good with ignoring canon, but of course others are not.

Yeah that’s always the issue with the Romulan War thing, it’s really hard to make a compelling story about it when you are fighting it without directly engaging the enemy.

That said I’m 100% convinced they will just ignore that and do what they want or just find an excuse to change ot. Look at SNW, this the show that has shown the Gorn years before they were supposed to be seen and completely changed Khan’s original timeline using TCW as the reason..

Discovery had an entire Klingon War when that didn’t remotely exist in canon.

So yeah it probably won’t matter that much end of the day. They will just make what they want and then will use some excuse to do it. That’s been the case since Enterprise as you said.

Exactly! Very well put!! I just wish someone from TPTB would listen already!

So, it would be set after Enterprise and before the Kelvin fiasco. Awesome.

Probably the Romulan Wars. And with no Enterprise. Not excited

If only I could insert the Will Farrel “I don’t believe you!” GIF.

Whatever this turns out to be, hopefully it will be interesting. More likely it will turn out to be just another dead Trek movie project.

So many of these stories do seem to go absolutely nowhere! However, I am not as negative about an origin story as some fans are. At this point, I am more neutral on the movie. I can see that under the right circumstances it could be quite interesting. Although prequels can be a tough sell to Star Trek fans. Ultimately the fact that’s a movie could work in its favor though. Less storylines to produce over the years might help keep the story focused! Though I am not sure it would be a box office draw.

I’ll believe it when I’ve seen it in theaters, listened to TrekMovie’s review, and have the blu-ray on my shelf 4 months later.

Where to place the Blu-ray tho?

Before ST09 or after Beyond? …or.. Before TOS?

They go in order of release, for me. But could this be the first Trek film I don’t purchase on disc? Time may tell…

It’s an origin story taking place in the prime universe so it will go either before or after Enterprise basically.

I’ll believe it when it actually happens. Also, Seth Grahame-Smith is not a good writer, so that doesn’t bode well.

My thoughts exactly.

I liked the book Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, but not the movie.

I absolutely loved the Lego Batman movie, though. If he is able to incorporate Trek lore with as much care as he did for Batman, it could turn out to be a very good movie after all.

I’ll believe it when I’m sat i theatre turning off my phone with my Star Trek Origins screensaver and eating popcorn out my STO popcorn bucket (the lid in shape of the Starfleet A insignia )

He co wrote The Flash right? I really liked that , I could imagine something similar happening with Nero as happened with Zod in that (going back to 1st film via timetravel)

This is what’s over at Box Office Mojo: Untitled Star Trek: Beyond Sequel (????)

Grain of salt, anyone?

There are apparently two movies planned. Origin and Trek 4…

Actually there are three now including one that we all thought was DOA two minutes after it was announced.

Three movies in development from a studio who has cancelled four of them for 8 years now. And this will be the fourth new script for the next Kelvin movie.

That’s why everyone is very very confident this one is happening for sure. 🙄

The only thing we can take to the bank is we will see Section 31, starring Academy Award winner Michelle Yeoh!!

Pretty much.

And a studio that is broke and in debt with junk status. None of these will likely be made or just the super cheapy origin movie if they can keep the budget low.

I’m pretty sure you got your facts wrong.

Sigh. Why do the powers that be always want to go backward in the ST timeline and do origin stories and such?

Lack of confidence in new ideas and to make it as cheaply as possible, are two things that come to mind right away.

It’s simple. They don’t want all that trek nerd baggage. They want a movie anyone would go to see and understand.

How’s that working for them?

You don’t get it.

I don’t get it either? It’s not like the prequel stuff has been huge home runs or big money makers.

The Star Wars prequels made a lot of money. That’s what Paramount still looks at, even though they have yet to duplicate that financial success.

Yes but that’s STAR WARS! It’s going to make a lot of money period. And those prequels came out when it was just the OT and nothing else for literally decades. There was a lot of hype just returning to those stories.

This is not the same thing, especially when we already had so many prequels in Trek now and with mixed results. That said I’m not saying it can’t be successful but I don’t see any huge hype around it either because most fans just seem to want to go forward and not backwards.

All the negativity over this ‘announcement’ is well deserved. Just make a fcking movie already Paramount, Jesus.

But I suspect IF this one is real it’s probably a much cheaper movie being new actors and maybe something with a lot less explosions and FX. I suspect it will probably be around $100 million.

It’s certainly doesn’t sound like something they are pushing to make a billion dollars or anything. Only people who cares about a prequel will be mostly old fans and even they aren’t exactly excited about yet another prequel judging by all the reactions so far. Maybe they will attract an A list star or a well respected one to bring more hype to it.

But same time I been pushing to just do something NEW with new characters and setting forever now. Stop trouting out Kirk and Picard, take a real chance with the franchise for a change. I was hoping it would be Post Nemesis but I should be happy I finally got half of what I wanted lol.

But I’ll believe it when I see it. I have literally been saying this line for six years now and I’m really tired of saying it. 🙄

Yup, exactly. Assuming it even happens, the premise sounds weak. Not surprised.

Yep. Unless it’s something truly mind blowing it’s not going to elicit a lot of excitement. Sure we’ll all go lol but I don’t see this thing having any real pull beyond the true believers.

It probably got the greenlight because its really cheap and it’s becoming embarrassing how long this franchise has languished.

I really only go to movie theaters to see Trek films (much prefer the comforts of home to see movies), so yup I’ll be going, good or bad. And yes, it is really pathetic the way this franchise has been treated on the big screen for the past 20 years. Disgraceful.

Ummm… what premise?? The only thing we know is that it is an origin movie. Nothing else. There IS no premise yet…

I think he means just another origin story itself feels a bit tired. But yes we don’t specifically know what that means yet but anything before TOS at this point just doesn’t really get a lot of fans all that hot and bother.

Whatever it ends up being it’s just filling in to more history we already know.

I get it. But no matter what era they make a movie in, there will be complaints. We have done prequels – some fans hate that. We have done same era as TNGish – fans complained. Likewise, we have had a show set in the future (soon to be another) – fans complained. There aren’t many options left.

Before TOS: Enterprise, JJ movies, Discovery, SNW just after TNG era: Picard, Prodigy, Lower Decks Future: Discovery, Starfleet Academy

Do they just make things in the era of TNG, DS9 and Voyager? No matter what is produced, there will always be a fan base that is unhappy.

I’m going to start reporting you now. One guy got the boot for being an obsessive troll and like you was already banned before anyway.

Leave me alone from this point on. I mean it.

What a total disappointment. I wanted to see the Kelvin crew return. It’s going to be 10 years between films.

Please be Kirk and Spock at least.

Check the first paragraph of the article out again. This one is presumably being developed ‘in parallel’ to the Kelvin crew sequel.

Recast Kirk and Spock, I presume?

I wouldn’t be surprised if the main character is Kirk’s great grandfather, Tiberius something or other.

