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Television Sci-Fi

Worf's Final Act: a 'Star Trek' Legend Looks Back (polygon.com) 70

The final season of Star Trek: Picard features the return of the Klingon Worf, reports Polygon, calling it "the chance to give one of sci-fi's most beloved supporting characters something that's usually reserved only for Captains and Admirals: a glorious third act."

Interestingly, back in 1987 Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry had "hoped to avoid relying on familiar alien antagonists" when creating the first Star Trek TV sequel in 1987. So after a last-minute addition, "the early development of the character was left almost entirely in the hands of Dorn, then best known for a supporting role on the lighthearted police drama CHiPs." "They really didn't have a bible for Worf at all," says Dorn of those early episodes. "In fact, one of the first things I did was, I asked the producers, 'What do you want from this guy? You've just handed me a piece of paper that says Worf on it.'" With Roddenberry's blessing, Dorn set out making the character his own, giving Worf the kind of personal investment and attachment that only an actor can provide. "I decided to make the guy the opposite of everybody else on the show. You know, everyone else, their attitudes were great, and they're out there in space, relationships are forming. And after every mission they were like, Wasn't that fantastic? I didn't say anything to anybody, I just made him this gruff and surly character on the bridge. No smiles, no joking around."

It didn't take the show's producers long to realize that Dorn's gruff, joyless performance could effectively turn any bit of throwaway dialogue into a laugh line....

Alongside his role as the show's unlikely comic relief, however, Worf developed into one of Star Trek's most complicated protagonists. Roddenberry mandated that the show's human characters had evolved beyond the sorts of interpersonal conflicts that typically drive television dramas, but Worf, an alien, was permitted to be contrarian, hot-tempered, and even malicious.... He strictly adheres to a code of honor that does not totally overlap with that of his peers.... Yet, however many times "real" Klingon conduct clashes with his values, Worf never allows this to pollute his own sense of honor. He remains unfailingly truthful, loyal, and brave. And, over the years, other Klingons take notice of this and grow to admire and emulate him....

Dorn — along with the rest of the Next Gen ensemble — has once again been called upon to revitalize a Star Trek spinoff. The third season of Star Trek: Picard reintroduces us to Worf as a wise old master, so confident in his ability to defeat his foes in combat that he rarely needs to unsheathe this weapon. Dorn has imagined the past 20 years of his character's life in detail, taking inspiration from a source not entirely disconnected from Star Trek: the films of Quentin Tarantino. Appropriately, Dorn has patterned this version of Worf after a character from a film that opens with an old Klingon proverb: Kill Bill.

"One of the characters was Pai Mei, this martial arts killer," says Dorn. "He's gone so far in the martial arts, the next step is — he can defend himself and kill with a sword, but he can also do it with his bare hands. And with that comes calm, and the ability to know that sometimes you don't have to kill. That's how he's grown in the past 20 years. Now he can dodge ray guns...."

One way or another, the actor looks back at his untouchable tenure as Starfleet's greatest warrior with warmth and appreciation.

And speaking of appreciation, this video shows Dorn out of his Klingon makeup, joining with castmember Brent Spiner to recall a fondly-remembered prank that they'd played on Patrick Stewart (who was directing the episode).
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Worf's Final Act: a 'Star Trek' Legend Looks Back

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  • by YetAnotherDrew ( 664604 ) on Sunday March 05, 2023 @04:29AM (#63343967)

    Some of us wanted more adventures for Captain Worf than just an episode in post-Abrams Picard-land.

    This is teh suck!

    I can only hope Q finds the people responsible and teaches them lessons.

    https://www.ipetitions.com/petition/to-begin-a-star-trek-the-captain-worf-tv-series [ipetitions.com]

    • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      There is the possibility of a Picard spin-off, and I think a Worf show would be a front runner for that.

      Hopefully it's not the same writers as Picard though.

