At Screenused.com right now there is a Star Trek: Voyager costume for sale worn by Roxann Dawson as B’Elanna Torres when she posed as a member of The Borg.

It originally was sold at Christie’s a few years ago.  It is a cool looking outfit, and similar in style to ones worn by Seven of Nine and Captain Kathryn Janeway.

B'Elanna Torres as a member of The Borg on Star Trek Voyager

It is for sale for the hefty price of $4,699.  If it sells at that price it will be the most expensive price for a costume of this version of The Borg.  This costume sold only 6 months ago on eBay for $1,875.    If you’re interested, check out the photos and details carefully, as these rubber costumes were not made to last beyond the production.  Buyer beware, as they say.

Bonita Friedericy as a member of The Borg on Enterprise

That said, it is an interesting, if not fleeting, artifact from Star Trek history.  Its tag shows use by Bonita Friedericy, who plays General Beckman on the TV series Chuck, which sadly has only two episodes left.  Sniff sniff.  She wore this outfit on an episode of the last Star Trek series, Enterprise.    Trek fans may find it interesting that Friedericy is married to John Billingsley, who played Phlox on Enterprise.

John Billingsley as Phlox

C.J. Bunce

Editor

borg.com

One of the key differences I have always appreciated is the differences between Star Wars and Star Trek that make both franchises great.  Star Wars was more rounded in science fantasy and Star Trek in science fiction, the difference primarily being thw eighting of the world building between magic and technological explanations.  It may be that is the reason that the omniscient race of Qs rubbed me wrong in Star Trek: The Next Generation.  Star Trek was always better staying away from magic or religion, a leaning and preference of creator Gene Roddenberry himself.  Q’s silly jumping in and out of crises, and even causing them, often made Picard, our hero, look baffled and sometimes petty and annoyed, which I think detracted more than it added to the series.  So I’m a bit surprised that I am not bothered at all at a union of similarly omniscient Doctor Who and Captain Picard’s crew in the May mini-series Star Trek: The Next Generation/Doctor Who: Assimilation².

What’s more fun than taking the two franchises’ greatest borgs, Cybermen and The Borg, and throwing them together?  A conversation between Rory and Data?  Commander Riker hitting on Amy Pond?  Is Q a long-lost Doctor?  Is the Doctor a long-lost Q?

Billed as the “two of the greatest science-fiction properties of all time come together in a comic book for the first time” that’s mainly true, although fans of the now-defunct Wizard Magazine and artist Mike Mayhew may recall seeing this stellar image created for one of Wizard’s last issues, bringing together for the first time the crew of the original Star Trek and Matt Smith’s Doctor Who with companion Amy Pond, chock full of Romulans and Klingons and Daleks and Cybermen:

I contacted the artist of the above artwork Mike Mayhew (www.mikemayhewstudio.com) to get his reaction to the new Star Trek/Doctor Who team-up:  “It’s about time!  IDW has set the stage for the sci-fi crossover folks have been waiting for.”

Mike explained the background for the Wizard project, too: “I was contacted by Wizard magazine for art to accompany an article called “Last Man Standing” that debated who would win: Vader vs. Agent Smith, Ripley vs. Sarah Connor, Alien vs. Skrulls, etc.  Wizard gave me all the characters they wanted and I researched the weapons and ships.”

I for one love it when obvious fans of genre series get to dive into the creative process like this.  borg.com readers will know Mike from his past work on Green Arrow.  He is currently finishing up the successful Marvel series FEAR ITSELF: THE HOMEFRONT and is currently working on a creator-owned book.

As a rabid fan of both Star Trek and Doctor Who, I couldn’t be happier that CBS and IDW Publishing finally realized what a good idea they had from the Wizard Magazine reference.

From the CBS/IDW announcement: “By joining these two sci-fi powerhouses, fans will be taken on the ultimate adventure through time and space,” said Liz Kalodner, executive vice president and general manager of CBS Consumer Products.  “We are excited about this new adventure for the Doctor and the fact that he will be travelling with Captain Jean-Luc Picard and his iconic crew. This is a perfect partnership for not only Doctor Who’s incredible fans, but also for the brand. We have just celebrated our most successful year yet. Doctor Who’s latest season delivered record ratings for BBC AMERICA and it was most downloaded full TV seasons of 2011 in the U.S. on the iTunes Store,” says Soumya Sriraman, executive vice president Home Entertainment and Licensing.

The eight-issue limited series will be written by Scott and David Tipton, who have written for Star Trek before in Star Trek: Infestation.  Doctor Who writer Tony Lee is also expected to contribute to writing duties for the series.  A key feature of the series will be painted covers and interior art by James K. Woodward (Star Trek: Captain’s Log: Jellico, Star Trek: New Frontier, Star Trek: The Last Generation, Star Trek: Alien Spotlight).

One photo circulating the Web shows the 11th Doctor taking companions Amy Pond and hubby Rory to Star Trek’s past–the bridge of Picard’s Enterprise-D:

If this is truly from the series (sometimes blogs release their own Photoshop fantasies as reflecting a new release so it is anyone’s guess) this may indicate the future time period for this mash-up, or that there may be some time travel within Picard’s tenure in Starfleet.  I know what you’re thinking:  Will the Enterprise-D be harder to steer than the Tardis?

Here’s a nice 2012 convention sketch by Woodward merging Doctor Who with Batman:

Sketch from Woodward's website: http://www.jkwoodward.com

And here is some of Woodward’s past work on the Star Trek franchise:

Cover to Star Trek: Captain's Log: Jellico

Woodward's take on klingons and Captain Harriman in Alien Spotlight: 4000 Throats

Woodward is pretty creative, too.  Check out this great take on a classic Justice League of America cover (#195).

And yet another great Woodward cover, proving yet again, the coolest Klingons wear eyepatches:

Star Trek: The Next Generation/Doctor Who: Assimilation² is scheduled for release May 2012.

