From Ferengi in Roswell to the Bell Riots, some of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine’s best episodes started life as unmade stories for the TNG cast.
Summary
- Some of the best episodes of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine began as storylines originally pitched for Star Trek: The Next Generation.
- These storylines were heavily adapted to fit DS9’s cast and setting, but it’s interesting to ponder how TNG characters would fit into them.
- DS9’s unique premise as a space station allowed for different and more ambitious storytelling than its parent show, TNG.
Throughout the 1990s, there was often more than one Star Trek show in production at the same time, so it was inevitable that some episodes of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine began as stories pitched to the Star Trek: The Next Generation writers’ room. DS9 entered production in 1992, in response to a desire from the network for more Star Trek off the back of TNG‘s popularity. Star Trek: Deep Space Nine was a very different beast to TNG as it was set aboard a space station, and not a starship, meaning that, in the early days, strange new worlds often had to come to Commander Benjamin Sisko (Avery Brooks).
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine‘s showrunner Ira Steven Behr later reflected that the show was at its weakest when it was just aping the type of stories done over on Star Trek: The Next Generation. While Behr has a good point, it’s interesting that some of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine‘s best episodes began as storylines originally pitched for TNG. Of course, the storylines were greatly changed from whatever the TNG version would have been, being heavily adapted to DS9‘s cast and setting. That being said, it’s just as fascinating to ponder how Captain Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart) and the crew of the USS Enterprise-D would fit into these storylines.
8 Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Season 1, Episode 14, “The Storyteller”
Story by Kurt Michael Bensmiller
The idea for “The Storyteller” was first pitched for Star Trek: The Next Generation season 1, but never made it to screen. This was despite the support for the script from producer Michael Piller, who could never convince the TNG team to make it. A dearth of available scripts later lead Piller to instruct Kurt Michael Bensmiller to adapt “The Storyteller” for Star Trek: Deep Space Nine season 1. In the DS9 version, Chief O’Brien (Colm Meaney) has to reluctantly step in for a Bajoran village elder to save the villagers from the terrifying Dal’Rok. It’s notable for starting the friendship between Chief O’Brien and Dr. Julian Bashir (Alexander Siddig).
7 Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Season 2, Episode 1, “The Homecoming”
Story by Jeri Taylor
Jeri Taylor pitched “The Homecoming” for an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation season 6, in which a Bajoran woman was attempting to rescue a hero of the resistance movement. In later drafts, the Bajoran woman became Ensign Ro Laren (Michelle Forbes), but Michael Piller wanted it for Star Trek: Deep Space Nine instead. Ironically, for a story that was pitched for TNG, “The Homecoming” is an early example of how DS9 would be completely different from its parent show. Replacing Ro with Major Kira Nerys (Nana Visitor), “The Homecoming” was the first of a three-part story arc that opened DS9 season 2, a forerunner to the more ambitious arc-based storytelling that the show would become known for.
6 Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Season 2, Episode 7, “Rules of Acquisition”
Story by Hilary Bader
“Profit Margin” was Hilary Bader’s original pitch for the episode that would eventually become Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, season 2, episode 7, “Rules of Acquisition.” In the DS9 version, Quark (Armin Shimerman) finds himself attracted to his business associate, Pel (Hélène Udy) who turns out to be a Ferengi female in disguise. In the original pitch, the Pel character was to have been involved with Commander William T Riker (Jonathan Frakes), though it’s unclear if their involvement would be romantic. With DS9‘s reputation for Ferengi comedies, it was clearly a more suitable home for Bader’s pitch than TNG would have been.
5 Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Season 3, Episode 5, “Second Skin”
Story by Robert Hewitt Wolfe
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine season 3, episode 5, “Second Skin” reveals that Major Kira Nerys is actually a deep-cover Cardassian operative, although it’s quickly confirmed to be an elaborate deception. “Second Skin” is very different in tone from Robert Hewitt Wolfe’s original pitch for a Star Trek: The Next Generation episode in which Q (John de Lancie) facilitated a Quantum Leap style bodyswap between Picard, Lt. Commander Data (Brent Spiner) and Counselor Deanna Troi (Marina Sirtis) and some Romulan officers. However, Hewitt Wolfe remained interested in this concept and after a failed attempt to reveal Chief O’Brien as a Cardassian, created one of Major Kira Nery’s best DS9 episodes.
4 Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Season 3, Episodes 11 and 12, “Past Tense”
Story by Robert Hewitt Wolfe
Robert Hewitt Wolfe had pitched an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation in which Captain Picard and Lieutenant Geordi La Forge (LeVar Burton) crash-landed on the eve of the real-life Watts Riots in 1965. The idea was never fully developed as a script for TNG, perhaps being deemed too close to the bone in the wake of the 1992 LA riots. The idea later morphed into Star Trek: Deep Space Nine‘s “Past Tense”. Set on the eve of the fictional Bell Riots, the concept of Starfleet officers observing the social and racial inequality of their past and our present is still at the heart of the classic DS9 episode.
3 Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Season 4, Episode 8, “Little Green Men”
Story by Jack Trevino and Toni Marberry
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, season 4, episode 8, “Little Green Men” started life as a very different episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation. In Jack Trevino and Toni Marberry’s original pitch, Captain Picard and the USS Enterprise pursued a Ferengi ship through a temporal anomaly. When the Ferengi crash-landed in Roswell, New Mexico, it was up to the TNG crew to preserve history by cleaning up the mess. The TNG writers’ room had reached their allocated quota of time travel episodes and turned it down, but the story of Earth’s first contact with the Ferengi later became one of DS9‘s best comedy episodes.
2 Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Season 6, Episode 14, “One Little Ship”
Story by René Echevarria
René Echevarria wrote a spec Star Trek script about a shrunken spaceship, but never pitched it to the Star Trek: The Next Generation team until he was well established in the writers’ room. After he pitched the story for TNG season 6, Echevarria remembered that Supervising Producer Jeri Taylor looked at him as if he had gone mad. Undeterred, Echevarria pitched the story to both Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and Star Trek: Voyager. Eventually, Bradley Thompson and David Weddle realized Echevarria’s idea as “One Little Ship”, an episode of DS9 season 6, which was effectively Fantastic Voyage meets Die Hard.
1 Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Season 6, Episode 24, “Time’s Orphan”
Story by Joe Menosky
Joe Menosky originally pitched an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation where Worf’s son Alexander was rapidly aged, as a means to write out the character. Michael Piller rejected the story idea because Alexander was his mother’s favorite character. Much later, in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine season 6, the idea was resurrected in a script by Bradley Thompson and David Weddle. In the finished version, it’s Chief O’Brien’s daughter Molly (Hana Hatae) who falls through a time portal and spends 10 years in isolation. It’s a deeply traumatic episode for the O’Briens, and has a much happier -if melancholic – ending than Joe Menosky’s original pitch.
