star trek voyager dark frontier

Dark Frontier (episode)

• 1.2 Act One
• 1.3 Act Two
• 1.4 Act Three
• 1.5 Act Four
• 1.6 Act Five
• 1.7 Act Six
• 1.8 Act Seven
• 1.9 Act Eight
• 1.10 Act Nine
• 1.11 Act Ten
• 2 Log entries
• 3 Memorable quotes
• 4.1 Story and script
• 4.2 Cast and characters
• 4.3 Props, makeup, wardrobe, and sets
• 4.4 Production
• 4.5 Visual effects
• 4.7.1 Previous episodes
• 4.7.2 Other Star Trek series
• 4.8 Reception
• 4.9 Apocrypha
• 4.10 Video and DVD releases
• 5.1 Starring
• 5.2 Also starring
• 5.3 Guest stars
• 5.4 Co-stars
• 5.5 Uncredited co-stars
• 5.6 Stand-ins
• 5.7 References
• 5.8 External links

Summary [ ]

A Borg probe attacks; Voyager defends itself…

A vessel has been detected by the Borg Collective and drones are activated aboard one of its ships. The drones are instructed to alter course to intercept the vessel. Inside a Borg ship drones immediately move from their alcoves and carry out the instructions. The Collective identifies the vessel: Federation Starfleet ; Intrepid -class ; 143 lifeforms . The drones are instructed to prepare for assimilation of the vessel.

The target vessel is the USS Voyager . The Collective states its usual hail: " We are the Borg. You will be assimilated. Resistance is futile ". The image of Voyager is replaced by one of Voyager 's bridge . Captain Kathryn Janeway stands with Commander Chakotay at her side. Behind them, at the auxiliary tactical console is Seven of Nine whom Janeway has asked to be present for her tactical expertise. She replies with a warning to the Collective to break off pursuit or Voyager will open fire. The Collective dismisses Janeway's threat and repeats that it is intent on assimilating Voyager , they cut off communication.

…and prevails

The Borg vessel closes on Voyager but it is neither a cube nor a sphere; instead, it is a probe . The two ships exchange fire. Aboard the probe, there are explosions as the deflector shields are disabled. The Collective instructs that they be regenerated and the weapons re-modulated when, suddenly, a Starfleet photon torpedo is transported into the vessel. A drone moves to disable it but as the drone is about to begin dismantling the torpedo it detonates, destroying the probe and all drones aboard.

Janeway gets an idea to steal a transwarp coil from a damaged Borg sphere

On Voyager 's bridge, Janeway and Chakotay watch the explosion on the viewscreen . Both seem disappointed, Chakotay asks what happened as the goal was to merely disable the probe. Seven of Nine explains that the torpedo detonated near the power matrix, causing a chain reaction in the probe's systems. Janeway asks about survivors and Lt. Commander Tuvok reports that there were none.

Janeway stares at the viewscreen for a moment then orders Chakotay to begin a salvage operation. The probe could have something they could use, such as weapons or possibly a transwarp coil . This is a key component of Borg supraluminal technology, allowing them to travel at speeds far greater than the Federation's standard warp drive . If they can modify it and their warp engines to work together, thousands of light years could be put behind them in mere days, taking years off their journey.

Act One [ ]

Janeway and Chakotay enter cargo bay 2, where the debris from the destroyed probe is being studied. They walk around the debris, inspecting various components. Chakotay informs her that they have salvaged some useful components from the probe: power nodes and plasma conduits . Also, a transwarp coil was found amidst the debris field.

Seven informs Janeway and Chakotay that the salvaged transwarp coil is unusable

They go to see the coil and find Seven of Nine and Lieutenant B'Elanna Torres examining it. Their report is disappointing as the coil is unusable. Seven explains to her that when a Borg vessel is critically damaged, all of its vital technology, such as its transwarp coils, self-destructs .

" You're about to drop one of your bombshells. " " Now, what makes you say that? " " The way you fiddle with your combadge. You do it every time. "

But Seven of Nine also has hopeful news from their salvage operation. She shows Janeway and Chakotay two Borg data nodes , one of which contains long range sensor telemetry , assimilation logistics and vessel movements in a thirty light year radius . This is vital information for Voyager as they can use it to avoid any further encounters with the Borg for a time. However, the unusable transwarp coil is a great disappointment and Janeway orders Seven to translate the node's data so the ship's computer can read it.

In astrometrics, Seven shows Janeway and Tuvok the translated tactical information. She reports there are three cubes on a course parallel to their own, nine light years distant which pose no threat. But Janeway points out a Borg sphere whose position is not far from them and asks Seven about it. Seven reports that the sphere is damaged from an ion storm and traveling at low warp . Janeway orders Seven to provide her with a detailed schematic of the vessel.

Janeway calls a meeting with the senior staff in the briefing room . She describes a plan: they are going to steal a transwarp coil from the damaged sphere. The plan is labeled " Operation Fort Knox ", after the 20th century facility which, all through its existence, defeated all attempts at intrusion. Ensign Tom Paris helps by explaining the reference to the others present. Chief Engineer Torres talks about how useful even one coil would be in drastically shortening their journey time to the Alpha Quadrant .

Tuvok asks Janeway if she believes the sphere's defenses are low enough for them to do this. Janeway does believe this but she warns that the operation must be planned to the smallest detail. She reminds them that they cannot forget that they are dealing with the Borg. She proceeds to explain the plan in general terms: they will head for the sphere and use a diversion to allow an away team to beam aboard undetected. The away team will then steal the coil and return to Voyager with it. Chakotay recommends they create a holodeck simulation of the operation to practice it. Torres recommends they use a few "old Maquis tricks" she knows to mask their warp signature . Janeway agrees to both remarks and ends the meeting to begin preparations.

Act Two [ ]

After the meeting, Janeway calls Seven into her ready room . She informs her that she has a specific assignment for her relating to the operation. She wants Seven to research the data logs of her parents, Magnus and Erin Hansen , for any information which could give them a greater tactical advantage against the Borg. These logs were retrieved the year before , among the remains of the Hansens' ship, the USS Raven .

Seven of Nine begins to make excuses why the logs should not be consulted. She believes them to be irrelevant and flawed since her parents, despite all the knowledge they had gathered, were caught and assimilated. Janeway surmises, however, that Seven does not want to read them because they chronicle the events leading to her assimilation. But Janeway cannot afford to forgo the potentially invaluable tactical information contained in the logs and tells Seven that she will assign the task to Chakotay if she refuses. Seven informs the captain that, although reluctant, she will read the logs.

Seven is in her Cargo Bay 2 quarters , near her alcove, examining one of the Borg data nodes. Neelix enters with a large box full of PADDs . Seven irritably notes his tardiness and Neelix apologizes. He explains that cataloging the logs took much longer than he expected because of the amount of data including field notes, personal logs and bio-kinetic analyses. He sets the box down and quietly muses that she is fortunate to have so huge a reminder of her own parents. All he has left of his own parents is a faded holo-image. As he leaves to prepare the rest of the logs, Seven picks up one of the PADDs and activates it.

" We're off to see the Borg tomorrow. "

Annika Hansen is playing with a model of a Borg cube. Magnus Hansen enters. He leads her to a couch, sits with her and explains to her that they will be leaving the next day to study the Borg. Annika is full of questions for her father: Do the Borg have kids? What do they look like? Are they friendly? Her father answers her questions as best he can.

Aboard the Raven , Magnus and Erin Hansen debate whether or not they should refuel before continuing onward. Magnus does not want to, insisting they are too close and if they stop now, they may as well return home. Erin questions what they would return home to as they have committed numerous felony violations: unauthorized deviation from flight plan, crossing the Romulan Neutral Zone , failure to obey direct orders to return. She expresses that she is of the opinion their colleagues obviously think they have gone insane. Annika enters from her bedroom, complaining that she cannot sleep.

The Hansens encounter a Borg cube for the first time

The sensors sound an alarm, detecting massive subspace eddies . Magnus and Erin hurry to the main console and detect a ship their scans reveal that it is a Borg cube . They enter visual range and bring it up on the viewscreen. Magnus, Erin, and Annika stare at the cube as it scans them and their vessel. The cube does not alter course to intercept and instead it moves off. Magnus says that this confirms his theory how the Borg ignore anything living unless they consider it a threat, or a target for assimilation. They follow the cube, remaining well behind it.

A hail from the bridge by First Officer Chakotay brings Seven back to the present. She acknowledges Chakotay's hail and responds. Coming off the turbolift onto the bridge she sees the the damaged Borg sphere on the viewscreen. Janeway orders Paris to match its course and speed, keeping ten million kilometers away. Seven is ordered to the auxiliary tactical console to scan the sphere. She reports that its weapons array is regenerating, but its deflector shields and transwarp drive are off-line. However both systems will again be operational in 72 hours. The crew has a window of 72 hours to execute the operation. Janeway orders double shifts and 24-hour simulation drills for the crew.

Act Three [ ]

Captain Janeway, Seven of Nine, Tuvok, and Harry Kim quickly walk down a corridor on the Borg sphere, armed with phaser rifles . Chakotay, on Voyager 's bridge, counts down from two minutes, keeping them informed of their remaining time. The operation is going well, but Chakotay warns them they are behind schedule. Drones walk around the sphere ignoring them. Janeway and Seven proceed to the transwarp chamber, while Tuvok and Kim go to sphere's shield generator. They plant spatial charges around the generator while Janeway and Seven position transporter pattern enhancers on the coil. When Kim and Tuvok detonate the charges the coil is transported to Voyager . Chakotay confirms they have the transwarp coil and the away team proceeds to the pre-arranged coordinates for beam-off.

But their time runs out. Chakotay informs them the two-minute period it takes for the Borg sensor grid to regenerate after being disabled has expired. Aboard the sphere, an alarm sounds as drones immediately stop, face the away team and advance. Tuvok fires and kills two drones coming towards him and Kim. Janeway and Seven are engaged with two other drones, but the Collective quickly adapts to the phaser setting. Janeway turns to go along another route, ordering Seven to follow but she is frozen in place.

Seven is disquieted by the realism of the simulated sphere's interior

Janeway calls back to her sharply and Seven of Nine snaps out of it, following her down the corridor. They arrive at the transporter coordinates, where Tuvok and Kim are waiting, and the four of them beam out of the sphere.

On Voyager 's bridge, Paris reports to Chakotay the away team's successful return. Suddenly a contingent of drones appears on the bridge. Chakotay orders Paris to beam them off, but he cannot and the drones fan out and begin to advance on them.

" Computer, freeze program; both holodecks! "

Chakotay orders the computer to freeze both programs on both holodecks. It was all a simulation.

Chakotay demands an explanation from Paris. He replies that the drones must have piggybacked on Voyager 's transporter beam. Chakotay hails Janeway and informs her that they retrieved the coil, but also some most unwelcome guests. Because the two-minute window before the sphere's sensor grid returns online is the maximum amount of time for the away mission , they have to cut their time on the sphere to under two minutes. Beaming into the transwarp chamber directly is considered, but Seven responds that the chamber is too heavily shielded. The away mission looks impossible, but Seven informs them that her parents were able to spend several hours at a time on a cube undetected. By consulting their logs, they may be able to explain how the Hansens were able to do this. Janeway orders her to find out and ends the simulation.

As Janeway and Seven walk along the corridor outside the holodeck, Janeway asks her about her freeze-up during the simulation stating that she cannot afford such an incident during the operation. Janeway asks Seven if she is able to take part in the away mission. Seven responds that the simulation unsettled her. The last time she was on a Borg vessel, she was a drone. Janeway wonders if she is pushing her too hard and fast, making her face her past by looking at her parents research and now having her on the away team. Seven insists she will be fine. Janeway hopes so, the next time it will not be a simulation, she tells her. Seven acknowledges her statement and walks off.

Seven prepares to read another batch of her parents' logs in her quarters. The doors open and Naomi Wildman , daughter of crewmember Ensign Samantha Wildman , enters. She complains to Seven that she is having nightmares and wants to stay with her, promising not to bother her. Seven agrees but as she continues her work, Naomi begins asking some oddly familiar questions about the Borg: Does it hurt to be a drone? Do the Borg have kids? Are they friendly? Distracted and worn down, Seven tersely orders Naomi to return to her quarters.

" Resistance is futile. "

Naomi walks towards Seven and in a cold, hard voice states " Resistance is futile. " A Borg implant emerges and spreads on her cheek.

Seven panics as she looks around her quarters and sees Borg drones stepping out of the shadows. She frantically hails security , but receives no answer. Instead, she hears an ageless, disembodied, female voice state " They can't hear you. " Seven demands to know the voice's identity. " I am the Borg, " it responds. The voice calls her by her full Borg designation: Seven of Nine, Tertiary Adjunct of Unimatrix 01 , stating that she has become weak. Seven frantically tells herself that this is a dream that she is regenerating . The voice assures her that she is not in a dream. It explains how the Borg have accessed Seven's neural transceiver . The voice tells her that they know about Voyager 's plan to invade the sphere stating that it will fail. Seven demands to know why the crew hasn't been assimilated if the Borg believe the plan to fail. The voice states that they have contacted her to make an offer: " Rejoin the Collective and we'll spare Voyager . "

Seven is confused by this statement, as the only thing that set her apart from other drones was that she happened to have been chosen by the Collective to speak for the Borg during the events which had led to her de-assimilation. The Collective could easily have chosen any drone aboard that cube. ( VOY : " Scorpion ", " Scorpion, Part II ") Seven asks why any effort would be taken to retake her when the Borg has since then assimilated thousands of new drones. The voice responds that they wish her to rejoin the Collective because Seven is "unique."

The voice and drones vanish. The cargo bay is normal again and Seven is alone.

Act Four [ ]

Three months after first encountering the Borg cube, the Hansens have followed it through a transwarp corridor it created, arriving behind it in the Delta Quadrant , the region of origin of the Borg. Magnus Hansen is aboard the cube, wearing a bio-dampener to remain undetected. The Raven itself is outfitted with multi-adaptive shielding to mask it from Borg sensors. Both technologies have worked magnificently, allowing them to follow Borg vessels and beam on and off them without detection.

"Bill", "Junior" and "Needle Fingers"

Magnus reports back to Erin (who sits at the controls with Annika on her lap) that he is observing a badly-damaged drone, which the Hansens have dubbed " Junior " as it goes to an alcove to regenerate intending to repairing itself. However two other drones, which they have dubbed "" Bill " and " Needle Fingers ," arrive, deactivate the damaged drone and begin dismantling it. On the Raven , an alarm notifies Erin that Magnus' bio-dampener is almost out of power. She updates him, but he responds that he can stay on board for another minute.

Seven shows the designs for the bio-dampeners to Tuvok and The Doctor in sickbay . She found the designs in her parents' logs and explains how these devices should solve the timing problem. Tuvok instructs The Doctor to manufacture four of them, one for each away team member.

After Tuvok leaves, The Doctor compliments the Hansens on their ingenuity. Seven responds that the Hansens were efficient. Thinking that she is warming up to them, he happily cites this as an important stage in her social development, and encourages her to think of it as an exploration of how she was raised, an important part of her Humanity. Seven angrily replies that her parents underestimated the Borg. She states that because of their arrogance she was forced to be raised as a Borg drone. She storms out of sickbay and goes into a corner, struggling to regain control of herself.

The away mission will begin at 0600 the next morning. But Janeway has made a change in the away team composition. She calls Seven into her ready room, and tells her that she has decided to replace her on the away team with Torres. She explains that if the sphere attacks, she will need someone with Borg expertise at tactical. Seven insists that she must be on the away team. She gives the excuse that they may encounter unexpected problems that only she can overcome. Janeway takes offense to the comment, thinking that Seven simply considers them not up to that task.

However, Janeway realizes that Seven is not being arrogant, only fearful of the success of the mission. Seven fervently tells her that, in the time she has been on Voyager , the crew has become her Collective. Their survival is important to her. She would do anything to prevent harm from coming to them… anything. She pleads with Janeway to be put back on the away team. Janeway reconsiders and places Seven back on the away team, telling her that she is very pleased with the remarkable progress she has made as an individual and a crewmember.

Act Five [ ]

The Borg Collective detects a vessel and activates the drones manning the damaged sphere. They alter the sphere's course to intercept. The vessel is identified as a Federation Class 2 shuttlecraft with three lifeforms aboard.

The Collective does not instruct the drones to prepare for assimilation. The sphere resumes course. On Voyager 's bridge, Torres reports this to Chakotay. The shuttle is the diversion part of the plan; when the sphere drops its shields to take it in to assimilate it, the away team beams aboard. But the Borg are not taking the bait. Chakotay informs Janeway, waiting in one of the transporter rooms on the platform with the other team members, Seven included.

Ensign Kim suggests having the shuttle fire a phaser shot at the sphere, but Seven responds that that would not work; they would simply destroy the shuttle as a perceived threat. Janeway gets an idea. She orders Chakotay to have the energy output of the shuttle's warp signature increased. He does so. With the increased warp signature, the Collective instructs the drones to prepare for assimilation.

" Never forget… "

" …who you are "

On Voyager 's bridge, Ensign Paris reports that the sphere has locked a tractor beam on the shuttle and is taking it in. The sphere's shields drop and the away team beams aboard, wearing the bio-dampeners The Doctor produced. They begin their separate operations of the away mission. Seven immediately stops and has a vivid vision of herself when she was a drone. She hears the voice she heard in the cargo bay. " Never forget who you are, " it tells her.

Janeway, worried, touches her shoulder and asks if she is alright. She shakes herself out of it and follows her to the transwarp coil chamber. Tuvok and Ensign Kim place the spatial charges on the shield generator as practiced. Janeway and Seven plant the transporter pattern enhancers on the coil. Tuvok and Kim blow the generator and the coil is beamed off the sphere. Janeway and Seven quickly move toward the away team's beam-out coordinates.

Moving through the sphere towards the coordinates, Seven halts again. The disembodied female voice again beckons her to rejoin the Collective in order to spare Voyager . Janeway, realizing she is not behind her, turns and sees her standing, looking at her. Annoyed, she orders Seven to keep moving. Seven responds that she will not follow Janeway and wishes to return to the Collective.

Janeway firmly tells Seven she cannot let her do that. Seven responds that Janeway has no choice. Janeway aims her rifle at her, preparing to stun her and take her back to Voyager , to remain under guard in the sickbay or the brig until she regains her senses. She again orders her to keep moving. A force field appears between them, and two drones come up behind Seven. Seven pleads with Janeway to leave her. Chakotay hails and informs Janeway that the sphere is moving to intercept Voyager and that the away team must beam out in order that the ship is not assimilated. But Janeway does not move. She tells Seven she will not leave without her. Seven responds by telling her that if she does not leave, she will be assimilated. Janeway gazes at her for a moment then turns and runs towards the beam-out point.

The rest of the away team arrives at the coordinates, and Janeway hails Chakotay: three to beam out. Chakotay questions the number but Janeway orders him to energize. Once they are back on Voyager , Chakotay asks where Seven is and Janeway angrily replies that she had a change of heart. She orders a situation report and he responds that the sphere is altering course away from them. Torres reports that its transwarp drive is powering up. Janeway, even though she knows it is hopeless, orders Paris to follow it. In a glow of green, the sphere accelerates to transwarp and races away in the blink of an eye.

The colossal Borg Unicomplex

Seven is led by two drones through the corridors of the sphere. The sphere itself drops from transwarp into an incredible sight: an immense Borg complex . Structures interconnect with each other in a web so huge that it seems to take up an entire sector. The sphere moves toward a hatch on one of the main structures. The hatch opens and the sphere disappears inside.

As Seven and her drone "guards" enter through a spearhead-shaped door they stand in a large room with a wide, slight raised platform situated in the middle. Above the platform, a head and its upper torso descend on a lift from above. The head appears to be that of a humanoid female alien. Descending, the head smiles a little. As the head and upper torso approach the floor, a disassembled black mechanical body, composed of the rest of the torso and limbs rises from the floor. After the two parts of the Borg are attached, the body slowly walks up to Seven.

" Welcome home. "

Seven stares at the Borg as it descends from the platform. She realizes that this is the origin of the disembodied voice she had heard.

Her parents had a name for this type of Borg.

The Borg Queen .

" Welcome home, " the Queen tells her.

Act Six [ ]

The Borg Queen walks slowly around Seven, appraising her new appearance, noting how the individuals on Voyager have "remade her into their image" by removing her Borg features and giving her back hair and clothing. Seven sarcastically responds that she expected re-assimilation, not conversation. The Queen notes her sense of humor and comments that the last two years must have been remarkable for her. She repeats what she told her in Voyager 's cargo bay: she is unique.

Seven wonders aloud that her experiences on board Voyager are why the Collective wanted her back, to "add to their perfection." The Queen responds that this was Seven of Nine's mission all along. The Borg purposefully let Voyager 's crew take Seven. Surprised, Seven demands that the Queen explain herself, but she receives no answer. The Queen instead offers her a chance to regenerate in an alcove that has been adapted for her. She lets Seven know that after her regeneration they will speak further on her capture.

Aboard Voyager , in Cargo Bay 2, crewmen clear away the debris from the Borg probe. The debris was stripped of useful components and they will melt the components so that the polytrinic alloys can be extracted. As Janeway and Chakotay supervise the cleanup, she expresses her frustration at trying to understand Seven's actions. She cannot understand why she chose to rejoin the Collective now. Chakotay theorizes that Seven had been planning this all along, he reminds her that Seven threatened to betray Janeway after they had first severed her from the hive mind two years earlier. Janeway doesn't believe him and tells him that Seven had come to see Voyager as her Collective.

Janeway determined to retrieve Seven of Nine

Neelix, who is helping with the clean-up, comes up to them and asks Janeway what to do with Seven's alcove. With her gone, logically the alcove, which uses a lot of power, has no function and should be shut down. Janeway tells him no and he goes back to work.

In her ready room, Janeway sits at her desktop monitor , reviewing sensor logs from the day before their operation to steal the transwarp coil from the damaged sphere. She has a hunch that the Borg somehow influenced Seven to rejoin them and believes the logs have evidence of that. As she works, Tuvok arrives and explains that "a member of the crew" has requested an appointment with her. Janeway is about to refuse due to being so busy, but then sees Naomi Wildman peeking out from behind Tuvok and relents, allowing her in. Naomi has come to see her with a plan she has designed to find Seven. Janeway looks at it and tells her that it would not work but she commends Naomi for her initiative. Before Naomi leaves, she asks Janeway if they're going to rescue Seven, and Janeway assures her that a good captain never abandons a member of the crew; they're not giving up on Seven. The computer then beeps letting Janeway know that it has finished analyzing the sensor logs and has found an anomaly. Janeway and Naomi look at the monitor as it shows that Borg communication signals were directed towards Cargo Bay 2.

In the Borg Unicomplex, Seven awakens from regeneration to find her vision has returned to that of the Borg. The Borg Queen informs her that her brain's sight-controlling region has been re-enhanced with Borg technology with the addition of a neural processing adjunct. Seven fearfully and angrily demands its removal. The Queen responds that Seven prefers to remain small but Seven replies that she prefers to remain unique.

The Queen reassures her that this is not what the Borg want, they want her individuality intact. Seven returns to her initial question asking why the effort was made to capture her. The Queen replies that they need her for her individual, Human perspective. Seven does not understand as they have already assimilated her memories and could need nothing more. The Queen's answers that they want her to help them finally succeed in doing what they have twice tried and failed to do: assimilate Humanity.

The Borg Queen's personal vessel

Seven adamantly tells her she will resist. The Queen responds that she knows this.

The chamber shakes and Seven demands to know what is happening. The Queen informs her they are off to assimilate a species. She shows Seven a holo-projection of the targeted planet with a population of 392,000 and the inhabitants whom the Borg refer to as Species 10026 . Their presence is not required, she tells Seven, but she deems the experience necessary to remind her of what it means to be Borg. Seven looks at the projection fearfully. The Queen notices her fear, remarking that she is experiencing compassion, a Human emotion.

A hatch opens in a structure in the Unicomplex, and a diamond-shaped vessel emerges, carrying Seven, the Queen, and attendant drones. It moves out of the Unicomplex to rendezvous with two Borg cubes. The three vessels head off for Species 10026's planet. Aboard the diamond, Seven continues gazing at the projection in sympathetic terror.

Act Seven [ ]

A new drone is examined by the Hansens

Aboard the Raven , Magnus and Erin Hansen examine a regenerating new drone that they have beamed over from a cube they have been shadowing. They ascertain the species it was a Ktarian ( Species 6961 ). The drone's infrastructure was made of titanium , meaning it was a tactical drone. To their surprise they check its previous designation (Three of Five, Tertiary Adjunct of Unimatrix 1) and realize it used to work close to the Borg Queen.

As Annika watches with interest, they decide to put a tracking device on the drone. If it should ever return to Unimatrix 1, they could get the opportunity to study the Queen herself. An alarm alerts them that its regeneration cycle is almost complete and they quickly beam it back to its alcove aboard the cube. While Erin and Annika eat, Magnus inspects the drone's downloaded cranial transceiver logs, looking for communication signals from the Queen.

In Janeway's ready room, Chakotay reports that a comparison between the signals Magnus Hansen recorded in 2350 on the Hansens' logs and those that Janeway discovered being sent to Seven in Cargo Bay 2 matched. Seven was indeed getting communication from what he calls " this… 'Borg queen' " (the existence of such a thing is unknown to Starfleet at the time Voyager was pulled into the Delta Quadrant, since the Hansens never returned home with their data and the Battle of Sector 001 had just recently occurred).

