TREKCORE > VOY > EPISODES > DARK FRONTIER, PART I > Behind the Scenes

	This episode's origin was similar to that of the third season outing "Unity", in that – when the writing staff of Star Trek: Voyager were faced with the challenge of devising a show for the February rating sweeps period – the writers thought of the Borg. However, this idea was not an immediate one. Co-writer Joe Menosky offered, "We were heading into sweeps [....] But we had no idea what we were going to do."
	"The Killing Game, Part II". Joe Menosky reflected, "Because of the success of airing 'The Killing Game' in a single night, the network and the studio were really interested in doing a movie."
	Fellow co-writer Brannon Braga also wanted the episode to be, in his own words, "a big event" and the motion picture Star Trek: First Contact, another production that featured the Borg and a Borg Queen, provided an example that the writers were interested in attempting to surpass. Braga explained, "I really felt we needed something spectacular for February sweeps [....] To do a Borg movie, telefilm, or whatever you want to call it, we had to outdo First Contact. The space battles and the Queen had to be more elaborate."  Braga also said, "When we decided, 'Let's do something different; let's do a two-hour telefilm,' that made us rise to the challenge, and we did 'Dark Frontier'."
	It was Brannon Braga himself who crafted the episode's plot. He recalled, "We had all these different storylines laying around having to do with the Borg. I just cobbled them together late one night and we had 'Dark Frontier'." Joe Menosky remembered, "Brannon wrote this amazingly complete story memo that had everything."
	The inspiration for the backstory of the courageous Hansens – Magnus and Erin Hansen – was the history of gorilla specialist Dian Fossey.
	In their effort to turn out an exceptional script, the writers worked for long hours on the teleplay.
	Brannon Braga enjoyed scripting the scenes that include the Borg Queen and Seven of Nine. He noted, "It was fun to write the banter between [Seven] and the Borg Queen."
	Brannon Braga also deliberately left several questions unanswered, such as the fate of Erin Hansen and the possibility that the Borg planted Seven of Nine to act as a spy on Voyager. Regarding the latter issue, Braga admitted, "I wanted people [...] to ask that very question. The Queen may have done that; we'll never know. One of those tantalizing tidbits that the fans enjoy [....] I thought it was an interesting thing for the Queen to say. It certainly caught Seven's attention."
	The episode was scripted as if it were a two-parter. The final draft script for the first of these parts was submitted on 18 November 1998 (with further revisions up to and including 8 December of that year) and the final draft of the second part's teleplay was submitted on 2 December 1998 (being revised up to and including 15 December of the same year).
	Director Cliff Bole was instrumental in the decision to introduce the Borg Queen into the plot at the end of the first part. "I begged to get the Queen in the end [of that part]," Bole remembered. "Originally, they hadn't planned on it, and I said, 'Guys, you can't do this. You've got to tease, and you've got to bring these folks back, and you've got to have the Queen in this episode. You've just got to have what I call the end-teaser and introduce the Queen. I don't care if it's one page or two shots; just do it.'" The photon torpedo that destroys the Borg probe in the episode's teaser was initially deleted from the script for budgetary reasons. It was reinserted not long before the episode's creation came to an end.
	The script also describes the intricate sequence wherein the Borg Queen's body is assembled by stating, "The Borg Queen descends in a free-floating alcove that lowers from a port on the ceiling. As the Queen comes closer, we can see her body integrate piece by piece in a startling optical effect. Legs, arms, neck, head, torso – all clicking into place." Visual effects supervisor Mitch Suskin noted, of the same scene, that the writers "wanted it to be impressive." Visual effects producer Dan Curry concurred, "[Brannon Braga] said that the Borg Queen will be reassembled, but let's do something 'new and cool'."
	The script for the episode's second half refers to the Hansens, while they are examining a drone aboard the Raven, as "like biologists tagging a 'wolf' in the wild," which is consistent with the fact that Brannon Braga and Joe Menosky often thought that the Borg were like wolves.
	Similarly, Erin Hansen's statement that she and her husband imagine the Borg Queen is "like the Queen of an insect colony" is in keeping with the fact that the Borg were initially conceived as a race of insects.
	The script for the installment's second part comments that the Borg Assimilation Chamber where Seven of Nine sees alien victims of assimilation was to be "a redress of the Transwarp Chamber seen in Part One."
	Brannon Braga felt that this episode was an important one for the character of Kathryn Janeway. "I think [it] was as important a show for Captain Janeway as it was for Seven," Braga mused. "I think Janeway became more heroic and more human herself [....] The scene with Naomi made [Janeway] a little warmer, a little more human. I think her relationship with Seven changed in that show, inexorably in some ways. They will always be in conflict, that's the nature of their mentor-pupil relationship. But I think they became a little more Picard and Data than they ever had been in 'Dark Frontier'."
	he fact that this episode's casting process took place in November and December 1998 hampered the search for suitable actors. Cliff Bole remembered, "Casting was a bit of a problem; the town [of Hollywood] was awful busy then. You know, winding down before Christmas everybody's trying to get shows done, and finding the right talent was very tough."
	There were early rumors that Alice Krige would return to portray the Borg Queen in this episode. However, Krige was unavailable, at the time. Even by 31 January 2001, actress Susanna Thompson was still unsure of the reasoning for Krige's absence. Thompson, on that date, commented, "I wonder why Alice [wasn't] available! And I have no idea. There's all sorts of many different types of stories [but] she just wasn't available."
