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Locutus of Borg

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" Locutus of Borg " was the Borg designation forced upon Starfleet captain Jean-Luc Picard after his assimilation in late 2366 .

• 3.1 Appearances
• 3.2.1 Conception
• 3.2.2 Televised depictions
• 3.2.3 Film appearance
• 3.3 Apocrypha
• 3.4 External links

History [ ]

Picard's assimilation underway in 2366

The Borg intended to use Picard as an intermediary, a spokesman for the Human race, in order to facilitate the assimilation of Earth so that the process would be as quick and efficient (or as perfect, from the perspective of the Borg Collective ) as possible, with the fewest number of casualties on both sides. He may have had some form of individuality, as shown by his use of the pronoun "I". ( TNG : " The Best of Both Worlds ")

Locutus with the Borg Queen in 2366

The Borg Queen herself had been aboard the Borg cube where Picard had undergone his transformation into Locutus. Interested in overseeing this event, she had intended for Picard to become her equal counterpart. ( Star Trek: First Contact )

Locutus' complexion is drained during the final stages of his assimilation in 2366

Picard's assimilation allowed the Borg to acquire the whole of his knowledge and experience, as well as his own personal knowledge (a fact that was made apparent when Locutus addressed Commander Riker as " Number one "). Picard's detailed information regarding Federation technology and strategy yielded the Borg a significant tactical advantage when Starfleet confronted the Borg cube at Wolf 359 . ( TNG : " The Best of Both Worlds, Part II "; DS9 : " Emissary ")

A partially-assimilated Locutus of Borg in 2366

This access proved two-way, however, as the crew of the USS Enterprise -D was able to capture Locutus and use his link to disable and destroy the Borg vessel by sending the Borg cube a command to regenerate, which created a feedback loop that destroyed the cube and severed Picard's link to the Collective. ( TNG : " The Best of Both Worlds, Part II ")

Though his implants were removed and his wounds were allowed to heal, Picard's assimilation continued to haunt him. He returned to Earth, and paid a visit to his family in La Barre , France , where he eventually came to terms with the ordeal. ( TNG : " Family ")

Despite this, he carried the trauma for years, with it nearly overwhelming him when he visited the Artifact . ( PIC : " The Impossible Box ")

Despite his separation from the Collective, Borg drones that had never encountered Locutus, such as Third of Five , still referred to Picard using this name, due to Locutus' experiences remaining within the shared Hive mind . ( TNG : " I Borg ", " Descent ")

When Benjamin Sisko made contact with the Prophets in 2369 , one took the form of Locutus as he appeared on the viewscreen of Sisko's ship, the USS Saratoga , shortly before the Battle of Wolf 359 . ( DS9 : " Emissary ")

When the Borg attempted a second invasion in 2373 , Picard's experience with the Borg not only gave him prior warning of the attack, but also allowed him to pinpoint a weakness in the Borg defenses, which resulted in the fleet destroying the invading vessel. ( Star Trek: First Contact )

In 2374 , when Captain Kathryn Janeway was conducting negotiations with the Borg during the Borg-Species 8472 War , she requested to speak to an individual, and cited to the Borg: " You've done it before, when you transformed Jean-Luc Picard into Locutus. " ( VOY : " Scorpion, Part II ")

Picard finding an image of Locutus in 2399

When Picard went to the Artifact in 2399 , looking to find Soji Asha , he ran a computer search. One of the images that came up was of Locutus, which Picard reacted to by placing his hand on his own face, where the Borg implants had once been. Once he reached the Artifact, Picard began to experience anxiety from seeing the Borg architecture, thus experiencing vivid memories of his time as Locutus, recalling individuals such as the Borg Queen. He almost fell over until he was aided by several former drones. Hugh, who had accompanied the former drones then reassured Picard that he was no longer Locutus. Nevertheless, one of the former drones there later recognized him as such, ( PIC : " The Impossible Box ") as did the Borg Queen in the Confederation of Earth timeline. ( PIC : " Penance ", " Assimilation ")

In 2401 , it was discovered that what was believed to have been Irumodic Syndrome and a defect in Picard's brain was actually a result of genetic alterations that the Borg made while Picard was Locutus of Borg, alterations that went beyond even what a normal Borg drone received. These alterations made Picard a receiver for the Borg Collective, resulting in Picard maintaining a residual link with the Borg even without Locutus' implants. This alteration was also inherited by Picard's son Jack Crusher , although he became a transmitter rather than a receiver. By taking Picard's Borg-altered DNA and placing it into the transporter systems of Starfleet, the Changelings were able to compromise Starfleet, allowing the Borg to begin a takeover of the Federation from the inside. ( PIC : " Võx ")

After reuniting with Picard on a Borg cube over Jupiter , the Borg Queen referred to Picard as Locutus, but was no longer interested in returning Picard to Locutus as she now sought to make the Borg evolve, propagate and wipe out all other lifeforms in the galaxy. When Picard linked back into the Collective in an effort to save Jack, he experienced the same flashbacks of himself as Locutus that he had once seen just prior to the Battle of Sector 001. ( PIC : " The Last Generation ")

Appendices [ ]

Appearances [ ].

• " The Best of Both Worlds "
• " The Best of Both Worlds, Part II "
• DS9 : " Emissary "
• Star Trek: First Contact
• " The Impossible Box " (archive footage)
• " No Win Scenario " (archive footage)

Background information [ ]

Conception [ ].

The character of Locutus was created as a result of the writing staff of Star Trek: The Next Generation feeling it necessary for the Borg to have a spokesman, which the writing staffers referred to as a "queen bee." ( Captains' Logs: The Unauthorized Complete Trek Voyages ) Another inspiration on the character's creation, according to writer Michael Piller , was that the writing staff was requested by Paramount to devise a method of potentially writing Picard actor Patrick Stewart out of the series after the third season . This was because Paramount was having negotiating difficulties regarding closing a deal with Stewart that would see him return for the fourth season . ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 23 , p. 16)

The concept of using Picard to fill the persona of the Borg's central voice was directly preceded by a notion that involved the Borg capturing both him and Data before combining them as a single entity. ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 23 , p. 16; Captains' Logs: The Unauthorized Complete Trek Voyages ) Michael Piller pitched this initial concept to Rick Berman . ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 23 , p. 16) However, the idea was dropped when it was realized that the Borg lacked sufficient motive to carry out these actions. ( Captains' Logs: The Unauthorized Complete Trek Voyages ) Berman felt the suggestion of the assimilated Picard and Data combo was overly complicated. ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 23 , p. 16)

According to the reference book Captains' Logs: The Unauthorized Complete Trek Voyages , it was Michael Piller himself who came up with the subsequent idea of filling the spokesman role with an assimilated Picard, alone, and the writer later remembered, " It all just fell into place. I said, 'I've got it. Picard will be the queen bee.' " Alternatively, according to Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 23 (p. 16), Piller cited Rick Berman as having made the suggestion, though admitted, " I thought that making Picard that voice would be interesting. "

The concept of Locutus was foremost on Michael Piller's mind in the lead-up to writing "The Best of Both Worlds". Thus, after Piller decided he wanted to write the episode, one of the first ideas that he privately disclosed to fellow TNG writing staffer Ira Steven Behr was that of Picard being assimilated by the Borg. ( Star Trek: The Next Generation 365 , p. 163)

As for the name Locutus, Michael Piller termed it as "a name which I got out of the dictionary about language – I think it's a Latin word for language." ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 23 , p. 17) Locūtus actually means "having spoken" or "he who has spoken" in Latin, still an appropriate name for one serving as spokesman, although idiosyncratic. (In Latin, there are two similar words Locūtor meaning "speaker" or "spokesman"; and Locūtio means "speech", or at a stretch, the "language" definition, as suggested by Piller.)

The final draft script for "The Best of Both Worlds" stipulates about the assimilated Picard, " Half his face is gone… replaced with machinery. " A later description from the same script refers to Locutus as "Picard-Borg" and further states, " He speaks with a single but metallic Borg voice… a version of his [Picard's] own. " [1]

The way in which Locutus was represented in "The Best of Both Worlds" turned out to be very successful with production staff. David Livingston remarked, " I just remember the moment in dailies of seeing Patrick say, 'You will be assimilated' […] I think that was the turning point for the series, because here you have your captain, who's now a Borg, who's saying he's now gonna take you guys over. That was an extraordinary moment. " Livingston noted that the image of Locutus was an expression of the central concept of the Borg – the risk that humans might lose their individuality and humanity. ( Regeneration: Engaging the Borg , " The Best of Both Worlds " ( Blu-ray ) The way in which Michael Piller single-handedly delivered the concept of Locutus in the writing of "The Best of Both Worlds" impressed Ira Steven Behr, who later commented, " By Borgifying Picard, Michael tapped into Picard's humanity. Because at the time, the fans were bitching about Picard [such as by complaining that he was 'too cold' or not similar enough to Kirk] […] But by Borgifying Picard – which is something that Michael really related to, because there was a little bit of Borg in him – it led the way to 'Family,' and […] it's what kept the franchise alive. " ( Star Trek: The Next Generation 365 , p. 163)