Janeway notes that, whatever the nature of this "queen", she obviously is very influential, having made Seven turn herself over to the Collective the day after contacting her. Chakotay wonders if Seven was instructed to return to the Collective, but Janeway recalls her conversation with Seven before the mission when Seven insisted that she had to be on the away team and go aboard the sphere or the mission would fail. Janeway tells Chakotay that Seven had seemed very afraid, as if there was something she knew that she could not tell. In hindsight, Janeway intuits that the Queen didn't instruct Seven per se ; she threatened her with the assimilation of Voyager 's crew if she did not turn herself over to the Collective. Janeway orders Chakotay to compile a list of every available technology the Hansens developed to track the Borg. Seven saved them from the Collective by turning herself over, now it's time to return the favor.

Janeway addresses the entire crew from the bridge outlining the mission: a long-range tactical rescue. During her speech various preparations around the vessel are taking place. Torres is equipping the Delta Flyer with the recovered transwarp coil. An away team consisting of Paris, Tuvok, The Doctor, and Janeway will go after the sphere that took Seven through transwarp space using tracking technology Chakotay found in the Hansens' logs. The Hansens' multi-adaptive shielding will mask the Delta Flyer from Borg sensors, and narrow beam transporters will allow the away team to board the sphere. Chakotay will keep Voyager at the threshold of the Delta Flyer 's transwarp conduit to offer tactical support against any pursuing Borg ships on the Delta Flyer 's return. She ends her address with the following exhortation: they will be looking for one individual among thousands of drones. " But she is one of us, " she finishes, " and I am not about to let her go. " She looks at the expectant bridge officers. " Let's get started. "

The Delta Flyer takes off and on Janeway's order, Paris brings the transwarp coil online and, in a flash of green, the shuttle goes to transwarp , heading in the direction the sphere was traveling. Tuvok detects the sphere's residual transwarp signature, and Janeway orders Paris to follow it.

" How do you propose we adapt? "

The Borg Queen's vessel and the two escort Borg cubes arrive at the Species 10026 planet to begin assimilation. The Borg Queen manipulates Seven into suggesting a way to adapt to Species 10026 weapons fire, a modulating phaser pulse that can penetrate Borg deflector shields. Initially Seven refuses to provide a strategy stating, " You are the Borg, you tell me. " The Queen does not respond; instead, she lets the aliens bombard the Borg diamond until Seven becomes alarmed. She then calmly looks at Seven and repeats her question: How does she propose they adapt? Not wanting to die, Seven instinctively suggests a strategy. The Queen smiles, agrees with Seven's assessment and communicates it to the drones for implementation. Immediately the weapons' fire is rendered completely ineffective.

Pleased, the Borg queen instructs Seven to assist in the primary assimilation chamber . However, seeing Seven's terrified reaction, she changes her mind, thinking aloud that perhaps she is pushing her too hard. She instructs her to assist in repairing their shield generators instead.

Seven walks unsteadily through the corridors, going to her assigned task. Around her, captured members of the humanoid species are escorted by drones to assimilation chambers. Bloodcurdling screams ring out from the direction of the assimilation chambers. Fearfully, she reaches a panel and, trying her best to shut out the screams, starts repairing the generators. An explosion knocks her down, and as she attempts to stand up, two drones come behind her and pick her up roughly. She struggles as one brings a Borg prosthetic to her face. But it simply passes it over a cut she sustained, healing it. They release her and continue on their way.

A species 10026 male is assimilated

A small group of aliens pass by, on their way to a chamber, escorted by drones. Suddenly a male among them tries to run away past her. Instinctively, she grabs his arm, stopping him. She immediately realizes what she is doing and releases him. Her realization comes too late, as one of the drones returns for the male. It seizes him and mercilessly plunges its assimilation tubules into his neck. He freezes, trembling in agony. Black lines radiate over his head and neck, as millions of Borg nanoprobes flood his system, beginning his assimilation. Seven watches, horrified. She stumbles back, shuddering and hyperventilating.

She then notices that she is just outside an assimilation chamber and enters. Inside, a few of the aliens watch helplessly as a drone works on assimilating one of them with exact precision. Another drone stands by watching. The victim is lying on a platform and his right arm has been severed while an attachment for the prosthetic replacement the drone is about to install is on the stump.

The second drone leaves the chamber to go and carry out a repair. As soon as it has gone, Seven immediately comes up behind the drone working on the victim and deactivates it. She lifts the victim up off the platform and orders the others to assist her. They stare at her in confusion and alarm. She tells them sharply that she is not Borg; she will help them escape. " Assist me! " she orders. They take their comrade as Seven instructs them what to do. One of their ships is nearby. It is heavily damaged and the crew is dead, but the propulsion system still works. She will transport them aboard; they must remain there until the Borg leave, and then they must flee on a heading she gives them. They nod understanding, and Seven goes to a console and beams them out.

Seven re-enters the Borg Queen's chamber. The queen is pleased: assimilation is complete. Seven angrily asks if the three hundred thousand individuals who have just been destroyed should be congratulated as well. They should be indeed, the Borg queen responds; they have been delivered from chaos into order. Seven sarcastically comments that she should use those words next time instead of "Resistance is futile", they may actually get some of the victims to volunteer. The Queen responds that Seven is simply hiding behind sarcasm in order to not acknowledge the pleasure of a new species being added to the Collective, a pleasure which she fully remembers. Stop resisting, the Queen urges her, revel in it.

Seven pauses. She can indeed feel it. But the sickening horror of what she has seen makes her reject it. Instead, she remembers how she used to be part of such atrocities herself. Full of guilt, she tells the Queen that she will not take pleasure in the destruction of a race. The Borg Queen is again disappointed and angered by Seven's reaction. Impatiently, she insists that her feelings of guilt, compassion, and empathy are irrelevant. Seven strongly disagrees, arguing that they are relevant to her . This further angers the Queen as there is no 'me' , she insists; there is only 'us' .

" Let them go! Please!"

Then the Queen's head tilts to one side as she detects the ship containing the unassimilated aliens. It appears on her chamber's viewscreen and she asks Seven what should be done with it. Seven calmly and coolly tries to brush off the interrogation with subterfuge, saying that the ship contains only four aliens and would be a waste of Collective resources to capture and assimilate them, but the Queen will not have any of it, seeing through Seven's deception. She proclaims harshly that if one of Species 10026 escapes, then the species itself remains unassimilated. As they watch, a cube intercepts the ship and seizes it in a tractor beam. Seven watches, close to tears. She begs with the Queen to release them.

" I'm sorry this lesson has to be so painful for you, " the Borg Queen tells her with false sympathy, " but you are a difficult pupil. " She again urges Seven to abandon her Human emotions. " They are the cause of your pain, " she insists. Seven continues to plead with the Queen for the survivors' release. The Queen looks at her impatiently and releases them. The cube releases the ship from its tractor beam and the alien ship speeds off to safety. Seven is dumbfounded by this unexpected action and remarks, " I thought compassion is irrelevant. " The Queen acknowledges Seven with an intent gaze but gives no explanation.

Act Eight [ ]

The Raven flees at maximum warp. As Magnus explains in his log entry, a subspace particle storm knocked their multi-adaptive shielding off-line, leaving them exposed to Borg sensors. It was only off-line for 13.2 seconds, but that was enough; the Borg detected them and perceived them as a threat. Now they flee desperately from a Borg cube closely pursuing them. Although the Hansens have masked the Raven 's warp drive signature, the cube still pursues them. Annika lies in bed, frightened, listening as her parents loudly discuss what to do. Erin points out a Mutara class nebula three light years away as a hiding place, but Magnus rejects it, saying its particle density is too high and their hull would rupture. Erin argues that they have no time to look for anything else. Annika calls for Magnus and he goes and comforts her. A transwarp conduit appears 2.3 light years away; a cube is preparing to assimilate.

On the Delta Flyer , The Doctor pitches an idea to Captain Janeway to send a message to Seven through her interplexing beacon . Janeway approves and asks The Doctor to try once they reach their destination. Ensign Paris reports he has found the sphere, located two hundred light years from their position. Janeway orders him to head for it and orders Tuvok to raise the multi-adaptive shielding.

They drop out of transwarp and find themselves in the Unicomplex. The Humans and The Doctor are awestruck at the incredible size of the structure. Tuvok scans trillions of Borg lifeforms on it. A cube comes toward them but passes harmlessly, an indication that their multi-adaptive cloak is working. Janeway orders Paris to head into the Unicomplex and Tuvok begins scanning for Seven.

Species 5618: Human

In her chamber, the Borg Queen makes a decision, it is time for Seven to serve her purpose. She informs Seven about a new mode of assimilation they have developed, for "highly-resistant species", surreptitious as opposed to direct assault: an assimilation virus. Seven is confused as she has no knowledge of this technology, having left the Collective before it was developed. The Queen tells her that her knowledge of the species they had in mind when designing it is invaluable. She brings up a holo-image of that species: Species 5618 – Human.

As Seven listens in shock, the Queen explains how the virus works. The virus is designed to infect every lifeform on a target planet, assimilating the planet's life slowly. By the time the population realizes what is happening, half of their population will be drones. Seven comes to the realization that the Borg are planning to release this virus into Earth 's atmosphere. She tries to raise the objection that such a method would be inefficient, as it would take many years to yield results. The Queen merely responds that they have waited this long and the Collective can wait the required period. She gives Seven the job of programming the nanoprobes.

Seven flatly refuses to be part of Humanity's destruction. The Queen responds by reminding her of the thousands of assimilations she had been part of as a drone and how this is no different. After Seven still voices her refusal, the Queen again loses patience. They all came from "lesser species"; she herself came from Species 125 . But that is irrelevant, she asserts, as they are Borg. " I am an individual! " Seven responds. The Queen's patience begins to wear thin. She explains that this is the purpose they require Seven for and she will fulfill it. She threatens Seven to either comply or be re-assimilated. To emphasize the threat, she has drones converge on her. But Seven stands her ground and defiantly tells the Queen to proceed if she wishes.

The Queen sees that threats will not work. Instead, she tries even more intense psychological manipulation. The Queen and the drones continue to close in on Seven as she backs away. The Queen tells Seven that she is torn between her desire to return to the Collective and her loyalty to the Voyager crew. She tries to comfort Seven with the expectation that all of her grief, all of her guilt, remorse and compassion will become irrelevant once Humanity is assimilated. Seven looks around at them fearfully. The Queen demands her to forget Voyager as they " were never your Collective. " Seven stands her ground and rebelliously states that she is Annika Hansen – Human.

Magnus Hansen, now a Borg drone

The Queen smiles and tells Seven that she remembers Annika but wonders if Annika remembers someone else. A drone steps forward and a horrified Seven recognizes who it was immediately – her father, Magnus Hansen. The Queen, sensing that Seven's resistance is weak, soothingly tells her, " Your family's here. You're here . Be one with us again. " It works and Seven begins to give in to the Queen.

But then Seven hears the voice of Captain Janeway, urging her to hold on, they are coming. " Captain… " Seven whispers loudly enough for the Queen to hear her. " What did you say? " she asks sharply. Seven realizes her blunder and tries to say it was nothing, but the Queen does not believe her. She seizes her face and through the hive mind probes her thoughts finding the com link set up by The Doctor.

Act Nine [ ]

On board the Flyer , Janeway and The Doctor discover that their com link to Seven is suddenly being blocked, indicating that the Queen knows they are coming. Tuvok reports he has found Seven's location just 600 kilometers away. Janeway orders Paris to head for the location. In her chamber, the Queen comments that although Janeway's com signal originated close by, they cannot detect her vessel. But she understands why this is so as they must be using the Hansens' multi-adaptive shielding. However, she notes, they assimilated that technology, therefore they can adapt to it quickly and easily.

Paris tensely reports a cube has altered course to intercept them, meaning that they have been detected. Janeway immediately orders re-modulation of the shielding. This works, but she knows they cannot fool the Borg sensors forever. They have to hurry. Tuvok reports that Seven is in a large chamber but he cannot get a transporter lock at their current distance. Janeway orders Paris to take them in closer. In her chamber, the Borg Queen attempts to use deception to dash any hope of rescue, telling Seven that the ship has been captured. However, Seven immediately knows she is lying as she is connected to the hive mind. As Seven once told Janeway , Borg make lousy liars; they cannot practice deception, as the hive mind makes it impossible. Seven tells this to the Queen who is greatly angered by being reminded of this.

The Flyer approaches the superstructure containing the Queen's Chamber and Paris reports it is too heavily shielded for the transporter to lock onto Seven. Janeway orders Tuvok to equip the newly-made bio-dampeners and accompany her into the structure. She orders Paris to target the chamber with the Flyer 's weapons he asks for clarification, very concerned. " Won't you be down there? " " Do it " she insists and he acknowledges. Janeway and Tuvok beam onto the superstructure, armed with phaser rifles. Their bio-dampeners work as they are undetected by the various drones while they move down a corridor.

A subdermal bioprobe

But security is heightened and force fields go up along the corridor. These fields do not block drones, only non-Borg. They watch as a drone walks through one and Janeway gets an idea ordering Tuvok to give her a subdermal bioprobe .

On the Flyer , alarms alert Paris that the vessel's shielding is again being adapted by the Borg. Three cubes start converging on the shuttle. He quickly re-modulates their frequency and waits. In her chamber, the Borg Queen watches the viewscreen with great annoyance as the Flyer vanishes once again. Seven watches as well. " You underestimate them, " she tells the Queen with satisfaction. The Queen bitterly remarks that it is time for a more aggressive approach. The Flyer is suddenly rocked by Borg weapons fire as the approaching cubes blindly fire in the vicinity of its last known position. Aboard, Paris tensely bobs and weaves the shuttle to avoid the blasts.

Back near the Queen's Chamber, Janeway and Tuvok walk up to a regenerating drone and Janeway implants it with the subdermal probe and has Tuvok wake it. Once activated, the drone walks up to a force field, pauses and then walks through. Janeway reads the force field's modulation and adjusts her bio-dampener to be compatible in order to walk through the fields herself. As she does so however, the field overloads her bio-dampener making her detectable by the Borg sensor grid. She quickly orders Tuvok to disable the shields around the chamber and hurries forward.

Seven tries to stop the Borg Queen but fails

Aboard the Flyer , Paris realizes that his time is up; the Borg are now adapting to the shielding and sensing the ship no matter how fast he changes the frequency. The familiar, monotonous hail comes through: " We are the Borg. You will be assimilated. Resistance is futile ". In her chamber, the Borg Queen speaks the words, AS the Collective.

Anguished, Seven charges at the Queen, her arm raised to strike her down, but the Queen turns and seizes her arm with hardly an effort. Seven struggles, futilely. The Queen tells Seven that retrieving her was a waste of time. " We believed you would be an asset to us. We were wrong, " she tells her, scornfully adding that she has become weak.

" Don't listen to her, Seven, " a voice says from the doorway. They turn to see Captain Janeway standing at the door. She walks in slowly, rifle pointed at the Queen, looking directly at her. Drones converge around Janeway and she warns the Queen to call them off or be destroyed. The drones stop. The Queen matter-of-factly tells her that her weapons are useless. Janeway disputes that, replying that her tactical officer is disabling the room's shields and her ship's weapons are targeted on the chamber. The Queen observes that she and Seven will be killed along with her.

Janeway responds that death is better than being one of them. The Queen tests her resolve by ordering the drones to resume their convergence on Janeway. Janeway calmly orders Paris to fire on her command; upon seeing that Janeway is not bluffing, the Queen again halts the drones. Paris reports that the attacking cubes have withdrawn. She orders him to beam her, Tuvok, and Seven out of the chamber. Suddenly, the lighting and shadows shift within the chamber. Paris reports that a dispersal field has gone up around them and he cannot beam them out.

Janeway turns to Seven and orders her to shut the field down. The Queen, though, attempts one last appeal to the Borg Seven used to be. She tells her not to listen to Janeway. " She's poisoned your thoughts long enough, " she says sharply. Janeway simply makes her instruction to Seven a direct order. The Queen tries to counter by telling Seven that one order and one voice is "insignificant".

Seven looks at the Queen and then at Janeway. Attempting to reconcile who she was and who she is now, her inner battle is finally quelled. She moves to a console and plunges in her assimilation tubules.

The Borg Queen looks angrily at where Seven was, before she transported out

The field drops as the Queen furiously glares at Seven. Janeway smiles and orders Paris to energize, but then the Queen tilts her head and the lights and shadows suddenly shift again. Paris reports the field is back up. She looks at Seven and Janeway with contempt. Drones begin converging on them both. The Queen orders them assimilated. The drones close on them mercilessly.

Seven, however, informs Janeway that there is a power node directly above the Queen. If it is destroyed, the Queen's interface with the dispersal field will be broken. The Queen's head whips around to face her with a shocked, accusing glare.

" Our thoughts are one, " Seven reminds her with a satisfied sneer.

Janeway wastes no time and immediately destroys the node with a blast from her rifle. She and Seven disappear from the chamber in the Flyer 's transporter beam. The Queen watches, her eyes full of fury.

Act Ten [ ]

Upon beaming back onto the Flyer , Janeway welcomes Seven back to the crew. The Doctor runs a quick scan and finds Seven has not been in any way re-assimilated. She joins Tuvok at tactical and the Delta Flyer speeds away from the Unicomplex. Two cubes quickly follow the ship and are joined by the Borg Queen's vessel. On Janeway's order, the Flyer jumps to transwarp. Only the Borg Queen's vessel does the same – the cubes stay at the Unicomplex.

The Borg Queen's vessel fires torpedoes at the Delta Flyer

In transwarp space, the diamond fires on the Flyer , damaging its port warp nacelle . The shuttle begins to rapidly lose energy and Paris reports that they will drop out of transwarp in under a minute. Janeway orders rerouting of power from life support to the engines: better to suffocate than vaporize.

On Voyager 's bridge, Torres, at tactical, reports to Chakotay that a transwarp conduit is opening 30,000 kilometers off the port bow – the Flyer is returning. Chakotay orders battle stations. In the conduit, the diamond tries to catch the Flyer in a tractor beam, but Seven deflects it. Paris counts down the time until they return to normal space where Voyager is positioned.

The Borg diamond is destroyed

As the Flyer drops back into normal space, Janeway hails Voyager and informs Chakotay of the Borg vessel closely pursuing them. Chakotay gets an idea and he orders Torres to fire a full spread of photon torpedoes at the conduit's threshold. The resulting explosion would conversely implode the conduit for distance of at least a light year , destroying anything inside it for that distance. Torres does so and as the torpedoes detonate, massive space-transwarp space explosions cause the effect that Chakotay desired. Janeway hails Voyager and Chakotay informs her of the action taken. They seem to be home free, and she orders him to clear the Flyer for docking.

But then a shocked Torres reports the appearance of a large number of Borg signatures coming from the conduit. Neither she nor Chakotay can understand, as they were certain the conduit was collapsed. Chakotay tensely informs Janeway and orders battlestations and weapons ready. He and the bridge officers watch as the conduit opens, but that comes out is debris from the destroyed Borg Queen's vessel. They breathe a collective sigh of relief.

Janeway records in her log that the stolen transwarp coil gave them twenty thousand light years of service before giving out; they are now a good fifteen years closer to home. She enters Cargo Bay 2 and finds Seven at a console working, despite orders from The Doctor to regenerate for at least 48 hours. She is downloading Borg tactical data into the computer's database. She explains that she acquired a vast amount of data during her time at Unimatrix 01, connected once again to the hive mind. This data may prove useful in any future encounters with the Borg. Janeway approves.

" Sweet dreams… "

But there is something on Seven's mind. She tells Janeway that she betrayed them and threatened them with assimilation and still they came back for her. She had not expected that course of action at all. Why did they do it? Janeway smiles at her and responds that she apparently still has much to learn about Humanity. She tells her it is time to regenerate; she has to follow The Doctor's orders.

" When I am finished, " Seven replies.

" No, " Janeway responds, her smile widening, " now. "

Seven smiles back as she goes to her alcove and installs herself. As the regeneration cycle begins, she closes her eyes serenely. Janeway looks at her fondly and wishes her sweet dreams.

Log entries [ ]

• Field notes, USS Raven
• " Captain's Log , supplemental. Operation Fort Knox is ready to proceed. All departments are standing by and I've given the order to begin at 06:00 hours. "
• " Captain's Log, Stardate 52619.2. We got another twenty thousand light years out of the transwarp coil before it gave out. I figure we're a good fifteen years closer to home. "

Memorable quotes [ ]

" Vessel identified: Federation Starfleet , Intrepid -class , 143 lifeforms. Prepare for assimilation . "

" We are the Borg. You will be assimilated. Resistance is futile. " " Break off your pursuit or we'll open fire. " " Irrelevant. " " Is it? You've scanned our vessel. You know we can match your firepower. " " You will be assimilated. "

" I don't know about the rest of you, but I feel lucky today. "

" Now this is how I prefer the Borg: in pieces. "

" Captain! Don't touch that! " " What is it? " " I don't know, but a few minutes ago it was crawling around on the floor. "

" Better safe than assimilated. "

" Maybe I should go to red alert and get it over with. " " Commander? " " You're about to drop one of your bombshells. " " Now what makes your say that? " " The way you fiddle with your combadge. You do it every time. " " Well, I'll have to keep an eye on that. "

" It's impossible to offend a mindless drone. "

" I don't know about you, but I'm glad to be back on Voyager . Borg vessels make my skin crawl. " " It was a holodeck recreation " " Close enough. "

" When the New World Economy took shape in the late 22nd century, and money went the way of the dinosaur, Fort Knox was turned into a museum. A couple of Ferengi tried [to break into it] about 10 years ago , but other than that it is impenetrable. "

" I am the Borg. Seven of Nine, Tertiary Adjunct of Unimatrix Zero One, you've become weak. " " This is a dream. I'm regenerating. " " I assure you, it's not a dream. We've accessed your neural transceiver. Our thoughts are one. We know about Voyager 's plan to invade the Sphere. It will fail. " " If that's true, then why haven't you assimilated them? " " We've come to make you an offer. Rejoin the Collective and we'll spare Voyager . " " Why me? " " Because you are unique. "

" I'm not leaving without you! " " Then you will be assimilated! "

" How do you propose we adapt? " "You are the Borg; you tell me."

" They left behind their trivial, selfish lives, and they've been reborn with a greater purpose. We've delivered them from chaos into order. " " Comforting words. Use them next time instead of 'Resistance is futile.' You may elicit a few volunteers. "

" There are three things to remember about being a starship captain: keep your shirt tucked in, go down with the ship, and never abandon a member of your crew. "

" You believe that Voyager liberated you from the Collective. Did you really think we would surrender you so easily? " " Explain. " " You must be tired. It's time to regenerate. We've adapted an alcove just for you. Go. It will help order your thoughts. When your cycle is complete, we will continue our conversation. Comply. "

" My visual cortex… it's been altered. " " That's because we've enhanced it with Borg technology. You've seen through Human eyes long enough. It's a neuro-processing adjunct designed to increase your synaptic efficiency. "

" You're much too valuable to us with your individuality intact. But you've left Humanity behind. Try to abandon their petty emotions as well. Fear, anger, vanity. They've corrupted you, but the damage can be repaired. " " You've expended significant resources to capture me. Why? " " Isn't it obvious? You're going to help us assimilate Humanity. We failed in our two previous attempts to assimilate Earth, and we won't succeed the third time unless we understand the nature of their resistance. We want you to be our eyes. Let us see Humanity. "

" While I was regenerating, you assimilated my memories. " " Our thoughts are one. " " Then you already possess all of my knowledge. What more do you want? " " You are the only Borg that has ever returned to a state of individuality. We want to keep you exactly the way you are. Otherwise, you would lose your Human perspective. We don't want another drone. We want you. "

" Re-route power from life support. " " Captain? " " I'd rather suffocate than vaporize, do it! "

Background information [ ]

Story and script [ ].