      • by Kokuyo ( 549451 ) on Sunday March 05, 2023 @06:57AM (#63344099) Journal

        We are living such times that my hope goes to NOT getting spinoffs, sequels and reboots in the first place.

        • We are living such times that my hope goes to NOT getting spinoffs, sequels and reboots in the first place.

          It's dead, Jim!

      • There is the possibility of a Picard spin-off, and I think a Worf show would be a front runner for that.

        Hopefully it's not the same writers as Picard though.

        Getting actual good writers would be nice, but between Picard, Discovery, and the weird attempt at comedy, Lower Decks a lot of onetime fans just want Star Trek to become a thing of the past. Any writers for anything new would have a Herculean task. The present ones have as Clancy says - "Sheer. Fucking. Hubris."

        At least Discovery has been cancelled.

    • Some of us wanted more adventures for Captain Worf than just an episode in post-Abrams Picard-land.

      Bad news! Worf also appears in the MMO, where he plays second fiddle to your character in one storyline, following you around through an alien base and making suggestions while you do most of the work.

  • On the surface, this appears disturbingly similar to Andor--finally a competent, faithful TV (season of a) series, long after squandering all good will and excitement for the franchise through years of horrible (if not outright hostile) entries.
    • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 ) on Sunday March 05, 2023 @06:06AM (#63344061) Homepage Journal

      Picard has been plagued by poor writing. It's just bad storytelling, feeling more like a first draft. That was particularly true of season 2.

      The other big issue it has is over-reliance on nostalgia. Often more than half the episode is just nostalgic references and bringing back old characters for no real reason, e.g. in season 1 the whole Borg plot could have been omitted without affecting the outcome.

      Season 3 seems to be an improvement, but I'm reserving judgement. The last episode was basically a remake of Wrath of Khan, right down to recycling the music from that movie. Just not as well made. It's also very predictable, and the tendency to rehash old plot lines doesn't help it offer any surprises.

      I'm not sure what went wrong with Picard. Clearly Paramount can make really good Trek shows, as demonstrated by Strange New Worlds. For some reason the writing team on Picard don't seem to really know the basics of how to present a story.

      • Your comments give me hope that perhaps enough fans will push Paramount away from crappy spin-offs. SNW has been the best to date, but yet again they have their bad moments and even went off and re-raced some characters - thereby destroying in-universe continuity with TOS because of real-life politics getting involved. (Lt. Kyle)

        • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

          I don't really care about minutia of continuity like that. And anyway, they couldn't even get his first name consistent.

          One thing that made Prodigy good was that it was the essence of what Star Trek is, but the main cast were not Starfleet. They took the best bits of what Starfleet had to offer, doing the right thing and working as a team, without all the military style protocol and such. One episode opens with "Captain's log, stardate... ah, who cares?" and that pretty much sums up how I feel about it. I d

          • Re: Shades of Andor (Score:4, Interesting)

            by Ol Olsoc ( 1175323 ) on Sunday March 05, 2023 @07:52AM (#63344145)

            One episode opens with "Captain's log, stardate... ah, who cares?" and that pretty much sums up how I feel about it. I don't care if they get the stardates all perfectly aligned, I'm not going to check because that's not what makes Star Trek good.

            A lot of fans have a different outlook. When something aligns, there's a mental "click", the best way I can describe it is the sensation when travelling, and you find an interesting connection road. Not interesting for some, but for those of us who make mental maps, very satisfying.

            Which is not to say that everything has to perfectly align. An example is Worf explaining/not explaining why Klingons looked like humans wearing grease paint at one time in DS9. That ended up being hilarious.

            But when they assassinate characters for fun, they risk alienating the audience.

            In any event, the present day offerings stink. Discovery can't even get the lighting right.

  • A chance? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Opportunist ( 166417 ) on Sunday March 05, 2023 @05:14AM (#63344005)

    A chance to crap on the legacy of yet another beloved character from TNG for the sake of marketing? Get Wesley in there, at least people would rejoice if you butcher this character (including Wil Wheaton, probably).