C.J. Bunce

Editor

borg.com

As we previewed here a few weeks ago, the franchise of Star Trek: The Next Generation has teamed up with the franchise of the current Doctor Who series in a new crossover comic book series coming in May from IDW Publishing:  Star Trek: The Next Generation/Doctor Who: Assimiliation².  Since then we’ve learned that the shot of the Doctor, Amy Pond and Rory will be an exclusive, limited gatefold cover for the first issue.  It’s quite cool:

But even better yet for fans of all things cyborg, the true Best of Both Worlds will now undoubtedly be featured as common enemies of Captain Picard and crew and the Doctor and his companions, as revealed this week in this image of Issue #2 of the new limited series:

Yes, finally fans of 2 of the 3 biggest sci-fi franchises (don’t forget about Star Wars!) will finally get a good old fashioned mash-up of epic proportions.  Will the half human, half robot Cybermen–the decades old favorite borg enemies of Doctor Who–partner with, or also confront, The Borg–the cybernetic assimilators of all species that have plagued Captain Jean-Luc Picard back to the episode “Q Who?” in the year 2365?  We last saw Captain Picard face The Borg in Star Trek: First Contact in the future year 2373 and Captain Janeway faced (or will face) the Borg Queen in 2378 in the last Star Trek Voyager episode, “Endgame.”

Will the series take place between 2365 and 2373 or will writing Team Tipton give us a future story?  The answer to that can be found at least in part in the gatefold image above–showing clearly the bridge of the Enterprise-D, which is destroyed as acting Captain Will Riker careens the saucer section across the surface of Veridian III in 2371 (Star Trek Generations).  So, unless there is some time travel, and with Doctor Who there fortunately always is time travel, at least part of the story will occur on the Enterprise-D between 2365 and 2371.  Either way, Star Trek and Doctor Who fans can hardly wait!

C.J. Bunce

Editor

borg.com

By C.J. Bunce

There be SPOILERS here…

Let it be known that we here at borg.com will never pass up an opportunity to talk about borgs, from wherever they may originate, be it the 1960s or 1970s or 1980s or even the 2010s, or some future century.  As filming wraps next week in San Francisco for the next Star Trek movie, the release of the new Trek/Doctor Who crossover is getting closer.  And borgs from two franchises and several time periods will finally collide.

Just as we previewed the covers for the coming Issue #1 and Issue #2 of the IDW Publishing mash-up series with the long title, Star Trek: The Next Generation/Doctor Who Assimilation,² the comic industry Previews catalog published the cover to Issue #3 this week.  And it doesn’t take much of a discerning eye to notice some cool… cosmic anomalies:

If you can get past the smirk-inducing, albeit true to the original series, belly button shot of Captain James T. Kirk (cleverly included by artist Elena Casagrande), there is something amiss here… this is a Next Generation spin-off series, right?  And isn’t that the fourth Doctor?  And isn’t that the older version of the borg Cybermen?  What’s going on here?

It turns out that the Writers Tipton have some tricks up their sleeves for us, in the realm of some time travel between the 24th century of Captain Jean-Luc Picard’s Enterprise-D and the 23rd century of Captain Kirk’s original Enterprise (“with no bloody A, B, C, or D,” as Scotty would say), including an appearance by the shuttle Galileo (currently rotting somewhere in a yard in Ohio, if recent reports are accurate).  And a visit from the Fourth Doctor, to boot.  That’s a lot to bring together, but we Trekkiewhovians (WhovaTrekians???) are up for it.

And there’s one more bit of fun–color art for an alternate cover for Issue #1 by artist Tony Lee:

And this adds one more twist to the fun, with an appearance by The Borg from Star Trek Voyager, specifically Seven of Nine before she was separated from the Collective.

This is a further variant, a retailer edition signed by artist Tony Lee, available only from UK comics retailer Forbidden Planet:

Can’t wait?  Issue #1 will be released May 30, 2012.

By C.J. Bunce

We highlight them all the time here at borg.com.  But some of them don’t naturally come to mind when you think of cybernetically enhanced organisms–cyborgs, or borgs for short.  What makes a borg?  An organism, human, alien, or animal, who has been modified by technology or uses technology as part of or in place of another biological function.  We use this broadly, encompassing not only a long-accepted group of borgs that are more metal than man, but also robots or androids modified with biology or biomatter, although taken to the extreme this would seem to include the bioneural starship USS Voyager from Star Trek Voyager.

Regardless of how you define it, meet our borg.com Hall of Fame, always ready for new honorees…

With Marvel’s big premiere of Joss Whedon’s The Avengers, we’ll begin with Tony Stark’s Iron Man.  Tony Stark is not advertised as a borg, but if your power source involves techno-gadgetry via an arc reactor and you have his fully integrated armor, we think that makes you a borg.  Whedon is very familiar with borgs, having created the character Adam, the nasty, almost unstoppable foe of the Scooby Gang in Whedon’s Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

If Iron Man is a borg, should one of the oldest creatures of science fiction be considered a borg as well–Frankenstein’s monster?  How integral are those bolts and attachments to his survival anyway?  Does an external power source make a borg?  Did he ever have to regenerate?

And if Frankenstein’s monster makes the cut, maybe this spin-off fellow should, too:

Yes, Frankenberry, the only cereal mascot borg?  Are those pressure gauges on his head?  What functions do they serve?  Before we move forward very far in time, we also think we need to at least consider Maria’s doppelganger from Fritz Lang’s sci-fi film classic Metropolis as a possible borg.com honoree–a robot admittedly, but somehow transformed into a humanoid creation with flesh, used to replace the real Maria and wreak havoc across Metropolis:

From one of the biggest science fantasy franchises, Star Wars, Darth Vader began as Anakin Skywalker, but through his own rise to evil and subsequent downfall he became more machine than man:

He even caused his son to require borg technology by slicing off his arm and hand with his lightsaber, making Luke Skywalker a borg as well:

With Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith, we met an interesting new villain, General Grievous, a four-lightsaber wielding almost lobster-like biological creature made up of techno-armor and, in close-up are those reptilian eyes?  His apparent disfigurement and breathing problems hint at a back story that must be not unlike Vader’s.

