Star Trek: 10 Things You Didn't Know About Zephram Cochrane

9. Distinctly Different

Cochrane First Contact
Paramount Pictures

First Contact writers Brannon Braga and Ronald D Moore made the conscious decision that their Cochrane would be markedly different to the version played by Glenn Corbett in Metamorphosis some 29 years earlier.

That older (yet rejuvenated) version wasn't fully defined in the episode which did allow for some breathing room. Initially in First Contact the warp drive creator spent most of the film unconscious with Picard stepping in to sub for the warp flight. During rewrites Moore and Braga moved Zephram Cochrane into a more central role and provided him with an arc and more depth of character. Had the original plan been kept, Cochrane would have woken up as a changed man which the writers felt didn't work.

This meant they could develop James Cromwell's character from a reluctant, money-grabbing alcoholic into the first signs of the pioneer future generations would view him as.

The eighth Star Trek movie allowed for the legend of Cochrane and perhaps those original rose-tinted views from Metamorphosis to be challenged and create a more grounded Doctor Cochrane. This was a character that turned out to be just as fallible as the next person with at least a decent love of 1970's music.

Contributor
Contributor

A Star Trek fan from birth, I love to dive into every aspect of the franchise in front and behind the screen. There's something here that's kept me interested for the best part of four decades! Now I'm getting back into writing and using Star Trek as my first line of literary attack. If I'm not here on WhatCulture then you're more than welcome to come and take a look at my blog, Some Kind of Star Trek at http://SKoST.co.uk or maybe follow me on Twitter as @TheWarpCore. Sometimes I force myself not to talk about Star Trek.