Seven of Nine’s Character & Her Development - Was She Meant to Die?

Ro_Laren · Mar 28, 2013

Who created the Seven of Nine character??? I was watching the recent Trekcore interview with Brannon Braga and the following was said at 4:54…

Trekcore: A lot of fans say that “Braga kinda defanged the Borg in Voyager by making them less of a threat. What are your thoughts on that? Do you think there is anything behind that, or in your opinion were they the same as they were in the Next Generation?”

Braga: I think that for the most part, the Borg were a very successful villain on Voyager. I don’t think they were… They were “defanged” only in so much as they kept getting their a**es kicked! You know, once the Borg loses enough times, which is [***Comic Spoiler***]… That’s the danger when you keep bringing them back. I think we brought them back, maybe twice too many [times]. There were a couple Borg episodes I don’t think were quite as successful. I don’t remember the finale well enough… ‘cause I think I have a story credit on it, so you’d think I’d remember it. I don’t know that the Borg were super impactful there. Again, I think Seven of Nine should have bit the dust. I think there had to be a human sacrifice, a real sacrifice, for this crew getting home; a real blood sacrifice. Seven of Nine was, for me, designed to be a character that was gonna die tragically. I planned that.

Trekcore: A Spock moment. Somebody who’s not human, who becomes human by making the ultimate sacrifice.

Braga: That’s right. Well, there’s an episode called “Human Error” that I wrote in the final season, where she tries to… she experiments on the holodeck- it’s actually quite an interesting episode. She’s trying to feel emotions. And she actually succeeds, but then almost dies. She learns that there’s a Borg implant, that if she becomes too human, it will kill her. It was at that moment in my mind that would set up the finale, where she realized that she can’t live here, she can’t live there. And she dies getting her family home. And, I think then that you have a finale.

At first, he said that for him Seven was designed to be a character that was going to die tragically. Then he said that he planned that. He then mentioned how the episode “Human Error” had plot developments that would tie into his plan on an emotional level. Do you think that this was something that was really planned from the beginning by "the powers that be" (meaning more people that just Braga) or that Braga just came up with it at some point? He did say that for him it was planned this way. When I listened to this portion of the interview, it reminded me of the tv show Lost. A Producer, I forget which one, said that they always planned for Juliet’s story to end tragically and that was the reason they gave her the name Juliet (reminding us of the tragic Juliet from Shakespeare’s Romeo & Juliet).

I’m of course glad that 7 didn’t die. Perhaps "the powers that be" overrode Braga’s desire to kill her in case they wanted to use her in some sort of Trek film (assuming they didn’t want to pull another Spock moment and have her brought back to life in a film). Or, perhaps they just wanted the finale to be more Janeway centric vs. 7 centric. Anywho, while I’m glad 7 didn’t die, I think that that death would have made more sense than Trip’s death on Enterprise. :scream:

Guy Gardener · Mar 28, 2013

Re: Seven of Nine’s Character & Her Development - Was She Meant to Die

Braga didn't desire to kill her, in his mind, given this evidence, she was already dead.

Dead Borg Walking.

R. Star · Mar 28, 2013

Re: Seven of Nine’s Character & Her Development - Was She Meant to Die

It's rather obvious that everything about Endgame wasn't thought through. I'd say that includes Seven's death or lack thereof. Honestly I don't think Voyager's writers were bold enough to kill a main character for dramatic effect deliberately.

Melakon · Mar 28, 2013