And not surprised there was no announcement of the next JJ verse movie. I predicted a few weeks ago that one wouldn’t get made by 2026 or the 60th anniversary. Frankly I don’t even know why they are even bothering with it anymore? Whenever it’s supposed to come out it’s already going to be the last one and over 10 years since the last one came out.

What’s even the point? They are clearly moving on from it.

As far as the origin movie why not just make it for the 60th anniversary? Why rush it? It’s already been nearly a decade, what’s one more year at this point and you can Marley it better in an anniversary year.

Its the reverse of ST 6, here we getting the prequel movie instead of the final cast film (for the anniversary)

Someone on another board said we are probably getting the sequel to First Contact so it would make sense to have it for the 6Oth anniversary 30 years apart lol.

“[S]et decades before the original 2009 Star Trek film?”

Gimme Archer & T’Pol, or else…

Neither actor has any interest in returning to Star Trek, so that won’t happen.

No, no no. You’ve got it all wrong. It’s a story about a little design firm vying for the chance to design the Enterprise. It’s a story about a plucky band of mechanical engineers and physicists who come together to do the best pitch of their lives in a bidding war with three other firms. So, an origin story…from a certain point of view. ;)

I would watch,THAT!

I would write that!

I would direct that! (If I was Christopher Nolan)

No, I want Nolan doing ThePrisoner! He’s already got a script from the guy who wrote 12 Monkeys and the best stuff in Blade Runner, from over a decade back.

You probably meant it as a joke, but I’m also intrigued by this idea :D

Charlie Kaufmann does star trek.

Sure, you can store anti-matter in a glass jar. What could possibly go wrong?

Y’know, I know this is said partly in jest, but I wouldn’t mind that kind of movie if it was sort of a space race / WWII / Cold War drama, kind of a mix of Oppenheimer and The Right Stuff.

There’s a geo (spatio?) political angle (firm up the borders of the Federation, mitigate threats, and establish new allies while keeping up the exploration / first contact initiatives), the pressure on the engineering team to deliver groundbreaking new tech (and probably the cost of failed experiments, accidents, etc.), and then recruiting and training a new kind of crew – a starship crew (as Captain Merrick described them in ‘Bread and Circuses’.)

In essence, the origin of Starfleet as we know it – the first long-duration missions, the best of the best crewmembers, cross-trained, multidisciplinary, and for the first time, widely multi-species, etc.

Glad you all like. Paramount, you can send the check to: bmar, care of….

I’m thinking there’s going to be peace in the Middle East and nuclear fusion power is going to be a reality before they ever get back to the theaters.

Once upon a time I enjoyed Star Trek. Since the Nu Trek era began. I havent enjoyed any of the story arcs. They are just too aweful. There is a multitude of reasons why throught the web. Strange New Worlds S1 corrected course, however S2 not so. There are forces at work at Paramount. They are hell bent to destroy Star Trek. If Kurtzman and crew are in charge of the new movie. Get ready for more fantasy drama nonsense, and less plausable sci-fi.

Same here. I can’t get into NuTrek much at all. It feels like a shell of the golden era. For me that will always be 1966-2005.

But if others like it and getting new fans I’m very happy for them.

Same here. I’ve found a few gems in SNW S1, PIC S3, and S1 of Prodigy, but otherwise have been very disappointed in “NuTrek.” Of course I wish the franchise the best, but so far it’s been more misses than hits for me.

Yes I truly love Picard season 3! The best thing to come out of NuTrek so far. I don’t hate SNW but it railroads canon too much for my taste but it does feel like Star Trek again.

I haven’t seen Prodigy yet but I plan to watch it when season 2 begins and will watch season 1 before that one. Everyone kept saying it’s for kids and I’m far from a kid these days lol. But others here convinced me it’s a show for adults too so will give it a go

Wow, hell-bent on destroying Trek. Hell-bent, you say!! Just a tough melodramatic, are you?

Really don’t care about prequels and just want to keep going forward. Why not a movie in the 25th or 26th century with new crew and characters?

I may care more if Archer is involved or something. But I suspect this movie will bomb like the last one did. Only fans cares about prequels. New fans won’t care at all.

At least it’s in the prime universe again I guess.

But 25th or 26th century would still be a prequel to Discovery’s 32nd century :D

That doesn’t bother me because we don’t know anything about those time periods. We already know plenty about everything before TOS because it’s all been said or told now

Yeah I said this to another member the other day discussing any post Picard stories and that it will be completely new stories in a period we don’t know so it’s not the same thing. When you’re doing something like a TOS prequel you only have so much room and while it can certainly be interesting and creative it basically just like filling in to more stuff we already know.

That said the Section 31 movie time period is at least more interesting because it covers a much wider time period and they can be a lot more freer with the technology, etc so looking forward to that at least.

Yes I will admit although I’m not a big fan of the Space Nazi the time period of the movie intrigues me more. I always been curious of this period and the lead up to TNG, mostly because we know very little about it.

Discovery (in my view) kind of ruined everything in the Trek timelime. Just my opinion. Anyone who wants to just forget it happened, I’m in. Kidding, not kidding.

Agreed! I also don’t think it will be allegorical science fiction or be anything thought provoking. It will be a fast paced action adventure story that’s empty of depth and soul. Modern Star Trek is more interested in spectacle than compelling stories.

I’d guess that it means “origin of the TOS crew,” but that’s kind of weird, because we saw that in 2009.

Maybe this time they’ll start when they’re toddlers. (I kid, but not really). :)

They are going to re-do ‘A night in Sickbay’ like they did with Wrath of Khan/Into Darkness. It’ll be the same but different…..

Could this be their way of doing a George Kirk movie?

I would want to watch that, colour me intrigued…

“set decades before the original 2009 Star Trek film.”

Original 2009 Sta Trek film Sounds so wrong.

there is only two star trek origin stories i want to see the formation of the federation and it’s first few years if they have to adapt the rise of the federation novels for the movie and the origins of the borg they could adapt the plot ffor thet from the star trek destiny novels for a movie

Spot on, on both points!

2025? I hope it works out…

First we hear we are getting a Star Fleet Space Academy series that no one wants. The idea was mentioned in the 1980’s and shot down by fans. Now a retake on a Star Trek Origins films. Is any one currently running the Star Trek franchise in TV/streaming or film even listening to what the fans both old and new are saying?

It would seem not, sadly. How about establishing the time period between TUC and TNG, there’s a literal ton of stories to tell there? How the possibilities for storytelling within the franchise have been squandered over the years makes me frustrated, and frankly confused. SO many missed opportunities.

The upcoming section 31 movie will be set during that time frame as we know a young Rachel Garrett who later in life will be the captain of the enterprise c and defend the Klingon colony of narendra 3 will be in the movie maybe we will get to see the ent-b also again

Pointless movie as no audience will come see it at best it will make half its budget back. I mean they spent $250M on the 2009 movie and it showed on screen….you already know they are not spending that level otherwise it would be a Kelvin cast sequel!