Jonathan Frakes had several suspicions regarding how effective Locutus was with fans. " I'm not sure that anybody really believed Patrick was leaving the show, " admitted Frakes. " But I believed that the drama […] and the vision of him as Locutus, a Borg, was strong enough that you could suspend your disbelief in a way that, 'Oh, my…' And it really did get you through the summer. " ( Regeneration: Engaging the Borg , " The Best of Both Worlds " ( Blu-ray ))

Following the initial airing of "The Best of Both Worlds", fans anticipated discovering Picard's fate so much that someone devised a hoax script supposedly of the concluding part of the story, in which it turned out that Picard's assimilation had actually been a prank by the Q Continuum . ("The Best of Both Worlds, Part II" text commentary , Star Trek: Borg - Fan Collective )

For help with wording the process of corrupting the Locutus persona in order to enable Picard's inevitable return in " The Best of Both Worlds, Part II ", visual effects artists including Rick Sternbach were consulted. " We sat down with Michael Piller and a couple of the other writers, " recollected Sternbach, " and presented some of our notes about Data, and Picard as Locutus and, technically, how to get Picard back when shutting down the Borg collective mind and that sort of thing. " ( Regeneration: Engaging the Borg , " The Best of Both Worlds " ( Blu-ray ))

Televised depictions [ ]

Locutus was a larger role than Patrick Stewart was used to playing on TNG. " This part gave Patrick the chance to fish-out-of-water character. You know, to not just have that one dimension that he had on the series, " observed Director Cliff Bole . " This gave him another chance to be a heavy, which is always great fun for an actor. He enjoyed it, tremendously. " ("Regeneration: Engaging the Borg", " The Best of Both Worlds " ( Blu-ray )) Indeed, despite the increased workload, Stewart found that playing Locutus was an interesting experience without being overly taxing. He explained, " The interesting situation for me was how to create this murderous, autonomous figure while retaining, behind all that, the shadow of Jean-Luc [....] I think, for me, the Borg episodes were not as dramatic as they were for our audience. I can think of other episodes in which I felt that the character was expanding, developing and learning much more than in that one. It principally for me was a way of trying to find out how technically to make the Borg character work. Of course, a lot of it was left to the makeup department and the special effects department. The makeup made a significant contribution. " ( Star Trek: The Official Fan Club Magazine issue 87 , p. 4)

Concerning the "Best of Both Worlds" two-parter, Marina Sirtis asked, " Was that the one we got to see Patrick naked? " Although nudity was out-of-the-question for a family TV series such as TNG, Locutus had to be made to look differently from Picard. Stated Makeup Supervisor Michael Westmore , " We had to more or less take him through steps of Borgifying him. " ("Regeneration: Engaging the Borg", " The Best of Both Worlds " ( Blu-ray )) Depicting the gradual draining of Picard's Humanity as he was transformed from Human into Borg, during the two-parter, represented a challenge for TNG's makeup team. Initially, this was done by showing the exposed areas of his body paler by a couple of shades. According to Westmore, this demonstrated that "as humanity was drained away so was the color of life." Even when the full Borg makeup of Locutus was applied, the creative team still wanted to leave enough of the Picard character visibly recognizable so that the contrast between the two personalities was startling. ( Star Trek: Aliens & Artifacts , p. 85) The amount of bare skin involved in portraying Locutus was influenced by the fact that either Westmore or Rick Berman wanted the Borg drones in the two-parter to exhibit more baldness than in " Q Who ". " So when it came down to Patrick, " remembered Westmore, " here's a man with a bald head. They didn't want to put a helmet on him. " ("Regeneration: Engaging the Borg", " The Best of Both Worlds " ( Blu-ray ))

In the form it took on television, Locutus' Borg suit was created as a collaboration between Michael Westmore and Costume Designer Robert Blackman . The suit's face plates were crafted by Westmore from life castings of Patrick Stewart. ("The Best of Both Worlds, Part II" text commentary , Star Trek: Borg - Fan Collective ) Todd Masters said of the costume, " It had galoshes and phone cords on the feet, and underwear sprinkled with poly-foam and model parts. " ( Cinefex , No. 69, p. 105) The costume also incorporated a mechanical Borg arm prop which was a slightly modified version of those from "Q Who". ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 3, Issue 2 , p. 15)

Concept art showing the final stages of Locutus' physical transformation

There were actually two main variations of Locutus' full Borg makeup created for television – one that was used at the end of "The Best of Both Worlds", and another that was applied for the start of " The Best of Both Worlds, Part II ". Whereas the first of these makeup designs incorporated a headpiece that wrapped round from the back of the head to the front of the face where it covered the right cheek, the second version extended the headpiece so that it covered the majority of the face. Similarly, though the first variant of the makeup included only a few black ribbed tubes that seemed to run into his body and merely one identical tube that ran through the headpiece (a lead which, according to Michael Westmore, was intended "to indicate that it was connected directly through his skull to his brain"), the later version had considerably more tubes. ( Star Trek: Aliens & Artifacts , pp. 85 & 87)

Locutus' appearance in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine pilot episode " Emissary " required Patrick Stewart to once again endure the Borg makeup. ("The Best of Both Worlds, Part II" text commentary , Star Trek: Borg - Fan Collective ) Michael Piller was extremely proud of having Locutus appear in the opening moments of "Emissary", remarking, " You want to desperately open your show with a bang and what could be a better way to open the show than to have Jean-Luc Picard as Locutus on screen saying, 'You will surrender, resistance is futile.' " ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 23, No. 6, p. 34)

The immediate aftermath of Picard's transformation into Locutus was originally planned to be featured in an alternate past timeline experienced by Picard in TNG series finale " All Good Things... ". " The idea was when he jumps into that time period he has to convince not only the Borg to help him but Riker to help him, " explained Ronald D. Moore . ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 25, No. 6/Vol. 26, No. 1, p. 75)

Film appearance [ ]

Locutus as he appeared in First Contact

There were noticeable differences in the makeup design of Locutus between the TV series and Star Trek: First Contact . Among the changes seen were airbrushed "wiring" on the skin (made to seem as if it is beneath the skin), slightly more detailed "Borg implants" and a completely new body suit. The changes enhanced the somewhat sparse original look and corresponded with the "new look" of the Borg for the movie. Although creating this physical redesign for Locutus represented a comparatively special challenge for the makeup and costume designers of First Contact , it was not as challenging as it could have been, given that Patrick Stewart was not required to move much or perform stunts while in his Locutus guise. ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 28, No. 6, p. 24) The company Todd Masters Effects , hired by Paramount to build all the Borg suits in the film, were originally given the costume that had last been donned by Stewart for "Emissary". " It looked bad, " said Masters, " and there was no budget to upgrade it [....] And we knew that the fans would feel cheated if Patrick was wearing this rag while all the other Borg looked great – so we punched it up at our own expense. " ( Cinefex , No. 69, p. 105)

A specific Locutus-related nightmare sequence from early in First Contact – involving a Borg appliance popping out of Picard's cheek – was planned by Industrial Light & Magic artist Alex Jaeger . He not only drew a concept sketch of the appliance on Picard's cheek, in its fully spread-out state, but also created a computer-generated demonstration of the facial changes. The latter was done using six copies of a promotional head shot of Patrick Stewart as Picard (taken during production on the series) and inserting the slowly evolving "cheek popper" with Photoshop. Jaeger cited an ice-cube holder as inspiration for the dreamt device, "with those fingers that extend and grab." ( Star Trek: The Next Generation Sketchbook: The Movies , pp. 332 & 333) The effect was at first conceived as a physical illusion but was ultimately rendered in CGI by Stephen Braggs at ILM. ( Cinefex , No. 69, p. 105)

Apocrypha [ ]

In the comic story Star Trek: The Next Generation - Perchance to Dream , the Enterprise crew were attacked by a telepathic weapon called the Chova, which forced its victims to experience dreams and hallucinations focused on their personal failures. However, it was discovered that those with Multiple Personality Disorder could render the Chova inert (The multiple personas overwhelming the Chova, which could only attack one personality at the time), so Picard was deliberately infected with the Chova, as his mind meld with Sarek , the probe that gave him the memories of Kamin and the remnants of Locutus still in his mind gave him the makings of an MPD. The four defeated the Chova, but Locutus then attempted to regain control of Picard's body, nearly "killing" Kamin and Sarek before Picard gathered the mental strength to stop Locutus.

In the comic story arc The Worst of Both Worlds! , the Enterprise crew got pulled through a rift into an alternate universe in which Riker's plan to rescue Picard from the Borg failed and the Borg had conquered Earth. The crew team up with their counterparts, whose Enterprise was only the stardrive section, as their saucer section had to be abandoned. The two crews managed to capture Locutus and use his link to the Collective to defeat the Borg, much like in the canon universe, except the "sleep" command couldn't be used. Picard gambled on the possibility that his alternate self also mind-melded with Sarek, like he did in the episode " Sarek ". Whispering Spock's name in Locutus' ear caused the Vulcan emotions to trigger and allowed his Humanity to break through. Using the alternate Picard's suggestion of "eat", Data was successful in immobilizing the Borg and saving both Earth and the alternate Picard. It was later revealed that he was responsible for opening the rift which pulled the Enterprise to the alternate reality.

