Brent Spiner hasn’t been a big part of the publicity tour for Star Trek: Picard season 3, even though he, too, is returning to the series as the character Lore, twin brother of his original Star Trek: The Next Generation character Data, who died in the 2002 film Star Trek Nemesis (and died again in the first season of Picard). However, Spiner did talk to the New York Times (in a conversation with his other TNG castmates) that ended up returning to the subject Nemesis.
Spiner happy with Data’s death in Nemesis
In the New York Times profile, Brent Spiner was asked if he had any regrets about Nemesis, in the context of the new season of Picard:
Brent, there’s a running joke among fans about how every time there’s a new “Star Trek” story, there’s a new character for you to play. [Data has multiple clones and human quasi-ancestors.] Is there a part of you that wishes your original version of Data, who died in “Nemesis,” could be part of this rendition?
SPINER I don’t think so, because then I couldn’t have played those other things. You know, I was perfectly happy with the ending of “Nemesis,” even though I know that a lot of fans weren’t. And then I feel that was sort of redeemed, in a way, for the fans in the first season of “Picard.” I would hate to have missed both those moments.
So no, I’m perfectly happy with the way it’s gone. I can’t say much more. I haven’t really seen much of the show — they’ve kept it away from me because they know I’ll blow it.
New York Times interviewer Sopan Deb followed up by asking Patrick Stewart about Nemesis, and the Picard star ended up turning the question back to Spiner.
Patrick, did you think you were saying goodbye to Jean-Luc after “Nemesis?”
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[To Spiner:] Brent, there had been a lot of conversation about you and John Logan [who co-wrote “Nemesis”] writing a new film script, and that appealed to me enormously. But of course that was dumped along with everything else. And I felt frustration and disappointment about that because what we went out with wasn’t good, I don’t think.
SPINER There are things about “Nemesis” that didn’t work. I think we went into it with the feeling that it was probably going to be our last film, which was why we let Data’s demise happen. We thought a great dramatic conclusion to one of the characters would be a fitting end to the series.
Data says goodbye to Picard in Star Trek: Nemesis
TNG cast on Picard season 3 as a do-over for Nemesis
Picard showrunner Terry Matalas has stated that he felt Star Trek: Nemesis did not provide the TNG crew with a proper ending to their stories, something he is trying to rectify with season 3 of Picard. In the NYT profile, TNG actors LeVar Burton, Jonathan Frakes, Gates McFadden and Michael Dorn talked about how they also saw Nemesis as a missed opportunity:
BURTON I always felt it was a missed opportunity to create a story and play a storyline that had a fitting and proper conclusion to it. None of us knew that was going to be our last outing. So there was always, at least for me, a sense of a missed opportunity, something unfulfilled.
FRAKES Which is what season 3 of “Picard” has been, which we didn’t dare hope for.
BURTON That ship had sailed. Two decades have passed. I had long since given up on any hope of a conclusion as satisfying as this one is.
McFADDEN I had given up hope. I felt that my character in the movies was practically nonexistent; it was just bizarre. In this one, I felt more like the way I felt in “All Good Things” [the series finale]. “All Good Things” was a brilliant end. We all had great story lines, and in this, I think, the same thing is true. You feel the past — I felt my past connection with each of these characters, and that was something I didn’t feel in the films. Then I felt like I was just filling a role of, “Well, we have to have Crusher in here because she’s part of the cast.” There wasn’t really a sense that I had a through-line or real character intention. So this was unexpected, and I’m very happy with it. I think it’s an incredible season.
DORN I didn’t have any idea that [“Nemesis”] was going to be the last one. I thought that there was going to be another shot at some point. After 10 years go by, you go, “I don’t know if it’s going to come back.”
The cast of Star Trek: Nemesis
Spiner’s Lore in season 3 is “complicated”
Spiner’s role in season three of Picard was originally described by showrunner Terry Matalas and executive producer Alex Kurtzman as a “new old” character. When it was revealed what character he would be playing at New York Comic Con last October, Spiner said he was playing Lore but “in a very complicated way.”
Brent Spiner in publicity photo for Picard season 3
The third and final season ofPicard premiered on Thursday, Feb. 16, 2023, exclusively onParamount+ in the U.S., and Latin America, and on February 17 Paramount+ in Europe and elsewhere, with new episodes of the 10-episode-long season available to stream weekly. It also debuted on Friday, Feb. 17 internationally on Amazon Prime Video in more than 200 countries and territories. In Canada, it airs on Bell Media’s CTV Sci-Fi Channel and streams on Crave.
Keep up with news about theStar Trek Universe at TrekMovie.com.
