Would the Hugh Virus Have Done Anything?

[Christopher]

I will admit that I prefer to assume that "incubated drones" (like Hugh) were simply assimilated drones that were Borgafied at a really early age -- kind of like Seven was -- and so had no memories or identity to return to. The Borg baby from "Q Who" wouldn't have any previous memories or life to build on if we assume that it had been assimilated instead of being always incubated.

But that just seems so inefficient. Why rely exclusively on assimilating babies when you can just harvest gametes from the drones you already have and whip up some test-tube drones? And the Borg are nothing if not efficient. (Well, in theory, anyway.)

While Seven was far more emotional that Hugh was about being removed from the Collective, a huge part of her character was that she couldn't return to being Annika Hansen again and had to find a way to find out who she was now.

I always felt there was an irony there. Hugh had no identity other than as a drone, so his nature was to along with the crowd around him, and so when he was surrounded by individuals aboard the Enterprise, he readily absorbed their individualist values. But Annika was assimilated as a frightened child, undergoing the trauma of having her individuality taken from her by force, so when she was liberated by Voyager's crew, she resisted having another change of identity imposed on her. So Hugh took readily to humanity because of his innate Borgness, while Seven clung to her Borg nature because of her innate humanity.

My rationale is that the overall canon assumption seems to be that all Borg were assimilated at one time or another

That was the overall assumption of Voyager's producers. I'm not convinced that TNG's producers shared that assumption. It wasn't the way I perceived it when I watched TNG in first run back in the day.

, so I don't see the need to add the "incubated drones" that were not exactly stated in canon (as far as I know)

We were shown incubators in "Q Who." It doesn't get any more clear than that. Sure, if you filter that episode through the assumptions added by episodes written years later, you can force it to fit the assumption that all drones are assimilated. But if you'd been watching back in first run and "Q Who" was the only Borg episode you'd ever seen, you would've taken the baby drone in the incubator as exactly what it appeared to be -- an infant created by the Borg to be a drone. That was overt in the original concept, but it got reinterpreted in the revised concept that developed later. That's the trick of studying history -- you have to take care not to impose later assumptions when trying to understand how people saw things at the time. (Though it helps to be old enough to have been there at the time...)

Here's one more thing to consider: In TNG, all Borg makeup was the same. Every drone was just a pale human with machiney bits stuck on. We never saw what we later saw on Voyager, namely drones from multiple different species. Again, the idea of assimilation was paid lip service in dialogue in BOBW and later TNG episodes, but Locutus aside, it was never really used until VGR.

 

[WebLurker]

But that just seems so inefficient. Why rely exclusively on assimilating babies when you can just harvest gametes from the drones you already have and whip up some test-tube drones? And the Borg are nothing if not efficient. (Well, in theory, anyway.)

The reason Borg assimilate is they want to reach perfection. They also seem dependent on that to get new tech and information. Now, could they clone on the side? Maybe. However, I don't recall them stating where the drones originally came from until the assimilation idea was introduced.

Still that is an interesting thought.

I always felt there was an irony there. Hugh had no identity other than as a drone, so his nature was to along with the crowd around him, and so when he was surrounded by individuals aboard the Enterprise, he readily absorbed their individualist values. But Annika was assimilated as a frightened child, undergoing the trauma of having her individuality taken from her by force, so when she was liberated by Voyager's crew, she resisted having another change of identity imposed on her. So Hugh took readily to humanity because of his innate Borgness, while Seven clung to her Borg nature because of her innate humanity.

Very interesting way of looking at that.

That was the overall assumption of Voyager's producers. I'm not convinced that TNG's producers shared that assumption. It wasn't the way I perceived it when I watched TNG in first run back in the day.

As I recall, the TNG characters never learned that much about the Borg in the early encounters. Picard did learn more when assimilated (although he apparently forgot about the Borg Queen until the movie, as the Queen herself complained). So, I do think that gives TNG some wiggle room in regards to the source of the drones.

We were shown incubators in "Q Who." It doesn't get any more clear than that. Sure, if you filter that episode through the assumptions added by episodes written years later, you can force it to fit the assumption that all drones are assimilated. But if you'd been watching back in first run and "Q Who" was the only Borg episode you'd ever seen, you would've taken the baby drone in the incubator as exactly what it appeared to be -- an infant created by the Borg to be a drone. That was overt in the original concept, but it got reinterpreted in the revised concept that developed later. That's the trick of studying history -- you have to take care not to impose later assumptions when trying to understand how people saw things at the time. (Though it helps to be old enough to have been there at the time...)

The TNG crew only find a baby Borg in a chamber. As I recall, they can only speculate about what that means. It's not quite like where they had Q say that the Borg are only interested in technology and we have to jump through hoops to explain it. While the historical method does work for the behind the scenes understanding how the concept evolved over time, there's also the retcon argument; that VOY overwrites the outdated TNG info in that regard.