During the novel The Return by William Shatner , it was revealed that Locutus was not as unique as he had been portrayed; according to this novel, the Borg commonly assimilate a specific individual from a new species to act as a "speaker" to the new race to try and convince them of the merits of assimilation, thus making the process of assimilating a species easier and less 'wasteful'. During the events of the novel, the Borg created a Romulan "speaker" known as Vox, who subsequently proposed a Borg/Romulan alliance as a means of effectively conquering the Federation and the Romulan Empire , and secretly intended to assimilate the Romulans the first chance they got. The Borg also attempted to assimilate Spock , thus turning him into their "speaker" to the Vulcan people, but due to Spock's past mind meld with V'ger – an aspect of the Borg Collective – the traces of the Collective in Spock's mind from the meld resulted in the Borg assuming that Spock had already been assimilated, and thus left him alone.

Cloned Locutus from Star Trek: Armada

In Star Trek: Armada , set in 2376 , a new Locutus of Borg was created by the Borg that had captured a Dominion cloning facility. This Locutus led an attack upon the Federation and the Klingon and Romulan empires in an attempt to gain an Omega particle , resulting in the assimilation of Spock (who was on his way to a Romulan - Klingon peace conference) and the conquest of Earth. However, aided by the USS Premonition , a time-traveling ship from the future under the command of Captain Thaddius Deming, the USS Enterprise -E was able to undo this Borg victory by going back in time to intercept the Borg fleet sent to assimilate Spock, and the Locutus clone was destroyed after a brief confrontation with the original Picard.

In Star Trek: Legacy , set in 2380 , the assimilated Vulcan T'urell, who considered herself a Borg Queen, referred to Picard as "Locutus", much in the way the Borg Queen of 2373 also addressed Picard.

In the novel Resistance , set in 2380 , Picard became Locutus once again in an attempt to defeat the Borg Queen. After having defeated the Queen by re-altering her into a normal drone, Dr. Crusher was able to restore the captain to his normal self.

In the novel Headlong Flight , the Enterprise -E of 2386 encounters a version of the Enterprise -D from 2367 , in a world where Data and Shelby attempted to use Locutus to transmit the 'sleep' command to the Borg while still on the cube, with the result that Locutus was killed before he could be severed from the Collective as the ship self-destructed too quickly for them to get him out.

The Doctor and his companions encounter Locutus

In the Doctor Who crossover comic Assimilation² , Guinan explains to the Eleventh Doctor about Picard's past with the Borg and how they assimilated him into becoming Locutus and used his knowledge of Starfleet tactics at Wolf 359 as the reason why he refuses to help the Borg defeat the Doctor's enemies, the Cybermen . After convincing Picard of the threat posed by the Cybermen, the Doctor and his companions Amy Pond and Rory Williams take the TARDIS back in time to the Battle of Wolf 359 to recover a copy of the Borg central archive from the Borg cube during the battle after the present version is deleted by the Cybermen. On board the cube, they encounter Captain Picard assimilated into the Borg Collective as Locutus, but he ignores them as they proceed through the Borg ship to a computer terminal where the Doctor copies the executive libraries, as Locutus, like all Borg, doesn't register them as a threat so long as they do nothing threatening to the ship.

External links [ ]

• Locutus of Borg at StarTrek.com
• Locutus at Memory Beta , the wiki for licensed Star Trek works
• 3 Ancient humanoid

Locutus of Borg explained – Star Trek Picard season 3

Star Trek Picard season 3 just had a major reveal. In acknowledgement of that, it's time for a refresher on Locutus of Borg and everything we know about him.

James Osborne

Published: Apr 13, 2023

Who is Locutus of Borg? This article contains minor spoilers for Star Trek Picard season 3 episode 9. After the new episode of Star Trek Picard season 3, we could all do with a refresher on some Borg-related Star Trek history.

The latest outing of the Star Trek series it was revealed that Jean-Luc Picard’s short time as Locutus of Borg, when he was assimilated in the TNG two-parter The Best of Both Worlds, meant that he passed some Borg genetics into his son Jack Crusher . This has huge implications, so it’s time to learn more about Locutus of Borg.

Who is Locutus of Borg

Locutus of Borg is the identity of Jean-Luc Picard after being assimilated into the Borg collective, as seen in the two-parter episode The Best of Both Worlds.  Locutus is a Latin word which translates roughly to: the one who speaks. His name is apt then, as Locutus is the spokesperson for the Borg who makes contact with humanity more broadly.

Jean-Luc Picard’s assimilation, and his subsequent Borg designation, occurred in 2366 prior to the Battle of Wolf 359. Here, his information about Starfleet and his technical knowledge meant that the Borg aggressors had a major advantage over the Starfleet ships with a knowledge of their weaknesses.

Locutus of Borg was eventually recaptured by the Enterprise-D’s crew and he was used to destroy the Borg attackers before his connection to the Borg was mostly severed. His implants were removed, and his wounds were treated as he regained his identity as Jean-Luc Picard. He would then take some time to recover from his ordeal in France, where he considered resigning his commission.

Jean-Luc Picard after recovering from Locutus of Borg

After his experience as Locutus, Picard retained a connection to the Borg collective and was able to sense their plans and hear the collective in certain occasions.

He also carried a trauma with him from his experience as Locutus of Borg which is explored in the Star Trek series Picard. Additionally Jean-Luc Picard’s son, Jack Crusher, inherited a connection to the Borg from Jean-Luc as seen in Star Trek Picard season 3 episode 9 , which allowed the story of Locutus to continue impacting galactic events.

That’s it on Locutus of Borg for now. For more on Star Trek , read our Star Trek Picard season 3 review , or learn more about the Star Trek characters like Captain Shaw , Tuvok , Ro Laren , and Admiral Shelby . Or, take a look at our guide to every TNG Borg episode and find out what we know about the Star Trek Strange New Worlds season 2 release date .

James Osborne After graduating from the University of York with a degree in archaeology (inspired by Captain Picard), James worked with the news team at Screen Rant while contributing features to Vulture, The AV Club, Digital Spy, FANDOM, and the official Star Trek website. Now, he writes about all things sci-fi and fantasy at The Digital Fix with an 'Enterprise-D ambiance' playlist on loop. He's a seasoned expert on all things Star Trek , Lord of the Rings , Star Wars , and Yellowstone , and is more than willing to share his hot takes on TNG which he believes is the greatest series ever made.

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30 Years Ago: Captain Picard Becomes Locutus of Borg

On June 18, 1990, Capt. Jean Luc Picard appeared on the view screen on the Enterprise bridge, half his face covered with the robotic additions forced upon him by the genocidal Borg Collective.

A red laser shined from the side of his face into the screen. From the Borg ship he told Commander William Riker, “I am Locutus of Borg. Resistance is futile. Your life as it has been is over. From this time forward you will service us.” The laser filled the screen. The camera approached and turned on Riker, who, without looking at his weapons officer, gave the instruction: “Mr. Worf, fire.”

So ended the episode that’s reputed to have secured the position of Star Trek: The Next Generation in the long-running franchise’s history. “The Best of Both Worlds, Part 1” was the final episode of the third season, but the show had struggled against Trekkies’ loyalty to William Shatner ’s Captain Kirk and the original series. It worked, in part, because it was a strong story – and also because it was the first-ever Star Trek cliffhanger, and one of the few times the leading character of a leading TV show had been put at risk.

The Borg were previously featured on TNG  and proved themselves to be an archenemy in the vein of Doctor Who ’s Daleks. Terrifyingly advanced, they valued improvement over everything, including life, and existed only to assimilate other races, leaving no survivors. While leading Star Trek characters like Spock and Data became icons of the franchise, as non-humans who revealed who we are as we struggle to better ourselves, the Borg depicted the complete rejection of humanity as an element of improvement.

At the end of the third season, they’ve had their interest piqued by humanity and, concluding that a less direct approach is the best way to assimilate the best of the race, they form a plan to have a human spokesperson who’ll streamline the process with minimal massacres. Hence the arrival of a Borg cube, the kidnapping of Picard, the failure of his crew’s attempts to rescue him and his reappearance as Locutus, the voice of the Collective – leading up to the final scene, in which Riker gives the command to open fire on his captain.

Watch 'Star Trek: The Next Generation': ‘The Best of Both Worlds, Part 1’ Cliffhanger

“All of us were quite thrilled they had the balls to leave Picard on the Borg cube,” said Jonathan Frakes (who played Riker) in 2015. “It's commonplace now. Shows like Lost and House of Cards — they'll kill off a regular and think nothing of it. This was 1990. It was not commonplace to be killing off any of your series regulars. That was a big ‘Who shot J.R.’ type of plot.”

Riker’s future was also at stake in the episode. After two seasons of being seen as the “best number one in Starfleet,” it seemed strange he didn’t have his own command, and protestations that he was happy where he was didn’t sit well with the ambitious young officer he appeared to be. But while he dealt with the possibility of killing the senior officer who’d helped turn him into an even better number one, he was also trying to decide whether to accept his first command, while a younger and even more ambitious officer, Shelby, vied to take his place on the Enterprise. “The episode was key to Riker's character,” Frakes said. “Previously, I thought it was not very cleverly handled.”

