Star Trek: Starfleet Academy Answers The Question Everyone Has About Robert Picardo’s Doctor – SlashFilm

Spoilers for “Star Trek: Starfleet Academy” episode 8 to observe.

Robert Picardo lucked out together with his “Star Trek: Voyager” position as The Doctor, a holographic intelligence designed to help medical officers; on the stranded starship Voyager, the Doctor needed to step up for a full-time job. Because the Doctor is considered one of many mass-produced holograms, Picardo has been capable of simply return in different “Star Trek” productions. He even obtained himself a task within the movie “Star Trek: First Contact” by asking why the Enterprise would not have an emergency medical hologram (EMH) like Voyager.

Extra just lately, Picardo joined the forged of “Star Trek: Starfleet Academy,” which is about within the thirty second century, greater than 800 years after “Voyager.” However the Doctor remains to be round, having added some wrinkles and gray hair to his generated look to convey some getting older. This permits “Starfleet Academy” to account for Picardo wanting older than when he performed the Doctor on “Voyager.”

Everyone the Doctor knew on Voyager, the primary family and friends he ever had, is lengthy lifeless. The centuries have additionally left him many alternatives to kind new connections, solely to see them fade away to time, too. The apparent query in regards to the Doctor is, nicely, is he okay?

He isn’t. “The solely factor that permits me to bear my infinity shouldn’t be having to like anybody,” the Doctor says within the newest “Starfleet Academy” episode, “The Lifetime of the Stars.” Absent any exterior hazard, the Doctor’s lifespan could find yourself being so long as a star’s. Nevertheless, he is not alone; Starfleet Academy Chancellor Nahla Ake (Holly Hunter) is a close to-immortal Lanthanite, so she’s conversant in shedding family members just like the Doctor has. So, with some encouragement from Nahla, the Doctor accepts the photonic SAM (Kerrice Brooks) as a surrogate daughter.

SAM is a synthetic being just like the Doctor; she hails from Kasq, a planet of sunshine-primarily based beings who advanced out of holograms, or the Kasqians. SAM, the Sequence Acclimation Mil, was then created and despatched to be the Kasqians’ emissary to the world of organics. However in “The Lifetime of the Stars,” her program is failing. As such, the Doctor, Nahla, and SAM journey to Kasq to see if her makers can restore her.

When describing her worry of dying to the Doctor’s stiff higher lip, SAM says one factor she desires to expertise is falling in love with somebody. “Have you ever ever been in love?” she asks the Doctor. He does not reply immediately, however my thoughts (and possibly his) instantly flashed to Seven of 9 (Jeri Ryan), the liberated Borg drone who joined “Voyager” in season 4. 

The Doctor needed to learn to be human, so he was the proper individual to show Seven to be one as nicely. Beginning out, their relationship paralleled that of Professor Higgins and Eliza Doolittle in “My Truthful Girl,” notably within the “Voyager” episode “Somebody to Watch Over Me.” Ultimately, the Doctor fell for Seven, though the pair by no means truly obtained collectively on that present (and who is aware of in the event that they ever did earlier than Seven finally handed away). 

Nevertheless, the Doctor and SAM’s relationship winds up mirroring a special a part of his life on Voyager.

Within the “Voyager” season 3 episode “Actual Life,” the Doctor used Voyager’s holodeck to create a simulation the place he is a human Starfleet medical officer named Kenneth dwelling on Earth. He even had a spouse named Charlene (Wendy Schaal), a son named Jeffrey (Glenn Harris), and a daughter named Belle (Lindsey Haun). The Doctor initially programmed the holodeck to make him a “good” household, however his crewmate B’Elanna Torres (Roxann Dawson) advised he add some dysfunction to get a extra correct expertise of being human.

The simulation thus took a tragic flip and Belle suffered a deadly mind harm throughout a sports activities accident. Even 800 years after that, the Doctor nonetheless speaks of her as his true daughter; Belle was his first main loss and one which weighs the heaviest on him. Tears in his eyes, he confesses to an unconscious SAM (with Nahla in earshot) that she reminded him of Belle, which solely made the Doctor preserve her at a distance. (Picardo’s stirring efficiency will remind you ways he made the Doctor into the breakout character of “Voyager.”)

So, when SAM’s makers declare she will’t be fastened, the Doctor does not settle for that. He concludes that SAM’s neural deterioration is as a result of she wasn’t programmed with any pre-current reminiscences, so her thoughts could not deal with the burden of feelings. So, to save lots of her life, SAM is distributed to expertise 17 years’ value of childhood reminiscences — with the Doctor taking part in the position of her father. Because of time dilation, moments cross by within the “actual world” whereas the Doctor raises SAM. For photonics just like the Doctor, time has little which means, however he is remembered that it means lots to different beings.

“Star Trek: Starfleet Academy” is streaming on Paramount+.