Here's one more thing to consider: In TNG, all Borg makeup was the same. Every drone was just a pale human with machiney bits stuck on. We never saw what we later saw on Voyager, namely drones from multiple different species. Again, the idea of assimilation was paid lip service in dialogue in BOBW and later TNG episodes, but Locutus aside, it was never really used until VGR.

The Borg were always mostly "pale humans with machiney bits stuck on." In "Regeneration" (ENT), the First Contact Borg found in the beginning are pale humans with machiney bits stuck on, but the dialogue tells us that the two drones are not humans and are in fact from two different species. While there are a few non-"human" Borg in First Contact and VOY, the majority of them have always looked like human cyborgs, even if humans are presumably not very represented in the Collective (given the vast distance of space between Borg-land and Earth and the Borg Queen's lower opinion of humans as drones).

So, I'm not sure how useful that argument is, given that Star Trek has always used "human" aliens a lot across the franchise.

I'm not trying to pick an argument here, just discussing.

 

[DonIago]

Also on a side note, I just find it interesting Hugh was to appear in All Good things in early drafts, I do wish they had kept the BOBW timeline in it.

This is the first I've heard about this. Is any more information available?

 

[JesterFace]

My view on how Hugh's individuality affected the Borg compared to a fresh new assimilated person. (the same theory already mentioned in few posts)

New assimilation > individuality erased > Borg tech applied to the drone.

Hugh > already a member of the hive, but the Borg don't know he has become an individual, no "individuality erasing" required > Hugh plugged back in > individuality spreads to the collective.

 

[Christopher]

The reason Borg assimilate is they want to reach perfection.

All the more reason to selectively breed or genetically engineer their own drones rather than just relying on pot luck.

They also seem dependent on that to get new tech and information.

Yeah, but they still need bodies. Why not use every means of getting them?

However, I don't recall them stating where the drones originally came from until the assimilation idea was introduced.

Yes, they did, in "Q Who." Riker's line when they found the incubator was "From the look of it the Borg are born as a biological life form. It seems that almost immediately after birth they begin artificial implants." It doesn't get more explicit than that. Again, the very concept of assimilation wasn't even introduced until "The Best of Both Worlds." The word was never used in "Q Who." Maurice Hurley's original concept was that the Borg were technology scavengers. As Q put it, "You're nothing to him. He's not interested in your life form.... He's here to analyse your technology." They were a single race that had learned how to merge with technology and now went around the galaxy looking for other technologies that were interesting enough to add to their collection. That was all.

But when Michael Piller took over as showrunner the next season, he decided that concept wasn't good enough to generate more stories. Piller's highest priority was always character; to him, a story didn't matter unless it affected the characters in some way. The Borg of "Q Who" were a completely impersonal threat, not even noticing living beings unless they got in the way of the Borg's technology scavenging. So there was no way they could really drive a character-oriented story. So Piller retconned the Borg into scavengers of both technology and biology, looking for the perfect fusion of both. That way, they could prey on individual people and allow Piller to tell a story that affected the characters personally. And that was what made them viable as a continuing threat. You can't tell a lot of stories about an impersonal force of nature, so Hurley's original concept would never really have worked in the long term without Piller's assimilation retcon.

As I recall, the TNG characters never learned that much about the Borg in the early encounters. Picard did learn more when assimilated (although he apparently forgot about the Borg Queen until the movie, as the Queen herself complained). So, I do think that gives TNG some wiggle room in regards to the source of the drones.

Yes, but that doesn't exclude the possibility of incubated drones. It allows for both interpretations. You prefer an interpretation where the Borg assimilate exclusively, and yes, TNG's portrayal can be retconned into that model. But I think it makes more sense that they'd have both kinds of drone. The Borg's nature is to use every available resource working together toward a unified goal. They don't rely exclusively on biology or technology, but they use a mix of both. They don't rely exclusively on nanotechnology or macrotechnology, but they use a mix of both. So why wouldn't they use a mix of both assimilation and artificial gestation to produce their drone stock? Why rely exclusively on free range meat when they have plenty of tame livestock available for breeding? That seems like an incredible waste of resources.

Plus, of course, the main reason I went for the dual-population approach in Greater Than the Sum is it helps explain the difference in Borg behavior between TNG, where liberated drones were blank slates with no identity, and VGR, where most liberated drones swiftly remembered their past lives and wanted to return to them. In "Descent," it wasn't just Hugh who was like that, it was every Borg aboard his ship. If it had just been Hugh, you could argue that he'd been assimilated as an infant, but why would a whole ship of drones all be the same way? "Descent" only makes sense if there are entire cubes whose populations are bred from birth as "Q Who" suggested.

The Borg were always mostly "pale humans with machiney bits stuck on." In "Regeneration" (ENT), the First Contact Borg found in the beginning are pale humans with machiney bits stuck on, but the dialogue tells us that the two drones are not humans and are in fact from two different species.

