We’re continuing our week-long windup to the launch of Star Trek: Picard with another extensive interview with a pair of returning franchise favorites: memorable Next Generation guest star Jonathan Del Arco (Hugh), and beloved blonde Borg Jeri Ryan (Seven of Nine), reprising her role from Star Trek: Voyager.

Speaking with the pair of Collective cast-offs at this past weekend’s CBS All Access press tour in California, we got to hear a bit about the actors’ reaction to being asked back to the franchise after decades away, the efforts taken to protect the secret of their casting, fan speculation to their characters’ involvement in Star Trek: Picard… and just what the two former Borg drones have been up to for the last 20 years.

When the pair’s return was announced in a shocking moment at San Diego Comic Con last July, it was through enormous efforts by the Star Trek: Picard production and publicity teams that the surprise held until Seven of Nine appeared on the Hall H presentation screen — much to even the actress’ disbelief.

JERI RYAN:

I cannot honestly believe they actually pulled [the San Diego Comic Con surprise reveal] off. Because we were shooting on location… at Universal Studios on CityWalk! Our base camp was on the backlot, where the [tourist] tram goes through. We had these – we called them ‘the invisibility cloak,’ ‘the cloak of silence’ — I looked like a Dementor from ‘Harry Potter.’ I had to be completely covered as soon as I stepped out of my trailer, just to go between trailers, to get in the car to drive me to set. At one point, I’m in this cape, and we’re going really, really, REALLY slow going to the set. I wondered what was going on… and we were stuck behind the tram tour. I thought, “Are they doing this on purpose because they WANT it to leak? Shooting at, like, THE movie capital of the world?” It was crazy. And they actually pulled it off.

While Ryan had her spoiler-prone days on location, Del Arco was cooped up on remote sets elsewhere in California, facing his own set of secret-keeping challenges.

JONATHAN DEL ARCO:

We were [on set] out in the middle of nowhere. I mean, there are no buildings around, but [the producers] were worried because there were hills on the other side of the parking lot, and they warned me, “You’d be surprised, the paparazzi could be there with their lenses.” So I was sequestered in my trailer, which I hated, because I like to chat and graze. I called [Jeri] up and told her, “They lock you in your trailer, they bring you your food, they don’t bother you at all.” And she goes, “I’m gonna love that!”

One the word was out, however, fans began to wonder how this new injection of Star Trek: Voyager casting would impact the assumed Next Generation sequel series that had been expected.

Ryan told us how she took the news that the Star Trek: Picard team wanted to bring Seven of Nine back to television, and about her concerns from past experiences.

JERI RYAN:

One of my biggest hesitations in bringing [Seven of Nine] back, when it was first mentioned, was that there has to be a reason to bring her back. Right after I finished ‘Voyager,’ they wanted to stick her in whatever movie they were doing then. ‘Nemesis.’ I was like, “Why? She’s never interacted with any of these [‘Next Generation’] people,” and Seven would never be there…. There’s no reason for her to suddenly be in this crew. It just made no sense, story-wise or character-wise. The way they’ve done [‘Picard’] makes absolute sense, the way she’s introduced. I can’t tell you what it is – you’ll have to wait! – but I love why she’s introduced, and it makes perfect sense for her and [Picard’s] paths to cross and interact, because they have a shared Borg history. As, of course, does [Hugh]. It is quite seamless, and it makes sense.

The return of Seven and Hugh also sent fans into wild speculation about the Borg itself might play into the series, after the Collective was thought to have been destroyed — or at least severely cropped — after the events of “Endgame” in 2001.

Series executive producer Alex Kurtzman has called Picard “a very unique and very different Borg story,” and here’s what the pair had to say about the return of the Star Trek villains… at least, without getting in trouble with CBS’s secretive publicity team.

JERI RYAN: [We can’t give details, but it affects our characters] in a huge way. JONATHAN DEL ARCO: A huge way. I’m trying to think of how I can skirt the issue and answer it without getting my head chopped off when I see Alex [Kurtzman]! The Borg have changed before, right? The last time you saw the Borg that were with me we had disconnected from the Collective; when you saw Jeri’s character, she was in Starfleet. So it’s kind of an obvious progress: if you disconnect them from the Collective, what then becomes of them, right? Now, I’m not going to answer what happened to the Collective – whether it’s still there or not, is it still a threat… that’s to be revealed. But in terms of our characters, we’re already on the path to change, because we had already disconnected. For us, it’s been a furthering of that, but what I will say is that one of the amazing things about the story to me is the marginalization of these people. How these enemies –

Ryan quickly jumped in, laughingly waving Del Arco off from his line of discussion.