In The Empire Strikes Back we also briefly met Lando Calrissian’s majordomo who possessed some type of brain adapter technology–we learn from action figures, trading cards and comics his name is Lobot:

And probably the very first cyborg to be referred to specifically as a “borg” (by Luke Skywalker, even), Valance was a cyborg bounty hunter in the early pages of Star Wars, the Marvel Comics series:

Some borgs are more cybernetic than organism, at least at first appearance.  This would include Doctor Who’s Cybermen:

and we’d learn even the Daleks were cybernetic organisms:

and the Terminators from the Terminator movie and Sarah Connor Chronicles TV series, very much more machine with a bit of organics (and even Arnold’s character called himself a “cybernetic organism”):

In Star Trek: First Contact the Borg Queen alters the android Lieutenant Commander Data in such a way so as to make Pinocchio a real boy:

giving real organic material to Data, (like Maria’s double above from Metropolis?) bringing him briefly into the realm of borg status, like Isaac Asimov’s Bicentennial Man:

and this even suggests the Tin Man from L. Frank Baum’s The Wizard of Oz may be a rudimentary variant borg being along the lines of Frankenstein’s monster:

All humanoids or aliens modified to become The Borg of the Star Trek franchise clearly are good examples of cyborg beings, the most famous of which are probably Patrick Stewart’s Locutus:

the seemingly innocent Hugh:

and Seven of Nine from Star Trek Voyager:

On Earth we encounter humans all the time with bodies improved by borg technology.  Because of the OSI Steve Austin and Jaime Sommers were rescued from near death with enhanced biology and appendages to become the Bionic Man and Bionic Woman:

The British agent James Bond had to take on Doctor No, an evil scientist who took on his own technological enhancements because of medical maladies, bringing James Bond into the fold of genre franchises investigating a borg character:

Featured in a 1980s movie series and soon to be the subject of a new movie, Robocop:

showed us a variant on Austin and Sommers, and a bit like Iron Man, we have the government creating technology to make super-humans, and here, a superhuman police officer.  This is taken even further, making three animals into borgs for military use in the Eisner-nominated comic book mini-series WE3:

 …a far darker take on the classic cartoon character Dynomutt from Scooby Doo:

Inspector Gadget:

and Doctor Octopus (Doc Ock) in Spider-man 2:

both were borgs that made it into big-screen films.

In the DC Comics universe we have a newer Justice League featured member Cyborg, a football player/student who is in the wrong place at the wrong time, when his father’s lab goes up in flames and his father uses his own research to save his son from death:

Before that, Frank Miller envisioned a disfigured future world Green Arrow who would need his own prosthetic cybernetic arm in The Dark Knight Returns:

Mr. Freeze was an early borg villain in the Batman series:

In Marvel Comics Rich Buckler created Deathlok the Demolisher, another cyborg creation, and one of the earliest borgs in comics:

Add to that Marvel characters like Ultron, the “living” automaton:

Ultron’s own creation, named Vision, the “synthezoid”–

and the borg called Cable:

In the 1990s Jim Lee created the Russian borg in the pages of X-Men called Omega Red:

Long before these Marvel characters the cyborgs Robotman and Robotdog graced the pages of DC Comics in the 1940s, and yes, they were not just robots:

The modern Cylons from the reboot Battlestar Galactica TV series are borgs in the Terminator sense, robots made to look and pass for human.  And there were a bunch, not just background, but named characters, the most famous of which was the seductive Number Six:

Years before, Philip K. Dick would create more than one borg character in his novels and short stories, revealed to us the best as the Replicants in Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner:

Several replicants appeared in the film:

…all indistinguishable from humans to the naked eye.

In the horror realm we have Ash, from Evil Dead and Army of Darkness, his arm a functioning chainsaw, and at least in the comic book, like the Star Trek borgs he has an interchangeable arm like a mega Swiss Army knife:

If we include Ash do we also need to include Cherry Darling from Planet Terror, since she has a rifle as a leg like Ash’s arm attachment?

Heck, even horrific camp troller Jason became a borg eventually in Jason X:

Todd MacFarlane’s Spawn comics had both the borg assassin Overtkill:

and the cybernetic gorilla Cy-Gor:

Speaking of borg beasties, even Japanese monster movies embraced borgs, having their hero Godzilla encounter Mechagodzilla:

and Gigan:

In the world of manga and anime we have Ghost in the Machine’s own borg girl Motoko Kusanagi:

leader of a group of borgs, and the villain Cell from Dragon Ball: 

Cowboy Bebop had the borg character Jet Black, which seems influenced by the design of Seven of Nine:

Akira had Tetsuo Shima:

And we have a new one to add to the list because of the film Prometheus, the creepy borg, David 8:

But he’s certainly not the first in Ridley Scott’s Alien universe.  Don’t forget Ian Holm’s Ash in Alien:

Lance Henrikson’s Bishop from Aliens:

and Winona Ryder’s Annalee Call from Alien: Resurrection:

But these are just the biggest examples of borgs in popular genre works.  Countless books, comics and short stories have introduced other borg beings, not to mention every other new video game.   What will be the next borg to enter the mainstream, with a new TV show or movie?

Should we add an Honorable Mention list to the borg.com Borg Hall of Fame, for beings resulting from the merging of humans with cyberspace?  Think of characters like Tron and Flynn from Tron and Tron: Legacy?  Or Neo and Trinity & Co. from the Matrix movies?  You can argue some of the above in or out of the list, but we’ll be visiting most of them here now and then.

We’ll update this list from time to time and feature it as its own page on the borg.com home page.

Interview by C.J. Bunce

One of my favorite people in the Star Trek world is Penny Juday.  Not only is she a great person, she is always willing to share interesting stories about her days working for Paramount on Star Trek.  As a former U.S. Navy Submarine fleet detailer, Penny Juday staffed the Navy’s sub-fleet with crew assignments.  She joined the Star Trek Deep Space Nine decorating department in 1991.  Penny was soon hired as the personal assistant to the production designer of Star Trek, which then led to becoming the art department coordinator of Star Trek for the next 18 years, where she also served as Star Trek archivist.  During her off hours Penny attended art school at Otis Parsons and earned her certificates as designer and illustrator.  borg.com is happy to welcome Penny here today.

CB:  Penny, you have a pretty unique college background, studying art and design, as well as computer science and physics.  And you were on your way into Intelligence in the U.S. Navy.  You seem to be cut out for your role as guardian of the secrets behind the Star Trek franchise.  How did that background help you move into the role as Art Coordinator and Star Trek Archivist at Paramount Pictures?