Actually those drones do seem to have brow-ridge prosthetics similar to those seen elsewhere for Tarkaleans, though it's hard to be certain.

While there are a few non-"human" Borg in First Contact and VOY, the majority of them have always looked like human cyborgs, even if humans are presumably not very represented in the Collective (given the vast distance of space between Borg-land and Earth and the Borg Queen's lower opinion of humans as drones).

No, in VGR the individual drones often did show features of other species -- Klingon, Romulan, Bajoran, Hirogen, various Delta Quadrant races, depending on what was specified in the script. It's hard to tell under the machinery, but you can see the differences in the makeup in episodes like "Unity," "Infinite Regress," "Survival Instinct," and "Unimatrix Zero." Some examples are shown here:

http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Borg_species
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Unnamed_Borg

This is what I'm saying about the way the concept evolved over time. The Borg makeup underwent a complete reinvention between TNG and First Contact/VGR. The Borg went from pasty-white to veiny, the concept of nanoprobes and assimilation tubules was retconned in, the technology became less clunky and more Gigeresque. And part of that refinement was that Michael Westmore was finally able to show the species diversity of assimilated drones in a way he hadn't done on TNG.

I actually remember thinking this a few times back in the day -- if the Borg assimilated drones from other species, why did they all look like pasty-skinned humans? I wished we would see drones with recognizable features of other species. (I no doubt got the idea from Peter David's novel Vendetta, which featured a Ferengi DaiMon assimilated to be the replacement for Locutus.) And when VGR came along, I finally got my wish.

 

[WebLurker]

All the more reason to selectively breed or genetically engineer their own drones rather than just relying on pot luck.

Hmm. Fair point.

Yeah, but they still need bodies. Why not use every means of getting them?

Sure. It makes sense. The question being, would the Borg think to do that? As I understand it, the only way they get new tech and ideas for using is by assimilation (so, they might have tech A and tech B, but unless they assimilate a scientist working on certain experiments, they wouldn't think to put those together to make tech C). I riddle for the ages, I suppose.

Yes, they did, in "Q Who." Riker's line when they found the incubator was "From the look of it the Borg are born as a biological life form. It seems that almost immediately after birth they begin artificial implants." It doesn't get more explicit than that. Again, the very concept of assimilation wasn't even introduced until "The Best of Both Worlds." The word was never used in "Q Who." Maurice Hurley's original concept was that the Borg were technology scavengers. As Q put it, "You're nothing to him. He's not interested in your life form.... He's here to analyse your technology." They were a single race that had learned how to merge with technology and now went around the galaxy looking for other technologies that were interesting enough to add to their collection. That was all.

I won't disagree that was the original intent. I guess I'm not sure if we need to force fit it into the zombie Borg that they were retconned to always be (since that was far more detailed and explicit). As far as Riker goes, he was only making a guess based on what he saw (with no context as to what was waht), without any way to prove it (and his description is accurate to how Borg drones are createds, regardless of the incubated or zombie model). Q is a tricky one, although he's not exactly an accurate source of information.

You do have to wonder if the techno-scavengers the Borg were originally intended to be even holds up in the original episode. The Enterprise-D is far less advanced than the Borg ship and tech was. Why would they want to have it? The later revelations that they also want to assimilate people into drones and add tech to their own ships, reprocessing it, solves this "question."

But when Michael Piller took over as showrunner the next season, he decided that concept wasn't good enough to generate more stories. Piller's highest priority was always character; to him, a story didn't matter unless it affected the characters in some way. The Borg of "Q Who" were a completely impersonal threat, not even noticing living beings unless they got in the way of the Borg's technology scavenging. So there was no way they could really drive a character-oriented story. So Piller retconned the Borg into scavengers of both technology and biology, looking for the perfect fusion of both. That way, they could prey on individual people and allow Piller to tell a story that affected the characters personally. And that was what made them viable as a continuing threat. You can't tell a lot of stories about an impersonal force of nature, so Hurley's original concept would never really have worked in the long term without Piller's assimilation retcon.

Wasn't the Borg Queen added for that reason, too? To give the Borg a face and make them more than a force of nature?

Yes, but that doesn't exclude the possibility of incubated drones. It allows for both interpretations.

I will agree with this (I'm only asking questions for the sake of an interesting discussion).

You prefer an interpretation where the Borg assimilate exclusively, and yes, TNG's portrayal can be retconned into that model.

That's nice, since it allows people with different perspectives on the subject.

But I think it makes more sense that they'd have both kinds of drone. The Borg's nature is to use every available resource working together toward a unified goal. They don't rely exclusively on biology or technology, but they use a mix of both. They don't rely exclusively on nanotechnology or macrotechnology, but they use a mix of both. So why wouldn't they use a mix of both assimilation and artificial gestation to produce their drone stock? Why rely exclusively on free range meat when they have plenty of tame livestock available for breeding? That seems like an incredible waste of resources.

So, how would the Borg create incubated drones? Cloning? Sexual reproduction (ick!).