    • Re:A chance? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by drnb ( 2434720 ) on Sunday March 05, 2023 @05:31AM (#63344027)

      A chance to crap on the legacy of yet another beloved character from TNG for the sake of marketing? Get Wesley in there, at least people would rejoice if you butcher this character (including Wil Wheaton, probably).

      Funny you should ask for that ... [spoilers]

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      Nobody hates Star Trek more than Star Trek fans.

      We had all the same stuff when TNG came out. It was crapping on the legacy of the original characters, turned Trek from a frontier show into a boring diplomatic mission, the Klingons weren't baddies anymore, engineers should be wearing red and command wearing gold/green, it's was too woke and they even put a counsellor on the bridge and a woman as chief of security, they redefined the warp speed scale, Data is just a knock-off of Spock.

      While Picard has a lot o

      • Re:A chance? (Score:4, Interesting)

        by Opportunist ( 166417 ) on Sunday March 05, 2023 @10:06AM (#63344347)

        The thing about TNG was that first, there was a huge, HUGE gap in years between TOS and TNG. And there wasn't any alternative to fall back on, no Expanse, no Orville, thinking back, SciFi wasn't that big in the late 80s/early 90s. TNG eventually kicked that off again and in the late 90s you had all sorts of SciFi going on, but when TNG hit in 87, it was pretty much "this or you get reruns of Airwolf and Knight Rider, pick your poison".

        What TNG did right, though, was to start over fresh. A new crew, just with the same formula. They made "Kirk" the first officer this time around, giving him a much more boring captain who is kinda like a blend of Spock and Kirk, put the "real" Spock into an android body and give him a bit of a twist, rework Scotty into a blind black guy, make Checkov into a woman and made her tough as all hell (too bad Crosby didn't want to stay, I absolutely loved her character but there just wasn't enough material for her to "be", they really dropped the ball there badly, I would have left if I was her, too). The chemistry still worked, at least it did for me. Well, I was much younger back then, maybe I see it with the eyes of a teen who after eternal reruns of TOS and Space 1999 wanted something new.

        What I wanted to stress, though, is that they didn't just take the old characters and redressed them. That would not have worked anyway, because Kirk's chauvinist attitude was already outdated in the late 80s. That would not have been Kirk anymore. The "diplomat" Piccard fit into that time beautifully, and that's another thing that series had going for it, it reflected the development of our politics here on earth. The "Klingon Empire" was as fragile as the Soviet Union/Russia was during that time. That's why it worked.

        With Piccard... I don't know. They should maybe just have started something new. Lower Decks is a great idea if you ask me, something like this, but not as a goof and spoof like Lower Decks is but as a sensible, serious series, would work with a new audience, I think. Make it less about the monster of the week and more about how young officers try to navigate the everyday difficulties on a ship, this is pretty much what young people face in a corporate environment today.

        But as far as I was concerned, Piccard's story was told. This really feels tacked on, something akin to botched fan service with a "look, look who we have here, remember him, huh, huh?" every other week. It gets old.

        • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

          I'm not sure about the matching up characters as you describe. Riker and Troi were basically recycled from the first movie. Geordi was very different to Scottie, deliberately so, and actually wasn't even an engineer in the first season. It was a bit of a random move for him, made when they realized that they really needed a chief engineer character but didn't want to take on another regular. They just kind of retconned him to be a genius engineer after the fact.

          Another criticism I'd make of Picard is that t

          • I still say, instead of Piccard, a new show with new faces would have served the franchise better. Get back to the old formula and give it a new spin. Maybe indeed more of a focus on the mid-tier members of the crew. Or a mid-tier ship of the fleet. It needn't be the commanding staff of the flagship.

