Seven of nine: why target demographics need to die
In may 1997 Scorpion part one aired for the first time bringing with it Seven of Nine Tertiary adjunct of Unimatrix 01. Seven of Nine was pitched as the Spock to Captain Janeway’s Kirk, a foil to Janeway’s impulsive, emotional decision making based mostly on her gut. So how the heck did she end up in a skin tight catsuit and a corset?
Well to answer that we need to go back to 1993: Star Trek The Next Generation was about to end, Star Trek Deep Space Nine was just getting started, and Paramount Pictures was planning to start a new television network and they want a second Star Trek show to accompany DS9 and help launch it. With that in mind, preproduction began on Star Trek Voyager and elements that would be important to the show began to make their way into both TNG and DS9. In September 1994 shooting began on the pilot episode titled “Caretaker” however production quickly ran into problems with the first actress cast as the shows main character leaving the project two days into shooting causing an 11 day delay in shooting and costing millions. With the pilot alone costing 23 million dollars to shoot there was extra pressure on Voyager to succeed.
Despite Paramount being adamant that there be a woman in the captains chair Kate Mulgrew and the show were both very much so doubted during the production of the first season. There were conflicts surrounding her character on seemingly every level and it was clear that executives did not think that a woman who at the time was 39 years old would succeed with the same demographic as Picard and Sisko. However, production continued and the first 20 episodes were filmed.
On January 16th 1995 Voyager premiered in a 2 hour event launching UPN to 21.3 million views. However, this was the only time Voyager ever reached this level of viewership and as time went on the decision to make Star Trek compete with Star Trek for air time on non UPN stations hurt Voyager’s ability to establish an audience with those who were already watching DS9 and had been fans of TNG. Another problem with Voyager being so tied to UPN was that when the network failed to establish a solid Monday - Friday primetime line up UPN lost stations meaning more places had to choose between Voyager and the more established and reliable DS9.
So with Voyager not meeting the ratings that UPN wanted and the target demographic of 18-24 yr old males seemingly uninterested in a Star Trek show that starred a 40yr old woman as the lead the decision was made that the show needed sex appeal by the network. At the same time in an effort to increase ratings the decision to get rid of Kes due to her being “superfluous” as Rick Berman put it in a 2009 interview with Anthony Pascale and replace her with another character.
The then show runner jeri Taylor was excited to have the opportunity to introduce a new series regular and it was ultimately decided that the new character would be a Borg, something that had been considered since tng. With that the character of Seven of nine was written and casting began. There was a push from the network to cast some one to “spice things up” and bring sex appeal for the target demographic. The result: Jeri Ryan in a suit so tight it caused her to pass out.
The first of the many catsuits was a silver colored number with a tight ribbed corset that took Ryan 15 minutes to get into or out of and with restricted the blood flow to her brain if she turned her head resulting in her passing out twice on set. Due to the significant problems with the suit, like the need for filming to be put on hold for over a half hour any time Ryan needed to use the restroom this suit was quickly replaced. However the catsuit was never done away with and the character was only ever seen in other outfits a few times during the series.
Thanks to the effort to sex up this new character the positive changes made to the shows structure that came with having a foil to the main character and all of the excellent writing done for the character many fans of Star Trek dislike Seven of Nine and many of Ryans costars resented her. According to those involved with the production Mulgrew bullied Ryan who is 13 years her junior onset, accusations which are supported by the number made and the fact that Mulgrew and Ryan have only been at one convention together since the show ended. Robert Beltran was also very vocal about how much he disliked that Seven’s relationship with the Captain became more important than his characters even though he played the first officer. Among female fans there was also a sizable group that disliked that a show which had not given its female lead a romance and had portrayed such strong female characters had put such an unambiguously sexy character onscreen.
By trying to attract their target demographic UPN and Paramount neglected the fans of the show that they already had and created a character that in some peoples minds detracts from the show because of the overdose of sexy they gave her
Personally, I love Seven of Nine. She is one of my favorite characters ever and I love the dynamic between her and Captain Janeway. It was amazing to watch her journey from Borg to human over the course of four years but I can’t say I wouldn’t have liked it better if she was wearing something a bit less revealing.
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