I believe they spent just under 160 mil on the 09 (not counting the interest payments for holding the finished film for six months to get a summer release, or prints/advertising.) You’re probably thinking of BEYOND with the 250 number.

I still can’t see the money on screen in the 09, shooting in the damn brewery was Corman-level cheap.

The Numbers have the 09 costs 140 and BO Mojo sez 150, so yeah, way under the 250m you mention.

Can the ethos of Trek be distilled by JJ? Bob orci was bad for trek.

Kurtzman seemed to fall into trap w/discovery season 1.

Season 2, Picard, Lower Decks and SNW definitely sealed my thinking that Trek was in right hands.

Is section 31 and Rachel Garrett the right pivot for Trek? I thought 24th/25th century had plenty of stories to still tell.

Enterprise C, and possibly Tasha Yar/Sela after the events of Yesterday’s Enterprise! This should reboot TNG/Picard if ST: Legacy doesn’t happen.

Lower Decks makes me laugh Picard made me cry (good) SNW made me feel like Kurtzman should be trusted 💯

Great. Abrams ruined Star Wars and he’s finishing of Star Trek.

JJ had a planed out story plot for what he wanted to happen in the sequels but rian johnson chose to deviate from what jj had payed out so when jj returned for episode 9 he had to try and make the best of it and make his original story plot work but with the changes Johnson had made altering it so he had to come up with another evil sith mastermind and chose palpatine and he did course correct Rey’s lineage though it was different from who he had initially planned it to be and with Carrie fishers untimely passing he had to rewrite more and he had Luke show up as a force ghost to help rey when she returned to ach-to as apparently he was never going to have Luke die until the the final battle

I hope it has nudity

….and “Invincible” level action. It’ll be a hard R Quinton Tarentino could love.

Yes, we are on the same page.

CinemaCon basically works like a network upfront. You see clips and hear a lot of announcements. When there’s no cast or start date for announced projects, there’s maybe a 50/50 chance that the project will actually move forward (I was with a former employer for over 8 years and we announced a lot of stuff that generated a lot of buzz but then never materialized).

I think Brian Robbins will be gone within the next 12 months and if Robbins is pushed out this film is dead in the water.

This is probably the right answer.

I have next to no faith this will actually happen but they only have themselves to blame lol.

I remember a former poster kept saying ‘well this a new regime ‘ they aren’t the old guys’. Uh huh. It just shows end of the day they might be different but they still answer to the same shareholders and they know another Trek film is risky. Maybe this will finally get beyond a script this time but no one will be convinced until they start shooting the thing.

Rehashing old fandom letter campaign complaints from 40 years ago, don’t equate to the modern sci-fi fan, let alone the majority of Star Trek fans of 2024. The majority of complaints in the article comments are that there isn’t enough new future timeline Star Trek, so why would people NOT want a Star Fleet Academy series – new stories, new characters, new ships, new alien species/planets etc? An Origin movie is a vague enough description that it’s probably likely that the fandom can’t come anywhere close to a correct theory on when in the Trek timeline, this movie could be set.

I agreed with a commenter earlier, a George Kirk prequel movie would satisfy a lot of the fans, and hopefully generate enough interest for new and casual Star Trek moviegoers to warrant their going to a cinema complex. As to want the hardcore Star Trek fandom really want? There is too much dissent and bitter recriminations gone by, for any serious agreement by the fandom of their requirements, to stick for any longer than the next Trek major media article to be issued. And even if a majority agreement could be achieved – then we have the Mount Everest of EP Alex Kurtzman / Secret Hideout control of Trek production, to climb. A movie or series could have a billion-dollar budget, stellar A-list cast and crew, critical media acclaim for the story / screenplay. A favourable release timing and viral marketing, but fall at the last hurdle – the box office, due to the mountain of hate piled up against Paramount, Kurzman and his associates.

Now, as to the overall custodianship of the Trek franchise and its operation as a business, in general by Paramount, and its contracted creatives? Well, that’s a whole Hollywood chapter in itself. And is any of that even relevant in the long term, with the behind-the-scenes Harry Potter Wizard chess moves that are going on at the studio ownership, and network controlling interest levels? Apologies for the extended and extensive reply.

The first thing to do in order make a successful Star Trek movie is to ignore Star Trek fans.

God, please, no origin stories.

Star Trek: The Beginning, Part 1 — A Final Frontier Origin Story

Star Trek has always been a production dealing with many human issues pushing open the veils of awkwardness, embarrassment, and unaddressed behaviors that represent our culture planet wide. Thank You Star Trek. The one thing Paramount+ did that was just totally in bad taste was cancel Prodigy, bunch of morons.

Every fan’s preferences are different, but over the years I’ve ended up streamlining various ‘franchises’ I enjoy to my own liking when it comes to a re-watch – and these days my own limited Star Trek ‘canon’ purely consists of kicking things off with ‘The Cage’ pilot storyline….followed by my specific favourite TOS episodes in ‘production order’ (starting with ‘Where No Man Has Gone Before’, and skipping ‘The Menagerie’ two-part storyline)….followed by all the TOS movie storylines….and ending the Kirk crew’s adventures with ‘The Undiscovered Country’ as my preferred send-off for them all….then skip the antics of the ‘Generations’ movie, and instead continue on with my specific favourite TNG episodes (starting with the ‘Encounter At Farpoint’ introduction to Picard and his crew)….and then conclude the entire thing with the ‘First Contact’ movie’s storyline – which covers the development of ‘warp drive’, bringing everything full circle, and giving me all the ‘origin’ specifics I need..

All other ‘Trek-related shows and movies since then remain firmly on my ‘one-watch-only’ list, but I’m more than content with what I’ve outlined above.

I don’t know if I’ll ever get a ‘Star Trek’ movie which goes much deeper than glossy ‘pew-pew’ action and explosions in the future, but I remain hopeful.there might be a storyline that I really like again.

In the meantime, for my latest ‘alien contact’ fix, I’ve just finished up enjoying the excellent ‘Three-Body’ show’s inventive storyline and characters – the subtitled, 30-episode one produced by Tencent, which is currently available on YouTube and Amazon Prime (not the muddled 8-episode ‘3 Body Problem’ version by Netflix) – So much so, that I’m intending to buy the actual trilogy of books by the Chinese author, as I can’t wait for the next season to be made to find out what happens next. Some big ideas to come by all accounts, and I’m there for a bit more of that. .

The Netflix series is Superior

You’re welcome to your own preference of course.

But I far preferred the slow burn of the mystery and character build-ups in the Tencent version compared to the condensed and altered Netflix adaption. I just happen to find it a more satisfying and riveting version overall – and I will always prefer the way the ‘Judgment Day’ tanker got ‘nano-spliced’ in the Tencent version. Such an awesome sequence from start to finish!

