10 Times Star Trek Broke The Fourth Wall

Just like the ones found in Christmas crackers, the groan-inducing joke is a concept we can all share, having been the victim of one on many occasions in each of our lives. Within the realm of film and television, there’s nothing more groan-inducing than crowbarring a reference to the title within a script, and in First Contact, the Star Trek franchise has you covered.

One of the better entries in Star Trek’s decidedly mixed bag of movies, First Contact finds The Borg travelling back in time to prevent Zephram Cochrane’s first warp flight, curtailing First Contact with the Vulcans and ultimately ending The Federation before it even begins. Witnessing Earth turning into a Borg sphere before their very eyes, The Enterprise follows the Borg through the time portal with the intention to fix the timeline.

Whilst half of the crew stay on board the ship to defend it against a Borg incursion, Riker and Troi beam down to the surface to ensure that Cochrane’s flight goes off without a hitch. Having grown up on stories of the hero who began The Federation, the pair are shocked to find a grumpy alcoholic more interested in rock and roll than engineering.

Seeing no way to help him without breaking the Temporal Prime Directive, the officers reveal their origin, and the importance of his mission. Trying to wrap his head around it all, with possibly the cheesiest line in all of sci-fi, Cochrane asks: “You people, you're all astronauts on... some kind of star trek?” Groan.