Plus, of course, the main reason I went for the dual-population approach in Greater Than the Sum is it helps explain the difference in Borg behavior between TNG, where liberated drones were blank slates with no identity, and VGR, where most liberated drones swiftly remembered their past lives and wanted to return to them. In "Descent," it wasn't just Hugh who was like that, it was every Borg aboard his ship. If it had just been Hugh, you could argue that he'd been assimilated as an infant, but why would a whole ship of drones all be the same way? "Descent" only makes sense if there are entire cubes whose populations are bred from birth as "Q Who" suggested.

I will agree the large number of blank slate drones in one place is the trickiest point of the "all are zombie Borg" position. I guess, given the large number of drones in existence and their extensive work, they could have a sizable number that were too young to recall their previous identity. We're also assuming that all of Lore's drones were all blank slates. I could see some remembering their former lives but not feeling able to return to them for whatever reason (guilt, fear of how they would be treated, too many haunting memories, inability to access their homeworlds, etc.). I'm not going to be dogmatic about it, but it is an interesting theory, at least.

Actually those drones do seem to have brow-ridge prosthetics similar to those seen elsewhere for Tarkaleans, though it's hard to be certain.

I'll have to watch for that.

No, in VGR the individual drones often did show features of other species -- Klingon, Romulan, Bajoran, Hirogen, various Delta Quadrant races, depending on what was specified in the script. It's hard to tell under the machinery, but you can see the differences in the makeup in episodes like "Unity," "Infinite Regress," "Survival Instinct," and "Unimatrix Zero." Some examples are shown here:

http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Borg_species
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Unnamed_Borg

Okay. I haven't had a chance to see some of those shows yet. I was aware that VOY did make good on First Contact showing multiple aliens as part of the Collective, but I did recall most of them having more normal human features under the implants. Maybe I miss-remembered how many.

This is what I'm saying about the way the concept evolved over time.

Sure, I can get that, I just think it's more fun to look at it from "in-universe." Case in point, just saying that the filmmakers changed their minds, the discussion is done. But discussing if the two models can be reconciled (by assuming that one is the same thing from a different perspective, suggesting they could co-exist, etc.), that's what makes the conversation interesting, IMHO.

The Borg makeup underwent a complete reinvention between TNG and First Contact/VGR. The Borg went from pasty-white to veiny, the concept of nanoprobes and assimilation tubules was retconned in, the technology became less clunky and more Gigeresque. And part of that refinement was that Michael Westmore was finally able to show the species diversity of assimilated drones in a way he hadn't done on TNG.

Since the Borg are so tech based, I think that helps soften the changes; since their constantly adding new tech, we can assume that the changes are part of upgrades, new methods, etc. In fact, thanks to the VOY flasbacks with Seven, we know that the VOY-style Borg were in existence with the TNG Borg, which I think is cool. (Now, if only we could've seen a VOY Borg and a TNG Borg in the same scene!)

I actually remember thinking this a few times back in the day -- if the Borg assimilated drones from other species, why did they all look like pasty-skinned humans? I wished we would see drones with recognizable features of other species. (I no doubt got the idea from Peter David's novel Vendetta, which featured a Ferengi DaiMon assimilated to be the replacement for Locutus.) And when VGR came along, I finally got my wish.

Well, it's good that they satisfied you on that count.

Are you sure the got the idea from the novel, though? I didn't think the TV show producers and the book publishers worked together that much, unlike what Disney and LucasFilm are doing with Star Wars.

 

[Christopher]

Sure. It makes sense. The question being, would the Borg think to do that? As I understand it, the only way they get new tech and ideas for using is by assimilation (so, they might have tech A and tech B, but unless they assimilate a scientist working on certain experiments, they wouldn't think to put those together to make tech C). I riddle for the ages, I suppose.

In vitro fertilization isn't that advanced a technology, certainly not compared to warp drive or transporters. I find it impossible that they've never come across it after assimilating thousands of civilizations.

I won't disagree that was the original intent. I guess I'm not sure if we need to force fit it into the zombie Borg that they were retconned to always be (since that was far more detailed and explicit).

I don't think my solution is a "force fit." Just because the drones we saw in Borg territory in the Delta Quadrant all seemed to be assimilated, that doesn't mean there couldn't be other types of drone elsewhere. As I said, it stands to reason that the war with Species 8472 would've depleted their population severely in their home territory, giving them a need to assimilate heavily to repopulate, and that would result in a predominantly assimilated drone population in the core territories, while incubated drones would still survive in more distant parts of the galaxy unaffected by the war.

That's the thing -- Borg territory is so immense that it makes no sense to expect it to be absolutely uniform. The nature of the Borg is to adapt. It follows that Borg populations in different parts of the galaxy would adapt differently to fit the problems and needs they encountered.

You do have to wonder if the techno-scavengers the Borg were originally intended to be even holds up in the original episode. The Enterprise-D is far less advanced than the Borg ship and tech was. Why would they want to have it?

