10 Reasons Why Star Trek: First Contact Ruined the Borg

It may be an enjoyable action romp but here's ten reasons why Star Trek: First Contact forever ruined the Borg!

With a history that spans nearly half a century, 11 feature films and a combined total of over 700 hour long episodes of television---not all of the Star Trek stories are going to be stellar. In fact some of them are downright bad ("Spock€™s Brain"?). Still, they are all loved in their own way by fans far and wide, including this writer---but that can€™t make the worst of them better, nor can it make the plot holes, inconsistencies and changed premises easier to swallow. One of the worst offenders in Star Trek€™s history is the eighth feature film (second for the crew of the Next Generation) Star Trek: First Contact. A film that, while I enjoyed it, nearly ruined the series€™ most enticing villain. Here I€™ll recap ten reasons First Contact ruined the Borg.

1. Alien 5?

Everything about the Borg in First Contact was a departure from what was established previously---we€™ll get to other details of this later on---one of the most ridiculous of these however, was the shift of the Borg from a Collective intent on assimilating entire cultures in order to gain their technology in service to themselves; into something akin to Ridley Scott€™s Xenomorph designed by H.R. Giger. One of the most menacing aspects of the Borg has always been their cold, calculating methodology. Even in their debut story, Q points out that the Borg aren€™t interested in Picard€™s attempt at peaceful contact and they care nothing for humanity, only their technology and how it may best serve them. In this way the Borg were sort of presented as a type of intergalactic Zombie, undead drones interested only in the technology they can use to perfect their condition. By the time First Contact comes around the Borg€™s motivation of soulless assimilation is gone, replaced by an enemy that resembles the Borg but has elements of the Alien hive from James Cameron€™s sequel to 1979€™s Alien. In fact whenever we are meant to see something from the view of the Borg it is almost like we€™ve been taken out of a Star Trek film and landed on LV-426 with Ripley and a troop of Space Marines on a bug hunt. With this in mind, it€™s not really a surprise to learn that among the first choices to direct the film were both Ridley Scott and James Cameron. The film was given to Jonathan Frakes when the two senior directors proved unavailable.
Contributor
Contributor

A paragon of all things geek, by day Adam repairs computers for kids grades K-12 who go to school online. By night he writes articles about (mostly) Star Trek for What Culture as well as working on several creative projects (http://maddeningmuse.blogspot.com) He lives in Ohio with his Polyamorous life partner and their three children.