Welcome to Close Reads! In this series, Leah Schnelbach and their guests dig into the tiny, weird moments of pop culture—from books to theme songs to viral internet hits—that have burrowed into our minds, found rent-stabilized apartments, started community gardens, and refused to be forced out by corporate interests. This time out, Giles Gough looks dives into how Captain Worf introduces himself, and what that says about the character’s growth.
The finale of Star Trek: Picard is almost universally accepted as being great. Checking in on beloved characters after an absence of twenty years was wonderful, and whilst everyone has their favourites, the character development for Worf cannot go unnoticed. I’ve adored Worf ever since I first saw him in “Encounter at Farpoint” in 1990 (yes, it took them that long to get round to airing it here in the UK). Worf was the biggest, toughest, and in my estimation, coolest character in the cast. Having the bravery to be the first Klingon in Starfleet never escaped my attention, and I’ve loved him for many reasons, some of which we’ll get into later. By virtue of appearing in the most episodes across the extended Star Trek universe, Worf is perhaps the character with whom we’ve spent the most time. In the latter days of The Next Generation we saw him as a single father doing whatever the opposite of gentle parenting is, whereas in Deep Space Nine he spends more time as a geo-political power player and commander of a starship. His early appearances in Picard seemed to suggest he would be swinging from comic relief to screaming bad ass. To anyone else yelling “Dad’s home!” at the TV when he was introduced, just know, you are my people. But there’s something more interesting at play here.
Did you notice how he introduced himself to Raffi?