PJ:  I was a submarine fleet detailer.  They wanted me to go into INTEL when my tour was up but they would not agree to anything I asked for in return.  In retrospect it was not such a good idea on my part, of course.  I assigned submariners to their duty stations as they came out of school in Groton and kept track of all the available positions for enlisted crew for all the submarines.  I had to make sure they were properly and completely staffed at all times.  If one were taken ill or sadly, killed, I had to find the replacement ASAP.  I studied computer science and physics while in the Navy.  Another decision gone wrong.  If I had stayed with that, I could have been the girl Steve Jobs!  At the time computer programmers worked nights and weekends since it was still reel to reel and we worked while others didn’t.  I just couldn’t do that.  How it helped with my Star Trek job?  You have to be extremely resourceful to get a lot of military jobs done for many reasons.  My boss on Trek, Herman Zimmerman (who we called “Z”) often told just about anyone who would listen that I was the most resourceful person he had ever met.  I could find just about anything we needed to get a job done, or anyone, for that matter.  If a prop guy told Z we couldn’t find a particular product I would get the task.  Now that’s fun and interesting.  One of my favorite things was when I would call a company and tell them who I was and who I was with.  Usually there was a minute of total silence because they did not believe me, of course.  Then when it sunk in I was telling the truth…  I can’t tell you how much I could achieve with vendors just because I worked on Star Trek.  They would jump through a lot hoops to help us.  And the undercover Trekkies that I would run across!

Penny in her Star Trek “toybox” warehouse at the Paramount set.

The archives–being a personnel person in the Navy I took care of thousands of records, copied thousands of pages of documents, records and cared for the same, so making an archive was cheese cake.  Again finding anything… I was sent to Long Beach Naval Station to finish my Navy tour.  There had been a serious lack of commitment to record keeping, and personnel records were a mess so I was sent to help redo and get it smooth again.  Within days this Chief Petty Officer comes to my desk, almost in tears, very upset, telling me his records had been missing for weeks, meaning, he doesn’t get paid, can’t move forward in any capacity–remember this was before documents were scanned and kept on computer.  Some info was in Washington on OCR documents but the bulk of your records were still just paper in a manila folder in a real filing cabinet.  If that went missing you were in serious trouble.  So Chief tells me the story… he had been in day after day, asking someone—anyone—to search for his records.  “They cannot be found,” they tell him.  Knowing full well how badly the records in Long Beach had been stored, mostly by young “kids” who just didn’t care and wanted to get through their tour period.  I asked him his full name, was there any known misspellings, etc.  I take the “intel,” go to the records room and start the search… yup, under his middle name.  Chief hung his head in silence.  I still cry when I think of how happy it made him.  I got a letter of appreciation for that one, which is a small Navy award.  My work at the station was awarded several times with a scholarship, award letters, and I was the only female side boy at the station to pipe the leaving Captain away and pipe in the new Captain.  Side boys are the crew who line the plank at attention and one blows the pipes–a very great honor.

Star Trek cadet piping in Captain Kirk on the USS Enterprise refit (one of Penny’s duties in the US Navy).

CB:  You worked for several years with the Star Trek franchise but also worked on other notable films.  How did your work on Star Trek compare with your project and art coordinator daily duties on other action films like The Hunt for Red October and Alien Resurrection and comedies like Naked Gun 33 1/3 and Wayne’s World II?

PJ:  I have to start by saying nothing compares to Trek.  Nothing.  However, that being said The Hunt for Red October was my first film.  Poor Anthony [Penny’s husband, Anthony Fredrickson] is tired of watching it.  It is near and dear to my heart not only being the first film but they used the USS Houston, in the film known as the USS Dallas.  I was the detailer who put the original enlisted crews on board all the Los Angeles class boats as they were being built.  Eventually I got to see the Houston in dry dock in San Diego.  All the Los Angeles class subs look a like so they could easily get by with using one for another.  The first thing I saw walking on set was the missile silos.  I told the decorator I didn’t remember seeing neon around the bases on the real subs.  “Shuuuh,” he said.  But then standing next to Sean Connery was the memory any girl would cherish, whew.  Can’t believe I was still standing when he walked away.

The Hunt for Red October production photo.

CB:  As art coordinator for Deep Space Nine through Star Trek: Nemesis and Enterprise, you were second in command to art director and production designer Herman Zimmerman, known not only for his incredible futuristic sets on Star Trek but also work on Happy Days, The Land of the Lost, The Tonight Show and Cheers.  What’s the secret to running a multiple Emmy-nominated art department?

PJ:  First, I used to watch Land of the Lost all the time, even at my age it was just fun.  So on a Deep Space Nine episode we had a very rustic cottage with a fairly short door.  Z and a lot of us are inside, the special effects guy, Joe, comes in who was well over six feet tall.  The way Joe came in for some reason Z said you remind me of a Sleestak.  I said I was shocked that he knew this word.  I asked him how he knew what a Sleestak was.  He said, “I designed him.”  I had no idea.  So I was constantly learning of Herman’s accomplishments and shows, and awards, and the list goes on of things he has done throughout time, even working on one of my favorite soaps.

Original Herman Zimmerman Sleestak (display by Tom Spina Design).

As far as running art departments, whew!  Especially on larger shows like films.  I can’t make the list long enough of what your job title is.  You are the middle girl between most of the departments and the art department.  You are the coordinator for just about everything the art department needs.  The art coordinator is one of the first people in—meaning we are given a blank space to fill right down to the pencils.  You have to get it all, the phones, the phone lines, desks, copiers, papers all the supplies, set up the kitchen, often interview or find staff to be interviewed by the art director, depending on who that is, usually my production designers know me well enough that I hire the staff and set the deals.  Then research, finding things, orders, craft service kitchen, oh, boy!  Talk about egos–and the special needs of each and every one of the artists.  Can you say “four different kinds of coffee?”  I had a set designer who constantly demanded their own office because this person didn’t want to hear others talking.  Production meetings, usually keeping all the budgets for set decorating, often construction, and the art department.  Time cards for all of the above.  Location tours, call sheets, scripts, clearances (which I have no idea when the art coordinator became responsible for making sure everything was cleared but that happened somewhere in time).  Product placement, but I have to tell you… talk about fascinating… your every minute is different.  Alien 4 was one of my favorite films to work on at Fox.  Huge art department, sets, budgets, construction, and a lot of people from Star Trek, however, one of the first things the production designer told us was: “I see anything that looks like Star Trek, you’re fired!”  Ok, but he was a lot of fun to work for.

Filming the Baku Village at the Lake Sherwood set.

