Does the Borg Queen actually make sense to have in Star Trek: First Contact?

Does it make sense for the Borg to have a Borg Queen?

With First Contact Day winding down, I thought it’d be interesting to talk about one of the greatest villains of all time, the Borg Queen. Introduced in Star Trek: First Contact, the Borg Queen was a manifestation of the collective hive mind in a singular form. She got off to a hot start as well. She nearly took over the Enterprise-E, destroyed several key strongholds in Montana, and nearly got Data to betray Jean-Luc Picard.

She didn’t come in like Big Van Vader and squash everyone she saw, but she made herself look quite powerful regardless. Yet, some fans have asked this before and I’ll ask that same question; does it make sense for a hive-mind to need, for lack of a better term, a point of contact?

The original concept of the Borg is that they were one. To be swallowed up by them is to lose your individuality, granted they punted that aspect really fast with the season three finale, The Best of Both Worlds part one, where we saw Picard get assimilated and became Locutus of Borg.

Why did Picard get a name when no one else did, well Liam Shaw has a theory;

"The real Borg are still out there, and they have a name for you: Locutus of Borg. The only Borg so deadly they gave him a goddamn name."

Is that true? No, not really. The Borg have decimated entire planets at a time, surely there are Borg with a higher body count individually speaking. Picard helped kill a few thousand people, impressive in a sense, but far from the only one. There are grander Borg than Picard, at least in theory. Yet, naming him, regardless of the reason why, did wipe away the idea of Borg erasing individuality.

So in a way, the Borg Queen doesn’t do anything that the Borg themselves haven’t done without her. They’re clearly all about putting out a face to help sell the place, so why not the Queen?

Does it make sense for the Borg to have a Borg Queen?

So while it isn’t unordinary for the Borg to consolidate itself behind one face, one visage, she isn’t exactly a queen, now is she? The idea behind the Borg Queen that some have is that she’s the mother, the hive queen, the thought that all Borg has. But is that entirely true? I have my doubts. I think of her less as a queen and more as a spokeswoman. Though, “Borg Spokeswoman” doesn’t exactly sound intimidating, does it?

So she isn’t exactly a queen in the sense that a bee hive has a queen. A bee hive protects the queen, as it is its own independent concept. The rest of the bees exist to serve her. The Borg, on the other hand, is the inverse. The Queen exists to serve the Borg Collective. She isn’t making the decisions, she’s simply stating the will of the Borg through one channel.

As Memorphy Alpah puts it;

"The Borg Queen was the name given to the entity that existed within and served as a central nexus for the Borg Collective. Her name was coined by the Federation scientists Magnus and Erin Hansen, who discovered her existence."

So she’s basically just the manifestation of the Borg’s intent and nothing more. Just with a unique face. That’s done so we, the viewers, know this Borg is different from the other Borg.

So yes, it makes sense to have a singular character speaking for the will of the Borg. That said, it’d be far more intimidating in my opinion to just have hundreds, if not thousands of drones, speaking in one. It’d be a hard shot to do, to get that many people in makeup and on screen, but man, it’d be chilling.

That said, The Queen is far more efficient financially.