Breaking Borg; Part I

As synonymous as the Klingons and Romulans are with Star Trek, the Borg were established as one of if not the biggest threat to galactic peace - but where have the last 30 years taken them?

Rambling back to 1988 you start out at Q Who from The Next Generation's second season. You knew when this aired that the opportunity to bring the Borg back wouldn't be lost nor would it be too long in the making. If things had gone the way they were planned, the 88-89 season would have ended Borg rather than Grey. The writers' strike put paid to that but it did mean that Michael Piller came on board and pulled out one of the all-time top episodes of Star Trek; the first part of The Best of Both Worlds. Potentially that strike turned the Borg from being the enemy of the year ad a year that was certainly mixed in its quality into one of the deadliest foes Star Trek ever brought us...to a point.

But just look at the Borg in those fledgling The Next Generation years especially the ambiguous Q Who (in which ironically Q takes a massive backseat). There's no sign of assimilation, there's a nursery which would be revisited and promptly forgotten again in Voyager's episode Collective but that sinister, silent, menacing arrogance is there in every aspect of the race. All they want to do is acquire technology and advance themselves further.

Their appearance had been suggested back in The Neutral Zone in a still unexplained reference to all the machine parts being scooped up in the same way as J-25 and also Jouret IV but when you link everything together this thrown in observation doesn't work - wouldn't the Borg have just continued on if they were that close to the Federation or the Romulan Empire? Anyway, that's a conversation to be filed alongside "What Happened to the Conspiracy Aliens..."

Q Who is an exemplary episode introducing us to the cybernetic organisms, their cubic mode of transport and their haunting regenerative ability which we see on the hull of their ship. We're chilled by the way in which they adapt to phaser fire after only a shot and for once the Enterprise looked defeated, relying on the omnipotent Q to save the day. It effectively told us nothing about them. No queen, no real understanding of the hive, no idea where they were from, only that they were coming and come they did.

That flagrant arrogance is even more evident through the lone cubes which attempt to attack Earth in both the legendary two-parter The Best of Both Worlds and Star Trek First Contact but even going solo, their appearances in The Next Generation always brought a chill and a lump to the throat. Their interference was ominous, dangerous to the end and always to be feared. There is not one thing redeeming about them at this point. They exist solely to conquer, assimilate technology and move on, "bettering" themselves at every step.

Both Q Who and The Best of Both Worlds also chillingly pre-empt something else for me - the arrogance of the Federation and more specifically Starfleet. They admit in the two part cliffhanger that solutions to combat the Borg are years off and Picard himself in Q Who believes they are more than prepared for what's out in the great beyond. Starfleet sees itself as untouchable, a force for peace that other races will join or not choose to "oppose" because of its size and potential might (Dominion might have other ideas...) and it takes a cube making it to Earth and be within seconds of attacking before they step up preparations to another level.

The Best of Both Worlds demonstrates everything right about the portrayal of the Borg themselves as they head straight for Sector 001. We still known very little about them and the only assimilation we see on screen is that of Picard to become their figurehead/spokesperson Locutus. Later Voyager does tell us of Starfleet personnel who were taken at Wolf 359 (Unity, Unimatrix Zero, Part II) but at this time the only reason they take Picard is to have a human face and voice when they talk to humanity. The difficulty in defeating them here and in Q Who adds to their menace as an enemy that is keeping Starfleet absolutely on its toes. They are relentless, picking off anything that even looks like it might try and think about putting up some form of defence (Mars defences) or anything that simply gets in its path (USS Lalo) without a care. 

The cube is stopped with the single command; "Sleep" with only the kidnap of Locutus from the cube showing any kind of concern for the Collective but only momentarily. This story remains etched into the core of Star Trek lore to this very day with Deep Space Nine's pilot, Emissary bouncing off the seminal Wolf 359 battle and the loss of Sisko's wife key to the character's motivations. 

Even First Contact opened with Picard remembering his experiences as Locutus. How many references to the encounter are made over the course of the franchise I would hate to count but I think it's a lot and still with Picard it continues to this day. Off the back of it, the season five I, Borg offered the Federation a chance to destroy the race that ultimately backfired but once again that sense of danger posed by them was always there in the background. Hugh may well have broken free from his collective restraints but at the core the Borg were still the cybernetic machines we had seen in Q Who although this time on a little scout ship but there is still something inherent about who this lone Borg is although we are given hints that there is the chance for them to change.

Ultimately we know he returns to the Collective and this is the first point where I think Star Trek managed a disservice to the Borg. Picard's choice not to take out the Collective comes back again and again and for someone who has experienced the true horrors of assimilation, I'm one of those who believes he should have made the call.

The resulting story, Descent, is very much a tale of two halves. The first opens up a lot of questions, adds a new spin to the infamous enemy and then idiotically has Lore show up declare that they are going to take down the Federation. The subsequent season opener doesn't build on this vast opportunity and we have an hour of Geordi trying to convince Data not to torture him. The destruction of the Federation fizzles in ten minutes, the Borg individuality is restricted to a single ship and the edge and action that was borne from the opening firefight and Data's first experience of emotion feel totally underplayed. OK, so it rounds off the Lore story but it left us with the question as to what had happened to the Borg? What's going on with the rest of the Collective?