Sometimes things would go wrong or go missing.  When we were out at Lake Sherwood for the Baku village in Star Trek Insurrection, Worf’s teeth came up missing.  They were very expensive to make so there was one set at the time.  So the hunt was on and of course we were still shooting Deep Space Nine at the time.  That created quite the stir to have a whole lot of people searching for Worf’s teeth.  So yes, they were found, but at great cost to both productions.

Penny Juday (far right) as an extra in Star Trek Generations, in Ten Forward on the USS Enterprise-D. Also in this scene were Patrick Stewart as Captain Picard, Whoopi Goldberg as Guinan and Malcolm McDowell as Dr. Soran.

CB:  You were able to work with the Star Trek original series cast on Star Trek Generations, and even performed on camera as an extra.  What kind of interaction did you have behind the scenes with the original Enterprise crew?  Any lasting impressions?

PJ:  I met Mr. Kelley on Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country as they were walking out of the Klingon courtroom.  He had had a long day but stopped and introduced himself to me, shook my hand.  What a lovely, gracious man.  Shatner ran past, couldn’t leave the set quick enough, which is understandable.  I later met him on Star Trek Generations.  We were in the Valley of Fire, north of Las Vegas.  I was put in the crew van which was traveling to the site in the desert where the bridge set was.  I was in charge of taking orders for the crew gift bomber jackets.  He had never heard of a bomber jacket.  So that was a great fun thing to do, he got a laugh out of the whole thing.  Ms. Nichols, I interviewed her for Star Trek: The Magazine.  Again just so warm, friendly, kind, happy to talk to me.  I think I have met them all at one time or another and what an experience to meet your idols from your favorite show and then get to work with them.

Energy beacons used by The Borg that Penny helped to create for Star Trek: First Contact.

CB:  Part of your many roles for Star Trek included locating found props in the real world, such as purchasing furniture for sets or odd bottles to get re-dressed for use in Quark’s bar in Deep Space Nine.  What were some of the stranger creations you were asked to come up with?

PJ:  Wow, there are so many!  I think the Borg energy packs in Star Trek: First Contact—where they are on the dish—the Borg pull out these long acrylic tubes that glow… those were bird feeders that we put fluorescent tubes in, wrapped them in the mess they are shipped in, then wrapped those in a lighting gel.  When I called the company, because we needed a lot of them, they were so excited and it was hard for them to believe how they were going to be used.  I think the second is all the vacuum packaging we used.  If you look at the packages your cookies, candy, make-up, anything with a molded part, you will see a great deal of interesting usable shapes.  We had stacks of packages friends and family would save up for us, just in case we needed something on the run.  Anthony had a kludge closet in the art department where we would store found objects for instant prop and model making.  Then I think the Picard family album was probably one of my favorites.  I worked on that for weeks digging through flea markets, yard sales, antique shops, asking crew for items, family photos and such.  I would get French newspapers and make up articles, soak them in coffee or tea then run over them with the car.  So much fun!

Counselor Deanna Troi (Marina Sirtis) and Captain Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart) flipping through the Picard family album Penny Juday created. The original album was on display for years at the Star Trek Experience in Las Vegas.

Please come back tomorrow for part 2 of our interview with Penny Juday.

Brannon Braga is the writer who wrote more scripts than any other person in the Star Trek franchise.  He wrote some of the best time travel/parallel universe episodes, concepts he clearly had a nice grasp on using “time” as a science fiction storytelling tool throughout Next Generation, moving on to use time as an element in episodes of Deep Space Nine, Voyager, and Enterprise.  These included “Cause and Effect,” “Timescape,” “Parallels,” and “All Good Things…” on Next Generation, the movies Star Trek Generations and  First Contact, “Year of Hell,” “Living Witness,” “Timeless,” and “Endgame” on Voyager, and “These are the Voyages” on Enterprise.  It’s strange in hindsight that Braga penned the last episode to each of these series, yet they all are quite similar.

Braga returns this month to Star Trek: The Next Generation writing a new mini-series published by IDW Publishing, titled “Hive.”  Issue #1 takes place in both the 24th century and Jean-Luc Picard’s world 500 years prior.  Like “Cause and Effect” or any of the series-ending episodes, Braga hops back and forth in time in this new story.  We meet a post-Star Trek Nemesis Starfleet, complete with Picard at the helm of the Enterprise-D on leave with girlfriend Vash and Captain Riker leading the Titan.  The favorite villains of Next Generation–The Borg–have returned, but this time they are running from something scarier than any species in the four quadrants have met up with yet, Species 1881, freakish masters of chaos that look a bit like Species 8472 (for anyone keeping track).  And they want Jean-Luc Picard, formerly Locutus.  They want him to help them defeat Species 1881.  And they brought along Seven of Nine to help.

But that is all 500 years in the past.  In the future, the last remnant of Jean-Luc Picard percolates in a weary member of The Borg looking strangely like Locutus.  He uses the memories of Picard to create a facsimile of Data the android.  Why?  Because Locutus needs Data to help him to defeat the Borg Queen.

It’s all very strange and stretching continuity, but in light of the film Star Trek 2009, that’s the new thing, right?

And before we give all the credit for the new series to Braga, he wrote the “story”–the script itself was co-penned by Terry Matalas and Travis Fickett.  It’s another nice start to an IDW Star Trek spinoff series.

The best feature of Issue #1, in addition to just seeing all these characters together again, is seeing them look this good, courtesy of artist Joe Corroney.  The images are not photo real, such as done by J.K. Woodward on Star Trek/Doctor Who Assimilation², but the likenesses are solid and the overall look easily transports you back to where Star Trek Nemesis left off.  Quirks uber-Star Trek fans may notice include Picard in a First Contact style jumpsuit instead of his trademark two-piece uniform, a generous skipping over of background details like LCARS panels and other items you’d expect from the Trek universe, and a lack of technobabble in the text.  The story doesn’t feel so much like a Star Trek episode because it speeds past the science of Trek that helps give you the feel of being sucked into the Trekniverse.

But this is only Issue #1, and there is plenty to like about the story and the visuals to come back for more next month.  For Star Trek: The Next Generation fans missing the old classic series, this is a good way to catch up with your favorite characters.  And the above cover A and alternate cover B to Issue #2 are pretty intriguing enticements to come back for more, too.