            One thing that anyone who ever served on board of any navy vessel will comment on (and there sure is no lack of comments on that) is that the "prime time staff" isn't on deck 24/7. There are more than one "set"

            • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

              That's pretty much what Lower Decks is, but obviously that one is a comedy. Might actually be difficult to play it straight, given all the ridiculous stuff that regularly seems to happen.

              • The ridiculous stuff happening in Lower Decks is to no small part due to the crew being a collection of rather ... colorful characters who are written with the intention to create those ridiculous situations. Not to mention that the aliens and other encounters were geared towards funny rather than serious. Playing this straight of course does not work.

                But I do think that there is a story to be told here. I think the story would be much more personal for the characters involved, and the characters would have

        • by Cyberax ( 705495 )

          Lower Decks is a great idea if you ask me, something like this, but not as a goof and spoof like Lower Decks is but as a sensible, serious series

          It's impossible to make serious StarTrek movies that are not cringe-worthy. That's because the whole premise of the StarTrek universe is just ridiculous.

          I haven't grown up watching StartTrek, and I tried to watch a couple of random seasons when I was about 25 years old. I was constantly amazed at how ridiculously bad they were. Seriously stupid plots, wooden acting, and just the general sense that "it doesn't fit together".

          "Lower Decks" lampshades all this and that's what makes it work so well. It's lik

    • by godrik ( 1287354 )

      Get Wesley in there

      They did that already!

    • people would rejoice if you butcher ... Wil Wheaton

      Getting a bit carried away there perhaps?

      That kind of rhetoric is more apropos for a Holy War than a TV show critique.

      • You know how to cut out parts from a quote to turn its meaning around, you working for Fox News or something?

        If not, check if they're hiring.

        • You know how to cut out parts from a quote to turn its meaning around, you working for Fox News or something?

          If not, check if they're hiring.

          Ha, I see it now. When you wrote "people would rejoice if you butcher this character (including Wil Wheaton, probably)", I read it as including Wil Wheaton in the butchering, not as Wil Wheaton rejoicing. So I'll concede you're not a radical, just a mildly ambiguous writer :)

  • The problem is (Score:5, Insightful)

    by LondoMollari ( 172563 ) on Sunday March 05, 2023 @05:57AM (#63344049) Homepage

    Most of the new directors have decided to throw legacy Star Trek right out the window. They ignore established facts in the story line to make things "interesting" and destroy the franchise in the process. Gone is the utopia of the future (In "Picard") because gritty series like The Expanse, etc. have proven to be popular. Even Babylon 5 had homeless "lurkers." The alt timeline says the Enterprise was built on Earth, when it was clearly stated multiple times that it was built in space. Even Roddenberry approved the look of the Enterprise because it could only exist in space, not on the ground.

    Therefore, only TOS, TAS, TNG, DS9, VOY, ENT are cannon and even those series step on their own toes from time to time. SNW is really trying but they need to honor the source material more (such as nobody ever meeting the Gorn before Kirk) At least they just don't throw the whole story out the window, but it's getting close.

    Of course, this is all fiction so this is all IMO and YMMV depending on your consumption and preferences. I just like details.

    • Re:The problem is (Score:4, Informative)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 ) on Sunday March 05, 2023 @06:02AM (#63344059) Homepage Journal

      The best Star Trek series overall was DS9, not least because it did disrupt the utopian TNG ideal. It's okay to have that kind of variety over different shows, it doesn't all have to be the same.

      You seem to be confusing the Kelvin timeline with the prime one. The Abrams movies are in a different timeline to the current TV shows like Picard.

      • No I am just using it as an example of how writers are itching to drop previously established norms.

        • No I am just using it as an example of how dilettante hacks are itching to destroy previously established characters.

          FTFY

          • Re: The problem is (Score:5, Insightful)

            by Baron_Yam ( 643147 ) on Sunday March 05, 2023 @10:04AM (#63344343)

            I did dislike Picard S1 more and more as it went, and I found the ending to be entirely disappointing. As a consequence, I didn't bother with S2 or S3.