Anyway, if the Netflix version actually gets a second season, I’ll certainly check it out too….but I am definitely looking forward to the next season of the Tencent show, which has been greenlit already.

The Tencent version is just boring to me and you can feel the Party’s hands all over it. Glad you liked it though.

we don’t need origin stories for everything! in media res is the way to go – almost always – TOS just dumps you right in the middle of events without even the clunky intros of TNG Encounter at Farpoint.

If this movie does well will IT get an origin story? We’re going to end up at the pool of goo at the dawn of humankind waiting for Picard and Q to show up…

im happy with any good trek news… even if they made a direct sequel to the final frontier… but how many origin stories do we need? i’d be happy if someone forged a path forward and created new things…

So this one is set in the five-minute period between Enterprise and Discovery? Or the as-yet unexplored time between April 5th 2063 and Enterprise where it’s “stone knives and bear skins” and no Trek tech to speak of? Enterprise was the prequel! How’d that one work out?

If the movie is made ,I will judge it then.

I wanted the 4th Kelvin, do they know who their audience is? Nobody i know, Star Trek fan or general audience bothered to go see Beyond. It was like Nemesis all over again. The trailer was terrible, the movie was kind of meh to be honest. So in the intervening years since the 2009 somewhere they lost the audience. Star Trek 2009 was an event movie, and 2015 Force Awakens was as well. Good job letting JJ go to Disney so Star Trek died as a film series.

I’m guessing the fourth movie is still too costly to risk making another one at least right now.

Someone threw out an an interesting theory on the last thread discussing this for the 47th time that they suggested Paramount have no plans to actually make another Kelvin movie but just as a rouse for the next company that buys the studio.

It really makes sense at this point, they can dangle the idea the movie is in ‘development’ and then when someone actually buys it they can just decide to make it or cancel it.

I mean it doesn’t sound crazy considering where we are. It’s a movie that is working with their fourth new writer but there is still no director or even a starting date of any kind within the the next two years.

Them you have this origin movie that was just announced a few months ago and that’s already scheduled to come out next year. My guess is it will probably cost half of what another Kelvin movie would be. But yeah who knows if that will get made either, but it has a better chance than a Kelvin movie.

I can’t name anyone who actually wants an origin movie. By the way, didn’t we get that one with First Contact already anyway?

It’s not up to you or anyone you pretend to know.

Another prequel? This is getting ridiculous now. Remember when Star Trek used to go forwards? Enough already!

Kurtzman said he didn’t have the authority to greenlight legacy. I wonder if that will be like Bennet’s academy years and never happen.

18 months is not enough time for a movie of this size unless this is ready to shoot in july.

The JJ-verse is an aberration no one is particularly a fan of. There is no one who wants to how that mess started. It’s done nothing but foul everything that went before, leaving ST-ENT, of all things, as the only remaining official classic canon. Bugger that.

I need Star Trek that is hopeful, aspirational, and inspirational. 15 yrs later neither Bad Robot or Secret Hideout has done anything close to that. Sec 31 and Starfleet Academy aren’t anything viewers want. I wish they’d just stop.

lol,if you say so…

EXCLUSIVE: Former Anonymous writer of Trek 4 shares his experience

Interviewer: Hello, we are here today to talk to a former writer for the very very very (like really very) long delayed fourth Kelvin movie. With the announcement of a prequel movie being released instead and yet ANOTHER new set of writers for the next Kelvin movie, we reached out to the only person who returned our calls; a former writer from the 2023 project.

To give us an honest insight into his experience he wishes to remain anonymous. For the sake of this interview he will be simply referred to as ‘GotohellParamount’. Thank you for meeting with me today.”

GotohellParamount’: “You’re welcome.”

Interviewer: “It sounds like your experience working on the last movie didn’t end too well. How is your relationship with the studio today?”

GotohellParamount: “Bleep them in their bleeping bleepholes. I hope they all die from bleeping Ebola.”

Interviewer: ‘That’s some pretty colorful metaphors. Can I ask what happened?”

GotohellParamount: “Their bleeps that’s what. We spent a year working on that movie. We lost the director to go work for Marvel because these bleepholes kept bleeping us around. I got so frustrated I finally texted the Head Studio Guy and said ‘will you people stop bleeping around!? Get off your bleeps and let’s make a movie already!!’

Three weeks went by and I finally got a response from them. It simply read ‘K’. Bleepholes!!! By the way you’re not going to ‘bleep’ any of these words out are you?”

Interviewer: “Um…of course not. Can you tell us a little about what the movie was about?”

GotohellParamount: “The gist was a huge black ship comes from the 25th century to the 23rd century wiping out solar systems in the Federation. It was a new villain who wanted…wait for it…vengeance. That bleep was going to be bleeping awesome!!”

Interviewer: “So who was going to be the villain?”

GotohellParamount: “That’s the greatest part of it all. He was going to call himself…you ready: Kaos. JJ Abrams himself came up with that name. But then the true reveal was that he was indeed Kirk’s great great great great great great great great great great grandson from the future and came to stop Kirk from destroying his planet so he had to destroy the Federation first. We were even thinking Chris Pine can play both parts but Paramount was worried he would demand twice the salary.”

Interviewer: “I interviewed Chris Pine a few months ago and he was hoping there would be more scenes of him riding another motorcycle. Did you include that in the script?”

GotohellParamount: “Do you remember the ending of Mission Impossible 2 with the motorcycle duel? Pretty much the same ending with our movie with Kirk versus his evil grandson; except it was going to take place either on Romulus or in San Francisco. We were still figuring it out. There was even talk of it happening on a lava planet… but that would’ve ballooned the budget.

Interviewer: “Sounds very exciting. How was he going to wipe out the solar systems?”

GotohellParamount: “The ship he was on had the power to destroy stars by breaking down their fusion reactions. The FX was going to be bleeping sick.”

Interviewer: “Wait so the ship was a…Star destroyer?”

GotohellParamount: “Yep but to get around copyright issues JJ wanted to call it a Destroyer of Stars. The man is a bleeping genius I tell you.”

Interviewer: “It’s definitely a name.”

GotohellParamount: “We were so proud of the script. We gave it to JJ to read it. After he put it down, he took off his glasses put his hand on my shoulders and said ‘this is the most original Star Trek story I’ve ever read and I’ve read three of them.’ You have no idea how much that meant coming from such a visionary like him.”

Interviewer: “I’m sure you were. Was there any casting possibilities before it was shut down?”

GotohellParamount: “Was there?? We reached out to some incredible actors! Robert Downey Jr, Florence Pugh, Emily Blunt, Cillian Murphy and Matt Damon. We wanted him to actually play Kirk’s evil grandson.

Interviewer: “Wait… weren’t all of them in Oppenheimer?’

GotohellParamount: “(Hard shrug)! I don’t know I haven’t seen it yet. Unfortunately Matt Damon’s agent was the only one who bothered to call us back. Apparently he always wanted to work with John Cho. Go figure? Too late now unfortunately.”

