The plan for Naomi Wildman in Star Trek: Picard was needlessly dark and cruel

One of the biggest complaints about Star Trek: Picard from many fans, including some of our writers, is just how dark the franchise became. Needless torture was added to the series, as was graphic violence and unnecessary mature content that turned Star Trek from what it was to a watered-down Game of Thrones in space.

The show became less about plot and more about shock value.

Case in point, the needless deaths of countless beloved Star Trek characters for a storyline that was 20 years past due. While the series has its fans, and defenders, as each passing week and each new episode of shows like Strange New Worlds and Prodigy get released, it's becoming harder and harder to defend the needless "grimdark" motif Picard ventured into.

And if you thought the graphic torture of Icheb or the gratuitous death of Ro Laren was bad enough, Picard was going to raise the ante. According to Picard series runner Terry Matalas, he was going to make Naomi Wildman a darker version of the character we all enjoyed during Star Trek: Voyager.

Matalas, while speaking to the Master Replicas Collectors Club members (via Gizmodo), revealed that he had plans to make Naomi Wildman a darker, more depraved version of the character. A character so dark and ruthless that Seven of Nine would see her as a monster.

Needless to say, a far cry from the kind, empathetic, and studious child we saw on Star Trek: Voyager. As Matalas goes on to describe;

“There was an episode once the Titan was on the run and it needed to hide. And so we had this idea of Seven bringing them to sort of like space Tortuga, like spacedock for pirates where the Fenris Rangers were. And she gets help from an older Naomi Wildman who had also followed in her footsteps as a Fenris Ranger and was a badass. But Seven realizes she sort of created a monster because Naomi had become harder than she was. And so it was it was a Seven/Naomi story. We broke the story and we had reached out to the actress who played Naomi. But it just didn’t feel—if you had 13 episodes, you were doing this for sure. But if you had 10, you’re like,
‘I need to get to LeVar [Burton].’ It’s time to get there.”

And thankfully, the series never went there with Naomi Wildman.

Not only would this tarnish yet another beloved Voyager character (poor Icheb), but it seems pretty one-note. Just about every character on Picard was needlessly dark. We're thankful we didn't get yet another character filled with misery.

We're all for seeing our favorites again, and we're all about seeing Naomi Wildman's actress, Scarlett Pomers, reprise her role. We just want something different than the A-typical-Picard "grimdark" character. The show went far too dark, far too often, to the point it felt more like a film in the Hostile or Saw franchise and less like a Star Trek show.

So while we'd love to see Pomers back, we're glad it won't be for Picard.