            However, on the subject of 'destroying characters'... situations change, and people change with them.

            The underlying premise of Picard wasn't bad - the Federation stops being a utopia because of a threat that strikes successfully right on their capital world's doorstep. They become xenophobic because a 'them' group attacked them, and they cease being willing to help people who aren't already in the 'us' group.

            Picard is old, dying, and set in his ways... they just happen to be good ways and the Federation has gone wrong. And he comes out of retirement to help restore the Federation only to find nobody in any position of power cares that he fought the borg a lifetime ago, he's a fossil to be disregarded because he doesn't understand the current threat.

            That's potential story GOLD. The premise was interesting. It could have done what good sci-fi has always done, which is use a fantasy to explore our reality.

            It was what they did with that premise that was a travesty. Nobody needed to see an old ally of Picard's as a druggie living in a trailer. Nobody needed a ninja Romulan. Nobody needed to see Seven brought back, being awesome, and then getting cut down to normalcy without a thought. Nobody needed a big stupid 'reset' button to make the Big Bad Evil Guy go away like magic in the last seconds of the finale. And certainly nobody needed to see Picard replaced with an android copy running Picard 2.0.

            Great premise. Awful execution.

            • I did dislike Picard S1 more and more as it went, and I found the ending to be entirely disappointing. As a consequence, I didn't bother with S2 or S3.

              However, on the subject of 'destroying characters'... situations change, and people change with them.

              In real life, we all change to a certain extent, but assuming a Starship Captain has the chops to be a Starship Captain (using present day Naval officers as an example. They changed him too much.

              The underlying premise of Picard wasn't bad - the Federation stops being a utopia because of a threat that strikes successfully right on their capital world's doorstep. They become xenophobic because a 'them' group attacked them, and they cease being willing to help people who aren't already in the 'us' group.

              And they transform the Federation Universe into some sort of 21st Century Trump era place. And there is the biggest problem IMO. Star Trek original was rejecting the 1960's situation, giving some manner of hopeful outcome, not a situation that seems best cured by mass suicide.

              Picard is old, dying, and set in his ways... they just happen to be good ways and the Federation has gone wrong. And he comes out of retirement to help restore the Federation only to find nobody in any position of power cares that he fought the borg a lifetime ago, he's a fossil to be disregarded because he doesn't understand the current threat.

              That's potential story GOLD.

              You are spot on here. It very much is

            • fwiw, s3 of picard seems decent so far (though s1 and s2 were indeed pretty terrible)

      • by Anonymous Coward

        The best Star Trek series overall was DS9, not least because it did disrupt the utopian TNG ideal.

        People really need to stop repeating this. DS9 did NOT disrupt the utopian TNG ideal. Earth is still a paradise filled with good people who resolve their problems with talking and not being shitty to each other. It's not some grimdark circle-jerk where everyone is a suicidal alcoholic who murders people.

        All DS9 did is show what happens when those idealistic people are put into a situation where they can't talk their way out of it. The vast majority of the show doesn't even take place on a Federation ship/ou

  • by sTERNKERN ( 1290626 ) on Sunday March 05, 2023 @05:59AM (#63344055)
    The whole series is a disgrace, I am glad it is over.
    • by godrik ( 1287354 )

      Season 2 was truly terrible. It is still possible that season 3 turns out good.

  • The Commisar in Enemy at the Gates had a few lines which perfectly describe why Roddenberry's vision for humanity is completely impossible:

    I've been such a fool, Vassili. Man will always be a man. There is no new man. We tried so hard to create a society that was equal, where there'd be nothing to envy your neighbour. But there's always something to envy. A smile, a friendship, something you don't have and want to appropriate. In this world, even a Soviet one, there will always be rich and poor. Rich in gif

    • Thing is Enemy at the Gates is taking place in war-torn mid 20th century Soviet Union, a time where resource scarcity isn't just a thing, it's a major thing.

