Star Trek Reboot Killed Picard, Seven of Nine, and the House of Mogh

Promotional photo for Star Trek by Paramount Pictures

People often wonder what life would be like if events in the past played out differently instead of the way they did. A change in past events can easily end up worsening a situation just as easy as it can improve the present day.

This happened in the Star Trek universe when it was rebooted after Nero traveled back in time for his revenge on Spock. While the movie was enjoyable, everything in the Star Trek universe was changed. Not just what you saw in the trilogy of reboot movies released to date, but it also changed the universe in other ways you may not have noticed.

For starters, the changing of the universe surely affected the future captain-ship of the USS Enterprises. This means that Jean-Luc Picard may or may not be the future captain of Enterprise D. It's even possible that he not only may not become the captain, he may also decide to enter the field of archeology after making the choice to follow in his favorite professor's footsteps. If the leadership of not only the Enterprise, but also the Federation is shifted around in the past, who knows what the future may hold for other Enterprises.

Another change in the universe is that now with present day events in the original series changed, there's a good chance that the famous kiss between Captain Kirk and Lieutenant Uhara may never happen. With Uhara and Spock being romantically involved, the storyline from a romantic standpoint has forever changed.

A third change in the universe affects Star Trek: Voyager. With the planet Vulcan now obliterated, future Vulcans such as Tuvok will surely never be born. If his ancestors died in the near extinction of the Vulcan species when Nero blew up the planet Vulcan, Tuvok cannot exist in the future universe. Even if his ancestors are one of the survivors that the elder Spock led, the tragedy would surely change the storyline completely.


In the category of diplomatic relations, if the TNG has changed because of prior events, what will become of the House of Mogh? Not only would Worf's history be changed, but his grandfather, Colonel Worf, who was the legal advocate for Kirk and McCoy in Star Trek VI: Undiscovered County, may have never come to defend them after they were accused of murdering Chancellor Gorkon. With the universe changed, Gorkon may never meet Kirk and McCoy, Colonel Worf's history may take a different direction, and eventually his grandson may never find himself in the Federation, working for Captain Jean-Luc Picard.

Lastly, if the storyline to the original universe is changed, it can be assumed that first contact with the Borg may change. With Picard possibly not leading the Enterprise D, he could never be assimilated and become Locutus. The movie Star Trek: First Contact is completely out the window. Also, Seven of Nine may never become a member of Voyager, if she is ever even assimilated in the first place.

The new reboot of the Star Trek movies have been wonderful so far, led by good acting and intriguing storylines that lead to more debates. It unfortunately leaves the future of the universe up in the air, possibly destroying it as we all know it. On their own, the reboot holds up, but if it changes the future of the greatest captain (Jean-Luc Picard), then was the change worth it?

How Captain Jean-Luc Picard Influenced Me

Screencap taken from an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation

There are not too many characters on television that can go multiple seasons and remain a true hero type the entire run. I'm not necessarily talking about super powers when I say hero. Just someone that can remain a role model for every episode during a show's run. Often a protagonist-type of character will have at least some sort of slip up if their television series runs long enough (unless you're in a sitcom).

One character that remained the positive role model type for 178 episodes.

His name was Captain Jean-Luc Picard.

Out of all the main cast members from Star Trek: The Next Generation, Picard was the only one that remained a positive character for every episode. Data turned evil when his brother Lore and the Borg teamed up; Riker fell under the influence of Q for an episode; and even La Forge got in a war of words with Wesley when it came to Crusher's dating life.

You could say that Picard may have been swayed towards the dark side when he became Locutus of the Borg. I would argue that with the nanobots that transformed Picard into a member of the Borg, he was temporarily no longer himself, but a whole separate person.

Now to get to the point of this post. I give you the things that I have learned from Jean-Luc Picard.

1. Earl Grey Tea - I have had tea many times in my life, but it wasn't until Picard would order the replicator to make him Earl Grey tea that I even knew there were other flavors. I only thought tea came in one flavor. Because of Picard, I found out that tea could have a hint of citrus. As I grew older, I found that I actually preferred tea to most non-alcoholic drinks. Not just hot tea, but iced tea as well. This revelation came because of Captain Picard's obsessive ordering of the same flavor of tea.

2. Pulp Fiction - I have always been the bookworm type. It wasn't until Captain Picard entered the holodeck and assumed the role of the private detective known as Dixon Hill before I knew what mid-twentieth century pulp fiction was. It was because of the Dixon Hill character that Picard loved that I became interested in the cheesy but interesting storylines. This eventually led to my love of movies such as LA Confidential. In some way it may have been one of the factors to my current career as both a writer and online investigator.

3. Whiskey - Maybe this isn't a positive aspect I learned from Picard, but his choice of alcohol is Aldebaran whiskey. Obviously I can't try an alien brand of whiskey, but it led me to try whiskey first out of all the hard liquors. Now, out of all the hard liquors out there, I found that I enjoy a nice whiskey the most. The moment Picard shared a shot of whiskey with Scotty from the original series was an awesome moment for me. It connected my favorite character from the original series to one of my favorite characters from the newer series.

