Ensign Clancy (from “Elementary, My Dear Data” and “The Emissary”)

I’m admittedly fascinated by this stunningly beautiful woman (and promising helm officer) and was curious as to why she never appeared again after season two. Anne Ramsay has a very successful run on Mad About You, but I’d have loved seeing more of her in TNG.

 

Nobody was allowed to sit at helm for too long.

 

Exactly, when they started treating Ensign Sariel Rager like a human being rather than just another Helm Drone they got rid of her too

 

I dunno. Gates was there f o r e v e r

She came on in season 3's Sarek, & was there until the end. Rager was only in 4 episodes. Gates was in 46, over 5 seasons. After Wesley left, she probably logged more time at the wheel than anybody else. It actually kind of annoyed me that Rager got more substantial screen time in her 4 episodes, her REM deprivation in Night Terrors, abduction in Schisms... flipping the ship sideways in Relics. Gates never even got a 1st name dammit

 

Ensign McKnight was also around for awhile (seen here in “Face of the Enemy”).

 

They should have given these helmswomen some dialogue and repoire with Data, like Geordi and Wesley had in the early seasons.

 

They should have dome something with Gates, even if just one episode. She could have been a side character rarely focused on, like Beverly's assistant, Ogawa.

 

Why Ensigns always driving the ship? seems like a LT type job.

 

I think they were beta-/gamma-shift officers.

 

It's an entry level position.

 

I realize you meant this as a joke, but it actually makes sense in-universe. A junior officer who’s fresh out of the Academy would probably benefit from bridge experience, and the helm is the one station where someone would always have something to do that can be assessed by the captain and first officer in real time.

 

& piloting is something that they all have trained on profusely in the academy, as we've seen with Wesley. Geordi, Riker, Picard, Worf, Data, Ro, probably even Barclay. They're all, at their base essence, pilots/astronauts, except maybe some of the medical & special science divisions. They drive ships like we drive cars

Edit: You know... I've always been partial to Tess Allenby

 

Too slow and with a turn signal on?

 

or too fast & don't know how to merge lol

It had to be contractual. Joyce (Robinson) Agu (Ensign Gates) was never credited once in all her times on the show. She was just an extra, (like Martinez, or Jae)

Lanie Chapman, (Rager) on the other hand, was credited all 4 times she appeared on the show. She must have been negotiated differently in the cast. Patti Yasukate (Ogawa) was also credited as supporting cast, whenever she appeared

I'm pretty sure Ensign Gates never even spoke, until the final season, when Picard orders her by name, to plot a course into the Pegasus asteroid, & she finally gets to speak one line. "Course plotted, Sir". Honestly, if they were throwing her a bone in the final days of the show, they should've called her Lieutenant. 5 seasons is a long time to be an Ensign. Just ask Harry Kim lol

 

It's something that just shows the lack of decent female representation in TNG, that the only bridge position they often held for roughly four seasons was as the silent ensign at the Conn. Any of the young officers mentioned could've become a recurring (or even regular) character to at least give them some development and dialogue other than 'aye sir'. Even the likes of Ro was underutilised (of course that probably depended on Michelle Forbes availability) but she did show what could've been done with one more perspective on the bridge crew.

 

I'll take Ensign Lian T'Su.

 

She's good in that position.
You know, sort of that lose her in a crowd, type of face.

 

She wasn't a helm officer

 

If one of the guest helmswomen had become a regular, would that have required paying the writers of the episodes they’d previously appeared in?