The Borg here are totally unique. Still drones, still recognisable physically as the beings from Q Who and The Best of Both Worlds the clever choice was to keep this rogue individuality confined to Hugh's ship. I take this as a somewhat standalone Borg piece since they are their own collective unit, not quite total individuals and still somewhat threatening. Perhaps even more deadly given their potentially "illogical" actions such as the desire for revenge we see in the encounter which opens the story. They remained sinister and unknown in these early years with so much unsaid and therefore so much that our imaginations conjectured as to their nature.

The influence of the Borg does expand beyond just the episodes they appear in with repeated nods to the rebuilding of the fleet following Wolf 359. The way in which the updated Starfleet would appear in the form of the Steamrunner, Norway, Saber and Akira classes were designed with a more military purpose in mind and, of course, in the creation of the Defiant which had one, sole reason behind its existence - to defeat the Borg.

To count the episodic one liners that nod to The Next Generation's creation of the Borg are extensive and in at least one Parallels future there's a big-bearded Riker still commanding (if it hasn't exploded) one of Starfleet's last remaining ships... I'd love to see how that universe evolved.

The movie appearance of the Borg is a massive change from their televisual origins. Given the scope of the cinema screen there's no surprise that the basic outfits and pale make-up are taken to another level, giving the drones an even more menacing physical presence. The armour has a more organic feel and the assembly more patchwork and less perfect. First Contact gave us our first real, graphic look at the assimilation process. In fact this is the first time we ever see or understand that the Borg are out to add more drones to the Collective. Truly a terrifying series of events, to this time only Picard had been joined to them onscreen but now it was an ever-present threat. 

First Contact cemented the hive mind concept with the powerful introduction of the Borg Queen, a character seemingly unrestricted by time and space due to her repeated, inexplicable avoidance of death. Her entrance in the movie is one of the great moments from the last 50 years however did she overstay her welcome after First Contact? 

We'll discuss that later. Here she provides that one-on-one nemesis for Picard, a perfect foil for the captain and for Data allowing the audience to easily follow the story and have a figurehead against whom the crew can be directly pitted. Imagine the movie without the Queen and it would be almost a silent production in some scenes. She is the voice of the Collective and ultimately does her death (spoiler!) truly offer the moment when the Borg should have been defeated? Significantly it's also the only time that the Defiant ever took on the purpose for which it was originally built and only just survives. Back to the drawing board perhaps?

Just as with Locutus, the Queen becomes the face of her people and draws the audience successfully into the nature of the species, how they operate and the motivations behind their actions. I solemnly believe that First Contact is the final point in the franchise where the Borg retain some of their mystery and eeriness that makes them a compelling enemy. I suppose their failing is that mass consciousness which means that there has to be some kind of vocal point to which we have to focus but it doesn't take away from their nature. 

The Borg of First Contact are a calculated step forward wielding more deadly weapons (that never get used) and with empty zombified facial expressions to chill you to the core. There's a much less human feel to the drones than we ever see in The Next Generation as well as those variants on the assimilated species - Cardassians, Klingons and more including the Enterprise crew themselves. Aside from the Queen they do remain faceless and as relentless as always but that mystery is somewhat quashed with the introduction of their imperious leader. 

The Borg Queen would reappear more in Voyager (played by Susanna Thompson apart from the finale where Alice Krige returned) but First Contact offers a pivotal point in the evolution of the Borg onscreen from an army of minions led by a central voice to being overseen by a single entity that refers to itself in the singular rather than the plural. 

Linking nicely to that eighth film - but perhaps not sitting too well with fans is the Enterprise episode - and the final appearance of the Borg ironically - in Regeneration. Now aside from the crew of the NX-01 managing to survive the attack in the first place when the crew of the Enterprise-D barely escaped in Q Who it's a fairly neat idea but does screw around with the continuity a bit but we have to understand that techniques develop over time.

The discovery of the Sphere wreckage from First Contact is a brilliant way to bring the series and the cyborgs full circle almost, giving us a core reason as to why they chose to head in the direction of Sector 001. Aside from introducing us to the Borg before we were introduced to them, Regeneration does have one core feature which aligns itself more correctly with The Next Generation than Voyager. It regains the air of mystery and danger that the species represented in that earlier series and gives away nothing to the nature or reasons for the Borg actions. It is a story which, for all its temporal failings, does stay more faithful to their origins than a lot of the Voyager entries. 

Separating the drones from the Queen and placing them against a less powerful adversary than the later Enterprise-E returns them to the faceless minions they were in Q Who and The Best of Both Worlds but adds in the twist that while the viewer knows what might be around the corner, the NX-01 crew are none the wiser to the escaping Borg and we the viewer appreciate just how damn lucky they are to have been spared from assimilation...

I am a firm believer that The Next Generation presented the best and most frightening presentation of the Star Trek foe even if physically the outfitting of the Borg is the most basic. So if that's the case, what happened when Starfleet stepped into the Borg's home turf of the Delta Quadrant...?

To be Continued...

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