C.J. Bunce
Editor
borg.com

Finally, the best of Star Trek: The Next Generation is not only coming to Blu-Ray, but an episode worthy of seeing it on the big screen is on its way to a movie theater near you.  Fathom Events announced this weekend its next great one-night genre film event will be April 25, 2013.  In light of the April 2013 release of Season Three of Star Trek: The Next Generation on Blu-Ray, Fathom Events will be presenting a feature-length screening of the remastered two-part “The Best of Both Worlds” story arc featuring the first appearance of Patrick Stewart as Locutus. The April 25 screening at 7 p.m. local time will also include a “making of” feature as part of the screening.

“Best of Both Worlds, Part 1″ is universally acknowledged as one of the best cliffhanger episodes in TV history, and it’s in the top 10 of most Trek fans’ “Best of” lists.  It also features the two scenes with the best delivery of lines by both Jonathan Frakes as acting Captain Will Riker “Mr. Worf… Fire” and by Michael Dorn as Lieutenant Worf with his comment about Captain Picard’s abduction “He IS a borg.”

If you’re fans at all of “all things borg” like us, then this Fathom Events presentation, along with a movie screening of the Jonathan Frakes’ directed Star Trek: First Contact, will likely be the best view you could ever get of The Borg from the Star Trek universe, and in particular Locutus, the very best imagined member of The Borg from Star Trek.  Go to the Fathom Events website tickets link here for theater locations and to reserve your seats now.  Some theaters have limited reserved seating and will sell out quickly.

Here is a preview of the two-episode Blu-Ray release:

If you’re like us and skipped the releases of the first two ramp-up seasons of Star Trek: The Next Generation on Blu-ray in light of their merely half a dozen great episodes of 48 in all, the April 2013 Blu-ray release of Season Three will be highly anticipated.  With Season Three you arguably have the single best season of the seven years of all of Next Gen.  The season had some of the very best and re-watchable episodes of sci-fi TV ever: “Yesterday’s Enterprise,” “Who Watches the Watchers,” “Captain’s Holiday,” “Hollow Pursuits,” “The Most Toys,” and “Sarek.”  You can pre-order Season Three at Amazon.com or just pick up the special “The Best of Both Worlds” Blu-Ray edition also at a pre-order discount at Amazon.com.  And if you’re a completist and don’t want to wait for the likely forthcoming seven season boxed Blu-Ray set sure to be released down the road, you can also pick up the Blu-Rays of Season One and Season Two at Amazon.com, also.

C.J. Bunce
Editor
borg.com

If you haven’t read the four-issue limited series Star Trek: The Next Generation “Hive,” tomorrow IDW Publishing releases a trade edition at comic book stores everywhere.  ”Hive” reads every bit like the next television episode of Star Trek featuring The Borg–the fearsome race of half machines/half organic lifeforms that assimilate species across the galaxy.  With the best of their stories found in the Next Generation two-parter “The Best of Both Worlds” and the Jonathan Frakes-directed big screen blockbuster Star Trek: First Contact, long-time series writer Brannon Braga returns to tell his untold epic story of Locutus, Seven of Nine, and the return of Data, with scripts by Travis Fickett and Terry Matalas.  Below we are previewing the trade edition courtesy of IDW Publishing.

After the events in Star Trek: Nemesis, Will Riker now captains the Titan. Lieutenant Commander Data is dead, sacrificing himself to save Captain Jean-Luc Picard and the crew of the Enterprise-E.  “Hive” occurs after Star Trek: Nemesis and explains events that led to the absence of Seven of Nine in the Star Trek Voyager finale, “Endgame.”

The Borg Queen contacts the Federation, requesting to speak to Locutus, the name given to Picard’s identity as an assimilated member of The Borg in “The Best of Both Worlds.”  Federation leadership is perplexed, and questions asked about Picard’s loyalty after his assimilation at Wolf 359 are asked again.  Riker urges them to listen to the Borg Queen–and she tells them that both The Borg and the Federation are in danger from the Voldranaii–a chaotic species that have followed The Borg after failed assimilation, now dead set to make sure no species tries to conquer them again.

Five hundred years later Locutus lives as the Borg King having conquered the universe finally with the Borg Queen.  But at the end of conquest Locutus feels a great loss.  He re-creates Data from the knowledge he brought to the collective from the Federation and now he plans to send Borg Data to try to prevent the universe from being assimilated in the first place.

And in the past, Captain Picard meets Annika Hansen–once Seven of Nine–and enlists her on a mission to infiltrate and finally destroy The Borg from the inside.

The entire Next Generation crew returns: On the Titan, Captain Riker, with his chief tactical officer Commander Tuvok and Commander Deanna Troi, and on the Enterprise, Captain Picard, Geordi LaForge, and Worf, along with new faces, like Lieutenant Kira Archer, who lost her brother to The Borg and presumably is a descendant of the Enterprise series captain.

Well-known Star Trek comic book artist Joe Corroney reveals “Hive” as a lavish and familiar environment that fans of the various series will easily get sucked into.  Down to LCARS panel details and readings on tricorders, to costumes and crew complements, Corroney knows his source material and delivers characters that closely resemble their actor counterparts.  And Corroney’s covers are some of the best designed of any Star Trek comic book series to date.   Alternate covers by well-known artists show iconic American imagery disrupted by The Borg.

Star Trek notable producer, director, and screenwriter Brannon Braga is the award-winning writer of more scripts than any other person in the Star Trek franchise.  He wrote some of the best time travel/parallel universe episodes, concepts he clearly had a nice grasp on using “time” as a science fiction storytelling tool throughout Next Generation, moving on to use time as an element in episodes of Deep Space Nine, Voyager, and Enterprise.  These included “Cause and Effect,” “Timescape,” “Parallels,” and “All Good Things…” on Next Generation, the movies Star Trek Generations and First Contact, “Year of Hell,” “Living Witness,” “Timeless,” and “Endgame” on Voyager, and “These are the Voyages” on Enterprise.

Braga penned the finale to every series from Next Generation on.  “Hive” feels very much like a finale episode.  It has much in common with “Endgame,” where Admiral Janeway uses time travel to try to save Seven of Nine.  It also pulls much from the episode “Timeless,” one of the best episodes of any series in the Star Trek franchise. “Timeless” found Commander Chakotay and Ensign Harry Kim returning to a snow-covered planet where the doomed Voyager lay destroyed.  With the help of the Emergency Medical Hologram Doctor, they work to undo the past yet again.