      TNG is a universe where we have achieved the end of energy, food and other resource scarcity in which people are free to pursue their passions and personal fulfillment. TNG made it point (maybe even it's strongest points) that all those thing don't eliminate the interpersonal human conflicts but it certainly helps a damn lot. Hell the whole interestin

      • These are all great points, and I just wanted to add that there's nothing wrong with a story being aspirational even if it's somewhat realistic.

        New Trek seems even more unrealistic in the opposite direction as old trek... a story that seems rooted in over the top pessimism.

        That said S3 is supposedly better, will probably watch that when it's done if they can keep up the quality and don't blow the ending.

        • Agree, for the shows that are aping so much nostalgia off the back of TNG nobody writing it seems to understand how much of it was rooted in philosophy, diplomacy and ethical problem solving. It's like everyone only watched the TNG movies and not the actual show.

          Likely the fact that TNG was doing 20+ episodes a season with limited budget, so many episodes were primarily just people talking but the writing was engaging and thoughtful (most of the time).

  • it's done.

    You're just a market, and it's just about money. Look at Discovery. Broke by woke. Picard. Nothing happens. Old man has regrets. Booooorrrinnnggg. That's not Star Trek, that's just a nostalgia trap for both viewers and advertisers. Please, please, no more horrible spin offs just trying to capitalize on the memory of better stories past.

    You're better off to watch reruns. Gomtoo anyone? Remember that one? An animal that flies thru the vacuum of space. And don't mess with him, cause, he's telepathic,
  • I didn't mind him in STNG but in DS9 they went too far. He wasn't funny and was constantly complaining about something.

  • Worf is the greatest warrior in Star Trek because he got so much practice being tossed around like a rag doll [tvtropes.org]. If he didn't learn to dodge to where he could dodge ray guns, he'd have serious back problems or be dead.
  • The Klignons are supposed to be badass, but Worf lost almost every hand to hand encounter he had. He was totally pathetic.
  • "It's a gorch."

  • SF fans love "world-building" and expend great efforts to make all the plots - each invented by a somebody telling one story, and very willing to twist the "Bible" to tell it - consistent, possible in the same reality. Great anguish is expressed when "cannon" is broken.

    Caring about that dived out the window for me when I read something just devastating in "Trekonomics" by economist/trekkie Manu Saadia: none of the writers or showrunners had the faintest idea how the civil society worked. Never crossed th

    • > I read something just devastating in "Trekonomics" by economist/trekkie Manu Saadia: none of the writers or showrunners had the faintest idea how the civil society worked. Never crossed their minds.

      I say this with humor and not as an attack: You had to have someone else tell you that?

      The average Star Trek writer is obviously ignorant across broad swaths of human knowledge. Economics is pretty far down the list. Hell, they're not even particularly good writers even if you ignore all the stuff about h

      • I vaguely recall one DS9 episode with a Ferengi and maybe a doctor(?) and somebody was injured and it took place mostly in a shuttlecraft ... anyway the writers tried to make the Ferengi seem like backwards schmucks but actually they make an excellent case for free market economics.

        Accidentally I think.

        There was one Voyager writer who went on to do many free-market media productions, but - omg Voyager - there's only much one can do.

        I was out when one dude briefly turned into a lizard and had sex with the ca

        • >I was out when one dude briefly turned into a lizard and had sex with the captain - who also turned into a lizard. What the actual fuck ...because OBVIOUSLY if you go faster than warp 10 it causes your body to follow your species future path of evolution for x number of years. That's science!

          There's enough wrong with the premise that you could write large volumes critiquing it., but you'd be wasting your time even as an intellectual exercise. Better just to actually take a course in biology and evolut

  • Star Wars is near 50 years old. Give it a rest already.

  • It took an act of immitigated gall to hold the away-team at bay with a non-function laser; I admire such gall. For me, that was Worf's breakout episode, which had one of Patrick Stewart's best deliveries.

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