• This episode's origin was similar to that of the third season outing " Unity ", in that – when the writing staff of Star Trek: Voyager were faced with the challenge of devising a show for the February rating sweeps period – the writers thought of the Borg. However, this idea was not an immediate one. Co-writer Joe Menosky offered, " We were heading into sweeps […] But we had no idea what we were going to do. " ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 32)
• The episode had the working title "Untitled Borg".
• The scale of the episode was influenced by the first airing of the fourth season two-parter " The Killing Game " and " The Killing Game, Part II ". Joe Menosky reflected, " Because of the success of airing 'The Killing Game' in a single night, the network and the studio were really interested in doing a movie. " ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 32)
• Fellow co-writer Brannon Braga also wanted the episode to be, in his own words, "a big event" and the motion picture Star Trek: First Contact , another production that featured the Borg and a Borg Queen, provided an example that the writers were interested in attempting to surpass. Braga explained, " I really felt we needed something spectacular for February sweeps […] To do a Borg movie, telefilm, or whatever you want to call it, we had to outdo First Contact . The space battles and the Queen had to be more elaborate. " ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 32) Braga also said, " When we decided, 'Let's do something different; let's do a two-hour telefilm,' that made us rise to the challenge, and we did 'Dark Frontier'. " ( Star Trek Monthly  issue 58 , p. 16)
• It was Brannon Braga himself who crafted the episode's plot. He recalled, " We had all these different storylines laying around having to do with the Borg. I just cobbled them together late one night and we had 'Dark Frontier'. " Joe Menosky remembered, " Brannon wrote this amazingly complete story memo that had everything. " ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 32)
• The inspiration for the backstory of the courageous Hansens – Magnus and Erin Hansen – was the history of gorilla specialist Dian Fossey . ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 34)
• In their effort to turn out an exceptional script, the writers worked for long hours on the teleplay. ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , pp. 56-57)
• Brannon Braga enjoyed scripting the scenes that include the Borg Queen and Seven of Nine. He noted, " It was fun to write the banter between [Seven] and the Borg Queen. " ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 34)
• Brannon Braga also deliberately left several questions unanswered, such as the fate of Erin Hansen and the possibility that the Borg planted Seven of Nine to act as a spy on Voyager . Regarding the latter issue, Braga admitted, " I wanted people […] to ask that very question. The Queen may have done that; we'll never know. One of those tantalizing tidbits that the fans enjoy […] I thought it was an interesting thing for the Queen to say. It certainly caught Seven's attention. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , pp. 66 & 65)
• The episode was scripted as if it were a two-parter. The final draft script for the first of these parts was submitted on 18 November 1998 (with further revisions up to and including 8 December of that year) and the final draft of the second part's teleplay was submitted on 2 December 1998 (being revised up to and including 15 December of the same year).
• Director Cliff Bole was instrumental in the decision to introduce the Borg Queen into the plot at the end of the first part. " I begged to get the Queen in the end [of that part], " Bole remembered. " Originally, they hadn't planned on it, and I said, 'Guys, you can't do this. You've got to tease, and you've got to bring these folks back, and you've got to have the Queen in this episode. You've just got to have what I call the end-teaser and introduce the Queen. I don't care if it's one page or two shots; just do it.' " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 87)
• The photon torpedo that destroys the Borg probe in the episode's teaser was initially deleted from the script for budgetary reasons. It was reinserted not long before the episode's creation came to an end. ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 33)
• The script for this episode's first half defines the Borg Queen that appears here as being separate from the one in Star Trek: First Contact , as the scripted version of the queen's introduction in this episode specifies, " Although this Queen has a similar design to the one seen in 'First Contact', she is a different character with her own, distinct personality. "
• The script also describes the intricate sequence wherein the Borg Queen's body is assembled by stating, " The Borg Queen descends in a free-floating alcove that lowers from a port on the ceiling. As the Queen comes closer, we can see her body integrate piece by piece in a startling optical effect. Legs, arms, neck, head, torso – all clicking into place. " Visual effects supervisor Mitch Suskin noted, of the same scene, that the writers "wanted it to be impressive." ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 33) Visual effects producer Dan Curry concurred, " [Brannon Braga] said that the Borg Queen will be reassembled, but let's do something 'new and cool'. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 62)
• The script for the episode's second half refers to the Hansens, while they are examining a drone aboard the Raven , as "like biologists tagging a 'wolf' in the wild," which is consistent with the fact that Brannon Braga and Joe Menosky often thought that the Borg were like wolves.
• Similarly, Erin Hansen's statement that she and her husband imagine the Borg Queen is "like the Queen of an insect colony" is in keeping with the fact that the Borg were initially conceived as a race of insects.
• The script for the installment's second part comments that the Borg assimilation chamber where Seven of Nine sees alien victims of assimilation was to be "a redress of the transwarp chamber seen in Part One."

Cast and characters [ ]

• Brannon Braga felt that this episode was an important one for the character of Kathryn Janeway. " I think [it] was as important a show for Captain Janeway as it was for Seven, " Braga mused. " I think Janeway became more heroic and more Human herself […] The scene with Naomi made [Janeway] a little warmer, a little more Human. I think her relationship with Seven changed in that show, inexorably in some ways. They will always be in conflict, that's the nature of their mentor-pupil relationship. But I think they became a little more Picard and Data than they ever had been in 'Dark Frontier'. " ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 34)
• The fact that this episode's casting process took place in November and December 1998 hampered the search for suitable actors. Cliff Bole remembered, " Casting was a bit of a problem; the town [of Hollywood ] was awful busy then. You know, winding down before Christmas everybody's trying to get shows done, and finding the right talent was very tough. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 56)
• There were early rumors that Alice Krige would return to portray the Borg Queen in this episode. ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 33) However, Krige was unavailable, at the time. Even by 31 January 2001 , actress Susanna Thompson was still unsure of the reasoning for Krige's absence. Thompson, on that date, commented, " I wonder why Alice [wasn't] available! And I have no idea. There's all sorts of many different types of stories [but] she just wasn't available. " ( VOY Season 5 DVD , "The Borg Queen Speaks")
• Susanna Thompson, who had unsuccessfully auditioned to play the Borg Queen in Star Trek: First Contact , was asked back to audition for the queen in this episode. She recalled, " I used [Alice Krige's performance in First Contact ] as a springboard for what I brought into the audition, and they cast me. " ( VOY Season 5 DVD , "The Borg Queen Speaks")
• Even though Susanna Thompson had appeared in several previous Star Trek productions (portraying Varel in TNG : " The Next Phase ", Jaya in TNG : " Frame of Mind " and Lenara Kahn in DS9 : " Rejoined "), this was the actress' first encounter with large scale prosthetics. ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 58)
• Susanna Thompson was aware that she was playing a different queen from the one in Star Trek: First Contact . Shortly after appearing in this installment, the actress commented, " I'm not the same Borg Queen. She's the new Queen of the hive. There are similarities, but we are different. " ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 32)
• Even after Susanna Thompson was cast as the Borg Queen, however, she still tried to take inspiration for her role here from Alice Krige's performance in First Contact . " I wasn't afraid of duplicating her, " stated Thompson. " There was no time to imitate her, but there had to be similar elements because whatever Queen is clicked into the Collective, they all come from the same mind […] I was very much encouraged to make the Queen my own [though]. " ( Star Trek: Communicator  issue 121 , pp. 17 & 81) Thompson also remarked, " I took some information from [ First Contact ]. They did not want me to duplicate Alice's character, but my own development of the background for this character was that there had to be elements that were the same, because ultimately they come from the same brain; they are an extension of the same central brain. There might be more knowledge at any given moment, but there is still the same background. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 60)
• The presence of a new Borg Queen was a notable departure from continuity for director Terry Windell . " I think you have a consistency in the characterization of the Borg, the collective mind, and how they operate, " he stated. " Our Queen was obviously a different character; although she's still the Borg Queen, there's a very different take on it. So that's the part that I consider open territory to be different. The actual individual Borgs, I think, are manipulated very much in the same way, and that's how you keep the consistency and the continuity. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 58)
• Susanna Thompson felt that her primary task was to help make realistic the Borg Queen's effort to convince Seven of Nine to rejoin the Collective. " I think that my main role is to get to a point where the seduction becomes believable, " noted the actress. ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 61)
• Both Susanna Thompson and Terry Windell believed that, in this installment, the Borg Queen is a particularly maternal figure. " It's as if [the Borg Queen] comes back into [Seven's] life much like a biological mother would come back into some child's life, after years of not being there, and try and win her back, but in a very intelligent and manipulative way, " said Windell. " Both these people are obviously incredibly intelligent and hold a lot of information. They're going to know what the other person is thinking, so they really have to work to push the buttons. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 61) Thompson offered, " In an odd way, the Queen is a kind of maternal figure and of course, so is Janeway. " ( Star Trek: Communicator  issue 121 , p. 81) The actress clarified, " There really are two maternal figures. Janeway and the Borg Queen, in whatever twisted maternal way she is, are these two sides that are pulling at Seven and they represent her identity. She used to be here, she went away, and now she's come back to the Borg, and there is a sense of deprogramming and re-brainwashing. That's what the Queen does to her, and that's where the seduction lies. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 61)
• Susanna Thompson loved the effect of lights in the Borg Queen's lair following the queen as she moved, believing that the effect lent a greater sense of ambiance and power to her character. Thompson also felt that her Borg Queen's costume, particularly the restrictiveness of the outfit, aided her performance by making it hard to make any "extravagant" gestures. ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , pp. 61 & 59)
• Susanna Thompson gained some useful advice from Brannon Braga. " Brannon told me to remember that every movement the Queen makes has a purpose, " said the actress. ( Star Trek: Communicator  issue 121 , p. 81) She elaborated, " Brannon was very helpful in that he wanted that kind of fluid movement that Alice had. When I got on set I pretty much got it, but he came down, watched me, and just said one thing – that there's no extraneous movement. I just realized that I might have been twitching a little bit and, because everything is perfect, any little twitch can stand out like a big one. That was real helpful. He also encouraged the quality of being… it's really not conversational… but there is not that drone quality about the Queen's speech. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 60)
• Susanna Thompson was additionally advised by Seven of Nine actress Jeri Ryan . " We talked about character, absolutely, " recalled Thompson. ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 58) She also stated, " Jeri said for her, playing a Borg is constantly reinventing yourself in the moment. " ( Star Trek: Communicator  issue 121 , p. 81)
• Jeri Ryan also helped Susanna Thompson bear the Borg Queen makeup. " Some of the most important information Jeri wanted to give me was about how to lie down! " exclaimed Thompson. " I had to lie vertical, but Jeri knew that, and she had a neck pillow. What I did was, I had a mound of robes on the floor on my trailer, neck pillows on top of them, and then I was able to lie somewhat comfortably. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , pp. 58-59)
• The collaboration between Susanna Thompson and Jeri Ryan was enjoyable for the latter actress. " Susanna Thompson, who is a friend of mine, was fun to work with, " Ryan said. " As the Borg Queen, she did a beautiful job. " ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 28)
• Jeri Ryan was extremely enthusiastic about "Dark Frontier" in general. " That could have been a feature, " she opined. " I was very impressed with the way that whole show came together, not just the script, but the production values all around were outstanding […] I loved seeing exactly what made [Seven of Nine's] parents tick and what made them end up the way they did, and exactly how they had gotten there in the first place. It very much had the flavor of Dian Fossey, the woman who studied and lived with gorillas, to it; following the Borg in the wild. I thought it was very well done and very well thought out. " ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 28)
• Although the Hansen family had been shown twice before, they had to be recast for this installment. " I think the original actress who played Seven's mother was unavailable and working in New York , " remarked Cliff Bole, " and we just had to go searching […] Seven's parents were cast late. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 56)
• Both Terry Windell and executive producer Rick Berman were fond of Susanna Thompson's work on this episode. ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 61; Star Trek: Communicator  issue 121 , p. 12) Windell opined, " She was very good. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 61) Cliff Bole was likewise pleased with the results of the casting process, such as with finding Katelin Petersen to play the young Annika Hansen. " We lucked out, " he said, " but, by God , we looked; it got really tight. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 56)

Props, makeup, wardrobe, and sets [ ]

• Susanna Thompson found the makeup and clothing involved in this episode's production to be highly elaborate. " It was all that Star Trek can be, " she observed, " this great, big, theater side of it, with costumes and makeup. " ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 33)
• According to the unauthorized reference book Delta Quadrant (p. 291), the clothing used for Species 10026 consisted of stock costumes, including Romulan civilian clothing from TNG : " Unification I " and " Unification II ".
• Susanna Thompson wore the same costume as Alice Krige had worn for Star Trek: First Contact , but with some subtle alterations. Thompson noted, " They adjusted it for me. Our body types were similar, but it wasn't quite made to fit my body. " ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 32) Similarly, the Borg Queen makeup for both productions was handled by the same person, Scott Wheeler , of whom Jeri Ryan enthused, " [He] did a phenomenal job on her makeup. " ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 28) There were a few changes to the makeup, however; for example, the mechanical structure that this episode's Borg Queen wears on the back of her head was slightly different from that which Krige wore, with some new lights, and the contact lenses (which were specially silverized at a space center in Texas ) were the exact same kind of lens, although custom-made for Thompson. Some alterations were made on the set of this installment. " There were adjustments to the makeup in the center of the face and the eyes, the lips of course, and the forehead, " remembered Thompson. " They didn't want me to look as wet as Alice, so they had to make sure that looked okay. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , pp. 58-60)
• It was due to lengthy durations that Susanna Thompson had to wear the Borg Queen costume for, coupled with the fact that the costume wasn't completely fitted to match Thompson's physical proportions, that the actress found the costume uncomfortable. Firstly, it took five and a half hours for her Borg Queen makeup and costume to be put on. Shortly after working on the episode, Thompson described the costume as "like a very, very tight wetsuit" of which the long days had made her tired. ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 32) She also complained, " I found the costume, probably because it fit Alice better than it fit me, slightly constricting, particularly around the shoulders […] It was not an easy experience, physically. " Conversely, makeup supervisor Michael Westmore took note of the fact that Thompson "was able to tolerate the contact lenses a little easier" than Alice Krige had. ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 59)
• Susanna Thompson found her physical transformation into the Borg Queen to be a memorable experience. She declared, " It's so bizarre to have makeup spray painted on you; it's a very bizarre feeling. I felt like I was in the shop! " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 58)
• Terry Windell was sensitive to Susanna Thompson's predicament. " It was incredibly taxing for Susanna, but she was a real trouper, " Windell remarked. " She's into six hours of makeup before I even see her on the set and then there's also the costume. She's wearing metallic contacts which, once you get fatigued – and we're using smoke on the set – can really be an irritant. So she really had to work hard, and it's hard work to look effortless […] It was very gruelling for her. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 59)
• Other production staffers were on hand to help Susanna Thompson with the costume. " I had to have two costume people work with me, " the actress remembered, " just to get the costume in place and ready to shoot. " ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 33) She also stated, " There was always a costume maker with me to help me get out of the costume right away if I needed to go to the bathroom, and, being someone who doesn't really like to have a person constantly around me, that was a hardship. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 58) Thompson additionally stated that " always having to count on somebody else to help you through things " added to her tiredness. ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 33)
• Susanna Thompson theorized that an element of her costume had a practical application; " I have an electrical unit on the back of my head, and I guess you're left with the notion that that's what controls the light [in the Borg Queen's lair] really. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 61)
• Due to the fact that the writers were working on the episode's teleplay throughout the pre-production stage, some of the sets had to be designed without full knowledge of the script. Cliff Bole stated, " Our set designer, Richard James , had to pretty much put a set together without knowing the ending, and he had to build the Queen's set without knowing how the second part was going. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 56)
• Richard James tried to give the set for the Borg Queen's lair an unusual design. " I wanted something different from what we've seen before, so I made the Queen's lair look as if it was a sphere, " commented James. " The whole set was about two stories tall and was made with all new drawings. The inside of her lair is curved to give it a spherical feel. I wasn't necessarily trying to follow the shapes used in First Contact ; it just kind of came out that way, and I really like the look. The normal Borg walls are so square and flat that I wanted to add some depth and something real interesting. I also cut out the cylinders and made wafers instead, kind of like a large watch battery. " Terry Windell opined that, although similar Borg corridors to the ones here had been shown in Star Trek before, the newness of the set for the Borg Queen's lair gave the production crew " some freedom. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , pp. 57-58)
• The lighting in the set for the Borg Queen's lair impressed both Cliff Bole and Terry Windell, Bole noting that it was a lot more extravagant than normal. " I know that [on 'Dark Frontier'] we went for an incredible lighting package. Theatrical lighting, almost a rock-and-roll package for a lot of the work. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 61)
• The idea of having some of the set's lighting concentrate on the Borg Queen was thought up by Terry Windell. " I requested that we have a very different look than we had seen before, and we had these computerized lights installed in the set that they could program to move, " Windell explained. " Since the Borg Queen deals with controlling the whole collective by her mind, we thought it would be interesting that, as she moved around, some of the lights actually followed her. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 61)
• Jeri Ryan was impressed with the sets of this outing, remarking, " The sets were amazing. " ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 28)
• The sphere that Kim saw crawling around (and thinks it's an auto-generation unit, of some kind) is the same prop used in " Thirty Days " by Riga as 'measuring instruments' as he is boarding the Delta Flyer .

Production [ ]

• Similar to how this episode was scripted in two parts, the installment was also filmed as two separate segments, with Cliff Bole directing the first half and Terry Windell helming the second part. Due to the pressures regarding the amount of alloted time provided for the episode's production, Bole was gratified that there were two directors. Whereas Bole was a Star Trek veteran who was well acquainted with working on productions that involved the Borg (he having directed the Star Trek: The Next Generation two-parter " The Best of Both Worlds " and " The Best of Both Worlds, Part II "), relative newcomer Terry Windell had to do some research. The latter director admitted, " Obviously, I referred to First Contact and the episode where they pick up Seven. I researched about four or five episodes that were strong in Borg. The feature and ' The Gift [!] ' were probably the strongest in terms of how to handle the material. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 58)
• Brannon Braga was of the opinion that this episode was " very difficult to produce. " ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 34)
• In common with the writing of the script and the casting process, the episode's production took place in November and December 1998. In fact, when Cliff Bole started filming his part of the episode, neither the script nor the guest cast were ready yet. " A lot of times when they were looking [for actors], I was shooting, so that added to it, " Bole stated. " We were putting [the guest cast] together pretty much at the fifth hour, and I had to depend on the boys upstairs to do some casting without me, because my plate was full […] We started shooting before we had actually had a completed script […] The phone was ringing all the time; that's how Brannon and I had to work, because he was working so hard on the second part and finishing the first one. I mean he answered the phone immediately and we hammered our way through it. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , pp. 56-57)
• Cliff Bole was attracted to the possibility of utilizing a steadicam for this outing. " I used the steadicam quite a bit and the town was so damned busy, it was tough to line up the guys I like and the cameramen I like, " Bole reflected. " [The steadicam] became my main tool by the nature of the design of the set. It became more of a tool than a creative piece, because it just handled all the problems that came out of the design. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 60)
• The reason that the Hansens were cast late was, as Cliff Bole explained, " because that part of the show we did towards the end [of the production schedule], because we weren't sure how much we were going to do on it. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 56)
• The casting of the Borg Queen also had a correlation on the production process. Cliff Bole recounted, " They hadn't quite got the Queen yet, she wasn't available; so I had to come back to shoot. I had to come back after I'd finished filming, about a week later, to shoot my part with the Queen, which was just the ending [of the first part of the show]. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 57)
• Cliff Bole and Terry Windell worked together in an attempt to ensure that the transition between their scenes was seamless. Windell remembered, " I actually went on the set and watched what Cliff was doing so that we would have continuity. The biggest aspect was he didn't introduce the Queen's lair until the last act of his show and the majority of my show takes place there, so that was the big sequence we had to collaborate on, and we actually were there on the same day when he was filming his sequence. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 57)
• This is the final Star Trek episode that Cliff Bole worked on as a director.
• As Borg corridors had repeatedly been shown on Star Trek , Terry Windell intended to make the ones here seem a little atypical by giving them a cramped look, such as in the shots where an appalled Seven passes victims destined for assimilation, and various Borg drones. " I tried to lens it a bit differently than I've seen before: I tried to use longer lenses and compress a lot of the space, just to get a sense of claustrophobia, " Windell related. " What I've seen before a lot in the Borg corridors is wide lenses to give that kind of distorted perspective and, you know, get a little disjointed, and it tends to make the set look really open and big. Once the Borg Queen orders Seven to go back in and actually participate in assimilating another race, we felt that it should be in Seven's mind's eye, what the corridor was all about. I felt it should be very claustrophobic. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 58)
• Working the lighting effect that was characteristic of the Borg Queen into the production caused Terry Windell some scheduling problems. " What we would do is rehearse and when we had the blocking down with Susanna, then we would program the lights accordingly and she was fantastic about hitting her marks […] In terms of difficulty, what that did, the actual time to program the lights is something you don't really see when you're blocking out a week's worth of work. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 61) Nevertheless, Windell was still proud of the work of those responsible, including himself, for creating the dramatic atmospheres in the Borg sets. " I think that what we did in the Borg corridors and the Queen's lair was […] featuresque, the drama and the lighting, so that it's not always about seeing everything in total clarity; it's about using light and smoke. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 58)
• Susanna Thompson's long days of enduring her makeup and costume generally consisted of around 21 hours. ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 32) She reflected, " My days were very long. I had no idea; they were 20, 21 hour days. One day I think I did 22 hours. " Terry Windell offered, " By the time I'm at the end of a normal day, she's almost into 20 hours. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 59)

Visual effects [ ]

• Terry Windell remarked on the usefulness of the episode's visual effects; " I think that the visual effects give it the production value. When they describe the multitude of Borg vessels you have to see that. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 58)
• The CGI for both parts of the episode was done by Foundation Imaging , involving the input of Foundation's visual effects supervisors Robert Bonchune and Adam "Mojo" Lebowitz as well as director of animation John Teska . ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 32) Bonchune handled the visual effects of the episode's first half, whereas Mojo dealt with the VFX of the second part. ( Star Trek Monthly  issue 58 , p. 44) The episode also incorporated contributions from Foundation Imaging staffers Koji Kuramura (who was responsible for most of the Borg Unicomplex's construction, based on a maquette created by Dan Curry, and for the revamping of the damaged Borg sphere), Dave Morton (who created numerous Astrometrics graphics), Dan Ritchie (who both built and blew up the Borg probe), and Brandon MacDougall (who built and designed the Borg Queen's ship ). ( Star Trek Monthly  issue 58 , pp. 44 & 46) Dan Curry was also involved in modeling the queen's ship. ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 33)
• Star Trek: First Contact provided a precedent on which the visual effects artists based the episode's variety of new Borg ship designs, as well as the look of the Unicomplex. " We had the feature, to some degree, to refer back to, to make sure that this appears to be in the same universe, " noted Mitch Suskin, who acted as the visual effects supervisor for the first half of the episode. ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 33)
• A visual effect whose creation was particularly hurried was the interior view of the Borg probe's destruction. Mitch Suskin remembered, " As they cut the show, they looked at it and said, 'We really want more action, more drama.' We found out about that as they were finishing second unit photography. " With the visual effects team having had little notice that the effect would be wanted, Art Codron (the visual effects coordinator for the episode's first half) subsequently ran across to the set and obtained the necessary background plates. Suskin described the effect's creation as "a true team effort" that involved a Borg drone CGI model from Foundation Imaging. He continued, " John Teska gave us a couple of variations of [the single] Borg flying backwards, with interactive light passes. Then we took it into the bay, dug through our vast library of explosions, and pieced it together in an afternoon, between his animation, the elements we had, and a little bit of Harry [animation] work here and there to stitch it all together. It's the one shot in the film when you see an explosion ripping through and the Borg getting blown backwards. " ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 33)
• Mitch Suskin noted that some of the effects for the episode's first half were harder to create than others; " The big challenges in that show, as far as I am concerned, were the Borg city, the Unicomplex, and the scene where [the Borg Queen's body is assembled]. " ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 32) Suskin also believed that the writers were not alone in wanting the queen's construction to look impressive, a similar sequence having been created for Star Trek: First Contact . " We all secretly wanted it to be at least as good as what was done on the feature, " recalled Suskin. " We wanted to be a little bit different. " ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 32)
• By examining the set for the Borg Queen's lair, Dan Curry came up with the idea of having the queen's lower body enter from below, via floor panels, and then robotically assemble. Curry then mapped out the sequence with storyboards that, despite being quite detailed, also left ample room for the other team members to be creative. ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 62) Live action footage of Susanna Thompson's head, made-up to match that of the Borg Queen, was shot for the sequence. ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 63) Mitch Suskin reflected, " We shot a plate of the actress, […] a closeup that they tracked in. She's just standing on the stage in front of a bluescreen , but we actually had the camera tilting, and coming down, so we'd have a little bit of a perspective change. It was tracked in and composited at Foundation Imaging. " ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 33) Indeed, most of the sequence was done with CGI by John Teska. ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 32; Star Trek Monthly  issue 58 , p. 45, et al. ) This was because the queen's unique alcove did not actually work as an elevator. ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 32)
• Not only was the bluescreen footage of Susanna Thompson used for close-ups of the Borg Queen's head, but the sequence also involved CG models of the queen's head and body as well as the apparatus that physically assembles her. ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 63) Rob Bonchune recalled of John Teska's work on the sequence, " He built all the piping. I mean, basically, there was nothing in there. There was a thing in the background where she came down live, but he meshed the live actress to CG stuff […] and he built all the piping when it comes up through the floor. All we had was this plate, and he actually put the images on CG stuff and blended it in, and you see holes on the floor. " ( Star Trek Monthly  issue 58 , p. 45) Teska also lit the apparatus. A shot wherein the combination of CG and live action elements was used to represent different parts of the Borg Queen is the one where the upper and lower portions of her body are fastened together by small hooks that latch into her. " [That] was just a production shot of her, " said Suskin. " Everything that latches in was done at Foundation. " ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 33) Following this shot, the episode concludes solely with live action footage. The effect itself incorporated only six cuts and hardly any work for Susanna Thompson. ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , pp. 63 & 62)
• When Rob Bonchune saw the first test of the assembly machinery rising out of the floor, he was pleasantly surprised by how real John Teska had managed to make the effect seem. ( Star Trek Monthly  issue 58 , p. 45; Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 33) The sequence was so effective that it fooled people into thinking it had been done entirely on set. " Mitch [Suskin] told me, " recounted Bonchune, " that when they were viewing the tape over at Paramount, people would walk in to look at it and say, 'Oh, you guys shot that practical?' That's good […] It's pretty impressive. " ( Star Trek Monthly  issue 58 , p. 45)
• As transwarp travel had previously been shown (visualized with the same effect) in both " Threshold " and " Distant Origin ", the visual effects artists initially intended to make another reuse of the same effect in this installment. " We pulled out that reference, " Mitch Suskin stated, " because we assumed since it was the same term, that we would use that again. Peter Lauritson and the other producers looked at it and wanted something flashier. The thing that they actually liked was from [the fourth season finale] " Hope and Fear ", the slipstream . What we did was basically take the slipstream effect and change the color a little bit. " ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 33)
• The Raven was also revived for this episode, a previous version of the starship having been featured in a fourth season episode of the same name as the craft. " It was really a matter of almost starting over from scratch, " explained John Teska. A basic framework of the craft was in Foundation Imaging's possession, of which they did a render that they sent to Star Trek: Voyager Senior Illustrator Rick Sternbach . ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 33) He remembered, " I got a printout of the ship from Foundation, so I would have a three-quarter perspective […] We cut it down from eight or nine decks to four decks tops. This changed the scale of the windows and the entry hatches, and that sort of thing. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 59) Foundation Imaging then built the craft from Sternbach's refinements. ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 33)
• The transporter effect used in the flashback scenes corresponds with the effect used in Star Trek: The Next Generation and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine .
• The wide shot of the Delta Flyer being retrofitted with the transwarp coil was a re-use of the matte shot from " Extreme Risk ". The shot of the Delta Flyer exiting Voyager 's shuttlebay was another example of reused footage, having been used in both "Extreme Risk" and " Thirty Days ". Both shots were scripted to be stock optical shots.
• All the visual effects were transfered between the first and second halves of the episode, as Ronald B. Moore took over the supervising of the VFX. He commented, " We did all of the Queen interiors, and a lot of the ships, exploding the Queen's ship and going through the Borg city, the unicomplex. Foundation did some great work. I think the quality of the images we got was really terrific. " ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 33)
• Much of the visual effects footage of the climactic battle involving the Delta Flyer and Borg Queen's vessel inside a transwarp conduit was added late by Rick Berman. Ron Moore remarked, " At the end when Berman was making the final cut, he put some of those [shots] back, the interior of the warp conduit, the firing, and the chasing, which I thought was fabulous. Just before finalizing the cut, he felt that we needed the shots, so we put them back in, in a rush, because at that point we are usually talking about having another two weeks to work. " Moore also expressed gratitude that the visual effects team were able to pull together the effect, despite the rush. ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, pp. 33 & 34)
• Jeri Ryan was thrilled with this episode's optical shots, stating, " The effects were amazing. " ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 28)
• When the Hansens first detect a Borg cube, the music is reminiscent of the V'ger -themed music from Star Trek: The Motion Picture . ( Delta Quadrant , p. 289)

