10 One-Off Star Trek Characters Who Never Left
7. Harcourt Fenton Mudd
Harry Mudd was devised by writer Stephen Kandel and was originally proposed to be a part of the second pilot episode for Star Trek. Kandel felt that the cold and alien Talosians had put audiences off, so he wanted to bring in a character who was human, who was a swindler, who was 'the con-man that set up shop as the Wizard of Oz.'
Kandel, after having created the character, was then given one of Gene Roddenberry's original pitch ideas for Star Trek, titled 'The Women', to develop. He quickly combined this character with that script. He had effectively created a space pimp who was renting out intergalactic hookers. William Shatner would later recall that he marveled at the fact NBC allowed the episode to be made at all.
Kandel recalled that Roger C. Carmel was delighted with the character, truly enjoying embodying him. Set against this, as the years went by, work started to dry up for him, while Mudd returned twice more. Once in the episode I, Mudd, and a second time in the episode Mudd's Passion. There were plans for another episode, but Carmel was unavailable.
Despite this, Carmel remains the only guest star, other than Ricardo Montalban as Khan, outside of Enterprise crew members to face off against Kirk on more than one occasion.