Star Trek Picard: Everything You Need To Know About The Borg

Star Trek: First Contact is a direct sequel to The Best of Both Worlds and it doesn't touch upon the story threads introduced by Hugh. Written by Brannon Braga, Ronald D. Moore and Rick Berman, it does what all good sequels do and it takes the story in a far darker direction than Star Trek had ventured before.

The Borg return to Federation space and begin an onslaught that brings them to the very orbit of Earth, while Starfleet have sidelined the new Enterprise E and her crew, for fear of what Captain Picard will do when facing the collective again. After a brief but explosive fight, the Enterprise (having disobeyed their orders and joined the fight) aids in the destruction of the Cube, but not before a smaller Sphere escapes and disappears back in time.

For those who were discovering the Star Trek franchise through the new Next Generation movies, this is the film that probably hooked them. At the same time, Deep Space Nine and Voyager were on the air, so much like today there was plenty of Trek to choose from. But this was big budget cinema. This was 1996 and this was a horror film disguised as a sci-fi adventure. The Borg, treading water by the end of The Next Generation, returned in full, terrifying force. They are vampires, destructive and immensely powerful. However, First Contact will always be remembered best for the introduction of one of the all-time great Trek villains.

'I am the beginning, the end, the one who is many. I am the Borg.'

Alice Krige's Borg Queen is a seductive and sinister foe for Data in this film. While she is interested only in achieving perfection for the collective and is willing to wipe out humanity to do that, she frames herself as a new mentor for him. She shows seeming fondness and care, guiding him through gruesome skin grafts so that he can better feel emotion and sensation. All the while, she is commanding the drones under her command to spread out on the ship and take the rest of the crew.

Picard leads the fight against them, advising the crew not to hesitate when it comes to shooting at assimilated comrades. His attempts to fight back build on the resentment he already feels and in one of Patrick Stewart's most visceral deliveries, he hisses with seething hatred that he will stop the Borg. He will make them pay.

The Borg transformed from cold, unstoppable automatons to creatures of utter dread in First Contact. The simple plot point (send them back in time) worked beautifully. Gone was the support that the Enterprise could hope from Starfleet. The birth of the Federation itself was under direct threat. The Borg had come to destroy them all. It was a height that they would never again reach as the stories that followed began to veer toward the smaller and less fearsome aspects.