RYAN: Careful! Careful! DEL ARCO: I’m really walking a tightrope! [Laughs] I’ve got nothing to lose, they can’t cut me out of it now! Marginalization just speaks to the world that we’re in right now. There are marginalized people all around the world, in our own cities and communities, and that is an interesting turn for [Hugh] and for [Seven] as well. It means a lot to me, actually, because I am an immigrant, and the things that are happening worldwide — certainly at our border — are really personal to me. And the show has themes in it that touch on that piece alone. Later on in the season, when more stuff is revealed about that sort of a scenario and what’s happened to [Hugh], I’ll be able to talk about how, you know, as a gay man who lived through the AIDS epidemic and has seen a lot of hell, I was able to use a lot of my personal experiences to put into the work.

As for Seven’s life for the last two decades, Ryan wouldn’t get into it much in our discussion — aside from a brief reveal that we’ll be seeing “a lot of quite emotional stuff” that ties back to her life aboard the USS Voyager — but she did speak with IGN this weekend where she revealed that her character is now operating along side a team of “freedom fighters” trying to clean up the current state in which the galaxy finds itself…

…and that Seven has never met Jean-Luc Picard, until now.

IGN INTERVIEW:

Seven, I think, holds Starfleet and the Federation, in a large part responsible for much of it. The universe is a mess, and she initially sees Picard as part of that. She’s been working with sort of a group of freedom fighters called the Fenris Rangers, who are trying to keep some semblance of order in the mess that is the galaxy. This is the first time that Seven and Picard actually meet. They know each other by reputation; and as I said before, Seven’s not on the, “Oh, [Picard’s] a god” bandwagon, initially, when she meets him. Because she holds him partly responsible for what Starfleet has done.

Not only has the Borg changed in Star Trek: Picard, it seems so have too Seven and Hugh gotten new looks as the 24th Century nears its close.

Picking up in 2399 — twenty years after Star Trek: Nemesis — the characters have both aged in real-time since we last saw them, and the actors were happy to see that their famous skin-tight wardrobes were left behind for this new production.

JONATHAN DEL ARCO: Thank GOD! [Laughs] JERI RYAN: Seriously! The corset and catsuit? Yes, I’m happy! DEL ARCO: We can eat! We can pee! We do all the things! Yeah, we’re very happy. RYAN: It’s really good – and it’s what it should be! It makes perfect sense, too, with the character’s been through over the last 20 years, what she’s been through, what she’s been doing with her life. When the costume designer, Cristine [Clark], showed me the idea board with what they were thinking, I was so excited. Like, “That’s perfect! That’s exactly what I wanted!” DEL ARCO: I was thrilled. I just like to get the [acting] work done and function as a human being! I think that when you’re in your twenties you’re willing to put up with a lot more shit then when you’re in your fifties… in terms of like creature comforts, and, you know, the need to go to the bathroom more. So, I was like, “Thank you for taking care of THAT for me.” No rubber suit!

While we see Hugh relatively early in the season, Jeri’s debut as Seven of Nine won’t come until the Jonathan Frakes-directed fourth episode of the year, set to air in mid-February. The pair reflected on what it felt like stepping back into the world of Star Trek after such a long absence.

JERI RYAN: I walked on set for the first time, and thank God that Jonathan Frakes – who is also a dear friend – was directing my first two episodes [104 and 105]. My first scene is the one you see a little snippet of in the trailer, with Picard. Just seeing these two characters, who have never interacted before, and having Frakes there to direct it… he was like, “Man, this is a MOMENT, right?” JONATHAN DEL ARCO: I did get goosebumps in one of the scenes I was working on; I went to the director and said to her, “I think you’re creating like a classic ‘Star Trek’ moment in this scene.” And she tells me, “I think so too!” Your body just responds to it, you know, like, “This is gonna be a classic moment. Don’t fuck it up!” [Laughs]

Finally, the actors shared their joy in watching fans on social media tear up every new bit of released photography or footage of their characters, forensically inspecting each frame to try and uncover the secrets of the upcoming series.

JONATHAN DEL ARCO: What’s really fun to me, is like when a trailer drops, or photo, there will be people online that will dissect every frame of it – JERI RYAN: Everything! “The zipper on Seven’s jacket looks like a Romulan symbol!” I’m not kidding, this is a whole thread on Twitter! DEL ARCO: You crying [in the trailers]. “Who’s she crying over?” RYAN: “It could be this person or this person or this person,” going through and rattling off a whole list. DEL ARCO: Or they say, “Well that guy had curly hair, so it couldn’t be him!” RYAN: All shall be revealed. [Laughs] But not now!

As the interview session wrapped up, we had a spare moment to get in one last question to Jeri Ryan, who shared back in August that her updated portrayal of Seven was “a much more human” one, which makes sense after decades back in the Federation.

But does that mean she’ll still be known as Seven of Nine, or has she finally adopted her original human name, Annika Hansen?

JERI RYAN: I… can’t even tell you that. You’ll have to wait and see.

Star Trek: Picard debuts on CBS All Access on January 23, and follows on Amazon’s Prime Video service (outside of North America) on January 24.