	Susanna Thompson, who had unsuccessfully auditioned to play the Borg Queen in Star Trek: First Contact, was asked back to audition for the queen in this episode. She recalled, "I used [Alice Krige's performance in First Contact] as a springboard for what I brought into the audition, and they cast me."
	Even though Susanna Thompson had appeared in several previous Star Trek productions (portraying Varel in TNG: "The Next Phase", Jaya in TNG: "Frame of Mind" and Lenara Kahn in DS9: "Rejoined"), this was the actress' first encounter with large scale prosthetics.
	Susanna Thompson was aware that she was playing a different queen from the one in Star Trek: First Contact. Shortly after appearing in this installment, the actress commented, "I'm not the same Borg Queen. She's the new Queen of the hive. There are similarities, but we are different."
	Even after Susanna Thompson was cast as the Borg Queen, however, she still tried to take inspiration for her role here from Alice Krige's performance in First Contact. "I wasn't afraid of duplicating her," stated Thompson. "There was no time to imitate her, but there had to be similar elements because whatever Queen is clicked into the Collective, they all come from the same mind [....] I was very much encouraged to make the Queen my own [though]."  Thompson also remarked, "I took some information from [First Contact]. They did not want me to duplicate Alice's character, but my own development of the background for this character was that there had to be elements that were the same, because ultimately they come from the same brain; they are an extension of the same central brain. There might be more knowledge at any given moment, but there is still the same background."
	The presence of a new Borg Queen was a notable departure from continuity for director Terry Windell. "I think you have a consistency in the characterization of the Borg, the collective mind, and how they operate," he stated. "Our Queen was obviously a different character; although she's still the Borg Queen, there's a very different take on it. So that's the part that I consider open territory to be different. The actual individual Borgs, I think, are manipulated very much in the same way, and that's how you keep the consistency and the continuity."
	Susanna Thompson felt that her primary task was to help make realistic the Borg Queen's effort to convince Seven of Nine to rejoin the Collective. "I think that my main role is to get to a point where the seduction becomes believable," noted the actress.
	Both Susanna Thompson and Terry Windell believed that, in this installment, the Borg Queen is a particularly maternal figure. "It's as if [the Borg Queen] comes back into [Seven's] life much like a biological mother would come back into some child's life, after years of not being there, and try and win her back, but in a very intelligent and manipulative way," said Windell. "Both these people are obviously incredibly intelligent and hold a lot of information. They're going to know what the other person is thinking, so they really have to work to push the buttons." Thompson offered, "In an odd way, the Queen is a kind of maternal figure and of course, so is Janeway." The actress clarified, "There really are two maternal figures. Janeway and the Borg Queen, in whatever twisted maternal way she is, are these two sides that are pulling at Seven and they represent her identity. She used to be here, she went away, and now she's come back to the Borg, and there is a sense of deprogramming and re-brainwashing. That's what the Queen does to her, and that's where the seduction lies."
	Susanna Thompson loved the effect of lights in the Borg Queen's lair following the queen as she moved, believing that the effect lent a greater sense of ambiance and power to her character. Thompson also felt that her Borg Queen's costume, particularly the restrictiveness of the outfit, aided her performance by making it hard to make any "extravagant" gestures.
	Susanna Thompson gained some useful advice from Brannon Braga. "Brannon told me to remember that every movement the Queen makes has a purpose," said the actress. She elaborated, "Brannon was very helpful in that he wanted that kind of fluid movement that Alice had. When I got on set I pretty much got it, but he came down, watched me, and just said one thing – that there's no extraneous movement. I just realized that I might have been twitching a little bit and, because everything is perfect, any little twitch can stand out like a big one. That was real helpful. He also encouraged the quality of being... it's really not conversational... but there is not that drone quality about the Queen's speech."
	Susanna Thompson was additionally advised by Seven of Nine actress Jeri Ryan. "We talked about character, absolutely," recalled Thompson. She also stated, "Jeri said for her, playing a Borg is constantly reinventing yourself in the moment."
	Jeri Ryan also helped Susanna Thompson bear the Borg Queen makeup. "Some of the most important information Jeri wanted to give me was about how to lie down!" exclaimed Thompson. "I had to lie vertical, but Jeri knew that, and she had a neck pillow. What I did was, I had a mound of robes on the floor on my trailer, neck pillows on top of them, and then I was able to lie somewhat comfortably."
	The collaboration between Susanna Thompson and Jeri Ryan was enjoyable for the latter actress. "Susanna Thompson, who is a friend of mine, was fun to work with," Ryan said. "As the Borg Queen, she did a beautiful job."
	Jeri Ryan was extremely enthusiastic about "Dark Frontier" in general. "That could have been a feature," she opined. "I was very impressed with the way that whole show came together, not just the script, but the production values all around were outstanding [....] I loved seeing exactly what made [Seven of Nine's] parents tick and what made them end up the way they did, and exactly how they had gotten there in the first place. It very much had the flavor of Dian Fossey, the woman who studied and lived with gorillas, to it; following the Borg in the wild. I thought it was very well done and very well thought out."
	Although the Hansen family had been shown twice before, they had to be recast for this installment. "I think the original actress who played Seven's mother was unavailable and working in New York," remarked Cliff Bole, "and we just had to go searching [....] Seven's parents were cast late."
	Both Terry Windell and executive producer Rick Berman were fond of Susanna Thompson's work on this episode.  Windell opined, "She was very good." Cliff Bole was likewise pleased with the results of the casting process, such as with finding Katelin Petersen to play the young Annika Hansen. "We lucked out," he said, "but, by God, we looked; it got really tight."