Continuity and trivia [ ]

• This is the final Star Trek episode directed by Cliff Bole .
• Terry Windell noted a comparison between this episode and "The Gift", saying the reason he found that reviewing that installment helped with the production of this one was "especially since ['The Gift'] dealt with Seven's transition from Borg to being more Human, and this whole story is about the possibility of her becoming Borg again." ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 58)
• Susanna Thompson believed that the Borg Queen's attempt to persuade Seven of Nine to rejoin the Borg Collective here is similar to the relationship between Data and the queen in Star Trek: First Contact , describing both relationships as a "seduction" but also referring to each as a different form of that. ( Star Trek: Communicator  issue 121 , p. 81; Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 61)
• The episode's teleplays date the flashback sequences in the first part of the installment as "twenty years" before the rest of the events in that part and the flashbacks in the second half as "a full year" later.
• This episode marks the first and only appearance of the Borg probe in a Star Trek series. However, the probe's rectangular design was resurrected for this episode; a Borg " tetragon " (imagined as being much larger than the one shown here) was temporarily considered to appear in Star Trek: First Contact , as a possible replacement for the Borg cube in that film. ( Delta Quadrant , p. 289, et al. ) This episode also marks the first and only appearance of the diamond-shaped Borg Queen's ship .
• Janeway claims that use of the transwarp coil has brought Voyager fifteen years closer to home, over a distance of 20,000 light years. This implies an average speed of around 250 million miles per second. Voyager 's speed capabilities have previously been noted in " The 37's " ("4 billion miles per second" at Warp 9.9), " Maneuvers " ("2 billion kilometres per second"), as well as implied in " Waking Moments " (222 million miles per second) and " The Gift " (170 million miles per second).
• Seven of Voyager 's photon torpedoes are seen to be used in this episode (one of which was transported before detonation), two having previously been used in " Counterpoint ". This brings the total number of torpedoes confirmed to have been used by Voyager over the course of the series to 49, a total which exceeds the irreplaceable complement of 38 that had been established by Chakotay in the first-season episode " The Cloud ".
• Voyager loses a shuttlecraft in this episode, for a total of ten, after having previously lost nine shuttles in " Initiations ", " Non Sequitur ", " Parturition ", " Unity ", " The Gift ", " Day of Honor ", " Nemesis ", and " Counterpoint ". In this episode, the shuttle is sacrificed as part of a strategic distraction.
• At the opening of this episode, the Borg voiceover announces the detection of 143 life forms aboard Voyager , yet the crew complement had previously been established as 152 just two episodes earlier in " Gravity ". This apparent discrepancy is not accounted for.
• Paper makes a rare appearance in this episode, in the form of several drawings stuck to the walls of USS Raven. Paper previously made an appearance in " Once Upon a Time ".
• It is revealed in this episode that a single Borg regeneration alcove requires 30 megawatts of power.
• Seven is seen in her purple-tone jumpsuit for the first time. This outfit was introduced because the previous blue one had been difficult to film against bluescreen backdrops. ( Star Trek: Voyager Companion , p. 294)
• This Borg Queen reveals herself to be from Species 125 .
• In this episode, it is revealed that the Borg designation for Humans is Species 5618.
• The transwarp conduit represents the eleventh time besides the series premiere (after " Eye of the Needle ", " Prime Factors ", " The 37's ", " Cold Fire ", " Threshold ", " Death Wish ", " False Profits ", " Future's End, Part II ", " The Q and the Grey ", and " Timeless ") that the Voyager crew is presented with the possibility of returning home much faster than by conventional warp travel. In this case, the technology works, if only for a short while, and provides a significant shortcut.

Previous episodes [ ]

• This episode makes several references to the events of " The Raven ", and the eponymous ship of that episode also makes several appearances, in flashbacks that serve as a prequel to that episode. No dates are given for " The Raven ", but this episode establishes that the events of that episode happened "over a year" earlier.
• Janeway states that the crew of Voyager have "proven ourselves against the Borg once before, twice before", in a reference to the events of the duology " Scorpion " and " Scorpion, Part II ", and the episode " Drone ". Janeway also points out to Seven that it's been "over two years since you came face to face with the Collective", in another reference to " Scorpion, Part II ".
• Chakotay misquotes Seven as saying, two years previously, "I will betray you". She actually says "we will betray you" (using the Borg penchant for the first-person plural tense) in " The Gift ".
• While discussing the records of Seven's parents, Neelix claims that the only thing he has of his family is a picture of his sister. This picture made an appearance in the earlier fifth-season episode " Once Upon a Time ".

Other Star Trek series [ ]

• The Hansen logs indicate that Federation knowledge of the Borg existed prior to the events of TNG : " Q Who ", citing the limited information as "rumor and sensor echoes." No doubt the El-Aurians must have been a source of at least some of the knowledge, since the USS Enterprise -B witnessed their escape in Star Trek Generations . It is somewhat puzzling, however, that the Starfleet crew of the USS Enterprise -D are unaware of the Borg and the Hansens in the earlier TNG episode. As Joe Menosky remembered, the writers of this episode were well aware of the discontinuity when they devised this installment. " There was no way in the world we were going to get rid of the Hansen arc, just because it didn't match exactly what had happened when Q first threw the Enterprise near that Borg cube […] There should be some mention in a database somewhere, and Picard should have known. There was a little bit of that knowledge […] In our minds, the Borg were a very slender rumor, and the Hansens followed up on the rumor and just disappeared. Whether that completely holds water or not, that's all the justification we needed to go with the Hansen arc. Even if we couldn't have come up with that justification, we would have done it anyway. I think you are denying new audiences the chance to see this arc that couldn't be told if you were going to be faithful to something that was established a decade ago. We are not willing to be that rigid with continuity. " ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 34)
• Paris claims that Ferengi attempted to break into Fort Knox "about ten years ago". This would have been just a year after Humanity made official first contact with the Ferengi in 2364, in TNG : " The Last Outpost ".
• When Seven first encounters the Borg Queen face to face the Queen says: "Welcome Home" followed by a scene cut. This echoes the end of DS9 : " The Search, Part I " when the female changeling says the same thing to Odo and there is also a scene cut.
• The Borg in the flashbacks appear as they did in Star Trek: First Contact instead of the dry pasty look of the Borg during Star Trek: The Next Generation.
• The Queen tells Seven she is the first drone that has regained its individuality, apparently denying the existence of Hugh and the rest of Lore 's rogue Borg faction, as well as disregarding Captain Jean-Luc Picard 's temporary assimilation into Locutus .

Reception [ ]

• Brannon Braga was ultimately thrilled with this episode, saying, " It turned out to be really, really amazing. " ( Star Trek: The Magazine  Volume 1, Issue 1 , p. 61) Braga selected some of his favorite moments from the episode. " The best scene of the picture, I thought, was when the Queen was finally pushing [Seven] to the edge, pulling out all the stops, and finally just about to get her to crack, and Janeway's voice comes in. That was the best moment in the show, definitely. The scenes between Seven and the Queen I really liked […] Seeing Janeway in the little scene with Naomi, that was another one of my favorite scenes. Seeing people come to the Captain somehow felt right in that show. " Braga also remarked that he thought the transition of Janeway and Seven becoming more like Picard and Data was "a step in the right direction." He was proud, too, of the episode's production and was of the opinion that the installment succeeded in measuring up to Star Trek: First Contact . " The team really rose to the occasion, and it turned out great, " Braga enthused. " It had more action than First Contact . On a television budget, the fact that we in some ways imagistically took First Contact a step further is an impressive achievement, and I'm just really proud of that. We all enjoyed it very much. " ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 34)
• Joe Menosky especially liked the scenes showing Seven of Nine's temporary reintegration into the Borg Collective. " The thing I liked the most about the episode, " Menosky critiqued, " shows how cool a character Seven of Nine is. I love the scenes where she's in her Seven of Nine catsuit, and there she is walking around Borg corridors as if she is at home. I think there is great power to that image, and it perfectly captures her character as being this Human child raised by wolves […] I love the image when Janeway takes off, because she has no choice, from that Borg sphere and Seven is there amongst the Borg. I think it's a really powerful image, and goes to the heart of her character. " ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 34)
• Rick Berman was also happy with the installment, saying he was "extremely proud" of it. Berman additionally enthused, " Having the Borg Queen in [the] mix fits beautifully in the story […] [The episode] brings a very sensual and spooky element to the relationship between Seven of Nine and the Borg. All of our expectations were exceeded in bringing it to the screen. " ( Star Trek: Communicator  issue 121 , p. 12)
• This episode originally aired as a feature-length episode but it was later broken up into two parts for reruns in syndication. According to the unofficial book Delta Quadrant (p. 290), this episode – when shown on UPN – was the first of many Voyager episodes that the network edited by two minutes so as to include an extra commercial in each advertising break, thereby increasing revenue. As of 2020, this edited version of the episode, missing the scene in which Janeway chastises Torres’ dismissive attitude towards Seven, is still shown by several streaming outlets.
• The episode achieved a Nielsen rating of 4.73 million homes, with a 7% share. It was the most watched installment of Star Trek: Voyager (on first airing) since " Year of Hell, Part II ". ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 31, No. 11, p. 34; [1] (X) )
• In Great Britain , Sky first showed the episode as two separate parts that aired on the same night as each other. After the first part was shown, the continuity announcer joked that the second part would be postponed because the tape had broken. ( Delta Quadrant , p. 290)
• Unusually for the BBC (which frequently aired Star Trek two-parters as feature-length editions), this episode was broadcast as the two-part version on 11 and 18 June 2000 .
• This episode won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Special Visual Effects for a Series. Star Trek nearly swept the category that year; also nominated for it were VOY : " Thirty Days ", " Timeless " and DS9 : " What You Leave Behind ".
• The book Star Trek 101 (p. 175), by Terry J. Erdmann and Paula M. Block , lists this episode as one of the "Ten Essential Episodes" from Star Trek: Voyager .
• Manny Coto cited "Dark Frontier" among his favorite Star Trek productions. The episode inspired him to feature several multi-episode-arcs in the fourth season of Star Trek: Enterprise . [2]

Apocrypha [ ]

• Both the Borg probe and the Borg Queen's vessel, introduced here, are featured in the non-canon PC games Star Trek: Armada and Star Trek: Armada II , wherein the probe is known as a Borg "Interceptor". In Star Trek Online , the probe is a frigate -level ship.

Video and DVD releases [ ]

• UK VHS release (two-episode tapes, CIC Video ): Volume 5.8, catalog number VHR 4798, 2 August 1999
• In feature-length form, as part of the UK VHS collection Star Trek: Voyager - Movies : Volume 4 (with "Unimatrix Zero"), release date unknown
• As part of the VOY Season 5 DVD collection
• As part of the Star Trek: Fan Collective - Borg collection

Links and references [ ]

Starring [ ].

• Kate Mulgrew as Captain Kathryn Janeway

Also starring [ ]

• Robert Beltran as Chakotay
• Roxann Dawson as B'Elanna Torres
• Robert Duncan McNeill as Tom Paris
• Ethan Phillips as Neelix
• Robert Picardo as The Doctor
• Tim Russ as Tuvok
• Jeri Ryan as Seven of Nine
• Garrett Wang as Harry Kim

Guest stars [ ]

• Susanna Thompson as Borg Queen
• Kirk Baily as Magnus Hansen
• Laura Stepp as Erin Hansen
• Scarlett Pomers as Naomi Wildman

Co-stars [ ]

• Katelin Petersen as Annika
• Eric Cadora as Alien
• Majel Barrett as Computer Voice

Uncredited co-stars [ ]

• Holographic Borg drone
• Trish Baylord as Species 10026 member
• Debbie David as Russell
• Lin Chong as Voyager sciences ensign
• Carl D'Amico as Species 10026 member
• Tarik Ergin as Ayala
• Chiara Harris as Species 10026 member
• Kerry Hoyt as Borg drone
• Guy Korte as Species 10026 member
• Joyce Lasley as Lydia Anderson
• Mark Major as Borg drone
• Sam Mountain as Species 10026 member
• Borg Queen's drone
• Erin Price as Renlay Sharr
• Dominic Rambaran as Species 10026 member
• Craig Reed as Species 10026 member
• Lynn Speier as Species 10026 member
• Jean Vera-Montes as Species 10026 member
• Catherine Yurkovich as Species 10026 member
• " Needle Fingers "
• Three of Five
• Four holographic Borg drones
• Human hologram
• Two Borg drones

Stand-ins [ ]

• Brita Nowak – stand-in for Jeri Ryan and Laura Stepp
• Stuart Wong – stand-in for Garrett Wang

References [ ]

22nd century ; 2350 ; Alixia ; anger ; assault ; assimilation ; assimilation chamber ; asteroid field ; automaton ; auto-regeneration unit ; away team ; bad habit ; beer ; bio-dampener ; bioelectric interference ; biogenic charge ; biokinetic analysis ; biomolecular scanner ; boarding party ; Borg ; Borg Collective ; Borg cube ( unnamed ); Borg Queen's ship ; Borg drone ; Borg probe ; Borg scout ship / Borg sphere ( unnamed ); camouflage ; career ; Class 2 shuttlecraft ; class 5 probe ; coffee ; collective mind ; combadge ; command interface ; compression phaser rifle ; course ; cranial capacity ; critical velocity ; cubic kilometer ; cybernetic ; damage ; data node ; database ; debris ; Delta Flyer ; Delta Quadrant ; density ; department ; dilithium ; dinosaur ; dispersal field ; dozen ; drone manifest ; duty shift ; Earth ; emergency power ; emotion ; encryption code ; environmental systems ; evasive maneuvers ; exobiologist ; exo-plating ; exploration vessel ; fear ; Federation ; Federation Council on Exobiology ; Ferengi ; Ferengi burglars ; field magnitude ; field notes, USS Raven ; field regulator ; force field ; Fort Knox ; fuel ; gold ; Grid 325 ; Grid 532 ; heading ; heart ; heist ; hive mind ; holodeck ; holo-image ; hull ; Human ; individuality ; interplexing beacon ; Intrepid -class ; ion storm ; insect colony ; interplexing beacon ; intruder alert ; isogrid ; kiloton ; knowledge ; Ktarian ; Ktarian beer ; laser scalpel ; light year ; log entry ; logistics ; Maquis ; medical repair drone ; megawatt ; meter ; metric ton ; micro-suture ; money ; motion sickness ; muffin ; multi-adaptive shielding ; museum ; nanoprobe ; nanoprobe virus ; narrow beam transporter ; neural transceiver ; New World Economy ; newcomer ; nightmare ; ocular implant ; offline ; Operation Fort Knox ; orbit ; Papa ; pattern enhancer ; personal log ; phaser pulse ; photon torpedo ; physiology ; physiometric conditions ; pint ; plasma conduit ; polytrinic alloy ; power matrix ; power distribution node ; power node ; power utilization curve ; propulsion system ; pupil ; Raven , USS ; red alert ; regeneration cycle ; regenerative ability ; replicator ; rescue mission (aka rescue operation ); resource ; Romulan Neutral Zone ; sarcasm ; scout ship ; second ; sector ; sense of humor ; sensor range ; servo-armature ; shield generator ; shield matrix ; shield modulator ; shield generator ; shower ; sickbay ; spatial charge ; Species 125 ; Species 5618 ; Species 6961 ; Species 10026 ; Species 10026 homeworld ; Species 10026 vessel ; Starfleet ; " steady as she goes "; strategy ; subdermal probe ; subspace energy fluctuation ; subspace particle storm ; suffocation ; surgery ; tactical drone ; tactical simulation ; teracochrane ; teradyne ; teraquad ; threat ; throne ; time index ; toast ; toy ; tractor pulse ; transpectral analysis ; transport coordinates ; transporter beam ; transporter frequency ; transporter range ; Transporter Room 1 and 2 ; transwarp ; transwarp chamber ; transwarp coil ; transwarp conduit ; transwarp signature ; trial run ; triaxilation ; triquantum wave ; tritanium ; unicomplex ; Unimatrix 01 ; Unimatrix 424 ; United States dollar ; vanity ; vessel ; viral sequencer ; warp profile ; warp signature ; Wildman, Samantha

External links [ ]

• "Dark Frontier, Part I" (X) at StarTrek.com
• " Dark Frontier " at Memory Beta , the wiki for licensed Star Trek works
• " Dark Frontier " at Wikipedia
• " Dark Frontier " at the Internet Movie Database
• 2 Bell Riots
• 3 Daniels (Crewman)

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Star Trek: Voyager

“Dark Frontier”

Air date: 2/17/1999 Written by Brannon Braga & Joe Menosky Part I directed by Cliff Bole Part II directed by Terry Windell

Review by Jamahl Epsicokhan

"There are three things to remember about being a starship captain: Keep your shirt tucked in; go down with the ship; and never abandon a member of your crew." — Janeway to Naomi

Review Text

Nutshell: Ambitious and often very effective entertainment, but the plot doesn't bear too much scrutiny.

"Dark Frontier" does probably exactly what UPN executives wanted it to—it provides "an epic two-hour telefilm!" during February sweeps that is accessible to the average sci-fi-but-not-necessarily- Voyager fan and features the Borg, the most popular and reliable of all Trek bad guys. Obviously, no expense was spared in producing this two hour "event." So the real question: Is it any good? Answer: Yes.

Next question: Could it have been better? Answer: Yes.

I also have to ask: Was this story really necessary? I mean, the whole story, when you think about it, doesn't really take us anywhere new, especially when it comes to its central character, Seven of Nine. "Dark Frontier" seems at times like it exists more for the sake of grand spectacle than for grand story development. Not that I would necessarily let that get in the way of enjoying it.

If "Dark Frontier" was trying to get my attention with pure cinematic audacity, it worked. The episode wastes no time in coming out big and bold, showing off production values in an entertainingly effective way. The first scene opens on a Borg scout ship, featuring a Borg point-of-view sequence as a drone wakes up to assist the ship's attack on Voyager , which it has detected as a target for assimilation. David Bell's score comes out stronger than music is normally ever permitted to be on Trek episodes these days, with an actual theme and a thundering attitude. Not long after, there's a brief battle, followed by large-scale special effects and explosions when Voyager beams a torpedo into the ship and destroys it. As action-adventure, to say "Dark Frontier" revealed its intentions confidently and effectively right up front would be an understatement.

The crew salvages debris from the destroyed ship in hopes of finding useful technology. A transwarp coil in particular would be useful; it could shave 20 years off the journey. What's left of the salvaged coil, however, is useless.

From here, Janeway devises a daring plan. A crippled Borg vessel is detected heading back toward Borg space. With a carefully executed maneuver, the crew could break its defenses and steal a warp coil. The plan is appropriately dubbed "Operation: Fort Knox."

While we're talking about Janeway, I'd like to comment on a character whose actions have long been controversial and inconsistently written. I find myself reminded of second season's " Alliances ." At the end of that episode, the writers alleged that, in light of being stuck in the chaotic Delta Quadrant surrounded by brutal opportunistic enemies, Janeway's course of adjustment would simply be to maintain Federation morals—"business as usual," as Chakotay once put it. I found that attitude to be shallow, naive, and dramatically limiting. (To analyze Federation ideals, the writers must challenge them in new ways, even if it means willful deviation.)

Over the years of Voyager 's uneasy run, that attitude has been changed. Now we have a Janeway that, while still maintaining diplomacy and a sense of morality, will go further to protect her crew and get them home more quickly. (It has been said that Kate Mulgrew feels Brannon Braga understands Janeway better than former executive producers Jeri Taylor or Michael Piller did; perhaps that partially explains this alteration in attitude.)

So the question is whether this robbery mission better demonstrates Janeway's strengths. I'm thinking it does; it shows through action the way she will push the boundaries of typical Federation morals in the name of her crew. And Mulgrew fares well when she's allowed to show her teeth. (Although, Janeway came off as a little smug in the scene where she introduces "Operation: Fort Knox" to the crew; Mulgrew sometimes goes overboard with the body language.)

Now then—what about the moral implications of this theft? Is it okay to steal from the Borg, even if they are one of the worst enemies the Federation has ever known? More immediately, is it prudent to charge into the lion's den for a great prize if there's a risk the entire crew could end up assimilated? While I appreciate moral and practical ambiguity, the writers don't seem to really be asking these questions so much as they arise as a side effect. "Dark Frontier" charges forward with plot and action without completely considering the consequences.

But no matter. "Dark Frontier" exists more often for plot and action than for philosophic content. On that level, it fares well.

In preparation for the big heist, there are holodeck training drills and information searches. The major character undercurrent here, naturally, is for Seven of Nine, who, at Janeway's request, searches through her parents' data logs, which were retrieved from the USS Raven more than a year earlier. Seven apparently has been avoiding these logs to avoid facing her old pre-Borg childhood memories—back when her name was Annika Hansen. The new need for information now has her facing up to the past.

"Dark Frontier" is not afraid to invent or even reinvent backstory for the sake of advancing its story. Through a series of Seven's flashbacks, we get new insight into Annika's parents, Magnus and Erin Hansen (Kirk Baily and Laura Stepp). The story reveals them as two scientists who undertook a mission to find and learn about the nefarious Borg, and became so obsessed with their leads that they disregarded orders from their scientist colleagues, effectively alienating themselves. Since there was no turning back, they simply pressed forward, hoping to find Borg. Eventually, they did.

The Hansens' audacity is remarkable. There's a fine line between brave and stupid, and the Hansens walked that line for three years, we learn, studying a Borg cube without being detected as "relevant" before finally crossing the line and getting themselves assimilated. In that time, they boarded the cube on many occasions, and even kidnapped dormant drones from their regeneration alcoves to study them. All the while, they tell each other, "This could prove our theory!" I kept asking myself: What's wrong with these people? Don't they care about getting themselves and their 5-year-old daughter killed or assimilated? In any case, I found the Hansens' overconfidence and obsession interesting.

Was any of the Hansens' Borg research intended back when last season's " The Raven " was written? I doubt it, but then again I don't really care; "Raven" kept the Hansens' history vague, and the rewriting of that history proves interesting and is put to good use in "Dark Frontier."

On the other hand, some of this reinvention I found a little annoying, because it flies in the face of established continuity. More specifically, these flashbacks allege that Starfleet knew about the Borg years before they could have. The first Borg episode, TNG 's " Q Who ," was about 10 years ago. Starfleet knew nothing about them. Here, the Hansens apparently knew about the Borg some 20 years ago, which is simply impossible given what we've seen before.

Is any of this continuity quibbling important to "Dark Frontier"? Probably not, but it is a blatant disregard for past history for those of us who remember the Borg's introduction back in the second season of TNG , and I have to at least mention my objection to the distorting the facts.

But again, no matter. Story advancement first, plot continuity second. "Dark Frontier" blends the flashbacks into the main story effectively, balancing Seven's feelings on the matter with the bigger plot involving the mission.

It's about this time that Seven is contacted by the Borg, who somehow know about Janeway's plan. They tell her, essentially, that she must rejoin the collective, or the Borg will assimilate Voyager . Why do they want her? "Because you are unique." Borg riddles. Gotta love 'em.

This leads to a very nice scene where Seven makes a plea to Janeway to allow her to stay on the mission even though she has been fraught with emotional distraction over the last few days. Seven knows something Janeway doesn't, but can't tell her about it. The plan must go on for Voyager 's sake. Seven's sense of self-sacrifice is fairly affecting; the character certainly has come a long way in the past year.

The mission is nicely executed, as is Seven's capture. The story comes up with some interesting ways of giving Voyager the advantage, like the devices that make crew members temporarily undetectable from the Borg while on a Borg ship (which are established through the Hansen backstory, who used them to run around the Borg cube for hours at a time)—although, I was somewhat confused by the story's unclear intentions of how much of the plan the Voyager crew pulled off versus how much the Borg let them get away with it.

"Dark Frontier" is an episode whose action works through little details. The Hansen flashbacks benefit from some nice nuances, such as the Hansens giving the Borg drones pet names as a way of keeping track of them, or the frighteningly implicit consequences foreshadowed by little Annika (Katelin Petersen) saying "bye" as her parents beam a Borg drone back to the cube.

