I'm not usually a fan of recasting, unless it's absolutely necessarily. The radicaly difference of Neral between "Unification" and the aforementioned episode (referred to, from here on, as IAESL), however, is one of the strangest. Neral in Unification was explicitly described as a relatively young leader. He looks round faces and bright. Just seven years later, however, we get this extremely thin, aged fellow who looks a couple of decades older. Look, I know being a political leader is a stressful job that ages people prematurely, but come on! Why they didn't go with Norman Large again is total mystery. The only explanation is a cryptic respsonse from Ron Moore saying "We did consider it, but decided to go in another direction", whatever the hell that means. I doubt they thought he was a bad actor, since they cast him in three other roles after Neral. If they simply wanted a more seasoned character leading the Empire in the episode, why not simply create a new one?
Re: Why bother using Neral in "Inter Arma..." if you're going to recas Romulan Leaders routinely have their brains transplanted into new bodies with different faces. This makes assassinations harder.
Re: Why bother using Neral in "Inter Arma..." if you're going to recas They probably reused the character to create a continuity but then weren't able to get the actor due to scheduling conflicts or something. They decided that changing the name when the character was only a minor character in the first place wasn't worth the loss of the chance to reuse the character.
Re: Why bother using Neral in "Inter Arma..." if you're going to recas I have no idea what you are talking about. I think that probably pretty much answers it. Who cares If we can swallow two people playing Saavik, we can handle a minor guest character. I just googled and they both hardly had a role in both appearances.
Re: Why bother using Neral in "Inter Arma..." if you're going to recas Well the circumstances behind Saavik being recast are pretty well known, and I think it was far more important to carry her over from II to III than it was to bring back Neral.
Re: Why bother using Neral in "Inter Arma..." if you're going to recas Cretak was also recast, as was Ziyal (twice).
Re: Why bother using Neral in "Inter Arma..." if you're going to recas Naomi, Tom Paris' Daddy and Molly O'Brien were all recast.
Re: Why bother using Neral in "Inter Arma..." if you're going to recas Actually, they used the same girl for Molly throughout. Maybe you meant Alexander. (I don't think Brian Bonsall was still acting when they recast for DS9) I have no idea why they recast Admiral Paris. For Naomi, they probably wanted an older kid for a larger (possibly recurring) part. With Cretak, the original actress was apparently unavailable. Supposedly, they wanted someone older for Ziyal, if she was to have a relationship with Garak. With Neral, however, the character was so fundamentally different, I still don't know what was the point.
Re: Why bother using Neral in "Inter Arma..." if you're going to recas "In the Pale Moonlight" had confirmed Neral was still Praetor; I guess the writers had their own idea.
Re: Why bother using Neral in "Inter Arma..." if you're going to recas He was still referred to as Proconsul in "Pale Moonlight". IAESL said he'd been elevated to Praetor.
Re: Why bother using Neral in "Inter Arma..." if you're going to recas No. Hana Hatae didn't play the baby in Disaster.... I didn't notice. Was it established that he was the same Neral? There was a remarkably difference in age... Did Neral go and talked about the time he held Data and Spock hostage to Bashir?
Re: Why bother using Neral in "Inter Arma..." if you're going to recas Nobody counts babies. I think they did mention that he was the former Proconsul elevated to Praetor.
Re: Why bother using Neral in "Inter Arma..." if you're going to recas Stinks that they recasted the character. I really liked Normal Large's performance in Unification. He was one slimey romulan.
Re: Why bother using Neral in "Inter Arma..." if you're going to recas This is Molly today, aged 24... OMG!!!
Re: Why bother using Neral in "Inter Arma..." if you're going to recas That's Kitchen Nightmares - Sushi Ko. I remember the episode well for a) Sushi Pizza (No. Just, no.) and b) Akira's stunning daughter! LOL - and it's Molly O'Brien. How about that?
Re: Why bother using Neral in "Inter Arma..." if you're going to recas And they did a wonderful job casting the older Molly in Time's Orphan, didn't they? Looks a lot like the real older Molly!