You can’t go wrong with Braga’s newest offering in the world of Star Trek’s The Borg, which he personally developed as key villains through so many stories.  Although what is and what isn’t canon is usually pretty clear, readers will find it difficult not to view “Hive” as part of the Star Trek canon.

Click here to check out a high-resolution, seven-page preview of Star Trek: The Next Generation “Hive,” courtesy of IDW Publishing.  Find the trade edition at your local comic book store tomorrow, or you can find it online, including here at Amazon.com.

C.J. Bunce
Editor
borg.com

Last night at 7 p.m,. across America theaters showed a one-night only event–the world premiere of the remastered release of Star Trek: The Next Generation two-part episode “The Best of Both Worlds,” including specifically the cliffhanger Part 1, which arguably is the most important Star Trek episode and one of the best episodes of any TV series to hit the airwaves.  Why the best?  It featured a constellation of concepts that came together at just the right time, airing at the end of Season 3, the season where the NextGen cast and writers became comfortable in their roles and produced several incredible episodes, including ”Who Watches the Watchers,” “Yesterday’s Enterprise” (the other contender for best NextGen episode), “Captain’s Holiday,” “Hollow Pursuits,” “The Most Toys,” and “Sarek.”  

The stakes were never greater in a Star Trek episode than in “The Best of Both Worlds,” with the beloved Captain Jean-Luc Picard assimilated by The Borg, turned into the leader Locutus who had all of Picard’s memories and strategies to use against his shipmates.  It also featured something we all wanted to see–Jonathan Frakes’s Commander Will Riker as Captain of the Enterprise-D.  Its cliffhanger ending at the end of Season 3 created a devoted fan following who waited with bated breath all summer and came back for Season 4 and thereafter stuck with Star Trek as loyal fans to this day.  The Star Trek franchise might not be as successful today were it not for this great two-part episode.  

In last night’s theatrical showing, the slow and clumsy members of The Borg collective on the TV screen became even more menacing at 30 feet tall–we like these villains today because of what Patrick Stewart showed us portraying their cold-blooded leader.  The surround sound emphasized tension in the episode’s score that took on an even greater meaning for viewers.  The two most notable factors of the remastering process were LCARs panels you could almost read the letters from, and the detail of the Enterprise-D exterior shots–which are so clear they probably should have been redone to show digital people through the windows since the big screen version emphasized the look as painted squares.  And we were reminded that this episode really belonged to guest star Elizabeth Dennehy, who as Commander Shelby, showed us one of the strongest female characters to appear on TV in an episode that is very much about promoting a woman in Starfleet despite some surprising bits of sexism infused from a 1990 sensibility (like Admiral Hanson discussing “an old man’s fantasies” with regard to Commander Shelby, and Riker and other male crew constantly commenting about Shelby in the ship’s corridors should make you wince).  On the big screen scenes that may have skipped by back then really show how far we’ve all come in even twenty years.  It’s no wonder so many tie-in novels have been written about Shelby’s tough as nails character in the more than two decades since Part 1 first aired on June 8, 1990.  Worf (Michael Dorn), Data (Brent Spiner) and even Wesley Crusher (Wil Wheaton) all come across as very funny on the big screen, too–you forget how the late, great Michael Piller’s writing was always so clever and sharp.

The Fathom Events series continued its great single night programming including parts of the Blu-ray features before and after the showing.  One thing to be aware of if the single edition release of “The Best of Both Worlds,” Parts 1 and 2 is the same version shown last night–the TV series almost needs inserted commercials, especially at least some kind of break with Riker’s last word at the end of Part 1.  Part 1 and Part 2 slid into each other so quickly the impact of Riker’s stunning cliffhanger line was lost to anyone viewing the episodes for the first time.  Also, inserting a documentary in advance of the show which step-by-step revealed plot points of the show further would spoil the episodes for those dragging a friend along to see the episodes for the first time.  But Dennehy’s interview and the blooper reel afterward were great additions.  The crowd laughed loudly at every bit of the blooper reel.  And the documentary that aired before the main feature included some fun interviews with cast members as well as master art designer Rick Sternback, make-up man Michael Westmore, composer Ron Jones, and special effects modelmaker Greg Jein.

With next week’s release of the Season 3 Blu-ray set it’s a great time to re-watch this superb season of television.  Pre-release steep discount Blu-Rays of Star Trek: The Next Generation – Season Three are still available at Amazon.com as well as the discounted Blu-ray of Star Trek: The Next Generation – The Best of Both Worlds.  Star Trek fans who missed last night’s screening really missed a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to be dazzled by this key pair of brilliant episodes.

C.J. Bunce
Editor
borg.com

From the Diamond Select Femme Fatales series of collector statues, which includes key women characters from a broad stretch of genre properties such as Atom Eve from the Invincible series, Brian Pulido’s Lady Death, Image Comics’ Darkchylde, and David Mack’s Kabuki, Entertainment Earth is featuring a nice sculpt of Star Trek Voyager’s Seven of Nine today.

In particular compare the style and silver and copper accents in the Borg Alcove in the sculpt to the actual screen-used alcove below.

Today only, available at this link, Entertainment Earth is slashing prices on their Seven of Nine statue by 40%, and they expect to sell out of their stock today at this discounted price.

The regular list price of $39.99, for today only, is reduced to $23.99.  All you collectors of sci-fi statues out there may want to check this out.

C.J. Bunce
Editor
borg.com

It’s a question die-hard Star Trek fans ask themselves:  If you could own one favorite Star Trek prop, what would it be?  This weekend a Star Trek Facebook page asked thousands of followers to comment on one question:  If you could have any autographed Trek prop, what would it be and who would you have sign it?  With nearly 2,000 respondents we thought it was a good opportunity to use these responses from across Star Trek fandom to see if we can glean what Star Trek fans think are the most iconic props of the franchise.  It’s not all that scientific, since the page posting the question was a general Star Trek page, and many fans may only follow the individual pages from any of the Star Trek series.  The image shown in the post was of an original series phaser–did that skew fans to select that prop?  Are there more original series fans in the mix who follow this page?  We don’t know.  But the results are still interesting and who better than a random group of Trek fans to share what they see as the top Holy Grail of Trek props?