They weren't sure they did, at first. That's why they scanned the ship, sent drones over to look around, and carved a core sample out of the saucer. They then decided that there was something there worth having. Maybe it's not even a question of advancement. Scavengers don't always have to have the best new things; they just need tech that's functional and can be adapted to fit their needs. Or maybe it's a matter of different approaches. There's no simplistic, linear scale of more/less advanced technology; different cultures can approach technology in very different ways, and a culture that's "less advanced" in some ways can have its own innovations that the "more advanced" culture never thought of. Like how the Native Americans didn't have as much in the way of metallurgy as Eurasians and never developed the wheel as more than a toy, but had far more sophisticated agricultural knowledge and worked better with organic and stone building materials.

Wasn't the Borg Queen added for that reason, too? To give the Borg a face and make them more than a force of nature?

Basically, yes -- though in what I always felt was a more simplistic sense, the need to have a main villain for the movie heroes to play against and defeat at the end.

I will agree the large number of blank slate drones in one place is the trickiest point of the "all are zombie Borg" position. I guess, given the large number of drones in existence and their extensive work, they could have a sizable number that were too young to recall their previous identity.

All on the same ship at the same time? What, was it their day-care cube once upon a time?

We're also assuming that all of Lore's drones were all blank slates. I could see some remembering their former lives but not feeling able to return to them for whatever reason (guilt, fear of how they would be treated, too many haunting memories, inability to access their homeworlds, etc.).

Not "assuming." That means believing something without question, without considering alternatives. I've considered the alternative and I just don't think it's as probable. The story of "Descent" is that the individualized drones were directionless and unable to cope with individuality until Lore came along to lead them, which is why they were so susceptible to his cult leadership. If some of them had had prior experience with individuality, then they could've given the other drones the direction they needed. It has nothing to do with returning to their former lives; it has to do with teaching the rest of the drones what it means to be an individual. So I just don't think that interpretation fits the episode. Not an assumption -- a reasoned conclusion.

Sure, I can get that, I just think it's more fun to look at it from "in-universe." Case in point, just saying that the filmmakers changed their minds, the discussion is done. But discussing if the two models can be reconciled (by assuming that one is the same thing from a different perspective, suggesting they could co-exist, etc.), that's what makes the conversation interesting, IMHO.

And that's where we differ. I'm certainly not averse to in-universe reconciliations for fictional inconsistencies; heck, that's essentially what I do for a living. But I don't think those reconciliations should be monolithic. I think reality is complicated and nuanced and messy, that everything has facets and variations. Exploring those complexities that tend to get glossed over on TV is what interests me as a novelist, because I think it makes the fictional concepts more believable -- and because uniformity bores me. If the Borg drones in the center of their territory are different from the drones on the outskirts, and if that difference gives us insight into how they operate and why they do things, that's an idea worth developing. There's more potential in that variation than there would be in absolute uniformity.

It also helps underline a point a lot of fans overlook -- that Federation space is very, very far from Borg space, that from their perspective it's a remote territory way out on the fringes of the explored galaxy, and therefore not really all that important to their plans. That's why they only send one cube at a time to assimilate the UFP -- because they need the bulk of their cubes to do higher-priority work closer to home. So I like the idea that the cubes near Federation space are an outlier population.

Are you sure the got the idea from the novel, though? I didn't think the TV show producers and the book publishers worked together that much, unlike what Disney and LucasFilm are doing with Star Wars.

I didn't say they got the idea from Vendetta, I said I did. Reading Vendetta was what put the idea of multispecies drones into my head, and that made me wonder later why all the drones we saw in TNG looked the same.

 

[WebLurker]

In vitro fertilization isn't that advanced a technology, certainly not compared to warp drive or transporters. I find it impossible that they've never come across it after assimilating thousands of civilizations.

Okay, makes sense.

I don't think my solution is a "force fit." Just because the drones we saw in Borg territory in the Delta Quadrant all seemed to be assimilated, that doesn't mean there couldn't be other types of drone elsewhere. As I said, it stands to reason that the war with Species 8472 would've depleted their population severely in their home territory, giving them a need to assimilate heavily to repopulate, and that would result in a predominantly assimilated drone population in the core territories, while incubated drones would still survive in more distant parts of the galaxy unaffected by the war.

I did say before that if one accepted both versions coexisted, I did like your take on it all. I guess I'd prefer to retcon the older version, given I went into those episodes with the idea that they had "always" been zombie Borgs (I think "Best of Both Worlds" might've been my first Borg show). That may be part of the disconnect. You saw the changes happen live. I only came in after the change was established.

That's the thing -- Borg territory is so immense that it makes no sense to expect it to be absolutely uniform. The nature of the Borg is to adapt. It follows that Borg populations in different parts of the galaxy would adapt differently to fit the problems and needs they encountered.