Interviewer: “Well that’s all the time we have. Thank you for your incredible and honest insight. Any thoughts on the new movie announcement or the chances either one will actually get made?”

GotohellParamount: (Laughs for three minutes). That’s it.”

Interviewer: “Thank you.’

I laugh every.single.time! 😂

Well done per usual.

Nice. Don’t forget to throw the Beastie Boys in there someplace…wouldn’t be a Kelvin film without them…

This was indeed hilarious! 😂

I love how you parody JJ Abrams. He doesn’t seem to have an original bone in his body looking at both his Star Trek and Star Wars movies.

Another prequel? Why can’t they come up with new material?

star trek films borg

Star Trek Confirms the Borg Are Immune to a Major Galactic Threat

  • The Borg are immune to parasitic aliens in Star Trek: Defiant #13, sparking fan shock & speculation.
  • It is an encounter of two major villains: the parasites from "Conspiracy" vs. Borg, and it makes for an epic showdown.
  • Future Star Trek: Defiant issues hint that Borg nano-probes are a solution to the crisis. The Borg immunity may save the galaxy.

Warning: contains spoilers for Star Trek: Defiant #13!

Star Trek has confirmed the Borg are immune to a major new galactic threat. The parasitic aliens from the first season Star Trek: The Next Generation episode “Conspiracy” have returned, primed for a takeover of the Federation. Yet, in Star Trek: Defiant #13, the parasites try to bond themselves with Worf and his crew–and fans are shocked to learn the Borg are seemingly immune.

Star Trek: Defiant #13 is written by Christopher Cantwell and drawn by Angel Unzueta. Worf and the Defiant’s crew have docked at Starbase 99, which has been infested with parasitic aliens. The parasites then attack, and as Worf and company try to fend them off, one of the aliens attempts to take over Hugh, the ex-Borg drone that recently joined the crew. However, they are unable to do so, calling the Borg “corrupt tissue” that is of no use to the parasites.

Hugh cracks a joke, saying the rejection makes him “sad.”

Two of Star Trek's Biggest Villains Have Collided

An encounter will that inspire fan conversations.

The brief exchange between the aliens and Hugh is a meeting of two of the biggest threats to the Star Trek universe. The parasitic aliens from “Conspiracy” have finally returned, following up on the promise of their sole on-screen appearance. The episode ends with the aliens sending some sort of signal into deep space, with the implication it was a beacon, signaling for an invasion. It took the parasites some time to make their way back to our galaxy, but now they have returned and are deadlier than ever.

However, their goals of conquest have already hit a major stumbling block: the Borg. The parasites made a remark about Hugh’s tissue being dead and thus useless, a clear reference to the nano-probes the Borg use to assimilate others. As the assimilation process takes hold, living tissue is significantly altered, and apparently so much so that it renders the body useless to the parasites. What is ironic about this is that Star Trek: Defiant #13 draws a number of parallels in the societal structures of both the Borg and the parasitic aliens.

Star Trek's 2009 Movie Hid the Full Power of Nero's Ship (& Its Borg Connection)

Who would win: the parasites or the borg, it would be an epic star trek showdown.

Yet despite these similarities, the parasite aliens and the Borg are fundamentally incompatible. Both species are driven by the need to bring all life forms under their control, but take different routes for doing so. By assimilating, or taking over, other lifeforms, the two species expand their knowledge base. If a parasite cannot take over a Borg, they cannot defeat them. Solicitations for future issues of Star Trek: Defiant have revealed Borg nano-probes may be the only solution to the crisis. The Borg’s immunity to the parasites may be the galaxy’s saving grace.

Star Trek: Defiant #13 is on sale now from IDW Publishing!

Star Trek Confirms the Borg Are Immune to a Major Galactic Threat

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Published Nov 21, 2010

First Contact's Borg Queen - Alice Krige

star trek films borg

Alice Krige made such an indelible impression as the sinewy, sexy and sinister Borg Queen in Star Trek: First Contact that the character remains one the greatest Trek villains of all time. Krige later reprised the role in the Voyager series finale, “Endgame,” and provided her voice for both the game Star Trek: Armada II and the Borg Invasion 4-D short at the Star Trek: Experience attraction in Las Vegas. The Borg Queen represents just one role in Krige’s long and varied career, but it’s still a favorite to Trek fans and Krige herself. StarTrek.com recently caught up with the South African actress – who’s been living mostly in London since her home in L.A. burned down during the fires there-- for an exclusive two-part interview in which she talked about the Borg Queen and filled us in on her current acting and producing endeavors. Below is part one and be on the lookout tomorrow for the second half of the conversation.

Today, November 22, is the 14th anniversary of Star Trek: First Contact’s release into theaters. How crazy is it that so much time has flown by already?

Krige: Life fast-forwards, I guess. A lot has happened in those 14 years, in my life and probably in everyone’s life. Fourteen years; goodness, it is a long time.

You’ve done so much in your career, acted around the world on stage, in films and on television. That said, you’re extraordinarily popular with a core group of sci-fi and horror fans who appreciate your work in First Contact, Ghost Story, Sleepwalkers, Children of Dune and Silent Hill. Is that disconcerting, perfectly fine with you, or a phenomenon that’s out of your control?

Krige: I suppose that I’ve got two thoughts on it. Very often, the characters that one plays in the genre form, like Silent Hill or First Contact, are huge characters. They’re like Shakespearean women, like Lady M. They’re not just like playing your next-door neighbor and, as such, I think that they’re quite memorable. However, people have seen the other work, too. There’s more of an organized fan base for the genre work, of course. But if someone stops me to say, “Oh, were you the Borg Queen?” or “Were you the ghost?” they will also often say, “And I saw you in this and this and this, and I really enjoyed you in that as well.” So, it’s hard to quantify if (the genre projects) are what people principally recognize me for, especially because they’re part of a very communicative and organized fan base. They’ll come forward and say hello, which I love, actually. I don’t feel it’s an intrusion. I’m delighted to know that someone has seen something that I’ve done and enjoyed it.

When you think back to the actual production of First Contact , what are the first things that come to mind?

Krige: What pops is what a truly joyful experience it was. They were like the best repertory theater, that cast. They hadn’t worked together, the Next Gen group, for about two years, I think, and they were really delighted to see each other and to work with each other again. It was just a ball. It was just flat-out fun from beginning to end for me. Another thing that I found very striking was that everyone was absolutely determined that it should be a good film because they really wanted to support Jonathan Frakes (who was debuting as a feature film director after having directed several TNG episodes). There’s always a sense of focus on a set, but there was a kind of cohesion on First Contact. People stepped in behind him, I felt, to support him in the most loving way. I’m not saying that he needed support. I’m just saying that it was like a truly functional family supporting one of its own. If I look back on it, that was what was most unique about the experience.

