Earlier this week, we reported on some comments about the upcoming Jean-Luc Picard series made at Rose City Comic Con by Star Trek: The Next Generation actors Michael Dorn, Marina Sirtis, and Gates McFadden. The trio also talked about the current state of Trek, weighing in with some thoughts about Star Trek: Discovery as well.

Dorn happy he didn’t have to act with Discovery Klingon makeup

No single actor is more associated with Star Trek’s Klingons than Michael Dorn. He appeared as Worf, the first Klingon in Starfleet, in seven seasons of TNG, four seasons of Deep Space Nine, and four feature films. He even played an ancestor to Worf in Star Trek VI. It is fair to say he has clocked more hours in the makeup chair being transformed into a Klingon than any other person, so it is no surprise that when Dorn was asked what he thought of the look of Klingons in Star Trek: Discovery, he had some things to say.

Dorn started out diplomatically, providing some context to how Klingons have changed before:

In a general sense, in every iteration of Star Trek – outside of Next Generation and Deep Space Nine and all those Klingons – the producers were trying to make it their own and put their own stamp on the Klingons. So, they decided “We are going to do something different than everybody else.”…and I think that is what they came up with for Discovery. There is no rhyme or reason to it, or to any of the stuff, so I think it is just a matter that they want to put a stamp.

The actor then talked specifically about how he did not envy L’Rell actress Mary Chieffo and the time she had to spend being transformed into a Klingon for Discovery:

I am actually really glad that I am not in that makeup, because if you go online and look up YouTube of Mary Chieffo – just a wonderful, just a sweetheart, but what they do to that poor girl is mind-boggling. There are three makeup artists working the whole time on her…I mean, it’s okay. It’s just another iteration.

This prompted an exchange with Gates McFadden, where Dorn noted how the complex makeup could be limiting the actor’s performance:

Gates McFadden: It’s an incredible look and she is able to do incredible things when she is wearing it. It is different, though. Michael Dorn: That is the problem. There is nothing of her, at all…Nothing. Just her eyeballs. That’s it.

Sirtis talks Discovery and how Star Trek should return to morality tales

Marina Sirtis, Star Trek: The Next Generation’s Deanna Troi, was on the same panel, and after the discussion about Klingon designs, she explained why she can’t really weigh in on the topic:

I have never watched it…I am going to explain why I don’t watch Discovery, before they all hate me. We were on the best Star Trek show. If CBS thinks I am going to pay to watch Star Trek, they are demented. I will wait until I go to England and watch it on Netflix, which I pay for anyway.

Although she hasn’t seen the show, Sirtis sparked speculation on when she visited the set while Jonathan Frakes was shooting the second episode of the second season of Discovery in May. The actress got the crowd laughing when she spoke briefly about why she can’t talk about her visit:

When I went to visit Jonathan [Frakes] on the set of Discovery, I had to sign an NDA…I swear to god, we have to sign – Gates, don’t we have to sign so many NDAs, we feel like one of Trump’s mistresses.

Later in the panel, Sirtis spoke more about how she feels about all the Trek series that followed Star Trek: The Next Generation, saying:

I actually think that Star Trek got it right in our show and in the original show because the shows were about something. They weren’t just entertainment…They were little morality plays and that is what Star Trek lost after we were done. And it ought to go back to that.

More from Rose City Comic Con

See our previous article where the trio of TNG actors talk about how they haven’t (yet) been asked to be part of the upcoming Jean-Luc Picard Star Trek show with Patrick Stewart.