With Picard’s future seemingly stolen from him after being kidnapped by the Borg and turned into the spokesperson they’d use to make assimilating the human race easier, and Riker’s future in doubt because he had a crisis of loyalty, putting the two characters head-to-head made for very powerful drama. There was always the possibility that if Picard didn’t survive, Riker could become a captain without leaving his home ship.

A real-life dilemma helped inspire late writer Michael Piller, who, unusually, didn’t share the plot-development chores with the rest of the writers room. “Michael had a very personal connection to that particular story,” fellow script creator Ronald D. Moore said. “The episode starts with Riker getting an offer to go command another ship. … Michael said very overtly that he was in a very similar place. He was the number two guy on the show, and he was debating whether or not to leave Star Trek and go and run his own show. … So, he was Riker, and he wrote the story from that perspective. ... When Michael did ‘Part I,’ he said, ‘I have no idea how this thing ends. We're going to end on this cliffhanger of “fire” and we're going to figure it out next season.’”

Watch 'STTNG' 'The Best of Both Worlds, Part 1' Trailer

Rumors persisted that the cliffhanger was in part a producers’ ploy to put pressure on Patrick Stewart (Picard), whose contract was ending and whose agents were applying their own pressure, while the actor had made some outspoken comments about TNG . But Stewart denied his position was ever in doubt, saying in 1999, “I speak my mind about all the work I've been involved with. There have been times when I've perhaps been too public with opinions that should have been expressed privately. But, as far as the series was concerned,I was always very proud of it. … There was never a point when I tried to leave, despite popular opinion.”

“The Best of Both World, Part 1” closed with the caption “To be continued ... ” and fans began a three-month wait to find out what would happen next. That’s the element that appears to have helped TNG find favor with the TOS hardcore. “What people forget now is in the first couple of seasons of Next Generation , we were sort of not taken seriously as Star Trek ,” Moore observed.

“You would go to conventions and there would be bumper stickers and T-shirts that basically said, ‘I’m a real Trekker. Forget the bald guy.’ … When ‘Best of Both Worlds’ came out, suddenly there was all this buzz. And it got in the press and there was all this tension and people were talking about the cliffhanger and Picard. ... Suddenly, we had done something that was legitimate and got people's attention and told a great story. From then on out we carried the torch. We were legitimate and that was the show that turned it around for us.”

In 2013, Frakes argued that an additional layer of tension was added onscreen because even the producers, writers and cast didn’t know how the plot would be resolved. “We were left hanging out to dry,” he said. “And I think it was that seriousness of the story that made for such a brilliant cliffhanger. I think it is one of the greatest cliffhangers in television history.”

However, if Stewart had his way, the episode would never have been made. “I originally said no to doing it,” he recalled in 2020. “I remember questioning whether that storyline was a good one to follow. I wasn’t sure that it was.” As he struggled to work out how to depict what was happening to Picard, he found inspiration in the makeup room. “The best part about Locutus was that I have something to reference, the drama Picard had to endure … the makeup process for me, which was extremely unpleasant and painful and unsettling. No experience is wasted.”

The story was indeed continued with “The Best of Both Worlds, Part 2” as the fourth-season opener, though it wasn’t exactly completed. Even after Picard was saved from the Borg, the experience he had at their hands would fuel many other stories, including the TNG episode “Family” and the plot for Star Trek: First Contact . It also supplied one of the main themes for the first season of Star Trek: Picard .

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

"Resistance is futile; you will be assimilated."

“When it comes to seeing Picard again, the first things that come to mind are Data and the Borg.”

That’s what Star Trek: Picard Executive Producer Alex Kurtzman recently told THR about how they approached bringing back Patrick Stewart ’s most iconic character -- along with one of Star Trek ’s most popular villains. Both Data and the Borg play key roles in Picard ’s unfolding mythology, which finds Picard’s deceased friend and his most lethal enemy looming large over an intricate plot that involves a massacre on Mars where androids helped kill thousands of Romulan refugees, resulting in a Federation-wide ban on androids (AKA synthetics). Complicating matters is the reveal of a derelict Borg cube that plays home base to both what’s left of the Romulan Empire and several inactive Borg drones.

The latest episode of Picard , “The Impossible Box,” reveals more about the role that the race of cybernetic beings hellbent on assimilating various cultures into their hive-mind collective plays in Picard’s return to television after a 26-year absence. Here’s what the “Resistance is futile” baddies are up to, and how they got there:

The Borg Are Back...ish

The Borg have been a considerable thorn in both Picard and the Federation’s side since the captain and crew of the Enterprise-D first encountered them in the Star Trek: The Next Generation Season Two episode, “Q Who?” Their cold, unrelenting mission to assimilate entire alien races and worlds, in an effort to add their victims’ biological and technological distinctiveness to their own, reached a boiling point when they kidnapped and assimilated Picard 30 years ago, in the Season Three TNG cliffhanger “The Best of Both Worlds, Part I.” There, Picard was turned into Locutus, whose role in the collective was to act as a voice and figurehead to oversee the Borg’s assimilation of Earth. Thankfully, that plot to turn humanity into drones failed -- as did their second attempt in the 1996 feature film Star Trek: First Contact .

But the emotional scars from Picard’s brief experience as a member of a race using him to kill his own species took longer to heal than the physical ones. In fact, Picard recently revealed in its fifth episode, “Stardust City Rag” that Picard has yet to feel like he has regained all the humanity the Borg took from him 30 years ago. Ironically, that which he has lost is something the Romulans are helping ex-drones (“Ex-B’s”) get back on the Borg cube they have acquired, which the Romulans call the Artifact.

It’s there that Picard is forced to come to terms with his trauma, and those who inflicted it upon him, by stepping onto a Borg cube for the first time in three decades. There, he not only reopens old wounds for himself, but also discovers a sense of hope in a place that's home to those driven to take it away.

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’s oldest enemy laid claim to a damaged Borg cube. They renamed it “The Artifact” and began working on salvaging Borg tech from inactive drones, as well as “rehab-ing” former drones of various races back to a way less “assimilate everything” existence with the Borg Reclamation Project.

The Executive Director of the project is a former drone himself -- Hugh ( Jonathan Del Arco ). Picard helped free Hugh from the Borg when he was the drone designated Third of Five in the classic TNG season five episode, “I, Borg.”

At first, Picard plotted to use Hugh as a “Trojan Horse” and deliver a virus that would break down and destroy the Borg’s hive mind. As more of Picard’s crew members got to know Hugh, and see his humanity come through, Picard had a change of heart and let Hugh go. They would reunite later in the Season Seven premiere of Next Gen , “Descent, Part II.” “Impossible Box” reunites Picard and Hugh for the first time in over 25 years, and in doing so, we learn that the Borg are able to be rehabilitated. There is hope for their victims as they attempt to re-enter their lives, which sparks Picard to challenge his inner (and justified) prejudices against the alien race that still haunts him after all these years.

Helping Hugh and his efforts is Soji, played by Isa Briones . Soji recently lost her twin sister, Dahj, at the hands of Romulan operatives wanting to destroy her because she is an advanced android; a perfect mix of biological elements and Data’s positronic components. Soji is also an advanced “Synth,” but only recently discovered that about herself. Given that the Romulans hate androids, Picard came to the Artifact to protect her, since she is in the crosshairs of a Romulan spy named Narek. He is using her, and the Borg Reclamation Project, for less than altruistic reasons.

Why? Because the Romulans only have two speeds: Shady and super shady. Their hate for androids and any synthetic life is long-standing; there are no androids in their culture. (So it’s especially ironic that they would make their base aboard a ship full of that which they loathe.) Narek and other Romulans--conspiring with Federation brass as well--believe the Borg’s collective consciousness, along with Soji’s brain, can help them locate the secret Synth homeworld and wipe out the Synths that are still alive after the Federation ban.

Through Hugh and Soji’s efforts, we learn something new about the Borg: The Collective is like the iCloud for this race of interconnected beings. From the moment aliens or humans are assimilated into it, they join a chorus of thousands in service of the hive mind. Once disconnected from the collective, like Hugh was, they are free of those voices. But Picard tells us that what is never silent are the echoes or imprints that individual drones take with them. This mess of overlapping voices, speaking as one mind, operates in a “Time is a flat circle” sorta way.

For example: “The Impossible Box” puts Picard and Hugh in “The Queen’s Cell,” a room they have never seen or been in but know of, like it’s been there all this time. It is the private chambers of the Borg Queen, last seen trying to destroy Captain Janeway and her crew aboard the lost starship Voyager as they warped to get back home in the Star Trek: Voyager series finale, “Endgame.” It’s in this room that Hugh introduces Picard to an advanced tech belonging to a race Janeway encountered in the first season of Voyager . This tech allows for long-distance transportation with a range of up to 40,000 lightyears. The reason for this tech was to spirit the Queen away in case of an emergency, and the episode all but implies that the Queen survived her explosive demise at the end of “Endgame.”

