For characters who debuted in Star Trek: The Original Series, see Characters.Star Trek The Original Series
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Enterprise Crew
Commander Willard Decker
Commander Willard Decker
Played by: Stephen Collins
Dubbed in French by: Hervé Bellon
The new captain of the Enterprise. He gets demoted to the rank of commander after Kirk comes aboard and takes over.
- All There in the Manual: He's the son of Commodore Matt Decker from the TOS episode "The Doomsday Machine".
- The Artifact: Originally created for the aborted Star Trek: Phase II TV series, to be a replacement Kirk should William Shatner decide to leave the series at some point. The concept for the character would be refitted into Cmdr Riker for TNG.
- Ascend to a Higher Plane of Existence: Along with Ilia Probe and V'Ger.
- Commander Contrarian: Justified. Decker does know the refit Enterprise better than Kirk. Countermanding an order from Kirk actually saves the ship from face-planting in an asteroid. Less justified later, as he makes some suggestions that can at best be excused as understandably irrational from a guy who just lost his girlfriend.
- Never Found the Body: Technically speaking. Fusing with a giant spaceship and disappearing to a higher plane of being will do that. Kirk decides not to list him as dead, but rather "missing in action".
Lieutenant Ilia
Lieutenant Ilia
Played by: Persis Khambatta
Dubbed in French by: Annie Sinigalia
A Deltan officer who has a troubled romantic history with Will Decker, but still has feelings for him.
- All There in the Manual: Sex with a Deltan is said to be so mind-blowing that other species simply can't handle it, hence the oath of celibacy.
- The Artifact: Ilia was also intended to be a new character on Phase II, and screen tests of Persis Khambatta in a '60's-era miniskirt uniform are extant. Many concepts for the character would resurface as Deanna Troi in TNG.
- Deadpan Snarker: At least according to the background information that Gene Roddenberry wrote for the character's species. He described the race as having an extremely developed sense of humor with a delivery so dry that they seem very cold and aloof to outsiders. Most other races don't ever realize when a Deltan is making fun of them, which probably explains the Breathless Non Sequitur she delivers to Kirk:Ilia: My oath of celibacy is on record, Captain.
- Informed Attractiveness: We're not saying that Persis Khambatta isn't attractive, but Ilia is one of a select group of Trek characters with less hair than Picard, and yet several male crew members get all goofy around her.note The novelization explains this as her race releasing pheromones whenever they're around unfamiliar malesnote — so sometimes it's not just because of her attractiveness; they just can't help their reactions.
- One of those obviously goofified men is Sulu (at least in the Director's Cut); although gay actor George Takei always played Sulu as straight, this leads into questions about Ilia's pheromone effect on gay men or on Lesbians, something that obviously couldn't be dealt with at the time.
- Pheromones: Ilia emits sexual pheromones that can create reactions in other species. Unfortunately you'd have to read the novelization to realize why men are acting strangely around her, as this is never mentioned in dialogue — and it really only comes up at all in the Director's Cut, which has the added scene of Sulu acting goofy around her (the original cut does have her unexplained line about an oath of celibacy, but that's all).
- Mauve Shirt: We get a few scenes of her, establishing that she and Decker had a thing, and then V'Ger zaps her out of existence. Then it uses her appearance as a probe.
Commander Sonak
Commander Sonak
Played by: Egyptian actor Jon Rashad Kamal
, more properly Sultanzade Rashad Kamal Bey Effendi
A Vulcan science officer who is appointed when Starfleet can't get (initially) Spock.
- Body Horror: Courtesy of a Teleporter Accident. What Starfleet gets on the pad doesn't live long... fortunately.
- Replacement Goldfish: Recommended by Kirk pretty much solely for being a Vulcan. Then he dies and the Goldfish eventually replaces the replacement Goldfish.
- We Hardly Knew Ye: He dies in his second scene.
Other Characters
V'Ger
V'Ger
A vast and powerful entity headed toward Earth with a mysterious purpose.
- Abnormal Ammo: V'Ger's weaponry neatly erases you and stores a record of you in its memory banks.
- Anti-Villain: Cuts a swath of mayhem on its trip towards Earth, and basically holds the Federation at gunpoint until it gets what it wants. When it finally does join with its creators however, it leaves in peace.
- Arc Welding: While the films and shows have never said anything one way or another, it's been implied in various EU sources that V'Ger is somehow connected to the Borg Collective; Star Trek Online has massive Borg command ships you can battle that bear a suspicious resemblance to V'Ger.
- Ascend to a Higher Plane of Existence: Along with Ilia Probe and Decker.
- Desperately Looking for a Purpose in Life: Spock theorizes V'Ger is trying to do this.