4. Never Back Down - In fairness, I've learned this from many different avenues of influence in my life. Picard was just one of those who cemented this thinking into my personality. Even when confronted with malevolent characters with god-like powers such as Q and Ardra, Picard never flinches. From episode one of the Next Generation series, Picard matches wits with characters of undeniable powers and in every case, he defeats them through will and occasionally with his smarts. He even put the Enterprise on the line in a court case against Ardra who claimed to be also known as the devil on Earth. Confident in his abilities in a courtroom setting, Picard held his own.

5. Dealing with Lose - In this, I don't mean dealing with the death of someone close to you. I mean dealing with the fact that no matter what, you will lose at some point in your life. In the episode called "Peak Performance", Picard tells Data, "It is possible to commit no mistakes and still lose. That is not a weakness; that is life." He was right.

6. Be Yourself - Picard realized that one of the biggest headaches in life is when you try to be someone you're not. It causes problems and could lead to disaster in your social life. From the first episode of the series, Picard said, "If we’re going to be damned, let’s be damned for what we really are.”

6. Silence is Golden - Picard was not written to be the Captain Kirk-type of character. Initially he wasn't the type of captain that would sleep with every alien woman he encountered. He was quiet and did not brag about those he slept with or at least had relationships with. By the time the television series wrapped up and the movies were done being made, Picard had been in the most relationships out of any of the crew members of Enterprise D. I'm not kidding.

Picard started in the academy, pining for a woman with the initials A.F. His feelings for her were strong enough that he carved their initials in groundskeeper's Boothby's prized tree and then failed Organic Chemistry because he couldn't take his mind off her.

He then had a relationship with Jenice Manheim, but chose his career over love. He then moved on to Vash when he vacationed on Risa. The two not only had a physical attraction, but a common love in archeology. Any hope of this relationship was quashed when she ran off with Q.

Picard had a run-in with an empathic metamorph named Kamala (played by Famke Janssen). The two bonded so well that it left a lasting impression on Picard.

Another woman, Nella Daren, took over the Enterprise's Stellar Sciences department. The red-head (a common theme for Picard) became so inseparable from Picard that the rest of the crew noticed. Troi gave her blessing while Dr. Crusher became jealous. Eventually, Picard was forced to make a decision to save lives, putting Daren's life on the line. She survived, but the two knew they couldn't continue to work together.

And then there was Anij, a 300-year-old woman that Picard fell for while saving her people from the Ba'ku. Before leaving, he pledged that he would spend his 318 days of shore leave to visit her.

And then there are those that Picard never hooked up with--or at least not on camera. He had a relationship with Guinan that was said to go beyond friendship. Maybe they hooked up a few times, but decided to be friends. Then there was Lwaxana Troi. She would openly say that she liked the naughty thoughts that he had about her. Even when butting heads with the false god, Arda, she made it known that she wanted Picard to be her own personal love toy and even was willing to morph into the shape of others including Deanna Troi to get him hot.

Finally, there is Dr. Beverly Crusher. Picard has a thing for red-heads and she fits the bill. Despite commanding the mission that led to the death of her husband, Crusher had feelings for Picard for the entire series. In several "future" based stories, it was shown that the two would eventually marry.

Ultimately Picard had the best love life on the Enterprise without bragging about it or using the holodeck to fulfill his fantasies (i.e. Barclay).

Final Point... While many still view Captain James T. Kirk as the ideal star ship captain, it was Picard that held all the necessary traits to be a legend. Kirk was just born before Picard and therefore his legend grew. If he had to live up to the expectation levels of Picard, Kirk may have only been considered above average.

Aspects of Life that Disappeared on Star Trek

Watching Star Trek and Star Trek: The Next Generation, it's clear that many of the gadgets that we have today, may have been inspired by the television shows and movies. Captain Kirk's communicator is an early precursor to a cell phone. The senior officers of TNG are often seen with tablets similar to iPads. Also all versions of Star Trek feature teleconferencing which didn't exist before the shows debuted.

It would seem that life on Earth in the future is close to being Utopian-like. Homelessness had been eliminated, there is a virtual one hundred percent employment rate, humans were living a lot longer, and nearly all war between humans on Earth had been eliminated. With that being said, there are elements of future life that seem to be missing, that make present day life good.

1. Modern Sports: It would appear that almost all major sports have died off. You never hear Captain Picard asking about the scores for an NFL game. Captain Kirk never debates Bones about who the best basketball players are. The only traces are Commander Sisko's love for baseball, which he would often play on the holodeck and Captain Archer's desire to stay up-to-date with Stanford University's water polo team. A six-team baseball league on Cestus III apparently survived into the 24th century and it was mentioned by Sisko that the last World Series was played in 2042 before a crowd of only 300.

A game called Parrisses Squares, that shared elements of racquetball became popular on board Picard's Enterprise. What's confusing is that on Deep Space Nine O'Brien and Bashir play racquetball on the holodeck, so apparently while popular sports such as basketball died out, racquetball and games that sprang from it survived the centuries. Other sports that make brief appearances are volleyball (Voyager) and fencing (TNG's Picard in two episodes).