That makes sense, except for one point. It was my understanding that the Collective adapted universally across the whole board and that something that one part of the Collective learned was transmitted across the hive mind. There have been exceptions (like how First Contact Borg and Queen onboard the Enterprise-E were not part of the 21st century Collective, meaning there were two at once with no hive mind connectors and the survivors in "Regeneration" [ENT] were clearly operating as part of a mini independent Collective that seemed to be trying to get to 21st-century Borg space and presumably be re-assimilated into that eras Collective) but I'm not sure if the hive mind would allow for what you're suggesting. Am I missing anything?

(Your model sounds a little like what the Shanterverse novels did. At least one outright claimed that all the differences of the Borg were explained by different branches of the Collective.)

They weren't sure they did, at first. That's why they scanned the ship, sent drones over to look around, and carved a core sample out of the saucer. They then decided that there was something there worth having. Maybe it's not even a question of advancement. Scavengers don't always have to have the best new things; they just need tech that's functional and can be adapted to fit their needs. Or maybe it's a matter of different approaches. There's no simplistic, linear scale of more/less advanced technology; different cultures can approach technology in very different ways, and a culture that's "less advanced" in some ways can have its own innovations that the "more advanced" culture never thought of. Like how the Native Americans didn't have as much in the way of metallurgy as Eurasians and never developed the wheel as more than a toy, but had far more sophisticated agricultural knowledge and worked better with organic and stone building materials.

Fair point.

Basically, yes -- though in what I always felt was a more simplistic sense, the need to have a main villain for the movie heroes to play against and defeat at the end.

I maybe reading too much into it, but I get the impression that you're not the biggest fan of the Borg Queen. If so, is there something you think would've worked better?

All on the same ship at the same time? What, was it their day-care cube once upon a time?

That would be a funny explanation!

Like I said, I agree it is a weak point in my theory, but, given my biases, it's something I don't mind glossing over. Your mileage may vary.

Not "assuming." That means believing something without question, without considering alternatives. I've considered the alternative and I just don't think it's as probable. The story of "Descent" is that the individualized drones were directionless and unable to cope with individuality until Lore came along to lead them, which is why they were so susceptible to his cult leadership. If some of them had had prior experience with individuality, then they could've given the other drones the direction they needed. It has nothing to do with returning to their former lives; it has to do with teaching the rest of the drones what it means to be an individual. So I just don't think that interpretation fits the episode. Not an assumption -- a reasoned conclusion.

Poor choice of words. I should've used something else.

Fair counterpoint. I would suggest that even people with lives can feel lost and pointless and be drawn into a cult (it happens in real life, sad to say), but you make a good argument.

And that's where we differ. I'm certainly not averse to in-universe reconciliations for fictional inconsistencies; heck, that's essentially what I do for a living. But I don't think those reconciliations should be monolithic. I think reality is complicated and nuanced and messy, that everything has facets and variations. Exploring those complexities that tend to get glossed over on TV is what interests me as a novelist, because I think it makes the fictional concepts more believable -- and because uniformity bores me. If the Borg drones in the center of their territory are different from the drones on the outskirts, and if that difference gives us insight into how they operate and why they do things, that's an idea worth developing. There's more potential in that variation than there would be in absolute uniformity.

Good argument. I kind of like the Borg more uniform, since I think it provides just enough of the impersonal force of nature that they started out with and makes them scarier (I think the idea of being assimilated into a cyber-zombie is scarier than just being killed and having my tech stoled), but you present you opinion well, and I'm not sure that you're not wrong.

It also helps underline a point a lot of fans overlook -- that Federation space is very, very far from Borg space, that from their perspective it's a remote territory way out on the fringes of the explored galaxy, and therefore not really all that important to their plans. That's why they only send one cube at a time to assimilate the UFP -- because they need the bulk of their cubes to do higher-priority work closer to home. So I like the idea that the cubes near Federation space are an outlier population.

Okay.

I didn't say they got the idea from Vendetta, I said I did. Reading Vendetta was what put the idea of multispecies drones into my head, and that made me wonder later why all the drones we saw in TNG looked the same.[/QUOTE]

Whoops, did I ever misread that! Sorry.

Yeah, that was an interesting idea in the book, with Vastiator, or whatever he was called. While its version of the Borg didn't quite mesh with the TV show, it was still interesting for what it was (with the idea of being in the Collective like being in a sensory deprivation chamber, unlike what we see in the TV show).

 

[Christopher]

I did say before that if one accepted both versions coexisted, I did like your take on it all. I guess I'd prefer to retcon the older version, given I went into those episodes with the idea that they had "always" been zombie Borgs (I think "Best of Both Worlds" might've been my first Borg show). That may be part of the disconnect. You saw the changes happen live. I only came in after the change was established.

I figured as much. Although, honestly, for years I assumed that the later FC/VGR version was the default, and it wasn't until later that I looked back at it and realized "Hey, wait, it was different at the start."