You returned to the Star Trek fold for Armada II and The Experience , but you did not play the Borg Queen in her first Voyager appearances. Susanna Thompson assumed the role for those episodes. Did you, when you returned for “Endgame,” check out those Voyager episodes either to see what Thompson had done or to get a feeling for how the writers had developed the character in your absence?

Krige: I chose not to watch Susanna. I generally don’t like watching myself. In retrospect, it’s OK to watch rushes or to watch the replays on the monitor in the flow of making it, but I find it very painful to watch myself afterward. And I decided that I would not watch Susanna. It had absolutely nothing to do with Susanna. Whoever had played the role, I would have made the same decision. But I did ask to receive all the scripts. And I read them. I read all of the Voyager episodes that the Borg Queen was in, but I didn’t watch them. I didn’t want something in my head, in my imagination. I needed my performance to happen in the moment, and I didn’t even watch First Contact again. So not only did I not watch Susanna, I didn’t watch First Contact. I just focused on the stories I’d been sent, that had been filmed, and on the new script for “Endgame.”

Several years had passed between your appearances. So, how different an experience was it for you to play the Borg Queen on Voyager versus First Contact ?

Krige: It was very different in that this time (on Voyager ) I was actually working with two women (Kate Mulgrew and Jeri Ryan). There’s a very different energy to that; delightful and just as interesting and just as challenging, but quite different. What was lovely was there were members of the First Contact crew who were either on the lot, working on other things, or who were on Voyager, and everyone came in to say hello. That was lovely.

Be on the look out tomorrow for part two of our interview with the Borg Queen herself, Alice Krige.

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  • Space Exploration

The Star Trek “Origin” Movie Is Finally Going Into Production

The new Star Trek prequel movie is set to be revealed on the big screen. Probably.

LOS ANGELES - DECEMBER 1: Leonard Nimoy as Commander Spock (Mr. Spock) in the STAR TREK: The Origina...

For 30 years — from 1979 to 2009 — the longest wait between new Star Trek feature films was seven years. And, for most of that period, from the release of Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979) to Star Trek: Nemesis (2002), there was almost always a new Star Trek movie in theaters every two to four years. But after the wildly successful J.J. Abrams-directed reboot film in 2009, the release clip for Trek movies went from maximum warp to impulse power, to glacially slow. And now, by the time the next Star Trek movie hits theaters, it will have been about 10 years since the previous one — Star Trek Beyond — beamed into cinemas in 2016.

Since that time, for Trekkies, updates of a new Star Trek film have been very similar to the game football Lucy plays with Charlie Brown; just when a hypothetical movie sounds real, it gets snatched away. But now, there’s a glimmer of hope. Thanks to reports out of CinemaCon 2024, it looks like, the next Trek film is scheduled for release in either 2025 or 2026. But what’s it about? And will it really happen?

Star Trek 14 is “an untitled origin story”

Chris Pine and Zachary Quinto in 'Star Trek' (2009).

The new “origin story” will be set before the 2009 reboot. But how many decades before?

During CinemaCon 2024, Paramount confirmed several in-development projects including a live-action GI Joe / Transformers crossover (teased in 2023’s Rise of the Beasts ), a hardcore Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles live-action movie, a remake of the sci-fi thriller The Running Man (from Edgar Wright), the confirmation of an Avatar trilogy, and the assertion that a new Star Trek feature film will go into production this year, with a release date soon to follow.

Since 2016 to now, there have been at least five different attempts to make a new Star Trek film, either as timey wimey direct sequel to Beyond (“Star Trek 4”) a one-off space mobster movie (Quentin Tarantino’s script) or something else entirely (Noah Hawley and Matt Shakman’s attempts that remain undisclosed). But now, although Paramount is reportedly developing a sequel to Beyond — which would feature the reboot cast from the 2009 film one last time — the next Star Trek movie is not that sequel, but instead, as previously reported , an “origin story” that “takes place decades before the 2009 Star Trek film that rebooted the franchise.” This movie has been confirmed to be directed by Toby Haynes ( Andor, Doctor Who ) with a script from Seth Grahame-Smith ( The Lego Batman Movie , Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter) .

Wait? Wasn’t the 2009 film an “origin story?” While the answer to this question is technically a “yes,” the 2009 film (just titled Star Trek ) was also partially a time-travel sequel to the canon established in The Next Generation , and literally everything else in the Trek franchise up until that point. By saying the new prequel film takes place “decades before” the first reboot, this could hypothetically mean that the movie takes place in both the Prime and Kelvin timelines simultaneously.

TLDR: The Trek timeline diverged in the first reboot movie, beginning in the year 2233, so, a story set even a few decades before that divergence, in the 2210s or 2220s or earlier, would be consistent with all versions of Trek's future history. Presumably, the “origin story” won’t take place in the two decades between the prologue of the 2009 film (2233) and the main story (2258), because honestly, even for hardcore Trekkies that’s a big canon headache. So, sometime in the early 2200s, but before the 2230s is probably the best bet. And, even if the movie was set a bit earlier than that — say in the late 2180s or 2190s — we’d still be dealing with a very early point of Starfleet history that has never been depicted and that we know almost nothing about. Hence, if you squint — and don’t think about the prequel series Enterprise (2151-2161) too much — then yes, we’re looking at an origin story in which pretty much anything could happen.

Star Trek “origin” movie release date

LOS ANGELES - DECEMBER 1: The USS Enterprise during the opening credit for in the STAR TREK: The Ori...

One of the earliest shots of the USS Enterprise — from the 1964 Star Trek pilot episode “The Cage.” The new prequel film will likely be set half a century before this moment.

While some tweets out of CinemaCon seemed to indicate that the new Star Trek movie could hit next year in 2025 , TrekMovie confirmed that the “Untitled Star Trek Origin Story,” is on the Paramount slate for 2025 or 2026. TrekMovie also predicted that 2026 is more likely, writing, “If Paramount can move fast enough they could get the origin movie into theaters by 2026 — in time for Star Trek’s 60th anniversary.” Then again, 2025 is not impossible, it’s just cutting it a little close.

It should also be noted that the entire corporate entity of Paramount is reportedly close to a merger that would see it purchased by Skydance Media, the same production company behind the three existing J.J. Abrams-produced Star Trek reboots. If that deal is finalized soon, then, yes, this Star Trek feature film might actually happen very quickly. And if it doesn’t, there will still be plenty of new Star Trek shows streaming , not to mention the first direct-to-streaming standalone Star Trek movie, Section 31 , starring Michelle Yeoh, which will hit Paramount+ sometime later this year.

All the reboot Star Trek films (2009-2016) are currently streaming on Paramount+. The previous ten films (1979-2002) are all on Max.

Phasers on Stun!: How the Making — and Remaking — of Star Trek Changed the World

Ryan Britt's new book on the history of Star Trek's biggest changes. From the '60s show to the movies to 'TNG,' to 'Discovery,' 'Picard,' Strange New Worlds,' and beyond!

