Within the “Star Trek: The Subsequent Technology” episode “The Enemy” (November 6, 1989), the united statesS. Enterprise-D rushes to assistance from a downed Romulan vessel on a stormy, radioactive planet known as Galorndon Core. Dr. Crusher (Gates McFadden) manages to rescue an injured Romulan officer, and retains his situation regular again on board the ship. It appears, nonetheless, that the Romulan suffered a deep neurological harm that she will not be capable to deal with until she will get some Romulan blood she will be able to transfuse. Sadly, the Federation and the Romulans are nonetheless deeply at odds, and there’s no Romulan blood available.
Dr. Crusher does discover that she will be able to, with some intelligent natural chemistry, alter the blood of a Klingon to function an inexpensive facsimile, and there’s one Klingon, Worf (Michael Dorn), on board. All she must do is get a blood pattern from him, extrapolate the suitable ribosomes, and save her affected person’s life. The one drawback is that Worf refuses to present a pattern. Worf understands that if he refuses to assist, the Romulan will die, however he does not a lot care. Romulans killed his household, and they’re a sworn enemy of Starfleet, so Worf feels no want to save lots of them. He feels giving his blood to save lots of the lifetime of an enemy is a violation of his ideas. Nobody can order Worf to present his blood, so Crusher and Captain Picard (Patrick Stewart) need to persuade him to swallow his pleasure.
However Worf’s pleasure is unswallowable. Earlier than the episode ends, the Romulan dies. Worf expresses no remorse. Dr. Crusher is horrified.
Dorn talked about “The Enemy” within the oral historical past e book “The Fifty-Yr Mission: The Subsequent 25 Years: From The Subsequent Technology to J. J. Abrams,” edited by Mark A. Altman and Edward Gross, and the actor expressed some remorse over Worf’s resolution. He understood that Worf was knowledgeable largely by his pleasure, however in “The Enemy,” Dorn felt his character was cussed to the purpose of homicide.
Dorn and the producers disagreed over ‘The Enemy’
Worf, for any non-Trekkies studying, was raised on Earth by human dad and mom after Romulans killed his organic father. Worf has been residing amongst people most of his life, however had all the time been decided to reside by a Klingon code of ethics. He has remained humorless and stern his complete life, surrounding himself with the Klingon accouterments he missed in his youth. Worf, should you’ll forgive me, clings on to his tradition. It grounds him, it makes him who he’s. Therefore, when it got here time to specific Klingon ethics — that are very completely different from human ethics — the present’s producers felt Worf ought to stay as Klingon as doable.
Dorn did not like that as, within the case of “The Enemy,” it made Worf look dangerous. Dorn felt that Worf ought to have adopted a extra human viewpoint. The producers of “NextGen,” nonetheless, felt that there ought to all the time be one thing of an moral divide, inflicting extra private battle for the collection. Extra battle equals extra drama. Dorn remembers expressing his objections, saying:
“I known as the producers and stated I did not agree. I assumed [giving blood] was the honorable factor to do. I assumed individuals would have a look at [Worf] as a assassin. The producers felt that Worf was attending to be too Human … only a man with a giant head. When the chance got here for them to indicate that Worf was not Human, that he’s not certain by the identical morals as we’re, they felt it was a beautiful alternative.”
After Worf denied his blood to the dying Romulan, nothing was achieved. Nobody complimented Worf for sticking up for himself, and each Dr. Crusher and Captain Picard expressed their dismay and disappointment that Worf would assist save a life. However that made the story extra tragic and, therefore, extra satisfying. Additionally, it is vital to remind viewers that the nonhuman characters on “Star Trek” do not share the identical ideas because the people, and that ethics should all the time be challenged and mentioned.
It is what makes “Star Trek” “Star Trek.”