In the present storyline, we have good use of Naomi Wildman, a character whose presence manages to transcend the "cute" factor and tell us something about the other characters, whether serving as a reminder for Seven's truncated childhood, or playing off the captain in a scene that reveals Janeway's codependency of humanity and duty ("Keep your shirt tucked in; go down with the ship; and never abandon a member of your crew").

Once Seven returns to the Borg, the story's big hook is the reintroduction of the Borg Queen (Susanna Thompson), which is supposed to provide a one-on-one battle of wills, I think, over the nature of Seven's unique re-assimilation into the collective. It's at this point the story seems to resign itself to the fact the writers have used the Borg about a dozen times and now must ask, well, where can we go from here? The second half of "Dark Frontier" is entertaining, but psychologically it can't deliver much more than what we've already seen. It feels more like a series of skillfully executed set pieces than a story trying to find its way to some sort of emotional resolution. The Borg Queen's attempts to crack Seven are all too similar to the Queen's attempt to crack Data in First Contact : coercion, temptation, finding the crux of human morality, elusive riddles, etc.

The use of the Borg Queen had me asking questions with no apparent answers. For starters, what is the purpose of the Queen? As Data put it, "I wish to understand the organizational relationships." Is there some sort of hierarchy, where the Queen actually runs the collective? Or is the Queen simply a special liaison—a symbol of the hive mind—who is assembled whenever there is special need to psychologically crack an individual? (There's evidence here that could have it either way, but because by the end of the episode we'll now have two Queens that have died, it's apparent they aren't crucial to the collective.)

For that matter, I'm confused at why the Borg even want Seven of Nine back. What's so special about her individuality that makes her valuable? The Queen says that no other Borg has ever regained individuality, but I must raise my hand and ask about the entire colony in " Unity ." (But, no; I must again remind myself that continuity doesn't count.) But even forgetting that for the moment, if the Borg assimilate Seven's memories, won't that be everything they need? Apparently not; the Queen wants Seven to remain an individual who willfully chooses to side with the Borg. How this helps the collective I'm not sure. The story thinks weird, elusive dialog will suffice as an answer. I disagree. It was interesting in First Contact ; here it begins to feel like a shallow imitation.

Susanna Thompson works fairly well early on as the Queen (and she has great eyes for the part), but near the end her performance loses the surreal edge and seems far too concrete and flat to be anything more than a "Borg villain." Her attempts to coax Seven into abandoning her human compassion involves a host of psychological tricks, some of which are interesting, others which aren't.

The most compelling idea is the Borg's assimilation of an entire society while Seven is forced to assist, which proves quite effective and intense. Seven walks through the corridors as dozens of drones move mindlessly through the ship with their alien prisoners, as screaming emerges from an uncertain distance; it conveys a frightening chaos that seems like some surreal Nazi nightmare. It's a unique and powerful look at the Borg, and Seven's "human" choices in this situation are interesting.

On the other hand is the appearance of Seven's "father" in the form of a drone, which is going way too over the top, and in presentation seems like nothing more than a cheap "shock value" gag that puts forward no interesting consequences.

During all of this, the Voyager crew realizes Seven had been coerced into leaving them, so Janeway equips the Delta Flyer with the recently acquired transwarp coil to track Seven down in Borg space. They arrive there, which leads to a somewhat unexpected cinema cliché where Janeway and the Queen engage in the Borg version of the Movie Armed Standoff™ for the custody of Seven—with Janeway holding a big gun while lots of Borg threaten to come closer to her. The idea is handled somewhat klutzily (with tech procedures and "pure attitude" the key components in the showdown, and neither really winning a sense of urgency)—but I did enjoy the Queen's look of downright anger when Seven and Janeway beamed away.

Of course, I must point out that it strains the usefulness of the Borg as a believably powerful enemy in the galaxy if the Delta Flyer can get the better of them with some convenient technobabble and Borg connections, even though an entire fleet can barely deal with a single cube zeroing in on Earth. The Borg are neat enemies, but they lose their edge of implacability because of their willingness to negotiate near the end of "Dark Frontier."

Oh well. Despite Voyager 's tendency to overuse the Borg, I still thought the actual execution of the action was well done overall, and the final chase managed to milk a good amount of excitement out a questionable ending. And, hey, we even got 15 years closer to home thanks to the transwarp coil.

If I may comment on technical aspects: Simply put—awesome. The visual effects are among the best and most convincing I've ever seen on sci-fi television, and succeed extremely well on the "cool" factor. The sheer number of visuals is impressive. The Queen's ship is a marvel of design complexity that is still consistent with Borg geometry and symmetry—and, well, it just looks neat. The story ventures into Borg territory, where we see massive space stations. The sets and makeup design are all solid and pleasing to the eye (even if green light rays perpetually shining on the Borg Queen was pushing it). I can't imagine what this all cost to produce; there's a lot on the screen, and most of it proves very effective.

As television production goes, "Dark Frontier" is easily the most ambitious thing Voyager has ever done. It's exceptionally well constructed. Unfortunately, it's not exceptionally well thought out. The story just can't keep up with the ambition. Nevertheless, it's probably good to have ambition, and I credit the producers for trying something so large, even if original ideas couldn't always fit the concept.

Next week: Choose your title: "Harry Gets Some" or "Lust in Space."

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Comment Section

120 comments on this post.

In terms of quality, TNG's Borg episodes were like Night of the Living Dead. Voyager's Borg episodes(and Dark Frontier is no exception) are more like House of the Dead.

AJ Koravkrian

I have a problem with this so called heist. It is so very un-trek. You simply can't justify stealing technology when your directive instructs you not even to trade it with alien cultures...even if it is borg.

Jakob M. Mokoru

"No Borg has ever regained individuality." Well, anybody heard of one Jean-Luc Picard???

I didn't like the Borg Queen. In First Contact, she appears to be the Borg CPU. She simply organizes all the data in the Collective. Here she appears to be something akin to the evil matriarch in a primetime soap opera. Jammer's absolutely right about the fact that the Borg, if continuity mattered to the Voyager writers, should have simply reassimilated Seven. Why convince her of anything, when she would obviously agree with the Borg Queen once she was a drone again? With Data it was necessary, because Data could not be assimilated in the standard way. With Seven, it's completely illogical.

I sort of wank away the reason why the Borg didn't just assimilate Seven by looking at their appraisal of humanity. According to their analysis, humans don't have any particularly outstanding biological features and the technology of the Federation is woefully inadequate compared to the Borg. Yet they've managed to repel Borg invasions multiple times. Borg rarely fail when they set their sites on a civilization, and probably never when they have such a huge advantage in resources and technology. So how do these upright apes keep managing to do so? They could do something like send a hundred cubes to the Alpha quadrant, but I suspect that the Collective's hubris won't allow them to take such a drastic action; its an inefficient use of resources and tantamount to admitting that their perfection is flawed. One cube should be -plenty-. Yet it never is. Its a puzzle the Collective can't figure out, but they figure it must have something to do with Federation individuality. If individuality is the key, reassimilating Seven would be counter productive; the Collective wants, essentially, someone who knows how the -enemy- thinks and anticipate and adapt to that type of thinking. Assimilation would destroy that. Why Seven? Because she was basically raised by the Collective, so her loyalties are much more likely to be affiliated with the Borg, even if she becomes individualized. The other Borg who left the collective have all been adults who had lots of life experience before being assimilated (Hugh doesn't count -- his branch of the Collective collapsed). Also, Seven is human; since that is the main species the Borg are interested in as far as the Federation is concerned, it makes sense to use her. This is speculation, of course, but it seems plausible enough to fit what we're shown.

This episode, and many of the other two parters have convinced me that Voyager excels at the action-adventure side of Trek, much more so than the other series. In fact, had they realized this all along, they could have just had 13, two hour telemovies a year and been done with it. That having been said, Dark Frontier is the most pointless Borg episode of all the Voyager-Borg stories. The queen basically had no motivation for kidnapping Seven in the first place. And while I respect that Voyager is led by a risk-taker, and has more Borg knowledge from Seven...it kind of seems as if the Borg lost their teeth here...and never really got them back. This contrasts with TNG, where the Borg were scary, even in their stupid unitards with plastic. They were untouchable. Voyager made them mechanical Romulans, in a way: a threat, but one that could be dealt with.

I liked it, it was a good action-adventure (tho with a lot of holes). There was one scene however that infuriated me. After B'Elanna had managed to get the Borg/Fed engine to work (after looking at 7's data): Janeway: "And B'Elanna, don't access personal databses without my authorisation." B: "Captain?" Janeway: "There are protocols for observing privacy on this ship" B: "No offence, but 7 is not on this ship anymore" J: "I realise you two weren't exactly close. Regardless, we just lost one of our own." B: "She was never one of our own, Captain. Didn't she just prove that?" J: "I don't know what happened on that sphere, and neither do you Lt. Carry on." I love these two characters, but J really bothered me here. Leaving the alcove on would have been enough, without putting this scene in there.

Eh, the plot was a dribbling mishmash, thank you Brannon Braga, but I really enjoyed the music. Somehow, composer David Bell managed to break free from the Rick Berman collective edict of Sonic Wallpaper to deliver a bombastic score. It's still no Best of Both Worlds by Ron Jones; nonetheless, I found myself humming it for several days afterward.

I have to give this episode ***1/2 stars just based on the entertainment value alone! I was so "into" the episode that I even gasped when Seven's "Papa" appeared as a drone at a critical juncture near the end. As to the logic: I really bought the Queen's reasoning regarding Seven's "Uniqueness". It was clear from the start that Seven was chosen to interact with Voyager's crew initially (in "Scorpion") because she was a human who had been part of the collective for 16 years. The Borg were probably upset that she left the collective, and the Queen then made it her mission to get her back after "allowing" her to absorb human individuality for two years. Taking all of that in combination with the two failed attempts by the Borg to assimilate Earth and there's a certain fabric to the logic here. What I didn't buy was the scene at the end when the Queen tried to force Seven to help the Borg create the Earth "Bio-Bomb". That part seemed a little rushed, but it *did* allow for a very dramatic ending confrontation. This was no "Living Witness"; but it was perhaps even more enjoyable as pure entertainment.

no borg has ever regained their individuality. Picard Hugh All the aliens on that planet chakotay went to who later decided to become their own collective but still "regained their individuality" for a time continuity abused for producers/writers creative license. not to forget phlox in enterprise's "regeneration" he almost became borg and heard their thoughts

I'm surprised no one brought this funny nit up. Near the end when Janeway explains her plan to rescue Seven, she says "Thanks to the Hansens, we'll be prepared for an encounter with the Borg." Ummm..., weren't the Hansens assimilated? So, wouldn't any knowledge they had be useless since the Borg would obtained it once they were assimilated?

Did anyone notice the use of "Please"? Seven tries to persuade each of her Ersatz-mothers and both change their mind after Seven says "please": Janeway takes her onto the mission, the Borg queen releases the four aliens. Was that some kind of lesson or does Seven learn to use her charm?

Latex Zebra

Did no one else find the whole assimilation section of this episode extremely harrowing. Was very dark stuff. The producers painted themselves in a corner by announcing the age of Seven's assimilation in another episode. Better to have changed that and had a slightly older 7 (how old is she suppposed to be as an adult) so it could have fitted in with the Hansens heading off soon after the first Borg meeting.

Acoushla Moya: "Better safe than assimilated." LOL! A nice, stimulating episode, full of action and adventure. Shame about the several soppy "let's-talk-about-our-feelings" sequences, but they didn't spoil the overall thing. Another minor annoyance: Naomi Wildman's absurd forehead bumps. Ugly. What the hell... - reproductive glands or something??? For those talking about continuity and trying to explain the illogic and holes: Are you serious?! The Star Trek universe makes no sense anyway and if we began detailing everything that's inconsistent, illogical or just plain dumb about it, we'd end up with a tome more voluminous than the Encyclopedia Britannica! So, Janeway takes on the Borg and wins. Again and again. One busybody, who belongs to a species even the Borg denoted as of below-average intellectual capacity and lacking in many aspects, comes up trumps against a race that has effortlessly assimilated billions of individuals all over the universe. Ah, whatever. Just take it for what it is: A bit of harmless entertainment. In that regard, this episode excels. Four stars, at the very least.

@Michael "Another minor annoyance: Naomi Wildman's absurd forehead bumps. Ugly. What the hell... - reproductive glands or something?" Those things are the result of her being half Ktarian. I agree they look stupid, but there's a legitimate, canonical reason for them, and all four actresses who played Naomi (unless the infant was a CGI construct) had them. Even Naomi's daughter had them, in "Endgame." Why do they bother you?

Navamske: They look ugly, number one. Number two, it's laziness and lack of imagination on the writers' and makeup artists' part. What: The only way to make someone look non-human is to stick some seashells on their forehead?? The old "forehead of the week" story... - except this time it's a recurring character, so they could've invested a bit more effort into it. S'all.

Certainly this episode is one of the standouts of the series, but agree it's more for the action and spectacle, as opposed to the story. I certainly didn't like how the Borg backstory was conceived. This is one of those continuity goofs I never understood. It really seems to diminish the impact of "Q Who?" VOY tended to do very well by their big EVENT episodes. Most of the weekly stories are annoyingly average with the occasional classic. But usually the event episodes came off quite well. The stories may not have been the best. But the action and effects made them interesting to watch and "Dark Frontier" is no exception. It's just too bad the writers couldn't make the regular characters (outside of Seven and the EMH) more interesting on just a regular basis as opposed to the EVENT episodes.

Could do without spoiler comments.. some of us are going through the series and reviews later in life. (At least it sounds like the miracle growth nature of Naomi gets explored and probably explained, but still.) So this is the infamous episode that throws away all continuity and acknowledgement that TNG even existed. Other than that it was a very good episode, and on its own it had the potential to be a true Trek classic. Without going into great detail analysing the plot I would simply say it has a fine balance of action and things like characterisation and emotion, brilliantly produced and directed, with some great music. The blatant disregard for the past though, spoils it an awful lot.

Voyager "changed" continuity only inasmuch as it offered a deeper insight (granted a newly invented one, but so what, it was a new show) into that continuity. Why is it so wrong that the Borg's motivations at their core are the same as everyone else's, just with an atypically scary and probing form of propaganda, the collective? I think it's a brilliant way to apply TOS era Trek-ology to a TNG era creation. DS9 changed the continuity of what it meant to be human, but no one seems to give a damn. A character like Picard or Data could never be written into the DS9 Universe--notice that Picard hardly acts like himself in "Emissary," (or in ST: Nemesis for that matter). This episode was standout for its ability not only to 1) present an engaging action premise, yes but couched amidst ongoing character development, 2) coagulate themes from the series run as well as its predecessors' and 3) redefine (or expose fully depending on one's perspective) the nature of Trek's greatest enemy conceived to the cause of eventually deconstructing (and destroying) them in this series' finale. Remarkable episode which also featured stunning effects, characterisations, acting (I can't stress enough how much better it is than the regulars on DS9 and I'm sorry if Dukat and Garak aren't on the opening credits, they aren't "regulars") music and cinematography. 4 stars.

B. Silverbow

Did any one else notice the whole mother-daughter moment at the end of the episode between Janeway and Seven? Janeway asking Seven to go regenerate, Seven saying she'll go when she's finished and Janeway saying 'No, now.' Then she goes and sets up the alcove, metaphorically tucking her in and says 'Sweet dreams.' I thought it was really cute. Ya gotta love those two, there's such a tangible bond between them.

Voyager's greatest strengths and weaknesses exemplified here: it's ability to create engaging, action-packed episodes that no appealed to a wide demographic, for they are quite easy to follow for the more casual viewer. It's weakness is that the writing isn't as good as it could have been. It's a solid enough episode and it goes from A to B to C in a reasonable manner, but there's just not enough plot to sustain a two hour episode. It's pretty stretched and I didn't feel the characterisation probed as deeply as it could have. The endless exchanges between Seven and the Borg Queen lacked spark and drama. With some tighter writing, their scenes could really have been something special. It just never went anywhere. The Hansen flashbacks were adequate, although maybe a little unnecessary and unfortunately they p****d all over continuity, in a major way. The Hansens, whose obsession with the Borg bordered on idiocy, also have to be the most astoundably irresponsible parents ever seen on Trek. They obviously didn't care about their daughter's safety one little bit. Apart from that, it's still an enjoyable episode, if you keep the brain in neutral. Kind of the Trek equivalent of a Hollywood popcorn movie - something Voyager did well.

Funny how in the episode with the Cardassian doctor, which was just a simulation, bloody murder was screamed about using the technologies in question because of how they were acquired, but here the Borg, whose entire technology is essentially the rape of civilizations, Janeway actually goes on an expedition to grab her some...I think I even saw drool coming out of the side of her mouth.

Nitpicks aside, this episode is just a lot of epic-scale fun. I'd give it four stars.

"As I recall, Cochrane was famous for his imaginative stories. He was also known to be frequently intoxicated." T'Pol in Regeneration. Clearly the Hansens were big Cochrane fans and investigated his drunked story more seriously than Starfleet.

@Jay Janeway made the same decision in both the case of the Cardassian doctor hologram and in the case of stealing Borg technology.

"these flashbacks allege that Starfleet knew about the Borg years before they could have" No, Starfleet didn't know about the Borg at the time the Hansens were studying them. However, given the events of First Contact, it is reasonable to assume that there were rumors of the Borg. So the Hansens set out to find them. But there were no official reports of the Borg until "Q Who". That was Starfleet's real first discovery of them. The Hansens never sent any information back to Starfleet because they were brought to the Delta Quadrant and crashed on a planet.

Continuity was thrown away with Generations. Or did nobody ask a single El Aurian refugee what happened to their planet? I'd wager Braga was to blame for that blunder originally.

@ Grumpy...well actually it goes all the way back to Q-Who? When Guinan revealed her familiarity with the Borg, you'd think Picard would have replied "and you didn't tell us about such a malevolent and dangerous adversary because...?"

Ugh Lee....Ugh Lee! Any Salute Your Shorts fans out there notice that Seven's dad was played my the one and only Counselor Kevin "Ugh" Lee? 5 stars for that reason alone!

Well great entertainment but again an insult to viewers intelligence. DS9 may have gone against Trekian philosophy but it treated the viewers like adults. Voyager may have stuck with Trek ideals (when it suited them) but treated viewers like kids. I'd still rate this as 4 stars, it's the Voyager movie that never went to cinema, great production values and FX. JUst leave your brain at the door.

I think this is about the point where the Borg stopped being scary and unbeatable and became just another race of Hard-Headed Aliens that could be easily defeated by Our Heroes. If we use the logic of BOBW, the Hanses' entire research should have been completely useless because the Borg now have that knowledge as well. It just takes them way too long to figure it out. It's not just a matter of continuity, it's a matter of keeping us on the edge of our seats. Still, I can't say I wasn't entertained.

Jonathan Baron

So now we have a love triangle - or Two Suitors for Seven. The Borg queen's come-on was much more erotic so I guess they had to kill her off. Janeway beats the dominatrix and has to content herself with simply having the obsessive object of her desire be the only woman on the ship to prance around in a cat suit to stare at longingly watching her "regenerate." Were this Showtime or HBO it could have been overt and far more interesting :)

Jo Jo Meastro

It worked well as a big action spectacle event and the very solid characterisation meant we had plenty of emotional pay-offs to soothe over the cracks of the actual plot. It wasn't exactly deep but it was very satisfying and it made me care whilst in the heat of the impressive set pieces, so I'd consider it a success. 3 stars seems about right. I'd even be tempted to nudge it up to 3 and a half if the mechanics of the plot were a little less wobbly.

One other thing, I finally figuired out what 7s' facial implants remind me of! The one around her eyebrow looks like a metal dolphin and the one by the corner of her jaw is like a little star fish....I can't be the only one to see that! Oh and while I'm at it I'll mention that I still dislike Niomi (sp?) Wilman, I hate Star Trek Ginius Sickly Sweet Children...but I have to be honest and say I'm not a big fan of kids in general, especially in sci-fi.

I just couldn't get past the plot holes, irresponsible Hansens and wonky Borg reasons to really enjoy this.

some reason, a lot of people get caught up in "continuity." many fans of star trek just like the stories. who cares if he hansens over lap with what happened in TNG? most people wouldnt even know or care? how does what happened in TNG have any impact on how i watch this episode? i thought it was a good way to explain what the Hansens were really doing. I enjoyed the story. i enjoyed the graphics. what i am surprised is no one mentioned how they are good enough to install the coil, but it only lasts x number of light years and it is worthless? good thing they dont have that problem with the warp drive. lol. any story is going to have a problem. we all know that the borg have millions of ships and billions of drones. the borg could send 10,000 ships to earth and destroy it..but it would be too convenient..right?

azcats... Personally, I believe any story is better if it obeys the rules of its fictional world, including canonical continuity. However, as you say, "any story is going to have a problem." It's a question worth thinking about -- or overthinking, as in this dialogue (with spoilers for some recent movies): www.overthinkingit.com/2013/07/29/genre-pieces-and-the-rules/

@azcats: The problem with this episode isn't that it's a LITTLE inconsistent with established Trek history. It's that it completely blows it out of the water. In previous episodes about Seven's parents, it's implied (or at least can be implied) that they were explorers who discovered the Borg before anyone in the Federation did. In this episode, Seven's father basically says their plan (which was approved by the Federation) was to go look for the Borg on the outset of the mission -- which makes no sense, given established Trek history. Assuming Seven is about 20 when Voyager rescues her, the episode flashbacks would have occurred in 2354-58 or thereabouts. That's about a full decade before the Borg (apparently) attacked the Federation and Romulan outposts along the neutral zone. In 'Q Who?', which occurs in 2365, the only person with any previous knowledge of the Borg was Guinan. So, unless the El Aurians or someone else ONLY tipped off a few scientists -- and not the Federation generally -- it's implausible that Seven's parents would know as much about the Borg as they do before their mission. Someone on the Enterprise (Picard? Data?) would have known about some rumored race of mindless drones in 'Q Who'. As with much of Voyager, the inconsistency wasn't necessary to advance the plot or make the story better. All they had to do was advance the storyline a few years -- maybe to 2365-66? -- and make Seven an older child on the Raven when they encountered (and first heard of) the Borg. Or, with the time parameters of this episode, Seven's dad could have said they were going to find a race with incredible destructive power, thought to originate in the Delta Quadrant. It's even possible that the events of 'First Contact' (and later 'Regeneration') could have somewhat increased the Federation's knowledge of the Borg. But naming the race and providing as much detail as Seven's parents had in the 2350s just makes little sense. Archer et. al, never got a name for the Borg. And, to the predictable counterpoint, yes, the new movies reset the timeline. But that was clearly established in the movie's dialog and plot. There's no indication that the Voyager writers were that clever -- they just rewrote established Trek history somewhat unnecessarily for this episode. The existence of the Hanson diaries -- which, presumably, Voyager had in its database before 'Caretaker' -- is another F you to Trek cannon.

The best sci-fi has interior logic and continuity. Deviations should be minimal or they become a distraction. That's what happened here. The episode was entertaining on many levels, but as a huge TNG fan, I could not ignore their complete disregard for the establishment of the Borg. That wasn't a minimal change. That was HUGE. The worst part is that it could so easily have been averted with a little effort and explanation. Paul came up with one that would have worked (see above). I am forced to conclude that the writers simply didn't care enough to bother; I consider that a weakness. It's one that you can choose to overlook, but it is a weakness nonetheless.

It really bugged how people kept dissing the Borg with Seven standing right around them. That was a total show tone disconnect. The crew of the Voyager is supposed to be evolved beyond that kind of childish behavior no matter how much they might dislike an enemy. Evolved sensibilities tell us that our enemy are still people even if they want to destroy us. The crew and even the captain of the Voyager were acting terribly hawkish, and that really turned me (and Seven) off. I feel like it was done simply to quickly give Seven more reason to want to leave the ship and was not at all how anyone had been acting prior to the opening of this episode. I thought the Borg Queen idea was just plain stupid. It was stupid in the movie and it was still stupid in this episode. The Borg are supposed to be a single huge enemy comprised of multiple unremarkable units. That made them scary because there was no one small person you could try to reason with. It would be like trying to talk to a water molecule to get a wave to stop crashing on the beach. Having a slinky, evil queen boss makes the Borg look no different than a dumb Bond villain with his senselessly evil organization. And, what is the point of having a head and shoulders that disconnects from the rest of the body? So stupid.

The Borg would have assimilated the Hansen's cloak technology, which makes this a pretty glaring plot hole.

@Tom just because you know how something works doesn't mean you know how to counteract it. See: H-bombs.

The Borg were much more menacing when they were a true 'collective', minus the inclusion of a Borg Queen. After all, the borg are terrifying because there is no weak link in their command structure, if one falls, another takes its place. They are a seamless entity, consuming whole civilizations to add to their own 'perfection'--- utterly horrifying to any species that treasures their autonomy and individuality. However, the crusade of the Borg to attain perfection through assimilation of all knowledge in the universe remains highly alluring, as long as one ignores the methods employed. As an action adventure shoot'em up, this episode was OK. I found it rather perpostrous so many high level command figures were in the delta flier. Would Picard endanger himself in such a way, leaving the Enterprises to fend for themselves while going on a suicide mission? I think not.

I was disappointed that the Hansens didn't even once stop what they were doing to look into the camera and go "Mmmmmbop!".

What was stopping the Borg from going back on their little "deal" and assimilating everyone? Don't the writers even think?

Really like this episode. Great atmosphere and music. Also really bought in to the sense of inevitable dread watching the Hansen's, especially when they first locate the Borg cube. There's a great moment when the cube first shows up on their senses and the dad tries to send Annika to bed and she peeks out from around the corner and the music changes. Good stuff.

