Star Trek: The Next Generation

Trivia: Another joke from the set designers: whenever someone is in the Jeffries Tubes, you will see several pipes on the walls labeled "GNDN" this stands for "Goes Nowhere, Does Nothing."

Loud as a Whisper - S2-E5

Trivia: Guest star Marnie Mosiman, who plays a member of Riva's chorus, is married to John de Lancie, who had a recurring role as the omnipotent mischief-maker Q.

Cubs Fan

The Measure of a Man - S2-E9

Trivia: When Riker views Data's file on his computer, Data is listed as "NFN NMI Data." This stands for "no first name" and "no middle initial."

The First Duty - S5-E19

Trivia: The Federation flag has the Roman numeral MMCLXI, which is 2161, the year that the United Federation of Planets was founded. It's motto, "Ex axtris scientia" is latin for "from the stars, knowledge."

Trivia: The ceiling of the transporter chamber is actually the floor of the transporter chamber from the original series.

Trivia: Further to the Trivia entry, a control in Engineering is labelled 'Infinite Improbability Drive' as a nod to Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy. Also, one of the indicators above a diagnostic bed in Sickbay reads 'Medical Insurance Remaining.'

Symbiosis - S1-E22

Trivia: Near the end of the episode, Picard and Crusher walk out of the cargo bay. As the doors close behind them, you can see Tasha Yar waving to the camera from inside the bay. Her character is killed in the next episode, but this one was filmed second. The actress was waving goodbye to all of her fans. (00:42:10)

The Game - S5-E6

Trivia: During a scene in Ten Forward with Wesley and Robin, in the background you can see a crew member in a blue uniform playing The Game. This is actor Brent Spiner, minus his Data makeup.

Relics - S6-E4

Trivia: Scotty visits the bridge from "his" Enterprise (from the original 1966 Star Trek series) on the Holodeck. As the original set had long since been destroyed, the captain's chair and center console used in the episode was donated by a fan who had recreated a life size version of the bridge. The turbolift alcove and one of the stations was built on-set (and re-used in the DS9 episode "Trials and Tribbleations"). Everything else was made up of footage from the original series that was looped.

Descent (1) - S6-E26

Trivia: Stephen Hawking guest stars in this episode, playing himself as a holodeck character (The "Poker with Einstein" program). This came about when he visited Paramount Pictures to promote "A Brief History of Time", and then told the Paramount people that he had always wanted to visit the Enterprise. He not only got to visit, but the writers added this special scene just so professor Hawking could appear on screen in a Star Trek episode. Hawking also reportedly stopped by the warp engine, smiled and said "I'm working on that".

Twotall

Trivia: The transporter was first created by Gene Roddenberry in 1966 for the original Star Trek, as an easier (and cheaper) alternative to get members of the Enterprise crew onto a planet's surface, instead of having the ship land on the planet each time. The same holds true here. Even the original version was based on a similar effect in the movie Forbidden Planet.

Hollow Pursuits - S3-E21

Trivia: The test objects that O' Brien uses on the malfunctioning transporter are U.S. Navy sonar buoy transport cases.

The Royale - S2-E12

Trivia: In this episode, Picard is studying Fermat's Great Theorem, and says it has remained unsolved for 800 years. Five years after the episode was made the theorem was proven, by Andrew Wiles and Richard Taylor from Princeton University (their proof is not the same as Fermat's though, as they used modern methods Fermat did not know of). In the Star Trek universe, this was referred to in an episode of Deep Space Nine, and is considered as a subtle correction for Picard's statements.

Twotall

Trivia: "VISOR" stands for Visual Instrument and Sensory Organ Replacement.

Cubs Fan

Trivia: The current King of Jordan appeared briefly as an officer saluting Picard in one episode.

megamii

The Royale - S2-E12

Factual error: 30 seconds in Geordi says: 'surface temperature -291 degrees Celsius'. (The scale only goes down to -273.15 which is absolute zero). (00:00:30)

More mistakes in Star Trek: The Next Generation

Deja Q - S3-E13

Picard: Return that moon to its orbit.
Q: I have no powers! Q, the ordinary!
Picard: Q, the liar! Q, the misanthrope!
Q: Q, the miserable! Q, the desperate! What must I do to convince you people?
Worf: Die.

More quotes from Star Trek: The Next Generation

Skin of Evil - S1-E23

Question: Near the end when they are in the holodeck for the memorial ceremony for Lt. Yar, Dr. Crusher's uniform is green and seconds later it is blue. After watching it several times, it does not appear to be a trick of the light. What happened here? Why would she have on a green uniform in the first place?

con8iv

Chosen answer: The uniform does indeed change colour. It may be due to the need for a green screen in part, or perhaps some lighting altering our perception. That being said, it certainly looks green at the start, blue thereafter.

The show has been done in HD now and not sure if they fix this problem.

Dan23

More questions & answers from Star Trek: The Next Generation

Join the mailing list

Separate from membership, this is to get updates about mistakes in recent releases. Addresses are not passed on to any third party, and are used solely for direct communication from this site. You can unsubscribe at any time.

Check out the mistake & trivia books, on Kindle and in paperback.