The BORG
First seen in "Q-Who?",
the Borg are a race of cybernetically enhanced humanoids. They
implant on themselves cybernetics parts which allow them to
communicate by the use of subspace signals ("The Best of
Both Worlds"). Being strictly connected one to the
other, they lost their individuality and became a collective,
thinking and acting as a single. Their thoughts are quick, their
reaction speed is disarming; they are able to adapt to almost
every weapon after it is used once or twice. They have a lone
purpose: assimilating the other life-forms making them borgs.
They appear in the
following episodes:
-
- TNG
"Q-Who?" : Q takes the Enterprise
to the J25 sector to demonstrate that the
Federation needs his help; in facts, the
Enterprise crew encounters a Borg ship (which is
cube-shaped); the Borg are too powerful, the
Enterprise cannot face them.
- TNG
"The Best of Both Worlds" I & II
: the Borg Collective is back: they scoop out the
entire colony of Jouret IV, destroy a Federation
starship and pursue the Enterprise; they kidnap
Picard, make him a Borg, Locutus, whose job in
the Collective is to speak for the Borg in all
their communications, and set course to the 001
sector, the Earth system.
- TNG
"I, Borg" : the crew finds a
critically-injured Borg in the crash of a Borg
scout ship; he is defined Three Of Five, but
acquires a new individuality staying with
individuals.
- TNG
"Descent" I & II : the
Enterprise receives a distress call from Ohniaka
III; they find a huge ship which they do not
recognize; an away team beams down on the base
and find a group of Borg; it comes out that those
Borg became individuals because of Three Of Five
(now named Hugh) return to his ship.
- DS9
"Emissary" : there is a reminder of
the facts happened in "The Best of Both
Worlds" in the teaser of the Deep Space Nine
pilot.
They think and act as a
Collective thanks to subspace communications present as a net
between them. Their purpose is to improve themselves by
assimilating the other life-forms.
They`re totally rational:
there are no emotions in the Collective. This rationality can be
seen in the shape of their ships: they are huge cubes and are
almost undestructable; they are vulnerable at the highest EM
band, but they quickly adapt to these frequences. They are able
to produce superabundant energy, so they can work even if the 78
percent of the ship is inoperative. They can use impulse speed,
warp speed and their special speed known as "Transwarp
Speed".
In "Descent",
however, we see a new type of ship, which is not symmetrical but
very huge, just like the cube vessels. This change of shape seems
to be a reaction to the Borg`s new individuality, but it may just
be an improvement of the Borg technologies.
It is almost certain that
the Borg Homeworld is in the delta quadrant. The Starfleet thinks
that the Borg drones grow as normal humanoids in the first period
of their life. Then they are implanted cybernetical parts and are
finally put to their place in the Collective. Each Borg has
different devices on his body, so each one has a different job in
the Borg society. It is supposed that the Borg are able to make
their drones grow to adult beings within months. We do not know
how many years a Borg life is long. The Collective is not able to
disconnect one Borg from the others in normal situations: it
would be like disconnecting one arm, we can`t do it. But if a
Borg is injured, he immediately disintegrates leaving nothing to
the Collective`s enemies` scientists.
The Borg collective
consciousness is divided in sub-commands: defense, communication,
navigation. Main commands are protected with an access password.
I heard a Borg
saying "I"; what`s the matter?
Have for sure you`ve just
met an individual Borg. A small part of the Borg became
individuals as Hugh came back to his ship. His individuality
affected his companions and they acquired emotions, too; Hugh
took the leadership of the Renegade Borg after Lore`s defeat.
But in "The
Best of Both Worlds" Locutus-Picard often says
"I": why?
There is only an answer:
the assimilation process is gradual and Locutus wasn`t completely
connected to the Collective.
Why do we never see
Ferengi Borgs, Cardassian Borgs and so on?
Maybe the Borg only
assimilate humanoids. A human brain is ok to be assimilated; a
Ferengi`s one probably isn`t. However, I`ll not astonish if I see
a Klingon Borg or something similar in the next TNG movie!
There's another possibility: maybe the assimilation process makes
all the races similar.
The next TNG movie, whose
last working title is "First Contact" after
"Resurrection", "Destinies", "Borg"
and "Generations II", will be about the Borg
Collective, which will be back to annihilate the Federation.
There will be spectacular battle scenes and a lot of action! It
is uncertain whether Picard will have a love story. Alfre Woodard
has joined the cast as the assistant of Zephram Cochrane, the
inventor of warp drive. Time travel is involved, as you can
understand; the result, as said by one of the producers, will be
something like "The Best of Both Worlds" and "Yesterday's
Enterprise". The movie is being directed by Jonathan
Frakes (William T. Riker) and has a big budget: 40,000,000 $!!!
Here I list the phases
the movie is passing; the stressed one is the current phase.
-
- PRE-PRODUCTION:
- it includes
the writing of the script and the definition of
other important stuff; this phase probably ended
in the first part of March 1996;
this
phase includes the construction of the sets and
other material, and, most important, the filming
of the scenes! It started in the first part of
April;
- POST-PRODUCTION:
- it means the
including of the special effects in the film, the
final editing and the other things which will
make this movie GREAT. We don`t know when it`s
gonna starting;
- THE BIG
SCREEN:
- the most
important! We will probably be able to enjoy the
new Next Generation movie in the 1996
Thanksgiving period.
It is sure that Michael
Dorn (Worf) will be in the cast. YES, THERE'S THE
ENTERPRISE-E, TOO!!!
There has been a lot of rumor about a Borg Queen: it's
confirmed! Playing the "vicious and hostile" Queen...
British actress Alice Krige ("Ghost Story",
"Sleepwalkers"). There are several unconfirmed news
about this movie; for example, they say the new Enterprise will
appear only in the second half of the movie and that there'll be
Borg spheres, too.