Hugh and Soji have also discovered that the collective share a common narrative full of archetypal information from past experiences but it is just as relevant and timely to them as present day news is to humans. What exactly Hugh and the Romulans want with this info is unclear, but all signs point to it paving the way to more mysteries being uncovered about Soji, her ties to the rogue synthetics the Romulans are hunting, and the future of the Borg.

Given that the Borg have been a cancer for Stafleet for over 30 years, it is safe to assume that, whatever happens next for Star Trek: Picard, this aspect of Picard’s past will play a significant role in shaping his future.

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Producing Star Trek: Picard: Locutus Revisited

"Coming to terms with his past, his history, the borg..."

Executive producers Alex Kurtzman, Heather Kadin and Michael Chabon revisit Locutus.

Star Trek: Picard streams on Paramount+ in the United States,  in Canada on Bell Media’s CTV Sci-Fi Channel and streams on Crave, and on Amazon Prime Video in more than 200 countries and territories.

Star Trek: How the Next Generation Would've Collapsed If Picard Stayed Borg

Star Trek: TNG's Captain Picard was forever changed by his Borg assimilation, but one comic showed how Locutus could've doomed the TNG era.

Captain Picard and the crew of the Enterprise have been to the brightest stars and darkest corners of the Star Trek universe. One of their most iconic adventures is depicted across two episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation   entitled "The Best of Both Worlds." The crew has a run-in with the Borg, a race of hive-mind-controlled aliens hellbent on assimilating the universe into their collective. In the special, Picard is captured by the Borg and forced to become Locutus, a sort of living command center. Fortunately for Picard and the people of Earth, the crew of the Enterprise is able to free Picard and stop the Borg before it wipes out the entire Federation and assimilates the entire human race.

However, things didn't end so cleanly in one of Star Trek's many divergent timelines.  Writer Michael Jan Friedman and artist Peter Krause explore the answers to these daunting questions in their 1993 Star Trek: The Next Generation storyline "The Worst of Both Worlds," which ran from Star Trek: TNG #47-50. The story begins on the Enterprise years after the events of "The Best of Both Worlds." Picard and crew are on a fairly routine mission to Mardion Three, which is uncomfortably close to Wolf 359, where they once fought the Borg.

Suddenly, they are pulled into an "anomaly" which pulls them into an alternate dimension. Before Picard and Riker can begin to understand what's happened, they encounter a second Enterprise which quickly beams them aboard. Worf's warrior instincts immediately kick in and he lunges at the mysterious people who have taken them onto their ship without permission only to find himself face to face with a version of himself. In fact, everyone on this ship is a doppelganger of an Enterprise crew member.

Related: Star Trek: How the Borg Assimilated the Universe's Most Dangerous Aliens

After their initial fracas, the captain of the alternative Enterprise introduces himself in an effort to make sense of the situation. Where readers might expect to find an alternative Picard, they instead find a haggard, eye-patch-wearing William T. Riker in his place. Riker explains that in this universe, the Enterprise and humanity lost the battle of the Borg. They were unable to free Picard, who is still the Locutus to this day. Sadly, Picard wasn't the only crew member they lost. Data, Counselor Troi, Guinan and Keiko all died tragically at the hands of the Borg. Later, Wesley reveals that his mother, Doctor Beverly Crusher, was most likely assimilated when the Borg got to earth. In fact, in this timeline - 90% of humanity is under the control of the Borg.

Related: Star Trek: How Doctor Who Crashed Into the Next Generation

The tragic results of their confrontation with the Borg has changed the crew, who are far more bitter and angry than their counterparts. Their sole purpose is to fight the Borg empire. Worf blames himself for not being able to rescue his captain; Geordi La Forge can't even look at the main universe's Data because he is too painful of a reminder of the friend he lost and Comms officer Miles O'Brien still grieves the loss of his wife Keiko. There is a particularly heartbreaking moment when O'Brien meets the other Keiko and her daughter. This glimpse of the family he might have had, the family another version of him has is clearly too difficult for him to handle.

Another significant difference between the two universes can be found in the presence of Commander Shelby. In the "Best of Both Worlds" timeline, Shelby leaves the Enterprise after a short stint to help rebuild the parts of the Federation that the Borg destroyed. But in this timeline, she is still aboard the Enterprise and full of bitter resentment for Captain Riker for not following her lead years ago.

After seeing the plight of the crew and the universe, Picard and his crew agree to help rescue Locutus and defeat the Borg. After all, they've done it once already, and this time they have two ships. Both crews journey to Earth where Locutus is being held. They fight a horde of Borg soldiers and manage to beam back onto the Enterprise with Locutus in tow, but they aren't unscathed, as this universe's Worf died in the battle. Data establishes a neural link to the Locutus and commands all of the Borg soldiers to "Eat" at once. This causes them to drain all of their power sources, thus defeating the Borg empire and freeing Picard.

Related: Star Trek: The Next Generation's Original Villains Were SUPPOSED to Be the Ferengi

Once Picard has recovered from his time as Locutus, he reveals that he channeled all of humanity's subconscious desire to defeat the Borg to open up a rift between dimensions and summon the other Enterprise. The original crew heads back home through the same dimensional rift, leaving behind a newly freed, but still wounded universe.

While Star Trek: The Next Generation featured plenty of timelines where events played out differently, this stands as one of the darkest turns of events in this iteration of the sci-fi franchise. The Borg were arguably this era's definitive villains, and plenty of Picard's adventures involved trying to stop the Borg from assimilating Earth. While those timelines were only ever glimpsed on the show, this storyline highlighted the immense personal costs of defeat in agonizing detail.

Keep Reading: Star Trek: The Next Generation - Why the Beloved Series Ended

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Locutus of Borg is a villainous Borg who was given that name rather than a standard Borg designation (ie. Seven of Nine) and a supporting antagonist in Star Trek: The Next Generation . Before and after assimilation, he is known as Jean-Luc Picard , captain of starships USS Stargazer, USS Enterprise D & E.

He was portrayed by Patrick Stewart who also played King Goobot in Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius , John Bosley in Charlie’s Angels , Pharaoh Seti I in The Prince of Egypt , Darcy Banker in Green Room , King Buffo in Courage the Cowardly Dog , Rafe Bentley in Masterminds , Avery Bullock in American Dad! , Dr. Jonas in Conspiracy Theory , King Claudius in Hamlet and Nettlebrand in Dragon Rider .

• 1.1 Initial assimilation of Picard
• 1.3 Re-assimilation
• 1.4 Locutus's Last Stand
• 5 Navigation

Biography [ ]

Initial assimilation of picard [ ].

TNG Best of Both Worlds Part 1 - Cliffhanger

Locutus was created when the Borg assimilated Jean-Luc Picard to act as the Collective's voice to the Federation, to prepare the people of the Federation for assimilation. Locutus ceased to exist when the link with the Collective was severed and Picard was returned to normal. The memory of his time as Locutus would haunt Picard for many years to come.

Locutus returned in 2376 when, in the first stages of an invasion of the Alpha Quadrant, the Borg assimilated a Dominion cloning facility and recreated the assimilated form of Picard.

This Locutus led the Borg invasion, and in one timeline succeeded in the complete assimilation of the Federation leading the Borg forces to take Earth. However, with the help of the USS Premonition Picard was able to take the USS Enterprise-E back in time to prevent the Borg invasion. Locutus's Cube was destroyed but he managed to escape in a Borg Sphere fleeing back in time to destroy the USS Enterprise-D shortly after its first mission to Farpoint Station. Fortunately the USS Premonition followed Locutus back and destroyed the Sphere before it could attack the Enterprise and alter history.

Re-assimilation [ ]

In 2380, Picard again heard the "voice" of the Borg and discovered the location of a nearby hive that was close to completing construction on a giant cube and resurrecting the Borg Queen by transforming a normal drone into the appropriate female form.

Defying the orders of Admiral Kathryn Janeway, Picard diverted the Enterprise from her assigned mission, and went to confront the Borg.

After losing an Away Team to the Borg, who now attacked on sight, Picard determined that the only way to get close enough to the queen to destroy her was to infiltrate himself, as Locutus.

His transformation was accomplished by Dr. Beverly Crusher, who implanted a chip in Picard's Borg cybernetics that would allow him to remain himself.

The operation didn't go as planned and Picard was captured by the Queen, who finished his transformation back into Locutus. Utilizing a Romulan cloaking device, Commander Worf brought the Enterprise within range of the cube and began a rescue operation.

Locutus's Last Stand [ ]

The Queen was defeated by Dr. Crusher, who had developed a way to reverse the Queen's transformation and revert her to normal drone. With the Queen's defeat all of her drones, including Locutus, went into hibernation mode.

Upon returning with Locutus/Picard to the Enterprise, Dr. Crusher was able to reverse the process, and restore Picard.

At some point in the same year, Picard encountered the rogue Vulcan T'Uerell who was attempting to form a Collective of her own in order to impose her cold logic and order on the galaxy. When she encountered Picard's assembled task force of Federation, Klingon Empire and Romulan Star Empire; she referred to Picard as Locutus.