That makes sense, except for one point. It was my understanding that the Collective adapted universally across the whole board and that something that one part of the Collective learned was transmitted across the hive mind.

Yes, of course the knowledge would spread universally, but that doesn't mean it would make sense to use it the same way everywhere. Like I said, different adaptations for different environments, different needs. Your heart cells and your skin cells all contain your complete genetic code in their nuclei, but they express different parts of it because they have different functions to perform.

I maybe reading too much into it, but I get the impression that you're not the biggest fan of the Borg Queen. If so, is there something you think would've worked better?

I do think it oversimplified the Borg a bit, and anthropomorphized them more than I preferred. But I understand the reasons for doing it. It seems to be a recurring pattern for faceless-mass enemies in SFTV to eventually get a more humanized spokesbeing to freshen the storytelling -- Davros for the Daleks, the Queen for the Borg, the humanoid Replicators for Stargate.

Yeah, that was an interesting idea in the book, with Vastiator, or whatever he was called.

Vastator. Which, surprisingly, turns out to be Latin for "destroyer" (same root as "devastate"). "Locutus" is Latin for "having spoken," which makes sense (inasmuch as aliens using Latin ever makes sense) because his role was to speak for the Collective. But Vastator was supposed to be a replacement for Locutus, a new spokesbeing -- so why name him "destroyer?" All I can think of is that it could be considered a Latin translation of "Marauder," which was the class of ship that DaiMon Turane commanded before his assimilation. But it's hard to see an in-story reason for that.

 

[socialjiism]

This is the first I've heard about this. Is any more information available?

It comes from the "50 year mission" books that were published this year. Braga says Hugh would have been aboard to save Picard during the aborted fourth timeline that would have revisited the events of BOBW. In what way, he doesn't elaborate.

 

[Emperor Norton]

It comes from the "50 year mission" books that were published this year. Braga says Hugh would have been aboard to save Picard during the aborted fourth timeline that would have revisited the events of BOBW. In what way, he doesn't elaborate.

It seems like maybe he would have been adopted onto the ship in this timeline, instead of given back to the Borg? But that is just a guess.

 

[socialjiism]

Well, like I said, if it arises from within a pure drone with no prior personality, then that might make it different than a pre-existing identity that comes from outside the Collective and is suppressed. I think that ideas that come from within ourselves can have more transformative power than ideas that come to us from outside. Or, to look at it another way, think of it as an autoimmune disorder rather than an infection, an attack from within rather than without.




Yeah, but the difference is that the TNG episodes only talked about it while the later stuff showed it. Theory vs. practice. In TNG, there was never any indication that Hugh or the "Descent" drones or any drones other than Locutus had any prior identities. Yes, they talked in the abstract about assimilating humans and so forth, but they didn't show it except with Picard. Voyager actually showed it and used it on a regular basis. The basic concept was the same, but the way it was handled was completely opposite. When Hugh was severed from the Collective, all he wanted was to return to it. He'd never known anything else. The whole story of "Descent" depended on the fact that the drones had no identity except as drones and thus were easy marks for Lore. But when drones in VGR were severed from the Collective, they usually remembered their former lives and identities, with Seven being the exception because she'd been assimilated so young.




This has nothing to do with judging. Pointing out a difference between two things does not require picking a winner and a loser. The point is merely to understand the difference. In this case, I think it's interesting to track how the concept of the Borg evolved over the course of the franchise. Understanding the change in how the writers approached it at different times helps explain why some episodes' approach seems incompatible with others'.

This is all fair enough. By the way, you're a published Trek author? I didn't know contributors to Trek hang around here. What Borg stories have you written?

 

[socialjiism]

It seems like maybe he would have been adopted onto the ship in this timeline, instead of given back to the Borg? But that is just a guess.

AFAIK the plan was for Picard to jump into the BOBW time period the same as the other three periods, not an alternative universe. But they've never elaborated and the book doesn't either. I imagine it wasn't very developed.

 

[Christopher]

This is all fair enough. By the way, you're a published Trek author? I didn't know contributors to Trek hang around here.

There used to be more, but now it's just a few of us. And we mainly frequent the Trek Literature forum.

What Borg stories have you written?

My only Borg-related work was the TNG novel Greater Than the Sum -- just the prelude to David Mack's Destiny trilogy, which was the decisive Borg epic in the novel continuity. It was pretty much my one chance to address all my outstanding questions about the Borg's inconsistencies and enigmas, so I threw it all in there.

Although I guess you could also count my story "Brief Candle" in the Voyager: Distant Shores anthology, a direct followup to "Survival Instinct" focusing on the Bajoran ex-drone who chose to live out her final days aboard Voyager.

 

[WebLurker]

I figured as much. Although, honestly, for years I assumed that the later FC/VGR version was the default, and it wasn't until later that I looked back at it and realized "Hey, wait, it was different at the start."

Interesting, similar starting point, but different conclusion.