The question is ongoing, with hundreds more responses entered after we stopped tracking answers–around 1,860.  Many responses were attempts at humor–many claiming Shatner’s toupee as their response (how do you autograph a toupee anyway?).  Others were rude or sexist or otherwise the typical worthless responses you find across social media on any given day.

Also, nobody addressed a key topic–why do people think it’s a good thing to autograph a screen-used prop?  The truth is that collectors of screen-used props will refuse to purchase a prop if it has been defaced in any way, especially by an autograph (screen wear and tear excepted).  Recent auctions of an original series gold tunic worn by William Shatner sold for a fraction of what a similar one sold for that was not so marked.  The autograph literally cost the consigner thousands of dollars.  One rare command Starfleet uniform worn by Robert Picardo on Star Trek Voyager was once highly sought after by collectors, and has remained unsellable for years because of a scrawling signature across the front.  The bottom line: Collectors prefer a prop or costume to look just as it did the last time it was shown on the screen.  Actors would be well-advised to refuse to autograph screen-used props at least without first telling fans they may be ruining their chances to re-sell the prop down the road.  Whether or not you think you might keep a prop forever, do yourself a favor and don’t limit your future options.

Putting the “should they/shouldn’t they” question aside, the great response showed fans love their favorite Trek and thousands would want a piece of TV or film history signed by their favorite actor.  So what did we learn?

Two items were neck and neck as the most sought after prop–an original series tricorder and a Star Trek: The Next Generation Klingon bat’leth, especially if tied to Lieutenant Worf.  A close second place was an original series communicator.  With roughly half of the tally of the tricorder, fourth place went to the original series phaser.

The big surprise for Next Generation fans may be that a bat’leth beat Captain Jean-Luc Picard’s Ressikan flute–the penny whistle-inspired instrument he played in the fan favorite episode “The Inner Light,” placing sixth on our list, nudged aside by Captain Kirk’s command chair from the original starship Enterprise.  The Star Trek: The Next Generation tricorder and phaser were next on the list, respectively.  (Some respondents differentiated between types of phasers and tricorders, but many did not so we lumped them together here).

Tied for ninth place were several easily recognizable items:  an original series “red shirt,” a pair of Leonard Nimoy’s Mr. Spock ears, a tribble, Mr. Spock’s lyre from “Charlie X,” Picard’s cup for his “Earl Grey tea, hot,” and the highest ranking item from Deep Space Nine, Captain Benjamin Sisko’s prized baseball.  This was followed closely by Seven of Nine’s facial prosthetics worn by Jeri Ryan on Star Trek Voyager, Lt. Geordi LaForge’s barette-inspired VISOR, and Lt. Cmdr Data’s head from presumably either the episode “Time’s Arrow” or the film Star Trek Nemesis.

Although not “props,” several costumes were mentioned by multiple respondents, like the aforementioned red shirts, Captain Picard’s last uniform type worn on-screen between Star Trek: First Contact and Star Trek Nemesis, the formal maroon Starfleet uniforms made famous by Captain Kirk & Co. in Star Trek movies II through VII, an original series blue tunic, and a red command uniform from Star Trek: The Next Generation.  Body parts worn by The Borg, including Locutus, made the list, as did Next Generation communicator pins, Captain Kathryn Janeway’s coffee mug, a Klingon disruptor, a blue Starfleet jumpsuit from the last series Enterprise, Captain Picard’s command chair, Uhura’s communicator earpiece, an original series chess set, bars of gold press latinum from Deep Space Nine, Commander Will Riker’s trombone, a horga’hn from Risa, Worf’s Klingon baldric, Constable Odo’s bucket, and Balok’s head from the original series episode “The Corbomite Maneuver” rounded out the list.  What?  No Tox Uthat?  No Worf’s bat’leth trophy?  No Admiral Kirk glasses from Wrath of Khan or Khan’s broken Starfleet emblem necklace?

Any given day this list could change, but doesn’t it seem to capture a good snapshot of what fans think should top the list?  Do you see any glaring omissions?  If so, let us know by posting them in the comments.

C.J. Bunce
Editor
borg.com

IDW Publishing writer Mike Johnson continues to take Star Trek where no one has taken Star Trek before.  As he did successfully in Star Trek Countdown and Star Trek: Nero, Johnson continues the adventures of Captain James T. Kirk and his crew in the Star Trek “Kelvin” timeline–the new timeline begun by J.J. Abrams beginning in 2009.  Johnson is breaking new grounds along with artist Tony Shasteen in Star Trek: Boldly Go, a monthly comic book series featuring a standalone story issue hitting comic book stores tomorrow.

In the first four issues of Star Trek: Boldly Go, Johnson and Shasteen take readers beyond last summer’s hit movie Star Trek Beyond.  Kirk and his crew are divided now, serving aboard separate vessels.  Kirk leads the USS Endeavour, with Bones as second rank under another medical chief.  Chekov serves with them.  Spock and Uhura are on sabbatical on New Vulcan with Sarek.  Scotty is teaching at the Academy back on Earth.  Commander Sulu is serving under Captain Terrell (played by Paul Winfield in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan) aboard the USS Concord.  And then a nemesis encountered much later in the Prime Universe pursues the Concord.  Why? Is resistance truly futile?  Find out when The Borg seize Spock.

Fortunately instead of being merely a gimmick to bring the key villains from Star Trek: The Next Generation into the realm of the original series, the change-up in the timeline is nicely tied to a logical occurrence in Kirk and Spock’s past, while further binding the ex-Enterprise crew together.

Tomorrow with Issue #5 Johnson and Shasteen set their focus on Jaylah, the heroine from Star Trek Beyond, and our nominee for the most kickass heroine of all the Star Trek films.  It’s a great, personal story, providing backstory showing how Jaylah ended up where she encountered the Enterprise crew at the beginning of Star Trek Beyond, and where the character is now.  Here is a preview of Star Trek: Boldly Go, Issue #5, courtesy of IDW Publishing:

Look for all sorts of variant covers for the Star Trek: Boldly Go series, including photo poster covers, clever “paper doll” covers, and more by Shasteen, George Caltsoudas, and Marc Laming.

If you missed the single issues, pre-order the trade edition at Amazon here, and find Issue #5 tomorrow at Elite Comics and other fine comic book stores everywhere.

C.J. Bunce
Editor
borg.com