Although his existence was brief, Locutus' actions left their mark more particularly on Picard. Soon after becoming himself again, Picard returned to his family at La Barre where he came to terms with what he had been through.

In 2369, the Commander Benjamin Sisko briefly met Picard on the Deep Space Nine station and he showed him hostility due to Locutus' actions leading to his wife's death, although his resentment is misplaced as Picard was in no way responsible for the actions of Locutus. Shortly after being entrusted with the station, Sisko was finally able to make peace with Picard.

Reluctantly, Picard posed as Locutus in the presence of a Borg cut from the Collective, Third of Five (Later known as Hugh), to test his newfound individuality.

In 2373, Picard was tormented by memories and nightmares of his assimilation during the second attempted invasion of the Borg on earth. Picard's traumatic experience, however, enabled him to deal severe blows to the Borg cubes thanks to Locutus' knowledge. Picard also crossed paths with the Borg Queen whom he had already met as Locutus.

In 2399, Picard meets another former Borg, Seven of Nine, who asks him if he has regained all his humanity. Picard admits he never really recovered but he and she are doing the best they can to try.

Picard later visits a former Borg cube renamed the Artefact which brings back his traumatic memories until he happily reunites with Hugh, now the executive director of the Artefact. The latter reassures Picard shortly afterwards that he is no longer Locutus.

However, unknown to Picard, his assimilation as Locutus had left him slowly dying from the Borg DNA still in his brain. After his death, a rogue Changeling faction led by Vadic recovered his body, and using that Borg DNA, implemented it into the Federation transporter system and Starfleet mainframe, infecting anyone who used the transporter with Borg DNA, turning them into unknowing dormant Borg Drones awaiting the command signal to awaken and carry out the Borg Queen 's endgame against the Federation. Worse still, Jack had inherited that Borg DNA himself, so when he surrendered to the Borg Queen, he became Vox of Borg, successor to Locutus, and the command signal for the Queen's endgame.

When Picard, Riker, and Worf infiltrate the Queen's Super-Cube to recover Jack, Picard, out of his own free will, reconnects to the Collective, momentarily being reminded of Locutus as he rejoins the Borg hive-mind, where he manages to break Jack free of the hive-mind by offering to stay with him in it forever out of love. Upon snapping out of the Borg hive-mind, Jack rips himself and Picard free, thus ensuring the end of both Locutus and Vox, while the Queen herself perishes with the Super-Cube after the Enterprise -D destroyed the beacon sending out the command signal, triggering a massive self-destruct of the Cube, and freeing all the assimilated Starfleet youth and fleet from Borg control forever, but leaving them traumatized by what they had and almost had done. Thus, with the Borg gone forever, Locutus was nothing more than a distant memory Picard could finally lay to rest.

Gallery [ ]

• Locutus of Borg spoke the first line of the series Star Trek: Deep Space Nine during the infamous Battle of Wolf 359, that being "Resistance is futile. You will disarm your weapons and escort us to Sector 001. If you attempt to intervene, we will destroy you.".

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Locutus was created when the Borg assimilated Jean-Luc Picard to act as Speaker of the Borg Collective to the Federation , to prepare the people of the Federation for assimilation. Locutus ceased to exist when the link with the Collective was severed and Picard was returned to normal. ( TNG episode : " The Best of Both Worlds ") The memory of his time as Locutus haunted Picard for many years. ( TNG movie : Star Trek: First Contact , et al.)

• 1 Locutus cloned
• 2.1 Parallel universes
• 3 Alternate timeline
• 4.1 External link

Locutus cloned [ ]

Locutus, the clone.

Locutus returned in 2376 when in the first stages of an invasion of the Alpha Quadrant the Borg assimilated a Dominion cloning facility and recreated the assimilated form of Picard.

This Locutus lead the Borg invasion, and in one timeline succeeded in the complete assimilation of the Federation leading the Borg forces to take Earth . However, with the help of the USS Premonition , Picard was able to take the USS Enterprise -E back in time to prevent the Borg invasion. Locutus's Cube was destroyed but he managed to escape in a Borg Sphere fleeing back in time to destroy the USS Enterprise -D shortly after its first mission to Farpoint Station . Fortunately, the USS Premonition followed Locutus back and destroyed the Sphere before it could attack the Enterprise and alter history. The clone died as a result. ( ST video game : Armada )

Locutus returns [ ]

Resistance .

In 2380 , Picard again heard the "voice" of the Borg and discovered the location of a nearby hive that was close to completing construction on a giant cube and resurrecting the Borg Queen by transforming a normal drone into the appropriate female form.

Defying the orders of Admiral Kathryn Janeway , Picard diverted the Enterprise from her assigned mission, and went to confront the Borg.

After losing an Away Team to the Borg, who now attacked on sight, Picard determined that the only way to get close enough to the queen to destroy her was to infiltrate himself, as Locutus.

His transformation was accomplished by Dr. Beverly Crusher , who implanted a chip in Picard's Borg cybernetics that would allow him to remain himself.

The operation didn't go as planned and Picard was captured by the Queen, who finished his transformation back into Locutus. Using a Romulan cloaking device , Commander Worf brought the Enterprise within range of the cube and began a rescue operation.

The Queen was defeated by Dr. Crusher, who had developed a way to reverse the Queen's transformation and revert her to a normal drone. With the Queen's defeat, all of her drones, including Locutus, went into hibernation mode.

Upon returning with Locutus/Picard to the Enterprise , Dr. Crusher reversed the process and restored Picard. ( TNG novel : Resistance )

At some point in the same year, Picard encountered the rogue Vulcan T'Uerell who was attempting to form a Collective of her own in order to impose her cold logic and order on the galaxy. When she encountered Picard's assembled task force of Federation, Klingon Empire and Romulan Star Empire ; she referred to Picard as Locutus. ( ST video game : Legacy )

Also in the same year, the Borg appeared in orbit of Earth claiming that they had encountered a powerful alien from an alternate universe. They specifically requested the help of Picard. This turned out to be a Borg ruse, however, and the fleet was decimated. But when a version of Data appeared from the future, having been sent by Locutus of 500 years hence, Picard agreed to allow himself to be assimilated again, directly by the queen. He briefly became Locutus again, but in the process introduced a nanovirus to the collective that destroyed them utterly. ( TNG comic : " Hive ")

Parallel universes [ ]

In a parallel universe where (among other differences) the USS Enterprise -D 's attempt to retrieve Locutus during the initial invasion failed, Locutus managed to circumvent the collective to open rifts to different universes. ( TNG comic : " The Worst of Both Worlds ")

The Enterprise crew from both universes worked together to retrieve Locutus from the former Starfleet headquarters on Earth and implement an "eat" command, destroying the Borg by forcing them to draw energy all at once. Beverly Crusher then restored the alternate Picard to human form. ( TNG comic : " And Death Shall Have No Dominion ")

In 2375 , Q took Picard to other parallel universes , in order to bring balance to all of reality. They arrived in one where Locutus continued to thrive; deadlier and more consistent than the version of "their" universe. Q was actually relieved when " mon Capitain " finally stopped his pursuit of them, with an explosion. ( TNG novel : I, Q )

Alternate timeline [ ]

In an alternate timeline , the Borg succeeded in a ruse to destroy most of Starfleet and, in the process, they re-assimilated Picard. He once again became Locutus, and reigned for 500 years alongside the Borg Queen. He then recreated Data from his stored intelligence and sent him on a mission to the past to destroy the Borg. ( TNG comic : " Hive ")

Appendices [ ]

External link [ ].

• Locutus article at Memory Alpha , the wiki for canon Star Trek .
• 1 The Chase
• 2 Preserver (race)
• 3 J.P. Hanson

Screen Rant

Picard season 3 answers a 27 year old star trek first contact question.

Star Trek: Picard season 3 drops huge revelations about Jack Crusher that also answer a lingering question about Jean-Luc in Star Trek: First Contact.

Warning: SPOILERS for Star Trek: Picard Season 3, Episode 9 - "VOX" Star Trek: Picard season 3's penultimate episode answers a Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart) question from Star Trek: First Contact that has lingered for 27 years. In Picard season 3, episode 9, "VOX," Jack Crusher learns he is not just the son of Picard and Dr. Beverly Crusher (Gates McFadden), but he is also the product of genetic manipulation by the Borg Queen. Jack's destiny is to be VOX, the voice of the Borg, whereas Jean-Luc Picard only spoke for the Borg when he was assimilated into Locutus in Star Trek: The Next Generation .

Star Trek: First Contact was a sequel to the TNG classic "The Best of Both Worlds," and the film began with Captain Picard having nightmares about the Borg. But Picard's visions of being Locutus turned out to be a warning that the Borg were on their way to invade Earth. Yet Jean-Luc could still hear the Borg's voices even though it had been years since he was reclaimed. This allowed Picard to anticipate the Borg's tactics and even identify the Cube's weakness, so it could be destroyed by Starfleet, although Jean-Luc chalked it up to residual memories of his time as Locutus. Yet Picard's continuing connection to the cybernetic villains and the Borg Queen (Alice Krige) was never explained... until Star Trek: Picard season 3.