There's also a cute scene between Janeway and Naomi in the Captain's ready room which is one of the few examples in either tv or movies of a scene depicted two female characters with one acting in a mentorship role to another. Usually the mentor role is played by a male character. Nice to see it flipped on its head for once.

On that note, Naomi Wildman is the least annoying child character in the Trek cannon.

Maxwell Anderson

I agree with DLPB. Too many of the comments here focus on the continuity errors. Continuity with TNG is a problem in this episode, however, this pales in comparison to the biggest problem with this episode, which is the Borg's inability to combat Janeway's away teams. It just doesn't make sense that they would be so vulnerable to attack. It makes sense on TNG that they don't consider them a threat when they beam over and look around with their Type 1 phasers in their holsters, but when Janeway sends multiple teams over at once, with Type 3 phasers drawn and Harry Kim planting bombs, they should be responding aggressively. Instead they just carry on with their everyday maintenance. And why oh why do they not assimilate Seven and Janeway at the end? The queen spends an eternity talking about how Voyager is inferior and they will be defeated, but they are just standing around doing nothing, for ages. It just doesn't make sense. And why does Janeway have to only blast one node for the Borg to lose their ability to keep shields? The writers do not take basic story logic into account, and the result is a depiction of the Borg as inept idiots. I could buy a story where they kidnap Seven and try to convince her to stay with the Borg as an individual, for the reasons Joseph B states, and also perhaps because they are trying to win the "hearts and minds" of humans as a way of validating their way of life, which could be quite interesting. But the writers fail to explore this idea at all, instead having the Borg queen try to force Seven to think like a drone even though they refuse to assimilate her. This basic illogic hurt the credibility of the story immeasurably.

Only a population of 300,000? I guess Species 10026 was having a reproductive crisis that week!

children episodes are so much better if you're a parent I can think of all those TNG serials which I found annoying but then rewatching them 20 years later the emotional response (like the Hansen flashbacks)were disarming nerds can only agree upon one thing:that there should be more episodes

Certainly a lot of holes. Some really big, like changing the continuity, as Jammer has correctly pointed out. I was a harsh critic of how DS9 changed a lot of things Trek's universe. Now that Voyager does the same (although in less philosophically profound and consequential ways), I will not be blind. It was a major hole that only once again shows the lazy writing regarding the plot initial motors. It is a recurrent problem in Voyager and here is put to the limit, just showing a "don't care" disrespect with basic Trek established history. That said, what a wonderful episode for Seven! How Jammer can find more action-based than deep in development, it is beyond me. This episode highlighted many of Seven's inner issues and created a lot of potential for lasting consequences to her (which, after seeing the few next episodes, I think is confirmed). It means, it was a huge character development in many parts. Overall, a really strong episode that, as usual, is built over a ridiculous plot hole. 8.5 ou of 10 from me.

A very good episode, with action, thrills and wonderful little character bits woven together.

I'll buy that the Queen would want Seven back. One thing that I thought gave the Borg a lot of character is that they would expend a lot of resources trying to reclaim former drones, as if they themselves regarded them as lost children. It continued to reinforce the idea that the Borg truly believe that they're doing the best thing for you by assimilating you, bringing you close to perfection. And if you lose your way, they'll move heaven and earth to make sure you can find your way back into the Collective.

I really liked that episode, small continuity errors aside. I really like the idea that the Hansens were actively chasing the Borgs - it explains why they would end up being assimilated and in the delta quadrant all of places. This being said, i hate the Borg Queen - here on in the movies. I thought that was a really weak move on the part of the writers. THAT is what made the Borg look weak, not Voyager. They were scary because they were a collective with drones which had lost all sense of individuality. Speaking to one was speaking to all. That's what made them so alien. The minute one was able to say "they're like..." (insects, a hive, whatever) their alienness was ruined.

I have to disagree with the comments about the Borg Queen making the Borg weak. From the outset the Borg are like and insect species based on hornets, wasps and ants but instead of chemical signals its a collective conciousness. The fact there is a Queen gives them purpose and a structure. I am currently rewatching Voyager after watching all TNG and TNG movies. Never got into TOS too 80's child and never liked "Deep Sleep 9" to quote the TNG cast. The people commenting on continuity are missing the point of Voyager. It is an alien of the week show with each big jump in space allows for new weekly aliens. The best saving grace of this was there was only one Ferengi episode. And the Borg got more dimention and with more exposure the scariest beast can be understood and that makes them less scary.

1. You're missing out on DS9 2. There were 2 VOY Ferengi episodes 3. The continuity bothers me and so did VOY constantly beating the Borg. Demystify the Borg and making them less scary and adding the Queen didn't bother me.

To those arguing the timeline of Seven's age and the time of the Hansen's explorations: This was addressed in Q-Who - Borg Maturation Chambers; it's possible Seven's growth/age was accelerated by a number of years when she was assimilated....how many assimilated small children have we seen running around in Borg ships? Not many.

In fairness, the way the Hansens talk about the Borg is like people talk about Sasquatch these days. The thing that jars it is the model Cube. Only someone that has actually seen the Borg would know what their ships looked like. Maybe those El-Aurians who survived the Nexus in Generations spread a few rumours.

My last point has already made by others... This pleases me.

PLOTHOLES, PLOTHOLES, GET YOUR PLOTHOLES HERE!!! 1. The Borg weren't introduced to the Federation until TNG's "Q Who," which was a second season TNG episode that took place exactly 10 years before the fifth season of Voyager. Seven was assimilated 20 years ago. Up until this episode, that didn't pose a problem. The Hansens were explorers who, according to Janeway, "pointed their small ship to the Delta Quadrant and were never heard from again." It's possible they simply encountered a Borg cube and were assimilated. But here, it is established that Starfleet knew about the Borg 10 years before TNG's "Q Who" and even gave the Hansens the green light to track them down. The young Seven even plays with a model of the Borg cube while they are still on Earth getting the green light from Starfleet to search for, and study, the Borg. Absolutely insane continuity error! 2. Janeway says that Seven has been an individual now for "over two years." The Borg Queen just says "two years." Actually, it's been one and a half, dumbasses! 3. The Borg Queen says that Seven is the only drone to ever regain her individuality. Jesus, let me count the people that have regained their individuality from the Borg: Picard, Hugh (TNG's 5th season episode "I, Borg"), about 500,000 Borg drones under the control of Data's evil twin brother Lore (TNG's Descent 1 and 2, season 6 finale/7 premiere), and of course the entire colony of yet another 500,000 Borg drones who regained their individuality in Voyager's 3rd season episode "Unity" (the one where Chakotay was linked to them). The writers are officially retarded! 4. When the Borg Queen talks about humanity, she creates a hologram of a naked male human...................in his underwear. I had no idea that the Borg are so prudish. Is that their weakness? The penis? 5. Janeway names her plan "Operation Fort Knox." Then Paris gives a history lesson saying that when money went the way of the dinosaur, Fort Knox was turned into a museum. But he continued saying that all the gold in it remained, and because of that "a few Ferengi have tried to break into it once or twice." But this is contradicted by DS9. In the sixth season Deep Space Nine episode "Who Mourns for Morn" it is established that the Ferengi currency "Latinum" is a liquid encased in those gold bricks. When Quark finds out that the Latinum is completely gone from the bricks in that episode and the inside of the bricks is completely dry, he says "there's nothing here but worthless gold." So why would the Ferengi want to break in to Fort Knox?

I think the concerns regarding plot continuity are overblown, although I remember feeling that way as well when it first aired. As others have pointed out, the fact that Guinan (and others) are hanging around the Federation already makes the Neutral Zone/Q Who storyline a bit awkward. And since Guinan was already present, it means that it was messed up from the very moment we saw our first cube. After all, there was not a single sociology grad student in all of the Federation who decided to interview the eyebrowless refugees from the mysterious Delta Quadrant? Why tir yourself down to something that already is problematic? Solution: well, the El-Aurians are a race of listeners, not talkers. They never said much about the Borg because, well, they thought the Borg were far enough away that it didn't matter. So Starfleet never got much out of the whole situation except, well, that they were a race that loved technology, cybernetics, and had cube-like ships. Heck, even once the Enterprise was in the Delta Quadrant, Guinan didn't mention the Borg, she just said they should leave. So clearly, data on the Borg was limited to almost nothing. Should Picard still have known about it? Maybe... But then again, rumors of a far-off race of bad guys isn't exactly going to be of pressing concern for a Starfleet captain. And once the Borg ship appeared, well, he had an expert on board who knew far more about the Borg than their computer did, so he had no need to consult the Federation database. And with what little information the Federation had, there would have been no reason to connect the ripped-out outposts along the Neutral Zone with the Borg. So perhaps our plothole can be filled in. There were rumors of the Borg, but only rumors. The Hansens set out to find them, but got assimilated before they could get any information back. As far as Starfleet knows, they were just lost in space (the episode even said they probably burned their bridges with the Federation crossing the Neutral Zone, so Starfleet probably didn't even think they ever found the Borg). Hence, Picard's knowledge of the situation was still very limited. While he could have consulted the old rumors in Q Who, he didn't because Guinan was right there. Problem solved. As for the episode itself, well, it was great except for the resolution. Great setup: Seven stuck with the Borg Queen, so how does she escape of Voyager come rescue her from the greatest threat the Federation ever knew? Riker had to pull off some impressive misdirection just to get Locutus off a single cube, so how are you going to get her out of the middle of Borg City? Answer: uh, standard action cliches. Just a complete letdown after all of that buildup. Same thing with the denouement. Seven just went through hell. So what do we get with the quiet final scene? Just Janeway telling her to get some sleep. Well, that was quite the anticlimactic character piece. I complain about the ending because, well, the setup was that great. This is about as exciting as you can make a TV show, and a lot of the scenery, a lot of the emotion, and a lot to make you think. Some other random comments: - The nightmare scene with Naomi was effective. I mean, when she started asking the same questions as the flashback, you already knew it was a dream or hallucination or whatever. But when Naomi suddenly turned into a Borg, it was still creepy and still sent a shiver down my spine. Not bad for something that was telegraphed. - As others have stated, the assimilation scenes were quite haunting. Probably the scariest the Borg have been. I mean, we've seen them assimilate Enterprise crew members in First Contact, and that's not comforting imagery, but at least they were soldiers. This was a systematic extinction, and thus far more menacing. Given that so many people consider this episode a neutering of the Borg, one has to admit that they were still scary in this scene. - Was anyone else reminded of Return of the Jedi with the Borg Queen and Seven? The Emperor taunting/tempting Luke? Sure, the Queen was being cryptic about everything, and it wasn't really clear what the final purpose was, but still the scenes were engaging. - That said, I don't think this was as unclear or poorly thought out as some people think. For starters, the assault on the Borg Sphere was as easy as it was precisely because it was a trap laid for Seven; no neutering of the Borg there. So people complaining that the Borg should have paid attention to the bombs and all were missing the point. Secondly, I think it makes sense that the Queen didn't want to simply assimilate Seven any more than she did Picard. She specifically stated that it was Seven's uniqueness; being fully Borg and living among humans (something that doesn't apply to either Picard, Hugh, or the Unity drones, so there's something unique there), that she wanted. Presumably, assimilating her would eliminate that uniqueness. The Borg have assimilated trillions of unique personalities, and usually just delete or ignore the personalities. Perhaps, if they were to just turn Seven into a drone, they would be unable to extract the unique element they're looking for, the psychology of humanity as seen from a Borg drone. They simply wouldn't know how to sift through an individual personality. Thus, they need Seven to give it willingly. - And with THAT said, the Queen seemed to jump straight into super evil mode, trying to get Seven to assimilate Earth while still resisting the Borg? Dumb dumb dumb. Then again, the Queen does consider these emotions irrelevant, and maybe she saw the time of the episode running low and felt she had to rush things... - Meanwhile, why are there doors on the Queen's chambers? Doors serve two purposes: privacy and security, and the Borg have no need for either of them. - As for the comment comparing this to Nothing Human, Janeway was consistent in both episodes. It was the Doctor, gleefully grave-robbing an arm off the Borg, that didn't really fit. Of course, an argument could be made that the Cardassian, being an individual, really should know better, while the Borg are more a force of nature. There would be nothing wrong with studying the aftereffects of a hurricane or a plague breakout, even if suffering occurred then, and using that research, so maybe the Doc felt that way here as well. But I agree, coming so close to that episode, it was jarring.

icarus32soar

The trivial and literal-minded nitpicking on this thread is depressing. This is an outstanding episode with atmosphere, mood and tone so rich it deserved the big screen. It's a superior stand alone ep with a cinematic pedigree some of the ST movies could only dream about. Thopmson is spectacularly effective, Ryan shines, and an ep based on a triangle of female relationships and tensions creates an extraordinary feminist statement. This is most satisfying SciFi above and beyond the narrow ST confines. The notion of a ST Canon and the harped upon need for continuity are a toddler's neediness, a fear of getting out of one's comfort zone. There's nothing in this ep that contradicts the spirit of ST and its scope for creating powerful metaphor. It's simply great meyaphorical ST and great Sci-Fi.

Diamond Dave

As a big screen actioner with stunning visuals, excellent production values and great score this succeeds unreservedly. As a story, I feel less so. The Hansen interludes I thought were an effective plot device well played. The Borg queen I was less happy with - there was none of the seductive eroticism of the queen in First Contact, and the interaction with Seven fell flat as a consequence. Ultimately this whole episode can be pretty much summed up as 'Seven is co-opted by the Borg and then rescued'. It can be enjoyed on that level but doesn't stand much deeper scrutiny. 2.5 stars.

I am another laughing my ass off at #4 of John's post. Hahahaha! Classic. Seriously, though, your post is all true.

Have i missed something. Do we know how the Hansens got to the delta quadrant in the first place

I'll only answer once. Yes, they followed the cube through a transwarp conduit.

Oh thanks i thought they must of covered that. I didnt think comment posted so kept doing it then 3 came up at once lol.

OK, 'First Contact' diminished the effects of the Borg in Q-Who... everything after that just piles on, along with the Hansen's and Regeneration etc. This is probably my favorite Voyager 2-parter (and that's saying something). Visually stunning, music was awesome and something that I don't think has been mentioned yet.... pace. Dark Frontier kept pounding at you... very, very good. The scenes where we actually see assimilation of civilians was gut-wrenching. they succeeded in driving the point home that the Borg have no morals. Hard to add to what Jammer wrote. I'll just give my cut on why the Borg Queen probably was so interested in 7. Seven is of course "unique", maybe, just maybe, Seven was looked upon as the next Borg Queen? Who knows, my one knock on this episode is they didn't elaborate enough on that revelation. As to why everyone doesn't know about the Borg? ... section 31 anyone? We know of a "race" of being that can't be stopped... I can see S31 snuffing that for the betterment of Star Fleet and the Federation. Easy 4-star episode for me.

Nicholas Ryan

It's possible Starfleet new about the Borg prior to Q Who. Very plausible if you consider the Enterprise episode Regeneration. It was probably just classified and compartmentalized to some part of Starfleet. The Borg have already been retconned anyway. Originally they didn't assimilate people but later on it was stated they always have.

Leave it to Voyager to make a Borg saga boring (**)

Jammer, I'm not sure why you assert that continuity has been rewritten regarding the introduction of humanity to the Borg. It has not been. The Hansens set out to pursue a rumor about a cybernetic species that no one in the Alpha Quadrant knew about. They remained far away from the Federation for years and never sent their data back to Starfleet. Ultimately their sacrifice was entirely in vain since they were assimilated before they could inform the Alpha Quadrant of their discoveries.

Why was kid Seven of Nine playing with a Borg Cube? That indicates more than a rumor. Especially as the Borg Cube as a concept was a complete surprise to Picard and the team when they encountered it. No... Ooh this sounds similar to the Borg theory that was knocking about 20 odd years ago. All they had to do was drop in a line about hearing about them from an El-Aurian and not have a model cube and it can make a bit more sense.

In my view, the concept of the Borg Queen killed it. The Borg were disturbing because of their faceless, collective nature - just this frickin cube of metal just absorbing everything under the leash of an ever-present hive mind. Then they brought in the Borg Queen. Some kind of serpentine villainess with all the irrational and vain characteristics the Borg consider irrelevant. Why the hell would the Queen have a personality? They could have renamed her "Arachnia, Queen of the Spider People" and it wouldn't have mattered. I think the dumbing down of Star Trek began here...when we needed "bad guys" and special effects over chilling concepts and creepy aliens.

Plot holes and continuity issues aside, I really enjoyed this one. It helps that due to a misspent youth my memory leaves much to be desired, and I just plain don't notice some of the continuity problems... A couple of points: - Annika's parents are deplorable people. And where was Starfleet? Apparently they approved the Hansen's plan to study the Borg, but would they really let them take a 5yo? I seriously doubt it. - I thought the child playing Annika was terrible. It made me appreciate more what a good little actress they found to play Naomi Wildman. - Here's a continuity issue that I don't think anyone has mentioned: child Annika has brown eyes. WTF? They did the same thing with Paris in his flashback scenes in "30 Days". I don't get it. Are brown eyed blonds cheaper to hire?

Harry Kim can't get a lock

Ug Lee! Ug Lee!! UG LEE! Always awesome to see Kirk Bailey in anything. He was the greatest camp counselor ever, and was great as Seven's dad. Too bad they just left him there and made no attempt to rescue him from the borg. It's not like the haven't liberated anyone else on this show.

Bloody hell how irresponsible were the Hansen's taking their 5 year child with them to study the Borg?! I thought Archer was bad taking Porthos along when hunting down the Xindi weapon, but that seems fairly minor in comparison. The Hansen's would have been less hideous to watch, and more believable (what sort of parent would actually do that?), if Annika had been in her mid to late teens but I suppose that would ruin the drama of 7 being 'raised' by the Collective. Agree the child actor playing Annika was dreadful and not at all believable as the infant 7 who I would imagine was a bit of a little madam.

Thoroughly enjoyed "Dark Frontier" although recognize there are continuity issues and plot holes. It's not perfect but it's very good Trek. The production is amazing -- normally that doesn't impress me, but I think there's enough new stuff here concerning the Borg that I liked it a lot. That new stuff would be some of the back story from the Hansen family mainly. The flashbacks of the Hansen family were pretty cool, although I find it a bit hard to believe they could last a couple of years studying the Borg so closely and it bugs me that this happened before "Q Who" (continuity issue). It was weird to see a Borg ship try attack Voyager right off the bat because I thought we were well beyond Borg space -- but no matter, VOY wanted another Borg episode so there you go. It was a great teaser. Some of the other things I liked was seeing the Borg station and how they went about assimilating another race. 7's reaction here is pretty predictable with her compassion coming through although that made me wonder why it was so easy to abandon Voyager in the first place just because of a call from the Borg Queen. I wasn't a fan of the Borg Queen in First Contact and nor was I here although she did serve a purpose for coordinating things and strategizing against Janeway. The ultimate end seemed a bit fortunate for Janeway & Co. So they blast some important power generation thingy, but all the while the Borg just stand there and don't try and assimilate Janeway -- made the Borg look stupid. For me, "Dark Frontier" does enough to get to 3.5 stars. Trek can't really go wrong with the Borg as villains. The action and the plot for the story was good enough to make me disregard sufficiently the inconsistencies, conveniences, and continuity issues. An interesting idea for Janeway to go on the offensive to steal Borg technology and then dealing with all the consequences.

A person being "cured" after Borg assimilation wasn't a "never happened before" thing, but it is rare. I always thought it would have been an intriguing notion if they had it that a person who has been assimilated by the Borg and then restored was thereafter immune from it ever happening again. In such a case, the Borg Queen's machinations with Seven of Nine, rather than just instantly re-assimilating her as some here indicate should have happened, would make considerably more sense.

Few nitpicks.. -- Naomi shows Janeway her "proposal." Janeway glances at it maybe half a second, no exageration. She says "oh!" Are you kidding me? She has developed super-fast reading skills in the Delta Quadrant? -- Toward the end, Seven murmurs "Captain" when Janeway contacts her through her [whatever]. Queen touches her face and knows exactly what communication took place in a milisecond? Why didn't she just touch her face and learn everything she needs in that case? Why have all the dialogues? -- And if the Queen can read Seven's mind with a touch, she can surely know instantly what each drone communicates or knows. That's the whole point of the collective anyway. So what is the purpose of each drone's separate [whatever] unique signal that the Doctor revealed as if he could communicate with them individually? Doctor made it sound like they could send a message individually to each drone without the rest of the collective knowing about it, and that just seems absurd in this case. And thank you Jammer for questioning the Borg Queen's role (few others followed it up in previous comments). I felt the same way when I watched Star Trek: First Contact. The Borg's strength was the colllective. That is what made them scary. In the name of creating a villain, the film threw that out the window and made a large number of drones unequal, dependent on a single Queen, and Voyager does the same here. Don't get me wrong, I liked ST: First Contact, but it did sacrifice a lot from the Borg's intimidating image and presence, in order to make it sexy (ie the good Starfleet vs the evil "one") to the large movie-going audience. Back to the episode. Aside from the nitpicks above, it was a fine, entertaining hour and a half of TV. Good point made by Charlie in his comment from 2009 (and Nic from 2013).

Matthew Burns

This episode is now nearly 20 years old! It holds up well I think. The VFX look good even by todays standards.

Startrekwatcher

3 stars This is one of my favorite Voyager episodes. It’s pretty much just an excuse to show off the Borg in all their intimidating glory. The two hour film also had great atmosphere and creepy mood. It also managed to pull together various little pieces over last two years and fill in blanks surrounding Seven and her background such as how the Raven wound up all the way in the Delta Quadrant Originally I was absolutely confused when the episodevrevealed the Hansens were aware and f the Borg even having a model of a cube ten years before “Q who?” But I reflected on it and realized maybe they had heard about the Borg from the El Aurian refugees but it would have been nice had that the writers taken just a minute to include a line or two to that effect I did like the way the episode approached the Hansen’s as researchers studying the Borg in pure scientific terms with their assortment of improvised tech gadgets I also liked how Naomi symbolized Seven as a child The Borg Queen is as big of a headache here as in First Contact. The writers of both try to play coy with what exactly she is instead of just coming right out and say she is an individual with emotions and the drones are her mindless slaves. The FC writers and Dark Frontier choose to play it vague. Is she an avatar for the Hive Mind? is she an individual? This episodes de was the perfect opportunity to really delve into who she is especially since Seven seems unaware of her existence until the queen appears before her Not only that but the writers had asked Alice Kruge to play the queen in this episode but couldn’t because of scheduling. Yet we saw the Queen in FC played by Krige be destroyed and all the drones self destruct as a result/-which totally goes against the idea of having things decentralized. Her death should have had zero effect if she were just merely a specialized drone who can be replaced with a clone or another female drone. But then in more confusion this DF Queen perishes st end of the hour but she returns in Unimatrix Zero and the Collective is still around so the DF Queen dying didn’t have the FC effect of drones dying when she died. Then Alice Krige returns in Endgame and ends up arguing and overriding the Collective furthering the confusion I did expect more from this outing but it was still enjoyable on its own terms Seven seemed to finally have a breakthrough in unimatrix one once confronted by her assimilated father and the queen and I thought after this episode she would reclaim her human name based on her outburst but it didn’t play out that way I also had an issue with the crew believing they could use the Hansen gadgets since knowledge of that tech would have been assimilated when they were and the Borg adapt from that point on to resist it. I also had a hard time believing the Delta flyer and Janeway could do easily waltz into the heart of Borgdom and surrounded by trillions of drones as Tuvok states. It also wasnt too bright to bring the Doc along with his mobile emitter. If it was assimilated the Collective would jump forward five centuries in technological progress Paris was already on board and could provide assistance if necessary

On the objection to Seven being the "first Borg to regain her individuality" I'd argue that in a sense it's true if we qualify it by excluding: 1. People who were only in the Collective for a short time. 2. People who were later re-assimilated either into the mainstream Borg Collective or some substitute hive mind. 3. Children who were in the Collective, but rescued while still very young. Seven is either the only or first to live as a Borg for nearly 20 years but eventually learn to function as a relatively normal person by the standards of her species (though highly traumatized and with special medical needs).

Pocket University

I always wince at: "Does [the Borg Queen] have a a crown?" "We think she's more like the queen of an insect colony--coordinating the activities of the others." In other words, she's very like the sort of queen who wears a crown, and almost nothing like the queen of an insect colony...

