Star Trek: Voyager could have lost out on Jeri Ryan because of one scene

Star Trek: Voyager brought Jeri Ryan aboard to play the former Borg drone Seven of Nine when Jennifer Lien's character, Kes, was written off the show. Seven of Nine had been assimiliated as a child so she had no adult memories; and, when Ryan was auditioning for the role, one scene in particular had her questioning whether or not she would continue with the audition.

Ryan was given two scenes to audition with, one of which was from "Revulsion" when, realizing Ensign Harry Kim [Garrett Wang] was trying to flirt with her, Seven of Nine tells him to undress in the middle of the mess hall. Had that been the only choice she'd been given, Ryan told TV Zone [via Screenrant] that she would not have done the audition.

"It was not one of my favorites, I personally found it terribly predictable and a bit cheesy. If it had been that scene alone there wouldn't have been a question in my mind; I would have never done the audition.""

- Jeri Ryan

Not only was this scene predictable, it also put Wang's character in a bad light. He knew that Seven of Nine just spent most of her life as a Borg drone, and he knew what those drones were forced to do at the behest of the Queen. Instead of thinking about what she'd gone through and about possibly how he could help her, he focused on her sexual appeal. That wasn't who Harry Kim was.

Though Wang's character wasn't given much opportunity for growth on the series, he was never made out to be the womanizing character Lt. Tom Paris [Robert Duncan McNeill] was originally. So the scene is actually demeaning to both Wang and Ryan. It's a good thing Ryan was able to audition with another scene as well or she wouldn't have become Seven of Nine who went on to become the captain of the new Enterprise on the third and final season of Star Trek: Picard.