“Resistance is futile”. Say that at a Star Trek convention and then all the Borg cosplayers with teleport out of nowhere. The Borg are arguably the most famous villains in Star Trek, a persistent cyborg species on an endless quest to indoctrinate all life forms into their ranks. They first appeared in TNG, but have been involved in several series and movies since then.
While fans still adore The Borg, the fandom hype has made Star Trek writers include them more and more, which only led to more holes in hat made them interesting and, ultimately, destroyed many things that made them great. Let’s hope Picard can save them. Until then, here are 10 ways Star Trek ruined the Borg
Data’s Romance
A key part of the Borg was their robotic, unfeeling nature. It was like they had a single, programmed objective and were unrelenting in pursuing that. The Borg Queen’s existence already walked the line of ruining that quintessential part of them. However, her psuedo-romance with Data tipped things over.
The Borg should not have entire evil plot about seducing and manipulating an android. If anything, the Borg should appeal to the robotic, manufactured side of him, not his humanity. What a wasted storyline for this once fascinating collective.
Species 8472
Part of the Borg’s mystique always was their advanced technology, ruthless tactics, and their strict, tactical look at everything. So, considering that characterization, how’d they make such a serious blunder when it came to Species 8472? They invaded space they were never meant to be in, attacked a race they knew nothing about, and weren’t prepared to face them.
Sure, it makes sense for them to come upon Species 8472 and react poorly, but to seeking out danger without recon or information is very unlike them. It would have made more sense if something else broke into fluidic space and the Borg just happened upon the aggressive species.
Their ENT Origins
While the Borg cannibalize known species into their own collective, their origins always remained a complete mystery. After all, they came from far beyond Earth, further into the Delta Quadrant. Without going deep into Borg territory, The Federation wouldn’t have a chance of figuring them out.
That is, until ENT decided that the Borg actually had prior connections with Earth, and may even have their origins somewhat tied to the planet. That might have been a fun fan theory, but in practice? It really ruined the mysterious nature and power behind the once-unknowable species.
Seven of Nine’s Outfit
A big part of the Borg was that they weren’t emotional, sensual, even familial. They just worked together as a collective and their individual bodies didn’t matter. Star Trek: Voyager changed the name of the game by de-assimilating a Borg drone and making her apart of their crew.
While the concept was innovative and resulted in arguably one of the best characters of the show, it had a serious flaw: the catsuit. Despite the fact Seven of Nine hadn’t interacted with sensuality in her entire life, she picks a sexy outfit as her first clothes. Considering she spent months eating nutritional supplements instead of food, she 100% would have picked something functional like a pocketed engineering jumpsuit, not that. But okay, the Borg needed to be sexy, supposedly.
The Borg Queen
At first glance, the Borg Queen was an interesting add to the Borg system. After all, their situation is already structured with serious bee hive inspirations. She gave a more direct voice to The Collective and gave a source for their objectives.
However, very quickly she became one of their biggest flaws. Her emotional, angry outbursts and obsession with Voyager and Seven of Nine led them astray. Emotions are not bad in an enemy; in fact, both Klingons and Romulans are very emotional species. That’s not what Borg are like, though. Borg were always known as single-minded conquerors. The Borg Queen could have existed to perform more complex thinking and decision making, but she never should have been so much like a comic-book villain.
Voyager’s De-Assimilation
When the Borg were introduced in TNG, their assimilation seemed far more permanent. They couldn’t change Hugh back or any other Borg they encountered. The only person they did revert was Captain Picard, but it was only because it was for a short time period and he still had lasting effects on him psychologically.
During Voyager, though, they make de-assimilation look easy. They took most of the Borg parts out of Seven despite her being assimilated for years. Furthermore, they let several crew members get assimilated just to change them back later. Those people also showed no long-term problems. Voyager’s deconstruction of how serious assimilation was really made the Borg less menacing than they deserved.
Borg Children
When TNG first revealed children and babies with Borg implants, it was traumatizing and horrific. The away team saw all this evidence that the Borg conquered and cannibalized cultures and people indiscriminately. They turned children into fully-grown machjines of destruction.
Voyager, though, included Borg children and just made them typical, whiny children. Star Trek always had a problem portraying kids well until Jake Sisko and Nog came along. However, the Borg children really took the cake. They should have been indoctrinated to act more like other drones and it could have made for a scarier episode, but nope. Simply put, this took out a lot of that initial horror.
Almost Human
Star Trek has always been known for sticking to humanoid style aliens. Despite that, though, the series does make an effort to give every new race different facial features and alien attributes. Unfortunately, they failed pretty spectacularly with this when it came to the Borg.
While the Borg hailed from the depth of the Delta Quadrant, almost all of the ones the Enterprise initially met looked like indoctrinated humans. Considering the Borg hadn’t met humanity until then, that doesn’t make much sense. It’s a small way the Borg didn’t make much sense. But with all the other problems, it still sticks out.
Seven’s Homemade Drone
Nothing about the episode Drone makes much sense. Somehow, nanoprobes melded with the Doctor’s transmitter and then the growing mass took human tissue samples and from that decided to make a drone. Correct, it’s convoluted at best and it’s still only the premise of the episode.
While it’s a contained episode, the fact they created a self-building drone, convinced it that it was an individual, and got it to sacrifice itself for the crew in a few days is a little absurd. Not only is it a less interesting version of I, Borg but also it makes the achievements of I, Borg feel less impressive.
Too Much Borg
The biggest problem with Star Trek ruining the Borg is simply that it used the species too much. In TNG, they introduced and fought them just enough. Voyager made a great addition in Seven of Nine, but the Borg Queen and their consistent run-ins were a little much. Especially since most Borg Queen episodes sort of ruined the Borg’s characterization.
However, it was the Star Trek movies and ENT that really tipped the scales. The Borg never should’ve been involved in First Contact or the early days of Starfleet. Overusing these great villains really helped ruin them in a lot of ways. Hopefully Star Trek: Picard can redeem them.
