Many of the worst moments in Trek were fought against strongly by the cast.
Category
📺
TVTranscript
00:00 Because Star Trek's characters are beloved by so many people, some of the actors have
00:04 gotten very attached to who they play on the show. And rightly so. But often, actors'
00:09 visions for their characters have been overshadowed by the vision of the writers and the studio
00:14 of executives. This has actually caused a lot of drama behind the scenes that audiences
00:18 aren't typically aware of. A number of issues like plot lines that come out of nowhere and
00:22 alien concepts that make no logical sense could have been avoided if the people in charge
00:27 had been more open to feedback from the cast. Others simply suffered from bad writing and
00:32 a lack of character development. Whatever their reasons, here are 8 scenes from Star
00:36 Trek that the actors absolutely hated shooting.
00:40 8. The first appearance of the Ferengi
00:43 Many fans don't know this, but one of the first Ferengi ever seen on Star Trek in the
00:47 Next Generation episode "The Last Outpost" was actually played by Armin Schimmermann,
00:52 the actor who went on to play Quark in Deep Space Nine. Unfortunately for Schimmermann,
00:57 this performance went on to haunt him. As he explained to GameSpot at the time, the
01:01 Ferengi were not yet fully developed into the species we know today. During the early
01:05 episodes of The Next Generation, they were originally intended to be more menacing, scary
01:10 and actual enemies of the Federation. But Schimmermann played up to the evil factor
01:14 perhaps a bit too much and as a result, ended up portraying the Ferengi as incredibly one-dimensional
01:20 and a bit silly during his first appearance. When Deep Space Nine began and the studio
01:25 was looking for someone to play their new recurring Ferengi character, Quark, Schimmermann
01:30 auditioned three times before getting the role. And even though we eventually got to
01:34 see more of the Ferengi and their culture throughout Deep Space Nine, it's fair to
01:38 say that he set the tone.
01:41 7. Dr. Bashir's secret being revealed
01:44 In the episode "Dr. Bashir, I presume" from season 5 of Deep Space Nine, it was revealed
01:50 that Dr. Julian Bashir was genetically modified by his parents when he was about 7 years old
01:55 to have superior physical and mental abilities. We learn that Bashir struggled with learning
02:00 at a young age, quickly falling behind all of his peers at school. So his parents gave
02:04 him illegal genetic enhancements, hoping to give him a chance at a brighter future, but
02:09 had to keep it a secret as genetic manipulation was banned in the Federation. It was a big
02:14 surprise and many fans saw it as fun and interesting, a new direction for Bashir's character even.
02:20 Because, prior to this, audiences had criticised him for being an annoying know-it-all, always
02:24 hitting on Dax and, you know, I think learning his secret about him made him seem a little
02:28 bit more human and all of his behaviour a little bit more justified maybe. However,
02:33 Alexander Siddig, who played the Doctor, disagreed. Siddig only learned of Bashir's secret mere
02:38 days before filming began on the episode, and he was devastated that the writers would
02:42 include such an important reveal for his character, without even consulting him once. To get back
02:47 at the execs, he said he purposefully put minimal effort into the recording of the episode
02:52 and protested for Bashir's genetic modifications to be largely ignored afterwards, though they
02:57 do occasionally come into play in the later series.
03:00 Number 6. Jadzia's death scene.
03:03 When Star Trek Deep Space Nine neared the end of its sixth season and the show was coming
03:06 to a close, Terry Farrell, who played Jadzia Dax on nearly every episode thus far, requested
03:13 to have her appearance made less frequent on the show so she could have time to pursue
03:16 other roles. Unsurprisingly, the producers denied this request and gave Farrell only
03:21 two options. Jadzia remains as a lead character, or she gets kittled off. Farrell chose the
03:27 latter which resulted in an RKO-style death scene where Jadzia is killed by the parwraith-possessed
03:33 Gol Dukat in the episode, Tears of the Prophets. Admittedly, this was a shocking surprise and
03:38 led to many interesting stories with Dax's new host, Ezri, which I found progressive
03:43 in some ways, but Terry Farrell was disappointed that her character had to die so abruptly.
03:47 It's likely that the writers had already thought about Dax having a symbiote move to
03:51 a new host, as throughout the whole series we've been learning about her past lives
03:55 and we always knew that one day she would transfer to somebody else.
03:59 Number 5. Chakotay and Seven of Nine's romance.
04:03 During season seven of Star Trek Voyager, Seven of Nine really made progress on regaining
04:08 her humanity. As the series came to a close, Seven began forming strong friendships and
04:13 even experimenting with romance on the holodeck in that episode called Human Error.
04:17 This episode and the one that followed, Natural Law, started toying with the idea of Seven
04:22 and Chakotay developing feelings for each other, but when Geri Ryan, who played Seven
04:26 of Nine, asked the producers if they were going to include a romance between the two
04:29 characters, they responded, "Absolutely not!" So of course, it annoyed Ryan when
04:34 she was surprised by a sudden random scene that was included at the beginning of Voyager's
04:38 finale, Endgame, in which Seven and Chakotay were seen to be like dating out of the blue,
04:44 presumably madly in love with each other. Ryan was told specifically not to play into
04:48 the romance between her character and Robert Beltran, but the producers still went ahead
04:52 and included it. Likely they were just trying to add some tactless conclusion to Seven's
04:56 story. Luckily though, in the first season of Picard, we get to see a more human version
05:00 of Seven without her need of a forced romance to prove it.
05:04 Number 4. The dance from Move Along Home.