Related: First Contact Is The Origin Story Star Trek Needed

Picard Season 3 Answers A 27-Year-Old Star Trek: First Contact Question

As Commodore Geordi La Forge (LeVar Burton) told Jean-Luc after analyzing his DNA in Star Trek: Picard season 3, episode 9, the Borg never truly let Picard go. Jean-Luc's mechanical Borg implants were completely removed from his body when he was reclaimed in TNG , but 35 years ago, no one realized or could have detected what else the Borg left behind: organic Borg DNA in Picard's brain. This organic DNA was remnants of Locutus that was misdiagnosed as Irumodic Syndrome. Worse, Jean-Luc passed the organic Borg DNA to his biological son, Jack Crusher .

Picard's latent organic Borg DNA that never left his system after he was turned into Locutus explains how he was still able to hear the Borg in Star Trek: First Contact. The Borg Queen maintained a link to Picard even as she tried to seduce and turn Lt. Commander Data (Brent Spiner) into her partner in First Contact. Captain Picard thought he severed his connection to the Borg when he killed the Queen and broke her mechanical spine - a symbolic snapping of his tie to the Borg. But it simply wasn't so, as the Borg had already seeded themselves in Picard's brain when he was Locutus, and that organic DNA remained until Jean-Luc's death.

How Picard Season 3 Retcons Jean-Luc's Season 1 Death

Admiral Jean-Luc Picard died at the end of Star Trek: Picard season 1, and Dr. Altan Inigo Soong (Brent Spiner) transferred Picard's consciousness into his Golem, a synthetic body that was then custom-made into a new, positronic Picard. At the time, it was accepted that Picard died from Irumodic Syndrome, but as Dr. Beverly Crusher confirms, he never had it to begin with. The organic Borg DNA in Picard's brain simulated the symptoms of Irumodic Syndrome and the elderly Jean-Luc died from its side effects 20 years after he passed on that Borg DNA to his son, Jack Crusher.

After Picard's death, Dr. Soong analyzed Picard's brain and detected an anomaly as Jean-Luc's corpse was stored in Daystrom Station. The Changelings led by Captain Vadic (Amanda Plummer) learned about Picard's brain from their alliance with the Borg, and they stole Picard's corpse to extract the Borg DNA from Jean-Luc's brain. The Changelings then used this organic Borg DNA to infect the transporters of Starfleet ships they infiltrated in order to clandestinely assimilate Starfleet Officers. All of this happened while Picard, Jack Crusher, and Starfleet were none the wiser until Star Trek: Picard season 3, episode 9 dropped the veil on this insidious, far-reaching Borg/Changeling plot that simultaneously answers an old question from Star Trek: First Contact .

Star Trek: Picard Season 3 streams Thursdays on Paramount+.

Star Trek's Borg Owe A Big Debt To Alien

• The Borg, inspired by Alien's design, are a formidable and chilling foe in the Star Trek universe.
• Originally insectoid, the Borg's cybernetic humanoids reflect a blend of organic and mechanical elements.
• H.R. Giger's influence on the Borg design continues to shape modern Star Trek iterations, like Star Trek: Picard.

The Borg remain one of Star Trek 's best villains, and their design owes a debt to the Alien franchise. Introduced in Star Trek: The Next Generation season 2, episode 16, "Q Who," the Borg make one of the most memorable entrances of any Star Trek villain. When Captain Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart) and the crew of the USS Enterprise-D first encounter the cybernetic drones, they quickly realize that, unlike any alien threat they have faced before, the Borg cannot be reasoned with. The United Federation of Planets' ideals of diplomacy and peaceful first contact prove ineffective, as do the weapons and shields of Starfleet's armada of starships.

The Borg were originally imagined as an insectoid species with a hive mind, but this proved too expensive. So the Borg became cybernetic humanoids, and the idea of a collective hive mind was adapted for the new type of Borg. Initially, the plan was to introduce the Borg in Star Trek: The Next Generation' s season 1 finale, in an episode that would have been part one of a trilogy. However, the 1988 Writers Guild of America strike halted those plans, and the Borg introduction was pushed forward several episodes. As for the design of the Borg drones and their technology, this was largely inspired by the designs of artist H. R. Giger, who created the xenomorph in Alien .

The design of the Borg also drew inspiration from the character Lord Dread from the 1987 television series Captain Power and the Soldiers of the Future .

Everyone In Star Trek Who Beat The Borg

Star trek's borg were influenced by alien designer h.r. giger, alien's influence can be seen in the design of the borg drones themselves, as well as the interior of their ships..

Known for his images that combined human bodies and machines, Swiss artist H.R. Giger was part of the Academy Award-winning special effects team for 1979's Alien . After director Ridley Scott saw Giger's designs, particularly his painting entitled Necronom IV , Scott recruited Giger to design the alien for the film as well as the alien's environment and the derelict spacecraft. Giger designed every version of the alien, including the "facehugger," "chestburster," and the adult xenomorph. With their combination of organic and mechanical elements, Giger's creations in Alien led to some of the most memorable body horror moments in cinema.

In much of H.R. Giger's work, it's hard to tell where the organic ends and the mechanical begins.

While the look of the Borg is not quite as visceral as the various forms of the xenomorph , the combination of organic and mechanical elements remains disturbing. In much of H.R. Giger's work, it's hard to tell where the organic ends and the mechanical begins. From the adult Borg drones to the baby Borg discovered by Commander William Riker (Jonathan Frakes) in "Q Who," there is something inherently horrifying about parts of the humanoid body being replaced by mechanical parts. This concept is later more fully realized when the Borg assimilate Captain Picard as their mouthpiece, Locutus.

Showrunner Terry Matalas Referenced Giger When Describing Star Trek: Picard Season 3's Borg Queen

Modern star trek creators continue to be influenced by giger's work..

In a 2023 interview with Entertainment Weekly , Star Trek: Picard season 3 showrunner Terry Matalas spoke about the Borg Queen (Alice Krige) , and the process that went into designing her new look. The Borg Queen of Star Trek: First Contact had a more obviously human appearance (her ability to detach her head from her body notwithstanding). But the Borg Queen of Picard season 3 has seen her collective destroyed and nearly been destroyed herself. Matalas describes this Borg Queen as an "H.R. Giger-esque demon," and, with her emaciated appearance, she certainly looks the part.

While the Borg had become somewhat less frightening over their many appearances in Star Trek: Voyager and beyond, Star Trek: Picard season 3 made the Borg genuinely frightening again. Alien may have focused more on the graphic elements of H.R. Giger's work, but the Borg exemplify the horrifying idea of machines taking over one's humanity. Star Trek depicts a very different version of the future from the one seen in Ridley Scott's Alien , but both franchises looked to H.R. Giger to craft some of the most iconic science fiction monsters of all time.

Source: Entertainment Weekly

Star Trek: The Next Generation & Star Trek: Picard are available to stream on Paramount+.

Star Trek: The Next Generation

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

Release Date September 28, 1987

Franchise(s) Star Trek

Writers Jeri Taylor, Michael Piller, Rick Berman, Brannon Braga, Ronald D. Moore

Directors David Carson

Showrunner Jeri Taylor, Michael Piller, Rick Berman

Where To Watch Paramount+

Star Trek: Picard

Cast Orla Brady, Michael Dorn, LeVar Burton, Brent Spiner, Jonathan Frakes, Jeri Ryan, Patrick Stewart, Alison Pill, Isa Briones, Evan Evagora, Marina Sirtis, Amanda Plummer, Whoopi Goldberg, Gates McFadden, Todd Stashwick, Santiago Cabrera, Michelle Hurd, John de Lancie, Ed Speleers

Release Date January 23, 2020

Writers Akiva Goldsman, Terry Matalas, Michael Chabon

Directors Terry Matalas, Jonathan Frakes

Showrunner Akiva Goldsman, Terry Matalas, Michael Chabon

Hi, what are you looking for?

TREKNEWS.NET | Your daily dose of Star Trek news and opinion

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Review: Star Trek: Picard – Firewall

Seven of Nine, a heroine who has resurged in popularity thanks to Jeri Ryan’s return to the franchise in Star Trek: Picard , is now the subject of a much-deserved character spotlight from veteran Star Trek author David Mack . Mack’s bibliography includes the end of the Star Trek literary universe as we know it, the landmark Star Trek: Destiny trilogy , and dozens of other Star Trek publications. Considering Firewall ’s author and its complex protagonist, fans should be happy to know Mack delivers a worthy tie-in to Picard , capably filling in Seven’s story between the end of Star Trek: Voyager and the beginning of Picard .

Firewall begins two years after Voyager returns from its harrowing journey on the other side of the galaxy, and Seven is at an inflection point in her life. She’s a stranger in a strange land, and the people of Earth, who are terrified of the Borg, don’t let her forget it. Members of Voyager’s crew – indeed, Seven’s adopted family – have gone their separate ways. Seven is alone, save for a precious but tenuous mother-daughter relationship with now-Admiral Kathryn Janeway. But even this relationship doesn’t stop Seven from wanting to forge her path in the stars since her track doesn’t lie within Starfleet thanks to the organization’s xenophobic resistance to bringing an ex-Borg into their ranks.