  • Science Fiction

star trek films borg

The Star Trek Origins Movie Is Officially Moving Forward, But I Have Two Serious Concerns About It

Am I the only one wondering about these things?

Zachary Quinto's Spock and Chris Pine's Kirk in Star Trek Into Darkness

If you have a Paramount+ subscription , you know full well how the Star Trek franchise has been thriving on TV again for many years now. Streaming has allowed the shows like Discovery , Picard , Strange New Worlds , Prodigy (which is now housed at Netflix) and Lower Decks to be made, and there are more upcoming Star Trek TV shows on the way, as well as the Michelle Yeoh-led Section 31 movie . However, not the franchise’s theatrical film side of things, we haven’t seen anything since 2016’s Star Trek Beyond , but apparently that’s about to change. Paramount Pictures is officially moving forward with that Star Trek origins movie that was reported about earlier this year , though after hearing this news, I can’t help but have two serious concerns about it.

During the Paramount presentation at CinemaCon today that CinemaBlend attended, it was mentioned that this Star Trek movie, which will be directed by Andor ’s Toby Haynes and written by Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter ’s Seth Grahame-Smith, is set to begin production later this year and is expected to be released sometime in 2025. Beyond that, no other details were revealed, so the only other thing we know about this project is that it’s set decades before the events of 2009’s Star Trek , i.e. the movie that kicked off the alternate timeline which follows Chris Pine’s James Kirk, Zachary Quito’s Spock and more.

Therein lies my first concern with this origins movie: exactly how is this going to function as a prequel? Not to get too nerdy, but the point of divergence between the Kelvin timeline and the main Star Trek timeline occurs when Nero’s ship’s came back in time to the former reality, which also happened to be the same day James Kirk was born. Everything before that day happened the same way in both timelines, including the events of the TV show Star Trek: Enterprise . So because that series chronicled Starfleet’s first deep-space exploration and ended with the formation of the United Federation of Planets, what origin is there to tell?

The main thing I can think of at the moment is we’d learn how Starfleet and the United Federation became the powerhouse forces they are by the time the 2009 Star Trek movie begins. But even setting aside the fact that this doesn’t need to be classified as a Kelvin timeline exclusive-story since again, such events would have happened the same way in both realities, would this make for a compelling enough cinematic event? With talent like Haynes and Grahame-Smith behind it, I hope so.

My second concern with this Star Trek origins movie is what this means for Star Trek 4 , i.e. the Star Trek Beyond follow-up. We’re coming up on 10 years of this project trying to get off the ground, with various behind-the-scenes creative talent boarding and exiting it, including director Matt Shakman, who left to helm The Fantastic Four . It seems like Star Trek 4 can’t catch a break, and I’m worried that this origins movie will result in it being shelved for good.

Now to be fair, when this origin story’s existence was revealed, it was mentioned that Star Trek 4 was still in “active development’ and is intended to be “the final chapter of the series.” So on face value, Paramount reportedly intends to give this version of the USS Enterprise crew a proper farewell, but given how many attempts to move Star Trek 4 forward have failed, will prioritizing the Star Trek origins movie will once again result in the other movie falling by the wayside? At this point, if Star Trek 4 does get made, it’s not coming out until well over a decade after Beyond . Is it even worth being remotely optimistic about its chances anymore?

As a longtime Star Trek fan, I’ll end up seeing this origins movie regardless, but these concerns will keep weighing on my mind until more information comes to light. Naturally we’ll pass along any major updates that come in, but for now, you can look through our 2024 movies schedule to stay on top of the cinematic entertaining coming out later this year.

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Adam Holmes

Connoisseur of Marvel, DC, Star Wars, John Wick, MonsterVerse and Doctor Who lore, Adam is a Senior Content Producer at CinemaBlend. He started working for the site back in late 2014 writing exclusively comic book movie and TV-related articles, and along with branching out into other genres, he also made the jump to editing. Along with his writing and editing duties, as well as interviewing creative talent from time to time, he also oversees the assignment of movie-related features. He graduated from the University of Oregon with a degree in Journalism, and he’s been sourced numerous times on Wikipedia. He's aware he looks like Harry Potter and Clark Kent.

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star trek films borg

A Star Trek origin story movie is officially on the way from Andor and Black Mirror director

It's set to take place decades before 2009's Star Trek

Chris Pine in Star Trek Beyond

Paramount has officially announced a new Star Trek movie – but it's not Star Trek 4.

The Untitled Star Trek Origin Story was unveiled at CinemaCon, with J.J. Abrams set to produce (H/T The Wrap ). The film will take place decades before 2009's Star Trek, with Andor's Toby Haynes set to direct and Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter author Seth Grahame-Smith set to pen the script. Plot details have yet to be released. Deadline first announced the film earlier this year.

Haynes directed the popular Black Mirror episode U.S.S Callister, which acts as a Star Trek parody. Black Mirror season 7 will feature a sequel to U.S.S Callister , though it has not yet been announced who will direct.

Paramount also stated that the origin pic would begin production later this year to make it in time for a 2025 theatrical release. Star Trek 4, the sequel to Abrams' 2009 flick, is still in development. WandaVision's Matt Shakman was previously attached to direct, but  left the project  in August 2022  around the same time he was announced as the new Fantastic Four director. Last month, Variety reported that Sucker Punch and Supernatural writer Steve Yockey would pen the fourth Star Trek film, which intends to bring back Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, and the rest of the cast.

The Untitled Star Trek Origin Story does not yet have a release date. For more, check out our list of the most exciting upcoming movies in 2024 and beyond, or, skip right to the good stuff with our list of movie release dates .

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COMMENTS

  1. Which Star Trek Shows & Movies Do The Borg Appear In?

    To date, Star Trek: Voyager is the series in which the Borg have made the most appearances, 23 episodes in total. Given that Voyager was set in the Delta Quadrant, the region of space where the Borg originated, their inclusion in the show only made sense. The Borg served as the main villains on Voyager from seasons 4-7 and were instrumental in the series finale where they unwittingly helped ...

  2. Star Trek: First Contact (1996)

    Star Trek: First Contact: Directed by Jonathan Frakes. With Patrick Stewart, Jonathan Frakes, Brent Spiner, LeVar Burton. The Borg travel back in time intent on preventing Earth's first contact with an alien species. Captain Picard and his crew pursue them to ensure that Zefram Cochrane makes his maiden flight reaching warp speed.

  3. Star Trek: First Contact

    Star Trek: First Contact is a 1996 American science fiction film directed by Jonathan Frakes in his feature film debut. It is the eighth movie of the Star Trek franchise, and the second starring the cast of the television series Star Trek: The Next Generation.In the film, the crew of the starship USS Enterprise-E travel back in time from the 24th century to the 21st century to stop the ...