05:07 Game Space Nine, like most other Trek shows, started off with a rather lacklustre first
05:11 season. But, you know, things get going after a little while. However, no episode fully
05:17 encapsulates the show's early failings as much as Move Along Home. In the episode, an
05:22 alien delegation from the Gamma Quadrant visited the station and brought aboard this mysterious
05:27 game which they eventually convinced Quark to play. Quark didn't realise, however,
05:31 that Sisko, Dax, Bashir and Kira were kidnapped from the station and put into this simulation
05:36 game. They were also controlled by his choices in the game. Eventually, he learned that they
05:40 were taken and saw that failure in the game could lead to their deaths.
05:44 This was a really cool idea for a story and definitely one of the most unique episodes
05:48 of season one, but it was executed in a way that was just… weird. In 2013, Avery Brooks
05:54 said that he particularly disliked the weird alien dance he and the others were forced
05:58 to do inside the game. All whilst hopping around and singing that ridiculous song "Ala
06:03 Mare, Count to 4, Ala Mare, Count to 4, Ala Mare, Count to 4, Ala Mare, Count to 4, Ala…".
06:11 And I've remixed it, haven't I? I've made it into an Afrobeat song. "Ala, Ala,
06:15 Ala Mare, Count to 4, Ala Mare…" Number 3 - Dr Crusher's Weird Ghost Romance.
06:22 Gates McFadden, who played Dr Crusher, hated the Next Generation episode "Sub Rosa"
06:27 and… well, most people found it peculiar, at least. This episode was so ridiculous,
06:33 I mean, she f***s a ghost. Wait, you know what, I'm getting ahead of myself. Let's
06:37 roll this back a bit. Dr Crusher gets a family heirloom from her recently deceased grandmother.
06:42 The small candlelight device then activates when she's alone and releases an alien entity
06:46 known as Ronin, who Crusher… well, she f***s him. She does. I mean, she has romantic relations
06:53 with him, if you want to put it in a better sense of words, but the scenes portraying
06:57 their intimacy were hilariously overacted by McFadden, who, of course, realised how
07:01 profoundly absurd the plot was for this episode. It gets even worse. Later in the episode,
07:05 her grandmother's dead body is possessed by Ronin and we learn that this same alien
07:09 entity has been seducing people in her family for generations. The scenes between Crusher
07:14 and Ronin are awkward, hilarious and painful to watch, and McFadden has talked often in
07:18 the past about how laughable she found them at the time.
07:21 2. The Holodeck Scenes in Star Trek Enterprise Finale
07:26 When Star Trek Enterprise was cancelled in 2005, the cast as well as the audiences hoped
07:31 that the show would at least, at least get a good conclusion for some of the main plot
07:35 lines that were set up over the series. By the last series, we had things going on like
07:40 the Temporal Cold War, the Zindi War and all of the side stories and they all had to hastily
07:45 be completed. A few of my Trek mates would say that the early cancellation of a show
07:49 is what prevented it from ever really taking off as much as other Star Trek instalments
07:54 over the years. If they were given more time, the plot lines could have been resolved more
07:57 elegantly.
07:58 The final episode made things even worse, particularly with the prevalence of Jonathan
08:02 Frakes, who returns as our good old chair-hopping Riker, watching a historical holodeck programme
08:08 about the end of Archer's journey with the First Enterprise. It's good to see Riker,
08:12 Troi and the old Enterprise D again, but having Riker interject with commentary or just stare
08:16 at the Enterprise characters as they go through some of the most emotional moments for them
08:20 in the series was presumably seen as insulting by Bacula, who never voiced his concern but
08:25 according to Bran and Braga, was very displeased by the finale. Frakes has gone on to say that
08:29 he believes his presence in the finale took away from the main cast moment.
08:33 Number 1. Captain Kirk's Death Scene
08:36 One scene that most fans will find hard to watch for one reason or another is Captain
08:40 Kirk's death scene in Star Trek Generations. James T. Kirk is one of the most renowned
08:45 Starfleet officers in history, both in lore and in the eyes of us fans. Unfortunately,
08:51 through his death in the seventh Star Trek film, it was hardly the send-off that the
08:54 character deserved. In Generations, Kirk was lost in a timeless dimension of pure happiness
08:59 known as the Nexus and is pulled back into reality by Picard and killed by falling to
09:05 his death by fighting Tolian Soren, a man who Kirk has never met and has no history
09:11 with. Not to mention, Picard could have re-emerged from the Nexus at any point in time, even
09:16 days before the battle with Saran, which made Kirk's death scene completely avoidable.
09:19 It shouldn't surprise anyone to learn that William Shatner was also not happy with his
09:23 character's unceremonious death. Shatner explained to TrekMovie.com that the only reason
09:28 he agreed to perform this scene was because the creative leads told him the only options
09:32 were to do this scene like they wanted or to make it happen off-screen. It was definitely
09:36 cool to see Kirk and Picard teaming up for the first time, but Kirk's death should
09:40 have been more personal to his character, not a quick torch pass to the next generation.
09:44 So there you have it, 8 Star Trek scenes that the actors hated shooting. If you've got
09:49 something to add to the conversation, let us know in the comments below. And of course,
09:53 like and subscribe. You can find us on Twitter @TrekCulture. And I am on all social medias
09:59 @MarcusBronzy, M-A-R-C-U-S-B-R-O-N-Z-Y. And also, Twitch.tv/MarcusBronzy runs streaming
10:07 Monday to Fridays. I've also got a podcast called Ain't Got A Clue. Go find out what