Star Trek: First Contact/Fridge

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


  • Fridge Brilliance: SF Debris pointed out that Picard's raving about not sacrificing the Enterprise-E could be in part justified because of his anger at losing the Enterprise-D in the the previous film, and lingering feelings of having lost the Stargazer before the events of TNG. Note that Picard has a look of utter horror on his face when he realizes the model he smashed in the cabinet with the gun is that of the Enterprise-D which is why his "Make them pay" rant goes off the deep end.
    • Another bit of Fridge Brilliance. Picard's refusal to pull back may not have been purely out of revenge. We know he could hear the Borg in his head sometimes. Who's to say they weren't still able to influence him, especially with the Borg Queen herself there. It's not that hard to believe they were giving little mental pokes to enhance feelings that were already there.
  • Fridge Horror: Combined with Nothing Is Scarier, there are few things in recent cinematic history as terrifying as hearing the audio pickup of thousands of terrified men and women ready to fight... and then hear the famous, horrifying litany that made the Borg truly fearsome- followed by screaming.
  • Fridge Horror: So the Enterprise-E is said to have roughly 800 crew aboard, not to mention the survivors they pick up from the Defiant (including Worf) in the opening battle. By the time Picard finally gives the order to abandon ship, it has been mentioned that the Borg "just took decks 5 and 6", leaving only four decks under the crew's control out of 24 or 26 (both numbers are given in the film). Even if Geordi brought dozens or maybe hundreds of engineering crew down to Earth to help repair the Phoenix overnight, and even if we saw scores of lifeboats leave in the evacuation, how many hundreds of crew members died or were assimilated at the hands of the Borg? Worse still, how many did it take before Picard realized the futility of staying to fight? Granted, plenty of the Borg victims were probably able to be rescued and surgically freed of their implants afterwards much as Picard was, but by the end of the film it would appear that the majority of the crew of the Enterprise are either dead or incapacitated, while the ship probably needs a long stay in drydock just to clean up the mess that the Borg left behind.
    • Also, psychological trauma of having been a Borg. And having to be a doctor removing the implants. And the Borg who got killed in engineering. And the people, if any, who were converted years ago and aren't from the Enterprise, currently far from everything they knew. And the ones that couldn't be saved by removing the implants because they make up so much of their body. And...
  • Fridge Horror/Fridge Logic: The Temporal Investigators who interview Picard about this had better not have heart conditions.
  • There's a reason Geordi finally opted for prosthetics, which he refused in the main show. Lursa and Betor both exploited his visor to nearly destroy the ship. That probably made Geordi decide it was for the better for security purposes.
  • The Bozeman is mentioned as part of the fleet to engage the Borg, and even has Kelsey Grammer reprising his role as one of the voices among the radio-chatter during the battle. The Bozeman was the ship misplaced in time and thrown forward 90 years during the TNG episode "Cause and Effect", something similar to what happens to the Enterprise in this movie. Also, the ship itself is named after Bozeman, Montana, the very site of First Contact.
  • Fridge Logic: Why doesn't Data ever think that the Borg queen is nothing more than the Collective expressing itself through a single, specially designed drone instead of the disembodied mechanical voice we saw in previous TNG episodes? This is the most logical conclusion to draw given the first part of their conversation: "Do you control the Borg Collective?" "You imply a disparity where none exists; I am the Collective." Even if it would later turn out to be incorrect, it's the best guess with the information available. Functionally, it's no different than the aforementioned disembodied voice except the form allows it to express more personality, and it adds a very interesting layer of character to the Borg if the Collective is an exotic, ages-old Femme Fatale able to handle personal interaction when it suits its needs, as well as being capable of seduction and subtlety just as much as being capable of invading other races and maintaining the Borg as a whole.
    • Just because we don't see Data ask the queen "Are you an avatar of the Collective?" or something similar, it doesn't mean the thought never occurred to him offscreen.
  • Data's near-betrayal of the crew. He considered joining the Borg Queen for a fraction of a second, which, for an android, is nearly an eternity. What do you suppose ten years serving alongside his crewmates is then?
    • It's the reason it didn't take quite an eternity for Data to decide to remain loyal.