The Grimmest Ensign Deaths on ‘Star Trek’

Lots of people die in Star Trek, and accomplish that fairly horrifically. Boldly going is lethal enterprise, however there’s all the time one thing significantly grim when tragedy strikes on the lowest rung on Starfleet’s officer ladder: the lowly ensigns that hold any good starship or house station buzzing alongside as they attempt to survive lengthy sufficient to eke it out to lieutenant junior grade and past. In last week’s episode of Unusual New Worlds, we obtained to sadly see poor Ensign Gamble pay the last word value in a very terrible method, so to… have a good time? We’re looking again at a few of his fellow ensigns who’ve additionally met equally grim fates.

O’Herlihy

The unique Star Trek might have the fame that gave us “redshirt” as a broad cultural time period for an simply doomable help character, however actually, the present didn’t kill off plenty of ensigns. As a substitute, it a lot most popular killing off crewmen, the enlisted rank under ensigns, and did so with suitably reckless abandon, no matter division.

Anyway, that brings us to an precise TOS-era ensign dying within the type of Mr. O’Herlihy, who obtained instantly vaporized by a Gorn disruptor as one of many first Starfleet casualties encountering the species (nicely, in years, given Unusual New Worlds‘ Gorn adventures). Enjoyable truth: O’Herlihy was performed by Jerry Ayres, who would return to Star Trek—to be killed off once more—as Ensign Rizzo a season later in “Obsession.”

Sito Jaxa

Maybe one of the well-known ensign deaths in any respect—to the purpose it grew to become a pivotal emotional crux for Decrease Decks, a present nearly totally in regards to the plight of ensigns—and positively grim. Sito Jaxa, from the well-known TNG episode “Decrease Decks,” was an ensign assigned to an extremely harmful covert mission after being put by the wringer by the Enterprise-D senior employees. Assigned to help a Cardassian defector re-enter Cardassian house, the younger Bajoran was in the end detected by Cardassian operatives and killed whereas making an attempt to return to Federation house in an escape pod.

Dern

A conn officer aboard the Enterprise-D, Dern was discovered mauled to items throughout the episode “Genesis,” by which the crew started to devolve into grotesque monsters by a viral outbreak. Not solely does that imply that Dern was mauled at his station by a member of the crew, however Information confirmed, scanning his corpse, that Dern himself was within the early phases of the an infection, besides. Oof.

Harry Kim (Duplicate)

Voyager discovered as some ways to kill Harry Kim and undo it because it did to cease selling him past ensign, however these largely obtained undone for essentially the most half… apart from that point the place Harry really died after which was changed by his personal quantum duplicate throughout the occasions of “Impasse.” Voyager‘s encounter with a spatial scission resulted in two variations of the ship, each the “unique,” making an attempt to exist in the identical house however out of section with one another. One Harry Kim dies, sucked into house by a hull breach, whereas the opposite, alongside the new child Naomi Wildman, goes over to the “different” Voyager whereas one of many ships self-destructs.

Once more, they’re each technically the identical Harry Kim, give or take a number of hours of alternate recollections brought on by the scission. However meaning a part of Harry nonetheless died, and he needed to simply… go about residing on with that.

Hogan

Think about getting stranded on a hostile planet, your ship stolen, and you then nearly instantly get eaten by an enormous eel creature. And then your skeletal stays go on to spark a spiritual disaster for a wholly completely different species of aliens!

Unnamed Subnucleonic Radiation Sufferer

Not solely is that this poor ensign (we are able to inform by the one rank pip on his collar) unnamed, however he’s additionally the one member of Voyager‘s bridge crew to not survive the ship making an attempt to plow its method by a Mutara-class nebula, bombarding the ship with radiation. Everybody else simply will get to wince in ache and have a headache; this dude’s total face will get burned off.

Jetal

Jetal’s dying was already fairly nasty—she was shot by an unknown alien whereas on an away mission with a devastating vitality pulse that labored its method up by her backbone and into her mind, inflicting large synaptic harm alongside the way in which. However the cause she really died was as a result of the truth that there was solely time for Voyager‘s EMH to function on one of many two injured crew within the assault… and the opposite was Harry Kim, whom the physician picked as a result of he knew higher. Certain, it led to the Physician himself having to discover some private trauma within the aftermath, however nonetheless, dying as a result of the working medical officer didn’t know you that nicely is tough.

Burrows

From the Enterprise episode “Daedalus,” Burrows was killed after touching a spatial distortion that was finally revealed to be a nascent transporter sign from a fancy experiment. Encountering the distortion brought about Burrows to bear “mobile disruption,” basically his physique imploding on a mobile stage, leaving his face hideously warped upon dying.

Connor

One other entry on this listing that’s a sufferer of being spaced, Connor died throughout the Battle of the Binary Stars in Discovery‘s premiere. However what makes his dying particularly grim is the truth that he type of wasn’t conscious of what was happening: injured on the Shenzhou‘s bridge throughout the battle, he was despatched to sickbay for therapy solely to, in a state of delirium, wander into the brig moments earlier than it suffered a hull breach.

Cortez

One other Discovery ensign, one other spacing. Ensign Cortez dies making an attempt to remain too lengthy to restore harm to the ship earlier than emergency drive fields kick in, stopping his escape in time, however other than that layer of tragedy, he additionally will get sucked out right into a subspace rift the ship was exploring right into a void of nothingness that we’d already seen violently disintegrate a robotic probe.

Niko and Angie

Technically one in all these might not essentially be a grim ensign dying, if solely as a result of the ensign concerned might by no means have really been an actual ensign in any respect. Two relationship officers who had been mates of Beckett Mariner aboard the USS Quito, Niko turned out to be a Harvongian shape-changer, who grotesquely reworked into his true type, seemingly triggered by Mariner joking that he may be a Harvongian shape-changer. Niko devoured his girlfriend, Angie, earlier than being phasered into submission by the Quito crew.

Alvarado

Alvarado’s dying is extra existentially horrifying than anything. A soldier combating on the planet J’Gal throughout the Klingon-Federation warfare, he was mortally wounded throughout fight and, in an try and triage restricted medical assets, held in a transporter sample buffer by Dr. M’Benga and Nurse Chapel till a starship with a surgical procedure bay might arrive. Sadly for poor Alvarado, a Klingon assault disrupted the medical base’s energy provide, necessitating a reboot of the transporter’s methods to get them functioning in any respect… purging the backlog totally, together with his organic sample. Demise by having your pc’s recycle bin emptied.

Middleton

Is it dying in case you technically by no means existed within the first place? That was the destiny of poor Ensign Middleton aboard the Voyager-A throughout the Prodigy episode “The Devourer of All Issues, Half II.” Attacked by a transdimensional creature known as a Loom, Middleton was eradicated from time and house totally in order that he was utterly forgotten, by no means current… and solely remembered by individuals sporting temporal discriminators on the time of his dying.

Gamble

And that brings us all the way in which updated with Ensign Gamble. He’s fortunate sufficient to get a mixture of each ugly dying and existential nightmares: the younger medical officer, simply months into his posting aboard the Enterprise, Gamble is immediately killed when a small orb containing a hostile spirit known as a Vezda. This not solely gorily explodes each his eyeballs but additionally results in him being promptly possessed by the Vezda, killing him and shuffling his corpse round in an try and sabotage the Enterprise and achieve management over its methods earlier than Dr. M’Benga realizes that Gamble’s now not dwelling.

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