- Eldritch Starship: A massive, mysterious, insanely powerful, techno-organic vessel hiding inside a gigantic energy cloud is as close as Trek has ever gotten to this trope.
- Fantastic Racism: Despite having absorbed all manner of life and knowledge in its journey across the universe, it never realizes carbon-based lifeforms are actually alive until it gets to Earth.
- Fusion Dance: On finding its creator, V'Ger then wants to become one with them, and refuses to take no for an answer.
- Gone Horribly Wrong: The machine race that fixed it up probably didn't intend any harm. They just saw it as helping a fellow sentient get home and fulfil its mission.
- Karma Houdini: It destroyed entire galaxies on its way home, judging by Spock's comments, but is allowed to ascend and go on its merry way to... wherever. In fairness, with something that powerful, there's not much that can be done to stop it. The novels do ameliorate this somewhat by revealing V'Ger could, as with Ilia, recreate the lifeforms it destroyed, and plans on doing so.
- Literal-Minded: V'Ger's original programming parameters were "learn all that is learnable" and return that information to NASA. And that's what it's damn well gonna do, even after it becomes sentient.
- Manchild: One of the oddest ones on record. V'Ger has a knowledge that spans the universe, but as Spock notes, its understanding of that knowledge is like a child. A child which can annihilate entire planets if it doesn't get what it wants, even as everyone's trying to explain why that's impossible.Dr. McCoy: Your "child" is throwing a tantrum, Mr. Spock. What do you suggest we do, spank it?
- Measuring the Marigolds: As Spock finds out when he merges minds with it, V'Ger is all knowledge. Pure, cold, knowledge, with no feeling. He's horrified.
- Mechanical Evolution: It wants to do this, and can't. So it gets tetchy.
- Obliviously Evil: V'Ger almost extinguishes all life on Earth, completely unaware that it is about to kill sentient beings. V'Ger actually does kill a lot of people, including some Klingons, the crew of Epsilon Nine, and Ilia, before realizing that they're lifeforms.
- Planet Spaceship: V'Ger is so unfathomably large that even small parts of it fill up the entire screen when compared to the Enterprise. In the original release, the ship itself is never seen in its entirety, which adds to the sense of enormity. The remastered version shows the ship in all its glory, being the size of a small moon roughly in the shape of a cylinder with spikes ringing its center section.
- Powerful and Helpless: V'Ger has knowledge that spans the universe and is in many ways, one of the most powerful beings ever seen in the Trek franchise. And none of it matters to V'Ger because it has reached its limits and needs to find a way to evolve into something greater. It even throws an impotent tantrum when Kirk refuses to acquiesce to its demands.
- Straw Vulcan: While not an actual Vulcan, V'Ger fits this trope pretty well, as its probe speaks in a Machine Monotone and dismisses all emotions as "illogical". It quickly becomes apparent that V'Ger itself isn't all that unemotional, though.
- Thank the Maker: To the point that it almost comes across as a "Well Done, Son" Guy.
Ilia Probe
Ilia Probe
Played by: Persis Khambatta
A probe made in the shape of Ilia by V'Ger to try and understand the "carbon units".
- Fantastic Racism: Being programmed by V'Ger, the probe initially just sees the organic occupants as an infestation of Enterprise.
- "It" Is Dehumanizing: Referred to as an "it" initially, and a "thing" by a pissed-off Decker. As the probe starts becoming more like Ilia, the crew start using "her" pronouns instead.
- Machine Monotone: More than the original Ilia, with an added mechanical reverb.
- Mouth of Sauron: Serves as V'Ger's mouthpiece, mainly because V'Ger can't speak.
- Ridiculously Human Robot: A nigh-exact replica of flesh-and-blood Ilia, right down to body parts and functions, as Dr. Chapel notes. And even Ilia's memories and personality in the mix.
- Super-Strength: Strong enough to punch through the Enterprise's walls, as the crew find out when she finally gets bored.
- Verbal Tic: She only ever refers to Kirk as "Kirk unit".
Lori Cianni
Lori Cianni
Played by: N/A
Kirk's ex, who dies in the transporter accident. Gets characterisation in the novel and Star Trek: Ex Machina.
- The Masochism Tango: Neither she or Kirk were good for each other, Lori being emotionally abusive and manipulative, and Kirk substituting her for his mother, Spock and the Enterprise.
- Psycho Psychologist: Downplayed, as she uses her skills to manipulate a depressed and vulnerable Kirk into where Starfleet wants him.
- Replacement Goldfish: She may have taken advantage of Kirk being vulnerable, but Kirk was definitely not innocent either, acting like she was some kind of mother figure and replacement for Spock and the Enterprise.