These, however, are unconfirmed.
"Resistance is
futile"; everyone knows this one
"Strength is
irrelevant";
"Death is
irrelevant";
"Your life, as it
has been, is over";
"You will lower your
shields";
"From this time
forward, you will service us"; include a pause among
"service" and "us" to put in more emphasis
SECTION
6: HISTORY OF THE BORG
Little is known about the Borg prior to the first encounter in
2365 by the USS Enterprise, (except for several colonies which
were destroyed in 2364 along the Federation / Romulan Neutral
Zone, their destruction later being attributed to the Borg). It
is a fact that their home was originally in the Delta Quadrant,
but they roam the galaxy looking for new technology to assimilate
into their collective. Their ability to adapt instantly to
counter any new threat makes them probably the greatest threat to
the Federation ever. It is important to note that the Federation
would not have encountered the Borg quite so soon had the being
known as 'Q' not brought both species together by throwing the
Enterprise light years off course to System J-25. The Enterprise
was only saved from destruction by the intervention of 'Q' who
sent them back to the Alpha Quadrant. At this point, Starfleet
began planning for the expected invasion of the Federation, now
that the Borg were aware of our existence. The Borg are an
immensely powerful race of enhanced humanoids, who implant
themselves with cybernetic devices which give them great
technological and combat advantages over simple 'biological'
humanoids. It is known that the Borg are born as totally
biological beings, but have their first implants inserted shortly
after birth and are then 'updated' as they grow to finally take
their designated place in the Collective.
In the Collective, different Borgs are equipped with different
hardware for specific tasks, and are tied into a sophisticated
subspace network. This links each Borg with all of the other
Borg, forming in effect one mind - The Collective. Due to this
combined intelligence and adaptability, most succesfull weapons
against the Borg only work once - they quickly adapt and generate
an effective counter. This is evident with the Phaser - one Borg
can be killed, but after that all the other Borg can generate a
shield to totally nullify this weapon. The crew of the Enterprise
partially got around this by designing a chip to fit in the hand
phasers which randomly changed the phaser frequency after every
shot. This stopped the Borg from being able to adapt. Larger
versions were installed in the ships phasers also.
The Borg finally invaded the Federation in 2366, when the USS
Enterprise (again) encountered a Borg ship entering Federation
space, on route to the Terran Starsystem. The Enterprise had been
investigating the disappearance of the New Providence colony on
Jouret IV. The Federation, true to form, was not prepared for an
invasion. The Borg captured captain Jean-Luc Picard from the
Enterprise with the intention of using a human voice to
co-ordinate their assimilation of the Federation. They then
however altered Picard by inserting bio-mechanical implants, in
effect making Picard himself a Borg - Locutus of Borg. All of
Picard's Knowledge then was avaliable to the Borg, who easily
defeated any of the Enterprise plans to destroy them. Locutus
then led the Borg to destroy 39 ships of the 40 which Starfleet
had emassed at Wolf 359. Eventually, the crew of the Enterprise
managed rescue Picard/Locutus from the Borg ship. Data then used
the Borg susbpace link with Locutus to implant a 'sleep' command
into the Collective. This then caused the Borg ship to self
destruct, and Picard was released from the Colective. Dr Crusher
was then able to remove the Borg implants and Picard was human
again.
The next time the Federation encountered the Borg was when a
crashed Borg scoutship was discovered on a moon in the Argolis
Cluster by the Enterprise. A single survivor, whose Borg
designation was 'Third of Five' was rescued. The Enterprise crew
nursed this Borg back to health, and gave him a name : 'Hugh'.
The crew developed a 'virus' which they could introduce into the
Borg Collective Consciousness, through Hugh, and was designed to
cause a fatal overload, hence destroying all the Borg at once.
However, the crew then realised that Hugh was becoming more
'self' aware and hence this weapon was effectively murder. Hugh
was returned to the crash site and later picked up by another
Borg scout ship. Incidentally, Picard was later given a severe
reprimand by Starfleet for alowing the Borg to leave without
attempting to use it to destroy the Collective.
The decision Picard made to return Hugh to the Collective had
a profound effect on the Borg. Hugh's new-found sense of
individuality began to be transferred throughout the ship he was
on - deprived of their group identity, individual Borg were
unable to function as a unit. All were confused and some even
starved to death as a result. They were unable to navigate or
indeed perform any function properly. This was changed with the
arrival of the android Lore, brother of Starfleet android
commander Data. Lore appointed himself leader of these Borg, and
promised that he would help them towards their goal - to become
totaly artificial life-forms free from any dependance on
biological or organic bodies. In 2369 Lore led the Borg on a new
offensive against the Federation. Using Transwarp conduits they
were able to travel many times faster than the top speed of
Starfleet's best ships. They first atacked a Federation outpost
on Ohniaka III, killing all lifeforms present, and then managed
to enlist the help of Commander Data himself who vowed to help
his brother Lore. Lore however was controlling Data (and the
Borg) by re-transmitting some of the emotions from his
emotion-chip to Data and by-passing his programming. The
Enterprise crew one again managed to save the day by destroying
the Borg ship, and enlisting the help of Hugh and some renegade
Borg to thwart Lore's plans. Data then dismantled Lore, and took
the emotion chip so that he would some day be able to use it
himself. The surviving Borg rallied under Hugh and are attempting
to make a new life, as individuals.
The Borg will continue in their single-minded purpose : the
assimilation of cultures and technology, until they are
destroyed. There have been no recent contacts with the Borg for
some time, though the usual pessimists believe that this will not
last. They talk about a new invasion
and the personal involvment of the (mythical) Borg Queen. Time
will tell.
Remember:
resistance is futile!