A few thoughts on part one (more later): Janeway stealing the Borg transwarp coil versus using the Moset program in Nothing Human: as pointed out above, Janeway was in favour of using the Moset program, so there's no contradiction there. But even if she was against it, I think the situations are different. Part of the issue is the concern that using Moset's research would normalize his methods, which is a risk since Moset is already a respected Alpha Quadrant figure/physician. He's been accepted. Now of course by this point, Cardassia is with the Dominion so things are a bit different, but Moset had already been accepted as part of Alpha Quadrant society, and so was basically rewarded for his tech. In this ep, Janeway is proposing an act of piracy to steal from the Borg, so her plan would both *hurt* the Borg and then gain something for her crew. It's a Robin Hood-type logic -- steal from the bad guys, which hurts the bad guys, and give to the good guys, which in this case is Janeway. The Borg don't benefit from Voyager stealing their technology against their will, is the idea. On the other hand, yes I think Janeway stealing the transwarp coil was a crazy idea and I can't believe no one called her on it (except for Chakotay to some extent beforehand when talking about her fiddling her commbadge). Now, the episode actually *does* call Janeway out on it in the episode's structure. The episode (part I in particular) emphasizes parallels between Annika's experience on the Raven and Seven's current experience on Voyager; Janeway, like the Hansens, is obsessed with a particular goal (getting home for Janeway, scientific knowledge for the Hansens) and it's leading her to madness and arrogance which is going to lead to the crew's destruction and, in particular, Annika/Seven's. Seven is terrified and only she can really see how dangerous what they are doing is, but hse doesn't quite believe it, and partly it's because on some level she's *still a child*; the episode gives Seven three parents or sets of parents, the Hansens, Janeway, and the Borg Queen, and three extended families (the Hansens again, Voyager, and the Borg), and the episode (part one that is) is about Seven realizing she's about to re-experience a traumatic event and she is still unable to do anything about it. (This is a really fantastic episode for Seven, all around, I think, and I disagree with Jammer's suggesting that it didn't do much new for the character.) The most she manages to do is to save Voyager, but *not* herself, and her decision tends to indicate on some level that she sees her parents' destruction as her fault, even as she's also angry with them for their destruction of her. The Hansens' arrogance is understandable because they had not really fully reckoned with the Borg's destructive power up close (this was pre-Wolf 359), though still worth condemning -- they got their young daughter assimilated, and *even had that not happened*, they still took her away from Federation society by breaking the laws they broke in the desperation to find answers. But I dunno -- Janeway finds out that the Borg knew about her transwarp stealing plan, and do she or the crew have a moment of reflection of, gee, maybe that was a stupid idea, taking on the Borg and assuming that we could pull off a heist against them in two weeks training, in retrospect it's obvious we were wrong and stupid? Well, no, of course not. It just seems weird to me that no one on the crew besides Seven seemed to realize how foolhardy Janeway's plan was, and there was very little internal justification. By contrast, in Scorpion, a lot of time was spent establishing both why Janeway thought her dangerous plan was the best option and Chakotay was given a voice to emphasize why he didn't believe in the risks. I know, I know, not every episode has to be Scorpion. But I just found Janeway's behaviour here hard to buy. Unlike the Hansens, I don't quite know why Janeway thought she could get away with this plan without being assimilated or destroyed. I guess here we could say it's part of Janeway's ongoing arc -- she's desperate to get home, and is taking bigger risks, but it's at the point now where the desperation is actually buried and so doesn't even show up except in her reckless behaviour, so that she does not seem to have the sadness that we saw in Scorpion or in the Year of Hell segments.

Part II: So the big character piece in this two-parter, under the action, is about Seven's role in her three families, and what it means for her to be recovered by Voyager. The Borg Queen tells her that (apparently) she was actually only allowed to be recovered by Voyager as part of the Borg's plan to allow her to be some sort of double agent to eventually take over humanity. Huge if true, and it makes some sense of the Borg's relative disinterest in recovering Seven; it's a revelation, though, that the show doesn't make much of in the long-term, and one wonders if it makes sense for it to have been introduced. (If she was a double agent, why not try to recover her again after this episode's end? It's not wholly inconsistent with what we know from, e.g., First Contact, that the Borg wanted some sort of willing counerpart representative from humanity. It's not stated explicitly, but implicit in the Borg Queen's run-through of human failings is that humans still avoided assimilation, and she wants to know why; that something about human resourcefulness, probably linked in some way to their individuality, is something the Borg know they lack, and so want to be able to incorporate with a willing counterpart ala a Picard/Locutus, a Data, or a Seven.) Anyway, the idea that she was allowed to be on Voyager as part of a double-agent plan creates a weird push-pull; on the one hand, her Borg family never truly abandoned her, and always had plans for her, lending credence to the Queen's claim that Seven is still *essentially* Borg rather than human, and that her human time is mostly a bad dream and an illusion. On the other, it emphasizes the cruelty of the Borg that the Queen apparently allowed Seven to suffer and believe herself to be completely cut off from them merely because of the utility of some sort of double-agent drone with human experiences. There were parallels drawn between Janeway and the Hansens, especially in part one, and now there are parallels drawn between Janeway and the Queen, with some repeated dialogue (the Queen's line about maybe pushing Seven too fast repeats Janeway's line before), and there's an open question how much the Queen and Janeway as dueling mothers both insist on imposing their own values on Seven in order to use her for her skills. Annika Hansen apparently when her family brought her to the Borg and they took her over and replaced her with Seven of Nine, Tertiary Adjunct to Unimatrix Zero One, who no longer had to fear the destruction of self and loss of family that Annika went through because the Borg were invincible and total; the fact that she was a Borg True Believer is part of their programming, of course, but also on some level a psychological defense mechanism from someone whose family were destroyed and who then needed to believe absolutely in the new family, even if they were the ones who destroyed her old one. It's creepy that her family was even folded into the Borg, and also that the Queen seems to wait to deploy this until the last moment -- a trump card that she has apparently hidden from Seven, who maybe believed her parents were murdered despite having been linked to the hive mind and so should have known that her parents were alive. It's not very Borg, I guess, or what we know about them, but it's kind of classic psychological manipulation in a cult (or other authoritarian regime), withholding belonging except sprinkled in small doses, doling out tiny secret privilege carrots only as temptations to prevent a person from escaping when the stick is likely to fail. We actually know from I, Borg already that individual Borg who don't have quite Seven/Annika's history don't react the same way to threats to Borg-ness that Seven did, in The Gift (and, as we discover, in Survival Instinct), and it seems to be the result of the isolation and terror of having her whole family killed or assimilated. Seven wanted to return to the Collective when Voyager got a hold of her, and only agreed to stay when Janeway started playing the Collective card -- telling her to comply and whatnot in The Gift. In The Raven, she still wanted to rejoin the Collective but was willing to allow that Tuvok and the others might not want to and to respect that. In Hope and Fear, Seven revealed that her preference would be to not rejoin the Collective. So we know that her preference would be to stay on Voyager, in this episode, but she's still ambivalent, and after deciding to give herself up in order to spare Voyager, Seven tries to make the most of her re-Borg-ification. So here we get a taste of what Seven has learned on Voyager. On Voyager she rejects Janeway's emphasis on individualism, but that rebellion took place in an environment which encouraged Seven's individualism to a degree, so here she resists the Queen's. We don't get much time on it, but Seven's allowing a handful of people to escape assimilation (in a really great, bravura sequence) is both her showing her Federation "corruption" and also showing the same spark of rebellion that Seven used to use against Janeway (in e.g. Prey), when she applied Borg philosophy to break against Starfleet, instead of Starfleet against Borg. What's interesting is the way the Queen seems to make some sort of allowances for Seven's rebellion, allowing the family to escape (the way, you know, the Raven wasn't allowed to escape), rather like the special privileges Seven occasionally enjoyed on Voyager. Janeway's taking a big risk to rescue Seven for Seven's sake in spite of Seven's betrayal is what convinces Seven to return to Voyager, and also on some level releases her from the trauma of her family having endangered/destroyed her. She even declares that her name is Annika Hansen here, for the first time (after having rejected that name for a long time), and she seems to be progressing to the point of, on some level, regaining a kind of ability to trust that was destroyed all that time ago. And yet there's still that edge to it; Janeway orders her around. We know that Seven would prefer to follow Janeway's orders than the Queen's now. When will she be past having to "comply," with either? Janeway's role as parent comes up again in the final scene -- where she orders her to go to sleep and have sweet dreams. And it's weird and interesting that Seven has this ambivalence about her "parents"; trusting her own parents (and being unable to stop them) led to her destruction, and then her second family took her individuality away and then abandoned her, and then her third family was a bumpy ride. Is it good or bad that she's trusting Janeway enough to follow her orders for her own good, rather than rebel? Is it progress or is she regressing? I like this episode a lot for the Seven side of things. But, and this is a big but, it's unbelievable that the rescue operation worked. It's one thing for Voyager to be able to win in a skirmish with some small sphere-shuttle, or something, but come on -- Borg HQ? Back in The Gift, the Borg's not trying to track them down indefinitely was explicable because they got the big distance-boost from Kes and, more to the point, Seven *wasn't that important*; she was just one drone. Here we learn she's a double-agent and also that the Borg are planning another assault on Earth, and it just dies on the vine because the Queen can't do anything but gape when Janeway shoots that one node thing? I don't buy it and it hurts the episode in a pretty major way. So the problems with both parts come down to the same thing -- the show doesn't sufficiently justify how Janeway et al. could reasonably expect to survive a Borg encounter. In part one, they justify it by having it be a puny sphere, but even then reveal that OF COURSE the Borg are too powerful and Janeway et al. are foolish, but then part two then amps things up by having Janeway et al. go to Borg HQ and then, after having the Borg having had a years-long (if opaque) plan far beyond Voyager's reckoning, they're completely incompetent in the face of a rescue attempt. It's not that hard to overlook this flaw during the Seven scenes, but it becomes difficult during the Janeway scenes. I think a high 3 stars for both parts -- but it's really a split rating, not between Part 1 and Part 2 but between different elements of the story (maybe 3.5/2.5? 4/2?).

Thinking about it, I think that the plan to steal the transwarp coil in part 1 might have been less crazy, I guess, had it been presented in a different way. They did emphasize that the one sphere was limping and that it had limited capabilities, and they did make an effort to show that they were trying to be "careful." The main problem is that we've seen repeatedly that the Borg do try to recover their technology. The idea that they might be able to board a Borg ship without being assimilated isn't that crazy because the Borg *sometimes* don't respond if they aren't interested, though even there they'd need to somehow either be sure the Borg didn't see them or that they wouldn't be interested, which is hard to determine. But would they allow someone to take their tech without recovering it? They recover lost drones and lost tech all the time. Maybe if the plan had been to get the specs on a piece of equipment to be able to replicate it or something, it would have been more plausible; or if there were some work establishing why this circumstance was special. I don't know; I think it'd be possible to more convincingly assert that there was a Special Opportunity with a small Borg target, and the episode didn't do that for me. I'll add that one thing that might have helped (and did sort of help in the final episode) is this: there is no reason to expect that the Borg were setting a trap, because there was no reason to anticipate that the Borg would play some sort of game. Why would they need to "lure Voyager in" with all the deception? It's not their MO. And then the show could reveal that the reason they are playing the deception is because the Queen wants Seven to come back willingly. Probably in the AQ, they know that the Borg sometimes want willing participants (from Picard/Data's revelations in First Contact), but that might not have been told to Voyager in the scattered messages they got in season four. (I'll also add that this episode would work better if not for Drone, which did show the Borg obsessively pursuing the ship because of One, and I'm not clear on why the Borg would have "forgotten" that, or that Voyager has 29th century tech on board. I don't consider that as big a deal because one could say it was just the freak occurrence of One's existence that led to the Borg's interest, but it should still be a concern for the Voyager crew.)

Re-watching this, it's very amusing how blatantly they have sidelined all the poorer actors in favour of the the Captain, Seven, the Doctor and Tuvok. Naomi Wildman is a more convincing character than most of the adults and that is embarrassing. I really enjoyed all the scientist back-story even if it was ridiculously reckless and is retconning, but this ep. is, yet-again, another showcase for superb Jeri Ryan acting. To have somehow found someone who looks like that for the geeks, and yet constantly delivers superb and convincing performances should result in a medal for the casting team.

The soundtrack to Dark Frontier is impressive.

Neelix spends a bunch of time downloading the information about Seven's parents and brings her a box of dozens of datapads, with more to come. Why? Can't she just read it off of any computer terminal? And do those datapads only hold 3mb of info or what? About those 'biodampeners' that are used. How would they even help? Borg sensors can't detect them maybe, but they can still be seen and heard. I guess the Borg don't see or hear? Actually they must not, because they are running around the Borg ship saying stuff like 'put the bombs over there' while standing right next to drones, and then putting the bombs there right in front of them. The whole sneaking around the Borg ship annoyed me a great deal. They would certainly arouse the Borg by doing that stuff alone, but then even after the bombs go off and they teleport away a transwarp coil, the Borg still do nothing until a few minutes later. Like that wouldn't have set off any alarms at all? The Borg are stupid in this episode. That the Hansen's would have been able to do all the stuff they did for so long without being assimilated is idiotic. And the fact that the Delta Flyer can show up at a Borg 'city' and get away, after assaulting the Queen of all things, is just plain silly. I don't care what shields or whatever they have. Plus all the other stuff people already mentioned. Especially the canon violations. 2 stars for Part 1. 1 1/2 stars for Part 2.

Skads - “And do those datapads only hold 3mb of info or what?” likely they did it to visually convey the volume of information, but I love the idea that back when this episode was made, a pad that size that contained terabytes worth of information was deemed “too unbelievable” for the average audience

icarus32soar Sun, Feb 21, 2016, 8:53am (UTC -5) "The notion of a ST Canon and the harped upon need for continuity are a toddler's neediness, a fear of getting out of one's comfort zone." Excuse me? So I'm a toddler because I demand a coherent universe, instead of every episode existing in a different parallel dimension from the one before it? This isn't an anthology series like the Twilight Zone, dude! This has nothing to do with my "comfort zone." It has to do with the integrity of the franchise. Either things in past episodes happened or they did not. But demanding that the show recognize its own past isn't a "toddler's neediness" for comfort. It's a need for basic facts to exist within the show's objective universe. Either previously established reality exists or it does not. But pretending that it does and that it is coherent, while, at the same time, flushing certain inconvenient past episodes down the "memory hole" is deceitful, contradictory, Orwellian, and indefensible. It has to be one or the other. Either anthology or the same universe. I can't believe in two mutually negating things at the same time. If these writers don't even respect the integrity of their own reality, why should we?

@icarus32soar: I'm also curious: Would you be okay if, in the next episode, Janeway were suddenly a man? Or the holographic doctor being a real flesh and blood human and the writers pretending that that was the case all along? How big does the continuity error have to be before it starts bothering you?

I particularly liked the precision planning for the Big Borg Caper. The holodeck simulation, the seconds that needed to be shaved off, the need for everything to run like a well oiled machine, all the derring-do, the way the Voyager team had to be a collective to defeat the collective. The Seven part was interesting and good character development, she actually says "I am not Borg," a big deal for Seven. Showing Daddy was a little over the top, especially since nothing was really done with that. I liked the scene where the Borg were doing the assimilation. Seven is really starting to get some perspective about what was done to her, by her parents and then by the Borg. The ship and Seven take a big leap toward home.

Comments on the comments: --The Borg Queen telling Seven she was the first Borg to regain her individuality . . . maybe she was just lying to make Seven feel special and avoid admitting weakness and the need for Seven to defeat the puny, inferior humans. --Hansen story line isn't the first to conflict with the "when the Borg were first known to the Federation" timeline. Does Voyager have to be consistent with the original, or the latest? --I liked that we found out how the Hansens even made it to the Delta Quadrant. --Definitely a deliberate comparison between "the parents" was set up . . . The Hansens, the Borg Queen, Janeway . . . with the "please" and more. --Naomi 's bumps: Lazy alien-making, sure, but realistic for a kid actor to endure. Maybe they learned their lesson with Alexander. That was a small child to put through that Klingon make up process. May explain his questionable acting and why he always looked cranky or bored and tired.

The crew should have mutinied. Janeway's plan to get back Seven amidst thousands of Borg is insane but the writing, while not distracting from that, also annoyingly made its progress feel insanely easy. This episode at least kind of destroyed the Borg (though the later "Collective" and "Unimatrix Zero" destroyed them quite a bit more), Janeway, the Voyager crew. Seven also seems crazy to agree to be taken back in order to let Voyager go, to ask to go on the away team rather than just tell Janeway captain the mission is a trap so get away, when she especially should know the Borg can easily break their promises-and the Queen quickly outright freaking tells her her purpose is to assist in assimilating all of humanity. The whole episode is so crazy, though, that Seven making such a crazy decision doesn't hurt her overall too much. The flashbacks were OK in the first half (yeah, the parents kind of interesting), way too choppily, annoyingly included in the second. The first half would be a little better, agreeing to the deal aside, if it had been its own episode (without Part I in the onscreen title) so it wouldn't be so obvious that the mission would fail and/or Seven would be captured.

Doug Willis

Anyone hate that fucking Elliott guy and his childish comments about DS9?

@Doug Willis I've never read his reviews nor will I ever do so. It's always something I have to scroll past when I scan the comments of an episode. I recall 1 brief interaction with him wherein he showed he didn't know what he was talking about. I also seem to recall he stated that he was a socialist -- that's all you really need to know.

RandomThoughts

Hello Everyone! I always like reading Elliott, even if I don't agree with what they have to say every time. Regards... RT

Ouch...I thought Elliot had a point (does anyone moderate language here?) And honestly, I always found DS9 a little boring compared to TNG and even Voyager, though later in life I'm finding DS9 gets more interesting (just dont watch the crappy VOY episodes and it's a pretty neat series...would have been nice if they took more chances but such were the constraints for a 1990s-era syndicated show with a mandate to pump out a finished episode every 2 weeks on average for 7 years straight)

@Rahul - what does his being or not being a socialist have to do with anything? No, don't answer ; I don't want to dwell on this Elliot business. @ Doug Willis - why did you have to invite people to discuss Elliot in a thread which he hadn't posted to for eight years? Sorry

A hugely entertaining and appropriately splashy two-parter. I do wish more was done with Seven and the Queen in the back half though, as there's never really any doubt that she'll side with Janeway in the final confrontation. As Jammer noted, it plays very similarly to the Picard/Data/Queen standoff in First Contact, which ultimately had more going for it, character-wise. Even just moving the "I am Annika Hansen" line to the climax would have given it some more weight, but as is there's just not enough ambiguity surrounding Seven's motivations here to really land that three-way confrontation. Doesn't stop this from being an absolute blast though and I just love the design of the whole 'Borg city'.

Way back in San 4s The Gift it was stated Sevens parents went off studying the borg 20 years ago, before Q Who. So it could be that there was a very small, vague awareness known to a few ppl in Starfleet, maybe just speculations of sevens parents known only to them, before Q Who, this would not violate continuity. Great to see Seven bsck5 on Picard. One of Treks best characters.

I really enjoyed this episode with 3 glaring exceptions: 1. The whole “no Borg has regained their individuality” thing that has been nitpicked to death already 2. The last 2 minutes: “we managed to get another 20,000 light years out of the transwarp coil before it gave out...” Huh??? It just gave out? And that’s it? No replicating it? No studying it to apply its mechanics to your warp system? Other than that, fantastic stuff. 3.5 stars.

Little Anika is beyond adorable. If I ever have a daughter, I want one like her! ❤ Naomi Wildman, subunit of Ensign Samantha Wildman, is also cute (minus the ridiculous forehead pimples). As kids on Star Trek go, she's pretty tolerable and even affable a lot of the time. I don't know why I found her so insufferable on a previous rewatch, a decade ago... As for the episode, I liked it. It was replete with dynamic action and just the right amount of talkie-talkie. Quite a few plot holes and groaningly predictable plot turns but, heck, the rest was suspenseful and enjoyable enough to be able to see past that. One big annoyance, expressed by a few others, is that this further emasculates and trivializes the Borg. Seeing them outwitted and overcome this easily, it's now difficult to think of them as much more than a bunch of kittens (with a capital P). It makes the Hirogen or even Malons more imposing and formidable. Pity. Anyway, 3-1/2 stars, maybe even 4.

Just about to watch the episode where human parents recklessly put their child in danger. The Hansens should have been locked up for child abuse. Apart from that entertaining episode with a good backstory for Seven. I guess the Hansens were working for Section 31 since mainstream Starfleet officers like Picard were new to The Borg since Archer's experience and the El Aurians refugees stories, must have been classified

@Den they not only took their 7 year old on an expedition to study the Borg, they also deliberately marooned themselves in the Delta quadrant in a runabout with their 7 year old (in the middle of Borg space). Bad parents doesn't even begin to describe what these two are.

Jillyenator

Interesting that the Queen considered Seven to have been assaulted, mutilated, and indoctrinated by humans, instead of liberated. The Borg see what Janeway did as abhorrent as we see Assimilation. Not too different than Quark's little speech about humans and root beer. It's all about perspective. We really only see the Alliance in Firefly as the bad guys because our main characters are on the lam, but is the Alliance evil? No. It gets into a greyer area with the Peacekeepers in Farscape, but aside from insane military commanders, are the Peacekeepers evil? On the far dark end we have the Empire in Star Wars, who definitely perform acts of atrocities, but seem to justify it as bringing order to the galaxy. Anyway, I love the ideals of the Federation, I really do! But in spite of the Prime Directive, the Federation does a fair bit of assimilation on their own, and I like the self aware nods to this here and there over the various Trek series.

Bob (a different one)

I had a bunch of points I was going to make but I see that many previous commenters have beaten me to the punch. The bottom line is that this is frequently a very poorly written show and these two episodes are prime examples. It feels like the writers either don't watch their own tv show or want to punish their audience for paying the slightest bit of attention. Jammer said: "(Although, Janeway came off as a little smug in the scene where she introduces "Operation: Fort Knox" to the crew; Mulgrew sometimes goes overboard with the body language.)" She performs that scene like she's a gangster in a 1930s crime flick and she's showing off her "moxy." Controversial opinion: Mulgrew does a very poor job of acting on most (but certainly not all) episodes of Voyager. Her body language is constantly exaggerated: a swaggering walk, excessive hand gesticulations, touching her face, draping her arms across chairs etc. All of those are things that people do every day, and it isn't like every gesture is wildly over the top or anything, but most normal people don't do those things constantly. It's like she feels that a every line has to have just a little bit of something "extra" or she isn't really acting. It just comes across as artificial, imo. Sometimes, less is more.

#Bob Mulgrew was convincingly charismatic though. Avery Brooks had his moments to shine but for my taste he was down the bottom of my favourites as captain, except for Bakula who is just last based on my disinterest in Enterprise.

Fine episode. Plenty of excitement and thoughtfully written scenes that were well-acted....both kids were good...just different from each other. The Seven - Naomi Wildman connection is worthwhile...from Bliss and into Dark Frontier and I am glad they put all that in there, as well as continuity in the girl's attachment to Neelix. Perfect continuity cannot be manufactured after the fact unless we ourselves invent a time machine. When "Q Who" was written, no one at Paramount had yet thought of the Hansens, let alone a transwarp conduit. While I marvel sometimes at the writers' fixations on- and re-use of - certain names and numbers e.g., JP Hanson with an "o" not an "e" (admiral at Wolf 359) and "39" (the number of Starfleet vessels destroyed at Wolf, as well as the number of alien ships attacking the Borg in Dark Frontier) I have to chalk that up to sub-conscious patterning within the writers' minds whenever the word Borg is mentioned. Ranting about it 'may be futile.' IMO there does seem to be enough room within the standard Trekverse chronology to allow us to smooth over the continuity choppiness so that the fictional timeline is acceptable. We can then get our lives back. Finally, I am glad the Borg are in theory beatable. They remain sufficiently menacing, just not perfectly impregnable perhaps, and I loved the handling of the closing scenes of the episode. Not spoiling that for new watchers. 4 stars

The Federation knew about the Borg at least as far back as Generations. It was just another distant ambiguous power/possible threat. Consider Earth had to fend off destruction from a giant cigar looking for whales and Earth's own probe returning-- some distant threat that may never manifest will be low on the list. There's also reason to believe Q's motivation in "Q Who" wasn't to warn Picard about potential threats in unexplored space, it was to warn him about an *imminent invasion* ... or even an invasion in progress, considering the attacks on the Earth/Romulan neutral zone, which is extremely close to Earth. As for the episode ... started out decent, if risky, but really slowed to a crawl in the second half. Seven and the Queen standing around chatting just wasn't interesting enough for the amount of screen time it got. Janeway was oddly stupid in this. I just can't see her going into attack mode against the Borg. But far worse was her not anticipating the risks to Seven of revisiting any aspects of her Borg experiences, and damn near forcing Seven to read her parents' logs. "Seven, please review your parents' logs where they endangered you, causing their presumed death and you being held hostage in a version of hell for the last 20 years."

The Delta Flyer managed to oust the entire Borg Unicomplex and the Queen using outdated technology that, as was stated by the Queen herself, was assimilated decades ago. This episode made the Borg look super weak, nothing like the Borg the Enterprise (the Federation's flagship) encountered in Q Who. Granted, Voyager is an updated starship and they have Seven helping them with some Borg tactics, but it was still way too easily pulled off. Okay, so the Borg can't see the Delta Flyer on sensors due to multi-adaptive shielding. Can they, I don't know, look out a window to visually see the Flyer? You're telling me in that entire Unicomplex, there isn't one visual port in any of those structures? No cameras or view screens with zooming capabilities? The end of part 1 gave you the sense that Seven was gone forever and far away, with no way to really retrieve her. "The Delta Quadrant is a big place", says Janeway, yet they take the Delta Flyer, equipped with a transwarp coil, and somehow fly around the Quadrant until they find Seven's interlink signature? I just don't get it. It's pinpointing someone's location across 15,000 light years or more while you're traveling 25 times the speed of light. How??? The solutions are a little too easy. The concept of a Queen, in of itself, makes no sense for a highly decentralized collective. In First Contact, a Queen was seemingly created because the micro-collective on the Enterprise needed someone to maintain order. There is no logical reason for there to be a figurehead for the larger collective, other than as a plot device. One other thing that bugged me about the choices of the writers is that Seven was the only character that received a really comprehensive backstory, with multiple episodes dedicated to her (Raven, Dark Frontier). With other characters, all we got were brief flashbacks, bits and pieces, or nothing at all. I think there's a reason why some fans started sarcastically calling Star Trek: Voyager the "Seven of Nine Show". I enjoyed Dark Frontier for the backstory and its attempt to give us a more comprehensive look at the Borg. I also enjoyed Mulgrew's acting, especially in the scenes between her and Seven, and in the scenes where you could clearly see that Janeway was grieving Seven's loss. I disagree with other posters above that Mulgrew is a bad actress. She was one of the actors who held the show together. I would say, on the whole, the female actresses on the show were superior to the males in depiction and performance. The one exception is Picardo (the Doctor), who is an excellent actor.