2. School Dances: Today, Proms and Homecomings are a tradition of teenage Americans. Three hundred years later and there appears to be no traces of the school time tradition. On TNG, there is a schooling system aboard the Enterprise, but it's always comprised of kids that appear to be under the age of 12. Do the kids not have a dance? If not, where else would their parents overspend to get their kid into a tuxedo?

3. Video Games: One of the fastest rising medias in entertainment seems to have completely disappeared in the future. Admittedly if you have access to a holodeck, the appeal of video games would probably decrease a bit. The only trace of a video game is a game introduced to the crew of Picard's Enterprise by the Ktarians. Although this game was used to numb a portion of the player's brain so the Ktarians could take control of the Enterprise. Oddly, the only member of the crew not to fall to the games addictiveness was a teenager (Wesley).

4. Photographs: Members of the various crews will occasionally look at family pictures on their view screens, tablets, or whatever you call their personal computers in the future, but there doesn't appear to be any photographs anymore. There is the occasional painting or sculpture, but photographs have seemed to all, but disappear. Because of this, crew quarters often seem minimalistic and void of personality.

5. Alcohol: By the time TNG comes around, almost all alcohol has been eliminated on Federation starships. Instead synthehol was created to have the properties of alcohol without the negative effects such as inebriation or organ damage. Maybe this sounds like an improvement over alcohol, but the characters that have had both, have always complained of the generic taste of synthehol. Scotty, perhaps the hardest drinking crew member of all the Enterprises, couldn't stand the taste of synthehol when he found himself aboard Picard's Enterprise. Picard on the other hand could handle whiskey very well and other alien crews such as Klingons still enjoyed their own versions of alcohol such as blood wine. Maybe the Federation should develop a way to inject the Borg with alcohol because as seen in an episode of Voyager, Seven of Nine drinks one glass of champagne and becomes severely inebriated.

6. Books: The only Star Trek crew member that ever consistently seems to have a physical book is Captain Picard. The mystery is, where does he keep them? In his quarters, he has a bookshelf that can be seen when he enjoys breakfast with Dr. Crusher, but there only appears to be a dozen books on that shelf. Does he re-read them over and over again?

7. Pets: Other than Captain Archer's beagle named Porthos and Data's cat named Spot, it appears that no one owns a pet. Picard has a lionfish named Livingston in his ready room, but he never interacts with it. In an episode called "All Good Things..." Q seems to be more interested in the fish than Picard. In fact, everyone of Picard's guests seem more interested in his fish than he is. Hugh of the Borg, DaiMon Lurin, and Berlinghoff Rasmussen all take interest in Picard's fish.

8. Disney: Well at least this plague has disappeared in the future.

Photo: Screencap from first season of Star Trek: The Next Generation

Will Teleportation Devices Lead to Ethical Issues?

Watching science fiction movies and television shows, one of the most common methods of transportation is teleportation. One of the most famous lines from Star Trek is, "Beam me up Scotty." In Stargate, the characters step through a portal that takes them millions of miles away to other planets. The theory of instant travel poses a serious question, especially if some form of this technology turns out to be real one day. If you are teleported somewhere else, are you really you or is it a clone of you that ends up in the final destination.

The movie The Prestige really takes the ideal of teleportation into an ethical direction when Hugh Jackman's character uses a device designed by Nikola Tesla (played by David Bowie), which creates a copy of himself and either himself or his copy is teleported to a spot within a few hundred feet of the original spot. Robert Angier (Hugh Jackman's character), sets up a water tank and drowns in what appears to be his original self as he falls through the floor, only for his copy to enjoy the standing ovation from the upper deck of the auditorium. The survivor of this magic trick by Angier, is essentially a clone, but can it be said that he is soulless? If it is a clone, it definitely poses a question to those who are religious at the very least. The clone believes he is Robert Angier, but how could he be Angier, if Angier is also drowning underneath the stage at the same time?

The same can be said for Star Trek. The transporter essentially breaks down a person's molecules and reconstructs them in a new location. If you are deconstructed though, have you not essentially been killed off, only to have a clone of you created somewhere else? Even taken out of a religious context, if you're atheist, would you not have died if you were transported and sent to an endless blackness/nothingness abyss? From a religious standpoint, has the man operating the device played God by creating a new person, regardless or not if the clone has a soul?

Another question that could be asked is if you are religious, would the man operating the transporter be held accountable for murder? Or could the person who is transported be considered a suicide, especially if they believe that it is a copy of themselves that ends up on the other side?

On a side note, could a transporter such as the one on Star Trek be used for medical purposes. The transporter takes you apart and re-assembles you at another location, but if it is able to do this, could ailments such as cancer or other life threatening conditions be left out purposely?

While a teleportation device might be necessary in the future and probably end up being practical (I.E. Star Trek), will it pose some sort of ethical or even self-preservation issues in the future? Possibly. Will people feel peer pressure if they are unwilling to be teleported somewhere? As seen in Enterprise, a Star Trek series prequel, some of the characters do feel pressured by others to teleport. It's a scary thought that an individual could be pressured into basically killing themselves to save some travel time.

Photo: Still from Star Trek the Next Generation