  4. Borg

    The Borg are an alien group that appear as recurring antagonists in the Star Trek fictional universe. The Borg are cybernetic organisms (cyborgs) linked in a hive mind called "The Collective." The Borg co-opt the technology and knowledge of other alien species to the Collective through the process of "assimilation": forcibly transforming individual beings into "drones" by injecting nanoprobes ...

  5. The History of Star Trek's Borg, Explained

    Captain Picard and the Enterprise-D crew faced the Borg only nine times in 35 years, including in the film Star Trek: First Contact and Picard Season 3. However, the Borg appeared in a whopping 23 episodes of Star Trek: Voyager-- in large part because of Seven of Nine, the former Borg turned Starfleet officer.The writers who succeeded Hurley worried that using the Borg too much would've ...

  6. Resistance Is Futile: A History of STAR TREK's The Borg

    The Star Trek: Picard trailer shows us a Borg cube, so we know that even without the transwarp hubs, they found their way back into Federation space at some point over the past twenty years. And a ...

  7. Star Trek: First Contact movie review (1996)

    Brannon Braga. Ronald D. Moore. "Star Trek: First Contact" is one of the best of the eight "Star Trek" films: Certainly the best in its technical credits, and among the best in the ingenuity of its plot. I would rank it beside "Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home" (1986), the one where the fate of Earth depended on the song of the ...

  8. Star Trek 101: The Borg

    Star Trek 101,StarTrek.com's newest regular column, ... Voyager and Enterprise, as well as the first 10 Trek feature films. Today, we learn about the Borg... The Borg collective is an amalgamated group of many subjugated races: human, Klingon, Vulcan - you name it. The Collective assimilates every sentient being it encounters, improving the ...

  9. 'Star Trek: Picard': The Borg Storyline So Far, Explained

    Welcome to the Borg Reclamation Project. Sometime after the loss of their homeworld and the explosive (and fatal) end to Picard's efforts to relocate the Romulans to a new home, the Federation ...

  10. Borg

    The Borg were a pseudo-species of cybernetic humanoids, or cyborgs, from the Delta Quadrant known as drones, which formed the entire population of the Borg Collective. Their ultimate goal was the attainment of 'perfection' through the forcible assimilation of diverse sentient species, technologies, and knowledge which would be added and absorbed into the hive mind. As a result, the Borg were ...

  11. List of Star Trek films

    Logo for the first Star Trek film, Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979). Star Trek is an American science fiction media franchise that started with a television series (simply called Star Trek but now referred to as Star Trek: The Original Series) created by Gene Roddenberry.The series was first broadcast from 1966 to 1969. Since then, the Star Trek canon has expanded to include many other ...

  12. A Complete Timeline of the Borg in Star Trek

    The Borg Returned in Star Trek: Picard for One Last Battle Throughout the six-decade history of Star Trek, there have been many iconic villains, but perhaps none more so than the Borg. Created by ...

  13. The Borg

    2063 - The Borg arrive in Earth's past. 2364 - The Borg destroy outposts along the Neutral Zone. 2365 - Q instigates the first meeting between Starfleet and the Borg. 2366 - The Battle of Wolf 359. 2373 - The Borg travel back to Earth's past in 2063. 2378 - Janeway deals a crippling blow to the Borg and brings Voyager back to Earth.

  14. Borg

    Borg - Part 1, The. This video includes footage or photos from the following movie and episodes: ST:FC - "Star Trek: First Contact" Star Trek: Enterprise -- ST:ENT 049 - "Regeneration" Star Trek: Voyager -- ST:VOY 101 - "Caretaker, Part I" ST:VOY 157 - "Blood Fever" ST:VOY 159 - "Unity" ST:VOY 168 - "Scorpion, Part I" ST:VOY 169 - "Scorpion ...

  15. Everything You Need to Know About the Borg Queen

    In Star Trek: Picard, the Borg Queen is cut off from the Borg Collective due the actions of Q and a divergence in time. As a result, she becomes wholly and fully obsessed with Agnes Jurati. StarTrek.com. Seen as the last of the Borg, instead of finding the Collective, she sets her sights on Agnes in hopes of building out a new Borg collective.

  16. The Borg Were The Best Star Trek Villains

    Jonathan Frakes' feature film "Star Trek: First Contact" featured a Borg ship that traveled back in time to the eve of Earth's First Contact in 2063. First Contact with the Vulcans was a ...

  17. 10 Best Quotes From Star Trek: First Contact

    Widely regarded as the best movie starring the cast of Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek: First Contact is an immensely quotable movie. The TNG cast follows the Borg back in time to the ...

  18. The Borg in 'Star Trek,' Explained

    A cybernetic hivemind with no respect for life or individuality, the Borg left many 'Star Trek' captains facing tough moral challenges. Matthew Doherty. Published: Aug 10, 2023 3:12 AM PDT.

  19. 7 best Star Trek villains ever, ranked

    2. Gul Dhukat. 1. Khan. Because Trek has always concerned itself with the politics of the stories it tells, the series has also introduced some genuinely nuanced bad guys. There are plenty of ...

  20. Paramount Pictures Officially Confirms Star Trek Origin Movie For Its

    The Star Trek movie was just one of many the studio confirmed as part of their 2025/2026 slate at their CinemaCon presentation today. Paramount Pictures CEO Brian Robbins led the studio's ...

  21. Star Trek Confirms the Borg Are Immune to a Major Galactic Threat

    Star Trek's 2009 Movie Hid the Full Power of Nero's Ship (& Its Borg Connection) The Narada, Nero's ship in the 2009 Star Trek film, had a much deeper history than fans initially thought ...

  22. Star Trek Origin Story Movie Slated for 2025, Starts Filming This Year

    The next theatrical Star Trek movie is a prequel to 2009's reboot. The next theatrically-released Star Trek movie is set to begin filming this fall, with plans to debut in 2025. Paramount Pictures ...

  23. First Contact's Borg Queen

    Alice Krige made such an indelible impression as the sinewy, sexy and sinister Borg Queen in Star Trek: First Contact that the character remains one the greatest Trek villains of all time. Krige later reprised the role in the Voyager series finale, "Endgame," and provided her voice for both the game Star Trek: Armada II and the Borg Invasion 4-D short at the Star Trek: Experience ...

  24. Star Trek's Most Mysterious Movie Is Coming Sooner Than You Think

    For 30 years — from 1979 to 2009 — the longest wait between new Star Trek feature films was seven years. And, for most of that period, from the release of Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979 ...

  25. The Star Trek Origins Movie Is Officially Moving Forward, But I Have

    If you have a Paramount+ subscription, you know full well how the Star Trek franchise has been thriving on TV again for many years now. Streaming has allowed the shows like Discovery, Picard ...

  26. A Star Trek origin story movie is officially on the way from Andor and

    The film will take place decades before 2009's Star Trek, with Andor's Toby Haynes set to direct and Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter author Seth Grahame-Smith set to pen the script. Plot details ...