Yes, of course the knowledge would spread universally, but that doesn't mean it would make sense to use it the same way everywhere. Like I said, different adaptations for different environments, different needs. Your heart cells and your skin cells all contain your complete genetic code in their nuclei, but they express different parts of it because they have different functions to perform.

Huh. Okay. I'm still not sure about that, but I think I get what you're saying. Interesting way of looking at it, if nothing else.

I do think it oversimplified the Borg a bit, and anthropomorphized them more than I preferred. But I understand the reasons for doing it. It seems to be a recurring pattern for faceless-mass enemies in SFTV to eventually get a more humanized spokesbeing to freshen the storytelling -- Davros for the Daleks, the Queen for the Borg, the humanoid Replicators for Stargate.

Okay.

Vastator. Which, surprisingly, turns out to be Latin for "destroyer" (same root as "devastate"). "Locutus" is Latin for "having spoken," which makes sense (inasmuch as aliens using Latin ever makes sense) because his role was to speak for the Collective. But Vastator was supposed to be a replacement for Locutus, a new spokesbeing -- so why name him "destroyer?" All I can think of is that it could be considered a Latin translation of "Marauder," which was the class of ship that DaiMon Turane commanded before his assimilation. But it's hard to see an in-story reason for that.

From a writing standpoint, Vastator seemed to bring more destruction than anything else. Maybe that was the idea? (Unless it's just because Picard had a Latin Borg name and it was assumed that Borg like him had them as well. The Shatnerverse novel The Return -- which ran with the idea of the Borg creating representative Borg, unlike the TV shows -- had a Romulan "Speaker" Borg called "Vox," once again using Latin.)

Although, yeah, the use of Latin, really doesn't make much sense in that novel. In Picard's case, he was speaking to Earth primarily, where Latin was spoken (albeit dead outside of academics), so I could see the Borg giving him a name that would mean something to the Federation. Since the Ferengi never spoke Latin, It really doesn't follow at at. Maybe we're not "supposed to know" it's Latin?

Actually, the really funny thing about names in that novel (to me ) is that one of the Ferengi is called Martok, a name with that spelling that would be used later on for a Klingon character on DS9.

 

[Christopher]

I can buy the Borg getting the name "Locutus" from Picard's classically educated mind and having him use it to address humanity. But it always seemed odd to me that they gave their spokesdrone a name at all, instead of just having it introduce itself as "Verbal Interface 001" or something. (Or a higher number if it was a technique they'd used before.) And giving subsequent interfaces different names, instead of just calling them all Locutus or Voice Interface ###, seems too impractical for the Borg. After all, Borg consider individuals to be just interchangeable parts. If you replace one of your car's headlights, you don't give it a new name. It's just a headlight.

 

[Emperor Norton]

I can buy the Borg getting the name "Locutus" from Picard's classically educated mind and having him use it to address humanity. But it always seemed odd to me that they gave their spokesdrone a name at all, instead of just having it introduce itself as "Verbal Interface 001" or something. (Or a higher number if it was a technique they'd used before.) And giving subsequent interfaces different names, instead of just calling them all Locutus or Voice Interface ###, seems too impractical for the Borg. After all, Borg consider individuals to be just interchangeable parts. If you replace one of your car's headlights, you don't give it a new name. It's just a headlight.

Locutus may be a word in the language of the originator race of the Borg. Or maybe it is a numerical designation: Drone 1,215,321,202,119; 12-15-3-21-20-21-19; L-o-c-u-t-u-s. Or maybe it is something from Picard's mind somewhere.

 

[socialjiism]

Locutus sounds cool, so I guess that's the reason. I still get chills watching the scenes of Locutus in BOBW, Emissary and First Contact

 

[JesterFace]

The virus that Geordi and Data desinged might have worked. Not necessarily, but they had an advantage, after Picard saw the desing, he had the knowledge how the Borg might react to it, he had been a Borg. I'm not saying it would have been a 100% success story, but it had potential. Even if the Borg didn't suffer a complete systems failure, it might have made them weaker, an attack by Federation and maybe some allies against a crippled Borg might have wiped the Borg out of existence.

 

[Paradise City]

I can buy the Borg getting the name "Locutus" from Picard's classically educated mind and having him use it to address humanity. But it always seemed odd to me that they gave their spokesdrone a name at all, instead of just having it introduce itself as "Verbal Interface 001" or something. (Or a higher number if it was a technique they'd used before.) And giving subsequent interfaces different names, instead of just calling them all Locutus or Voice Interface ###, seems too impractical for the Borg. After all, Borg consider individuals to be just interchangeable parts. If you replace one of your car's headlights, you don't give it a new name. It's just a headlight.

I can buy Picard getting the name Locutus given that it turns out a sultry dominatrix type with a quick wit runs the borg.

 

[Emperor Norton]

I can buy Picard getting the name Locutus given that it turns out a sultry dominatrix type with a quick wit runs the borg.

Brannon Braga?