Seven’s journey brings her first to a supposed member of the Federation Security Agency, who tasks her with infiltrating the extrajudicial Fenris Rangers. But this ragtag group of law keepers ends up being a place of supreme significance to Seven’s personal and professional life – so much so that she ends up eschewing a place in Starfleet to stay in their ranks.

Yes, Firewall is Seven’s origin story as it relates to Picard . While we received a few details in the show about her journey to the law-keeping but legally dubious security agency, it wasn’t a stretch to assume her story would one day be expanded. Mack has crafted a tale that shows Seven finally allowing people into her inner shell, much, in the same way, a computer firewall allows programs it deems safe. These people include love interests, mentors, and new friends; indeed, two of the standout characters in this book are Ellory Kayd, a fellow Ranger with whom Seven strikes up a passionate romance, and Keon Harper, an older Ranger who becomes the Obi-Wan to Seven’s Luke. While we obviously won’t spoil the state of these relationships by the end of the book, suffice to say we were fascinated at how Seven explored the torrent of emotions she experiences traversing the Qiris Sector, and how they helped transform her from the ex-Borg we knew on Voyager to the hardened do-gooder in Picard .

Mack knows the Star Trek universe, so it’s no surprise he’s able to rope in plenty of familiar elements to help the book’s worldbuilding – including, most excitingly, a familiar ship and crew from Star Trek: Prodigy . But we were surprised at how much Mack’s tapestry of Seven’s journey matched Picard ’s tone, which is of course completely appropriate for such a tie-in book . Many of the places Seven visits, such as the burnt-to-a-crisp Soroya IV, the metropolis Star Wars- esque Otroya II, and the lawless Qiris sector, are all places perfectly at home in Picard ’s culture. Likewise, villains in this book, such as the warlord Kohgish and the sneaky Arastoo Mardani, are some of the most memorable antagonists we’ve read in recent Star Trek books; they both cast a peculiar shade of darkness across the proceedings, and its no wonder Seven is so hardened by the time we see her in Picard .

Of course, it wouldn’t be a Star Trek book without a heart of light, and readers can look forward to a sentimental message at the core of Mack’s novel: found family can be everything. Indeed, it might be fair to say Seven’s new friends and loved ones help her more in Firewall than any single member of Voyager ’s crew during the ex-Borg’s time on that ship. Seven’s journey in Firewall directly sets her on the path to important character development we see in her in Picard , such as emotional intelligence, vigilante altruism, and, ultimately, major leadership responsibility. Rest assured, fans of Jeri Ryan’s character will find a lot to like in this book.

We appreciate Firewall because it offers valuable context for Star Trek: Picard fans. How and why Seven came to be the reborn hero we know and love is a vital part of the character’s happy ending on the bridge of the Enterprise-G , and Firewall fills in the context Picard didn’t care, or have time, to show. Finally, we’d be remiss if we didn’t mention Firewall ends on a chilling note regarding a particularly tragic aspect of Seven’s story in season one of Picard — so you can look forward to that.

You can buy Star Trek: Picard: Firewall on Amazon now.

Stay tuned to TrekNews.net for all the latest Star Trek merchandise news, plus details on Star Trek: Strange New Worlds , Star Trek: Picard , Star Trek: Discovery , Star Trek: Lower Decks , Star Trek: Prodigy , and more.

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Kyle Hadyniak has been a lifelong Star Trek fan, and isn't ashamed to admit that Star Trek V: The Final Frontier and Star Trek: Nemesis are his favorite Star Trek movies. You can follow Kyle on Twitter @khady93 .

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

The USS Discovery is on a mad chase across the galaxy for one of Star Trek’s biggest secrets

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Calling back to a single 30-year-old episode of television is a time-honored Star Trek tradition , one that’s led the franchise to some of its most fascinating detours. And in its two-episode season premiere, Star Trek: Discovery seems to be kicking off an entire season calling back to one particular episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation .

And not just any episode! The 1993 installment of Next Gen in question delivered a revelation so seemingly earth-shaking that it should have rewritten galactic politics on a massive scale. But then, as was the way in the 1990s era of episodic TV, nobody ever mentioned it again.

At least until now.

[ Ed. note: This piece contains spoilers for the first two episodes of Star Trek: Discovery season 5.]

Writer Michelle Paradise and director Olatunde Osunsanmi lay out the connection at the end of the first of two episodes released this week, “Red Directive.” Discovery’s mission is to follow a series of ancient clues leading to a cache of ancient technology, and to get there before a couple of professional thieves, Moll (Eve Harlow) and L’ak (Elias Toufexis), do.

The technology, as Doctor Kovich (David Cronenberg) explains, belongs to the so-called Progenitors, a barely understood ancient spacefaring species that “created life as we know it […] every humanoid species in the galaxy.” Presumably such tech holds the key to understanding how the Progenitors did that, and how that power could be used again.

The Progenitors are from the Star Trek episode “The Chase”

Kovich also calls up a helpful video presentation of the moment the Progenitors were discovered by an assembled group of Federation, Klingon, Romulan, and Cardassian captains, including Jean-Luc Picard. But you don’t have to be a Star Trek lore nerd to know you’re actually just looking at clips from an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation .

Specifically, from the 20th episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation ’s sixth season, “The Chase,” in which Picard and crew discover pieces of a computer program hidden inside the DNA of species from dozens of different planets. Questions abound: What does the program do? And what kind of entity could have been so ancient and powerful that it had determined the genetic legacy of most of the known galaxy before sentient life had even evolved here — and then left no trace of its existence except the genetic codes themselves?

In a nutshell, the mysterious death of Captain Picard’s old archeology professor (did you know that if he hadn’t gone into Starfleet, Jean-Luc was studying to be a space archeologist? Well, now you do) sets the captain and the Enterprise on a search for the missing DNA fragments necessary to complete his unfinished work.

The action of the episode becomes a grand chase, as Klingon and Cardassian captains come to believe the program must be a great weapon or dangerous secret. Eventually Picard and his rivals all discover the lonely planet with the final DNA strain — and when they get there, some Romulans who’ve been secretly following all of them show up, too, just to make things even more tense.

In the end, the program isn’t a weapon or a secret, but a message from an ancient race of humanoids that apparently created sentient life in our galaxy as we know it.

Actor Salome Jens appears as a Progenitor hologram, and delivers a speech that’s stirring by any standard of Star Trek monologues, telling the story of a race of sentients that took to the stars and found them empty. They had evolved too early to meet other forms of sentient life, and knew that their time was too limited to ever expect to.

“We knew that one day we would be gone; that nothing of us would survive, so we left you,” Jens’ Progenitor explains. The Progenitors seeded humanoid life across the galaxy in their own image; life that tended to evolve into bipedal, tailless, largely hairless creatures with two eyes and two arms and five fingers on each hand. And they left clues in the genetic signature of their work, broken up among the stars.

Wait, was this really all about lampshading the limits of Star Trek’s alien design?

Kinda, yes! The writers of “The Chase,” Ron Moore and Joe Menosky, were inspired by elements of Carl Sagan’s Contact , but also by Menosky’s pet fascination creating an in-universe explanation for why all the common alien species in Star Trek are basically shaped like humans (albeit with latex on their faces).

In other hands, it would be hokey and trite, but even under heavy makeup, Jens sells the hell out of her single scene on voice and stance alone — it’s no wonder she was asked back to the Trek fold to play a major antagonist role in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine .

“It was our hope that you would have to come together in fellowship and companionship to hear this message, and if you can see and hear me, our hope has been fulfilled,” the Progenitor hologram concludes, with gentle compassion. “You are a monument, not to our greatness, but to our existence. That was our wish: That you, too, would know life. [...] There is something of us in each of you, and so something of you in each other.”

But though “The Chase” carried a sweeping revelation, nothing ever really panned out from it. You’d think that a message of togetherness that fundamentally rewrote the origin of life in the universe would have to have tweaked Star Trek’s galactic politics a bit, right? Seems like this would give the Star Trek setting a radically different understanding of the origins of life than we have in the real world — this is literally intelligent design! At the very least there’d be some other characters talking about how humans and Vulcans, Klingons and Romulans and Ferengi and Cardassians and Trill and Bajorans, all share the same genetic ancestor.

But nope: The Pandora’s box of Progenitor lore remained closed. Gene Roddenberry’s successor and Trek producer Rick Berman seems to have been disenchanted with the episode’s reveal — and you can’t really blame him for not wanting to rock the whole cosmology of Star Trek in an episode that’s mostly about explaining how if you turn the DNA snippets like this they make a cool spiral. Now look at this computer screen with the spiral :

Except now, Star Trek: Discovery is opening the box and rocking the boat. This new mad, puzzle-box chase around the galaxy promises to expand on the Progenitors, an idea so big that not even The Next Generation was willing to touch it. It’s a tall order, but Discovery has never been more free to shake up Star Trek continuity than it is right now — we’ll have to wait for more episodes of the show’s final season to find out how free it intends to be.

Star Trek: Discovery is finally free to do whatever it wants

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