[I really need to step up the pace with this show. I see from looking at the comments section of the previous episode "Bliss" that my family and I watched that episode in 2021! It was in December, so "only" thirteen months ago, but still: at this rate it will take several decades to finish the series.] Excellent two-parter, 3.5 out of 4. My wife, who along with our daughter watches with me at my request, rated it a perfect four stars, which is particularly enthusiastic for her about any show but especially this one. @Jammer: "The Queen says that no other Borg has ever regained individuality, but I must raise my hand and ask about the entire colony in 'Unity.'" Fair question, although they don't have intimate knowledge of Starfleet military operations. "But even forgetting that for the moment, if the Borg assimilate Seven's memories, won't that be everything they need? Apparently not; the Queen wants Seven to remain an individual who willfully chooses to side with the Borg. How this helps the collective I'm not sure." I thought it was fairly clear: assimilating her memories is no better qualitatively than all the other assimilations they do. It just gives them a little more data. She has to remain an individual to actually think like a human and therefore, in theory, give the Borg a tactical advantage by anticipating what humans might do. Having all that "data" assmilated into the collective doesn't provide that. Now, reading the comments, I see that @STD saw it similarly fifteen years ago: "If individuality is the key, reassimilating Seven would be counter productive; the Collective wants, essentially, someone who knows how the -enemy- thinks and anticipate and adapt to that type of thinking. Assimilation would destroy that." I agree that the screams of the people being assimilated in the distance were harrowing. But I found it puzzling that the prisoners of that species were so impassive when we saw them up close, except for the one who tried to run (and of course Seven's impulsive move to aid in his capture loaded her up with plenty of guilt, although I'm sure he wouldn't have gotten far in any case). I do agree with @Rob in November 2016 that it was a mistake to introduce the Borg queen to begin with. The implacable faceless collective was uniquely chilling, whereas as Rob said "Why the hell would the Queen have a personality? They could have renamed her 'Arachnia, Queen of the Spider People' and it wouldn't have mattered." But this of course was a mistake made outside of Voyager and then the show had to follow along. @artymiss in August 2017 noted how "hideous" the Hansens come across and asks "what sort of parent would actually do that?" I felt the same, but it also occurred to me that (1) they were obsessed with their quest which is somewhat understandable given how brilliant they were and what an incredible discovery the Borg were; and (2) the alternative would have been either to abandon their research or leave their daughter behind on Earth for years at a time, also tough for most parents to swallow. Honestly, you could also ask the same question about the families aboard ship starting with the beginning of TNG. I'm not sure how many of the people commenting here were already Trek fans before TNG started, but I'm one of them: TNG didn't start until I was a teenager and had enjoyed Trek since I was a little kid watching TOS reruns (my dad had been a fan when it originally aired, before I was born). I remember thinking right from the TNG pilot that the whole idea of having children on the Enterprise seemed like a colossally stupid idea, considering all the peril Enterprise had been in on TOS and the movies (and of course would be again in TNG). That's actually one reason I was never as sold on TNG as so many others seem to be--I still much prefer TOS. @Startrekwatcher, November 2017: "I thought after this episode she would reclaim her human name based on her outburst" Yeah, I wish she would have. It would make sense for her character development, but I suppose the producers were afraid of confusing casual viewers or losing something that made her character design interesting. @William B, December 2017: "If she was a double agent, why not try to recover her again after this episode's end?" Because the queen said at the end of the episode that she was mistaken to have thought the whole double agent plan would work out. On continuity: I think some of the complaints people have lodged are legitimate, while others are needlessly picayune. (The comment right above mine from @Robert is a good example: "It's pinpointing someone's location across 15,000 light years or more while you're traveling 25 times the speed of light. How???" Similar complaints could be lodged about pretty much every episode of every Trek show.) I also wonder if in the wake of Discovery's complete trashing of continuity, people might now be a little more forgiving of Voyager. @Springy, October 2018: "Showing Daddy was a little over the top, especially since nothing was really done with that." I absolutely wanted them to bring out her parents (and why not both of them?), but I definitely did want them to do something more with it. @Sigh2000: "Perfect continuity cannot be manufactured after the fact unless we ourselves invent a time machine. When 'Q Who' was written, no one at Paramount had yet thought of the Hansens, let alone a transwarp conduit." I sympathize with your general sentiment, but technically you're wrong. If the writers are aware of all the continuity, or at least have a script supervisor who can alert them to violations, they absolutely can maintain perfect continuity without a time machine. It just means they can't write any scripts that contradict the earlier continuity. This obviously handcuffs them a bit, but it's absolutely doable.

Mellie Agon

Why are the Borg all men? (Apart from the Queen obviously.) I see why the creative team would favour an aesthetic of identical drones. But the Borg assimilate many diverse species: tall/short, male/female, non-humanoid etc. Yet all we see on their ships are clunky pasty men of the same height and build. Even allowing for technological intervention, it doesn't make sense. E.g. where are all the women?

EventualZen

Neelix tells Janeway that 7's Borg alcove uses 30 megawatts of power. 30 Megawatts? That's enough to power a small 21st century village! Next time Voyager's in a fight and shields are down to 47% they should divert power from 7's alcove.

Michael Miller

My opinions: I think the entire premise of the episode that some decades ago a little family style ship was able to pursue the borg as they transwarped across the galaxy, get right up close to them without being detected, beam on board using some "bio dampner", abduct a borg that's sleeping and run scans/implant tracking devices, without any of the borg noticing, was lunacy. The borg literally wouldn't detect a missing borg, suddenly beamed out of its "alcove" or whatever? Millions of years more advanced with the combined tech of tens of thousands of species, and they could get so easily fooled by the Hansens little personal space vehicle or the invincible delta flyer? These borg episodes make no sense and to be honest it is so much random technobabble, that it just becomes boring. And of course they can just casually hook up a transwarp coil to their own systems in no time, the same way every other invading alien of the week also instantly knows how to operate and commandeer voyagers systems..amazing how that works! Then we have the almighty delta flyer which on the one hand will have a wall implode from taking a little dip inside a gas giant, but can take literally more weapons fire than Voyager can from borg ships, and casually cruise through transwarp conduits while simulatenously taking a barrage of borg weapons hitting them in the process, and come out with barely any damage. The borg can create all these wormholes all over the galaxy, yet are blinded by some remodulated shields on a shuttle craft. They can withstand phasers and torpedoes but a drone can be pulverized by Janeway's phaser rifle. I did like the idea of a whole borg base instead of just the ships. Before this the whole idea of the borg can existing as random cubes and spheres floating around the galaxy was lame in my opinion. About time we see some home worlds and central command structures..etc. The whole idea of Steven's struggle between humanity and the borg collective is overdramatized and consumes so many episodes with that soap opera nonsense, it's getting a little ridiculous. When I want to watch a Voyager episode on Google TV I don't even look in season 4 altogether at this point. 2 to 2.5 stars for the action, but still kinda lame. Seriously what is it with all those random lights flashing in the borg ships all the time lol? And if the borg is one collective mind then isn't the idea of it having a "queen" contradictory? And why does the queen always have to be "assembled" again? That's just so dumb.

As others have stated here, I also find it hard to believe that as advanced as the borg are, they don't react at all to the away teams casually placing spatial charges and explosives on critical systems as drones waltz right by. The borg supposedly already assimilated the biodampner technology from the Hansens anyway. They have computers monitoring main systems right??

It's been awhile since I've seen this, but I do remember this episode. It really was well done-I was at the edge of my seat the whole time. Although, I am one of those that really believes that the Borg were a better idea without the idea of a Queen. A faceless enemy is more chilling. Or if the Borg really were like an insect colony. (A queen ant or bee doesn't give orders. Basically, they are just the source of breeding stock. I'm not sure how to do that with the Borg since I imagine that most of their drones are assimilated (I never understood why they showed a Borg baby in the Best of Both Worlds) I also like how Janeway and Seven have a bond of friendship and look out for each other (7 gave herself up to save Janeway and Voyager, and Janeway risked much to save 7)

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• Feb 17, 1999

Summary Star Trek: Voyager follows the adventures of the Federation starship Voyager, which is under the command of Captain Kathryn Janeway.Voyager is in pursuit of a rebel Maquis ship in a dangerous part of the Alpha Quadrant when it is suddenly thrown 70,000 light years away to the Delta Quadrant. With much of her crew dead, Captain Janeway is ... Read More

Directed By : Cliff Bole, Terry Windell

Written By : Gene Roddenberry, Rick Berman, Michael Piller, Jeri Taylor, Bryan Fuller, Nick Sagan, Michael Taylor, Joe Menosky, Brannon Braga

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Created By : Rick Berman, Michael Piller, Jeri Taylor

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Dark Frontier, Part I

Stardate: 52619.2 - After defeating a Borg scout ship, Captain Janeway decides to launch an attack on another damaged Sphere to steal a trans-warp coil (Borg propulsion technology). However, as the crew prepares for their heist, the Borg Queen is secretly aware of the entire plan. During the mission, Seven of Nine's loyalty becomes divided between the Borg and Voyager and is lured back to the Borg collective by the Queen in exchange for the crew's safety.   

Scarlett Pomers

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Katelin Petersen

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A Look Back: Star Trek – Voyager “Dark Frontier”

By elliot thorpe | mar 22, 2019.

When Star Trek – Voyager was first aired in 1996 on the new United Paramount Network, I managed to miss everything beyond the first half of the first year.

CIC Video released the series on VHS in the UK not long after, two episodes per tape per month, which became a long, laborious and quite expensive process – so I wasn’t able to maintain the pace and had other priorities, such as buying food and shoes for my kids. I never bought the DVD boxset and so my knowledge of Janeway and her crew languished for many years solely in ‘making-of’ books and the occasional article…until in 2018 Netflix clearly saw what I was missing all these years and kindly told me that I might like to watch it. (They did the same for Enterprise , for which I have a similar backstory.)

What I knew of the series prior to last year, I wasn’t actually keen on. I wasn’t a great fan of the Maquis storyline that Deep Space Nine and The Next Generation had set up and so wasn’t drawn in by the notion of a mixed bag of crew members thrust together. When Seven of Nine arrived, I could only hear in excerpts that I caught Jeri Ryan ’s voice an octave or two lower than what I assumed she normally spoke at, considering it felt uncomfortable for her as well as adding a notion of pointless melodrama to her character: “I was a Borg so I will speak dramatically all the time!”

So I’m catching up, going through about 8 episodes a week. At the time of writing, I’m watching ‘ Course: Oblivion ’, and so well over mid-way through Season 5.

I was pleasantly surprised by what I’ve found. Yes, Starfleet vs the Maquis was, as I expected, very clumsy for the first year or so (B’elanna Torres just needed to chill!) but the revelation that these characters were developing over time was quite surprising. I’ve read elsewhere that Chakotay was as wooden as Riker’s shoulders and that Robert Beltran felt his role never changed in the seven-year run but I kind of disagree. The frustration I have with regard to Chakotay is simply that he absolutely adored his captain to the point of love and it was never truly fulfilled. Why didn’t the writers take that relationship anywhere? Now, I’ve not seen any more than up to Season 5, remember, but I am pretty sure they didn’t end up together. So please… NO SPOILERS for me! And Seven of Nine’s voice? I’ve just got used to it, even though it is still a little annoying: “But I was a Borg, so I will continue to speak dramatically! All the time!”

Star Trek Voyager The Dark Frontier

Anyway, ‘ Dark Frontier ’ suddenly appeared on my Netflix feed, the mid-season double-length episode. With Seven at the center. And I’m here to tell you why I rather liked it.

I’d always thought the Borg had been over-used (something I feel the BBC have done with both the Daleks and the Cybermen in Doctor Who since 2005) after ‘The Best of Both Worlds’ and I was aware that Voyager featured them quite prominently in later seasons. Of course, with Seven of Nine a regular character (on her first appearance in her alcove, as a full Borg, I thought she was actually the Borg Queen) it would be clear that Borg-themed episodes would be prevalent.

Janeway’s audacious mission to steal a transwarp macguffin from a damaged Borg sphere is exactly the kind of thing I’d expect her to suggest.

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She’s by-the-book-Starfleet but puts Kirk to shame when looking at ways to get her crew home. I love this about her: she is a risk taker and has softened over the seasons to be more accepting that the Starfleet way isn’t always the best way. And so her plan is put into place. She’s a wonderful character and I really hope she has some form of presence in Patrick Stewart’s new series. She’s head and shoulders above Archer and Sisko and is a lovely cross between a passionate Kirk and a thoughtful Picard : she wrestles with her demons and the guilt of throwing her entire crew to the other side of the galaxy.

It makes sense that Seven wouldn’t be assigned to the Away Team for this mission and her conflict when she receives the internal communication from (yes) the Borg Queen is perfectly handled. Janeway initially won’t budge when Seven demands to be part of the mission to the sphere but soon relents when Seven argues her case. And so we know there’s a set up to a fall here.

Seven’s role is a nice counterpoint to the Queen’s use of Locutus and Data – she sees the benefit of a new voice in the Collective and in Seven’s case its what she has learnt as a human and what she can bring back to the Collective. That said, it does throw Borg logic up in the air: if they need a humanesque leader in the form of the Queen who in turn needs people like Locutus, Data and Seven to enhance her race’s power, then surely the Borg as they are must be flawed. That was something we were made aware of from only their second appearance (‘ The Best of Both Worlds, Part 1 ’), yet countering my own argument in the same paragraph, that surely shows that they are a race of cyborgs looking for perfection wherever they can? And I like that notion that ‘ Dark Frontier ’ presented. They are not out to assimilate, to survive, they are looking for utopia. It makes them more dangerous, because they are desperate, no matter how smoothly clinical the Borg Queen appears to be.

Star Trek First Contact Locutus and the Queen

The resolution was a little flat, however. A good solid 90-minutes of tense countdown action only to be concluded by the Borg Queen just standing there as Janeway and Seven do their worst (and Susanna Thompson makes a great villain, albeit not as charming and snake-like as Alice Krige…who I’m led to believe reprises the role later on [again, no spoilers, please!!!]). I have to ask though…is this the same Borg Queen? Or a clone? Does she have the memories of the one Picard destroyed?

And after this episode, I’m quite fond of Seven. Her history was reinforced here and it makes her a poignant and painfully sad character. She simply cannot move on from what the Borg turned her into. Her relationship with Janeway is not unlike a guardian and a ward, rather than her captain being a mother figure. That’s been there almost since the moment Seven stepped onboard Voyager and here we see the trust both women have in each other, and when that trust is tested, more kudos to Janeway for going back to launch a rescue anyway.

I have to say there are a handful of bizarre episodes I’ve experienced so far in my voyage with Voyager  (‘ The Thaw ‘ from Season 2 felt like it had been written and the sets designed for The Original Series ) but ‘ Dark Frontier ‘ really pushes the envelope in displaying the Borg and their effects on the societies they assimilate. Chilling stuff.

Related Story. The Sound of Star Trek Part 9: The Star Trek Voyager Soundtrack. light

So I’ve got just over two years worth of episodes left to go and I have a feeling I’m really going to miss Kathryn.

Dark Frontier Stardate: 52619.2 Original Airdate: 17 February 1999

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Published Jul 27, 2022

Everything You Need to Know About the Borg Queen

Long live the Queen!

StarTrek.com

“I am the beginning, the end, the one who is many. I am the Borg.”

The central locus of the Borg Collective is the amoral Borg Queen . Through her, like the queen of an insect colony, the Hive mind is granted order and common direction.

As the Villain Showdown enter its fourth week, pitting the Borg Queen against Gul Dukat , we’ve put together this handy guide on everything you need to know about the Queen.

The One Who is Many

Throughout the history of the Borg Collective, there have been a number of Queens. Only one Queen exists at any given time; when she is destroyed, a new Queen takes her place. In Star Trek: Voyager, it's revealed that the Borg Queen isn't a singular entity, but the name given to any that serves as its host, possessing all previous Queen's collective consciousness.

The Borg , a fusion of organic and synthetic matter, and their relentless pursuit of perfection brought fear to all quadrants of the galaxy. Residing primarily at Unimatrix One in the Delta Quadrant , the Borg Queen is the only one able to think independently from the Collective; possessing a unique personality and sense of individuality — traits not seen within the Borg.

The first Borg Queen (Alice Krige) made her debut with Star Trek: First Contact (1996) as the Borg sought to erase a historical moment in Starfleet history— First Contact Day —traveling back in time to prevent the creation and need of the Federation .

In her lair, the Borg Queen remains disembodied with just her head and spinal column — the epitome of perfection — with no remnants of her humanoid form. When she leaves her home base for assimilation efforts, she will reassemble herself into a predominantly artificial body.

Your Culture Will Adapt to Service Us.

The Borg doesn’t value the Federation’s belief in individuality – its mission is to add others’ biological and technological distinctiveness to their own, strengthening the Collective in its pursuit of perfection. Defeating their opponents isn’t enough; they sought to assimilate their enemies’ minds and flesh.

Captain Jean-Luc Picard still endures residual trauma decades later following his assimilation into the Borg . As Locutus of the Borg, selected to be their voice to facilitate their introduction into human society, Picard believed he never fully regained himself after they striped away his humanity and sense of self.

There is No 'Me,' Only 'Us'

It is in Star Trek: Voyager where we learn that the Borg Queen, obsessed with power, didn’t create the Borg; she was just tasked with leading the Collective. The collective consciousness, where each drone is linked through the subspace network, allows for the Borg to adapt quickly and eliminate threats as they arise.

In the episode " Dark Frontier " of Star Trek: Voyager, the Borg Queen believes Seven of Nine 's presence is vital to their path forward in their approach to assimilate Earth, seeing value in Seven's knowledge of humanity. The Borg Queen tries to lure her back to the Collective by "allowing" her to remain an individual instead of reverting to a drone. The Queen's seduction involved telling Seven she's "unique," and her experience will add to their perfection. However, she can't be selfish and only think of just her individual self.

Resistance is Futile.

When a Borg Queen is destroyed, another Queen is propped up. Susanna Thompson portrays the Borg Queen in Star Trek: Voyager ’s two-parter, “ Dark Frontier ” and “ Unimatrix Zero .”

Most recently, the Borg Queen was played by Annie Wersching in Season 2 of Star Trek: Picard .

Secrets of the Borg Queen, The

Bringing Order to Chaos

In Star Trek: Picard , the Borg Queen is cut off from the Borg Collective due the actions of Q and a divergence in time. As a result, she becomes wholly and fully obsessed with Agnes Jurati.

Seen as the last of the Borg, instead of finding the Collective, she sets her sights on Agnes in hopes of building out a new Borg collective.

Star Trek: Picard - The Borg Queen Returns

Interested in learning more about the Borg Queen and her latest machinations, stream all episodes of Season 2 of Star Trek: Picard now!

Christine Dinh (she/her) is the managing editor for StarTrek.com. She’s traded the Multiverse for helming this Federation Starship.

Star Trek: Picard streams exclusively on Paramount+ in the U.S. and is distributed concurrently by Paramount Global Distribution Group on Amazon Prime Video in more than 200 countries and territories. In Canada, it airs on Bell Media’s CTV Sci-Fi Channel and streams on Crave.

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Marvel and 'Star Wars' take note. 'Star Trek' is now Hollywood's ultimate shared universe

From 'Discovery' to "Strange New Worlds' via 'Lower Decks' and 'Prodigy', 'Star Trek' is leading the way.

Shared universes go back way further than Tony Stark, Steve Rogers and co sitting down for some post-Chitauri shawarma. Superheroes have been moonlighting in each other's comic books for decades, while Cheers regulars frequently paid Frasier a visit in Seattle. It wasn't until Marvel Studios launched the MCU ( Marvel Cinematic Universe ), however, that the concept started to gain serious mainstream traction. 

By incorporating the contrasting adventures of Iron Man, Captain America, Thor and Black Widow into one gigantic, overarching narrative, Marvel successfully blended cinematic spectacle with the "must-watch-every-episode" ethos of serialised TV. The MCU's famous end-credits stings also had the unexpected side-effect of convincing us all to stick around until the end of the closing titles of every movie, y'know, just in case. 

From a business point of view it's one of the shrewdest creative decisions ever made in Hollywood, a move that helped turn the MCU into the most lucrative franchise in history, while spawning an army of imitators. Some fell quickly by the wayside — Universal's planned Dark Universe didn't survive beyond its first release, "The Mummy" — while others (most notably DC's original answer to the MCU) simply felt tired in comparison. But with apologies to box-office behemoths Marvel, Star Wars and the Monsterverse home of Godzilla and King Kong, the most exciting shared universe of them all is currently located somewhere on the final frontier.

It's not quite "Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations" (sorry, Mr Spock), but " Star Trek "'s guiding principle since "Discovery" brought the franchise back to TV in 2017 has been variety. "Discovery" started out as an "Original Series" prequel, before warping off to the even-more-distant future of the 32nd century. That left a gap in the timeline for the less serialized voyages of a pre-Kirk Enterprise in " Strange New Worlds ". "Picard" picked up the story of the ageing Jean-Luc Picard two decades after "The Next Generation" crew's final voyage, while a pair of animated series — kids' show " Prodigy " and all-out comedy "Lower Decks" — were given freedom to take the most daring swings in "Trek" history. 

Throw upcoming spy adventure " Section 31 " and cadet-themed "Disco" spin-off " Starfleet Academy " into the mix, and it's clear that — beyond the obligatory warp drives, phasers and frequent violations of the Prime Directive — the main element unifying these very different series is their shared universe. Even their settings are far enough apart — geographically and chronologically — that there's little danger of storylines colliding in Spacedock. 

The contrast between the Alpha Quadrant and a certain galaxy far, far away is stark. Until " The Acolyte ", every canonical "Star Wars" movie and TV show had been set within a few generations of the Skywalker family tree. But even ignoring the limitations of that brief timeline, there's a creeping homogeneity to much of the saga's storytelling and dialogue. 

Scenes from "The Acolyte" (set around a century before "The Phantom Menace") feel interchangeable with moments in " Ahsoka " (several years after "Return of the Jedi"), while the powers-that-be at Skywalker Ranch seem more preoccupied with plugging holes in existing lore than telling stories for their own sake. What was the final episode of "The Acolyte" season one if not a prequel to the prequel trilogy?

"Star Wars" should be an exhilarating interstellar playground capable of supporting any story you can imagine, but it's increasingly constrained by strict rules that must, it seems, never be broken. "Star Wars" is calling out for its own "Lower Decks"-style comedy" , while the upcoming "'Goonies' in space" " Skeleton Crew " could be the kid-oriented launchpad that Prodigy has been for "Trek". "Star Wars" arguably needs both because right now, all that canon could easily feel daunting to anyone eager to take those precious first steps into a larger world.

Not that the current iterations of "Star Trek" deny the franchise's rich past. The glorious final season of "Picard" was a nostalgia-fest from start to finish, bringing back familiar friends and foes to give the "TNG" crew the send-off they deserved — if it's possible to replicate your cake and eat it, that season showed the way. "Prodigy" also goes big on the deep cuts, but crucially, it doesn't matter if you have no idea that the name of the USS Voyager-A's resident whale (Gillian) is a reference to "Star Trek IV". Or that a mention of the "dysfunctional" crew of the Cerritos is a callback to "Lower Decks". All of the in-jokes are simply window dressing holding the universe together, without excluding newcomers. 

That's the genius of the modern "Star Trek" universe, whose guiding lights clearly understand that expecting every viewer to be up-to-speed with the more than 900 episodes and 13 “Star Trek” movies in the back catalogue would be a surefire route to failure. The MCU and "Star Wars" lived charmed lives when they were built around a relatively small number of movies, but both franchises are now too vast and unwieldy to demand that even casual viewers become completists. 

Nobody should have to watch everything , so surely it's better for everyone if we accept that some people will set their targeting computers on "The Mandalorian" but avoid " Andor ", just as some "Discovery" fans can skip "Picard" without feeling they're missing out. 

Besides, we probably shouldn't be surprised that it's "Trek" leading the way, because this isn't Starfleet's first away mission to a shared universe. Back in the ’90s "The Next Generation", "Deep Space Nine", "Voyager", four movies and even prequel series "Enterprise" shared characters and plotlines, to the extent that after hundreds of hours of TV, planet Earth was losing interest in shows that were becoming increasingly formulaic. Sound familiar? The franchise's latest overseers have boldly taken note — now "Star Wars", the MCU and the rest should follow in their warp trails.

"Discovery", "Picard", "Strange New Worlds" and "Lower Decks" are all available to stream on Paramount Plus, along with "The Original Series", "The Next Generation", "Deep Space Nine", "Voyager" and "Enterprise". "Prodigy" is available on Netflix.

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Richard's love affair with outer space started when he saw the original "Star Wars" on TV aged four, and he spent much of the ’90s watching "Star Trek”, "Babylon 5” and “The X-Files" with his mum. After studying physics at university, he became a journalist, swapped science fact for science fiction, and hit the jackpot when he joined the team at SFX, the UK's biggest sci-fi and fantasy magazine. He liked it so much he stayed there for 12 years, four of them as editor. 

He's since gone freelance and passes his time writing about "Star Wars", "Star Trek" and superheroes for the likes of SFX, Total Film, TechRadar and GamesRadar+. He has met five Doctors, two Starfleet captains and one Luke Skywalker, and once sat in the cockpit of "Red Dwarf"'s Starbug.  

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• Mars Tafts I have been a Star Trek fan since 1966 and even I don't believe this article. Reply
• Amin Abakery Is this some kind of Joke? Paramount did worse to Star Trek than they did to Halo, than Disney ever did to Star Wars, its an insult not just to science but to morality and human decency. I used to grow up watching star trek, proud that it was written by scientists and good people like her. Now it seems to be written by your average twitter user. With an adulterer Spock and mushroom drive spinning ships. Reply
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