Star Trek: Picard was originally going to be a Borg spin-off, according to Jonathan Del Arco

Star Trek: Picard had quite a bit of the Borg in the series, which made sense as that was one of Admiral Picard's [Patrick Stewart] worst enemies. So having him face off again against the Collective, that had turned him into Locutus, was a great part of the show. But the large showing of the Borg was originally because, before Stewart had signed on to do Picard, the show being pitched was a Borg spin-off.

Jonathan Del Arco, who played Hugh in Star Trek: The Next Generation and Picard, talked to Trekmovie about his time on Picard and how his participation in the series came about. And surprisingly, Del Arco said he met with Alex Kurtzman, executive producer James Duff, and another writer to talk about the show, and Duff really wanted it to be a Borg spin-off.

"James was the showrunner on The Closer and Major Crimes and a very dear friend of mine and Jeri [Ryan]’s, and he had been hired to come very early on, one of the early executive producers and writers of a spin-off of Star Trek. We didn’t know what it was. There was no Picard yet. It was a spin-off of Star Trek. Alex Kurtzman, James Duff, and I believe maybe one other writer was involved at the time, and James really wanted it to be a Borg spin-off. That’s why he talked to Jeri and I, and really started talking to them about it being this Borg storyline. And somewhere within that he discussed it with us maybe a year before it even happened. And they didn’t have Patrick yet. So I think then they went and made the pitch to Patrick. But had Patrick not done it, some kind of show about the Borg would have happened. It would not have been Picard, it would have been a show about the Borg. And you can even tell how heavily Borg-influenced it was. So the Borg was really the the kernel, from what I understand of of the beginning of that idea."

- Jonathan Del Arco

Though the Borg were quite the frightening enemy, I can't imagine a spin-off series about them would have worked, although, Jeri Ryan had also been approached for the series. So there would have been two former drones, Seven of Nine and Hugh, onboard as the main protagonists, I imagine. Possibly the show would have been about them fighting to free more of the drones or simply fighting to finally finish the Borg off once and for all.

While I loved Hugh on The Next Generation and Ryan always brings her best to Seven of Nine [and we're all still waiting for Star Trek: Legacy to be greenlit], it's difficult to think of a way a show that was entirely focused on the Borg would have worked. Maybe I'm being too myopic, but the Borg was always sprinkled into Star Trek series sporadically. To have every episode be focused on them might have been a bit too much of a bad thing.