Encounter at Farpoint marked the final TV appearance of DeForest Kelley

Lore was originally planned to be a female android, but Brent Spiner himself came up with the evil twin concept that was ultimately used

The Borg were originally conceived as a race of insectoids, but that proved too expensive

Among the other actors contending for the role of Geordi LaForge were Tim Russ (who went on to play Tuvok on Voyager) and Wesley Snipes.

Stephen Hawking is the only person to ever play themselves in Star Trek history

Many Season 2 episodes were actually adapted from the scrapped Trek series, “Star Trek: Phase II”

Patrick Stewart sang “The Hills are Alive” from the Sound of Music to lighten the mood during Tasha Yar’s funeral scene in “Skin of Evil”

One of the best episodes of the series, “Yesterday’s Enterprise” was based off a spec script from the show’s open submission policy

Q was originally scripted as being the cause of Picard’s time travel in the episode “Time Squared”

In “Offspring” a scene was planned with a same sex couple holding hands but was nixed because someone called production to complain

The episode “A Fistful of Datas” was originally titled after a different spaghetti western as “The Good, the Bad, and the Klingon.”

Patrick Stewart hated that there were fish in the captain’s ready room because he felt it was inhumane to keep captive animals, especially when you’re portraying what is, effectively, a utopian society.

In an early draft of Best of Both Worlds, Data and Picard were combined as one Borg unit.

Patrick Stewart loves Beavis and Butthead and has been known to do impressions of them

Although only the women in the cast, Marina Sirtis and Gates McFadden had sword training, only the men were allowed to hold swords in the Robin Hood themed episode, “Q-Pid”

Originally, veteran Trek actor Kirstie Alley was supposed to appear in the episode “Cause and Effect” but was replaced with her Cheers co-star, Kelsey Grammer.

The episode, “Inner Light,” had its title derived from the Beatles song of the same name.

Tasha Yar was originally meant to reappear in the alternate universe episode, “Parallels” but Wesley was used instead.

The only episode ever filmed by Gates McFadden was “Genesis” which was also the first to be directed by a female cast member.

In “Chain of Command” Patrick Stewart insisted on being fully nude on a closed set to film the first torture scene. As a member of Amnesty International, Stewart was intent upon not backing off just what torture really is.

In the original concept for the episode, “Tapestry,” Q was going to show Picard multiple pivotal moments in his life, including the death of his best friend, Jack Crusher.

While rehearsing the first appearance of Picard as Locutus, Patrick Stewart recited the line as “I am Locutus of Borg. Have you considered buying a Pontiac?” which set the entire cast and crew into fits of laughter.

Whenever discussing a story Roddenberry wouldn’t have liked, Rick Berman would blindfold the Gene bust in his office so Gene couldn’t “see” what was happening.

“Captain’s Holiday” came about because Patrick Stewart wanted more “sex and shooting” for Picard

The series finale “All Good Things” originally involved the attack at Wolf 359 as one of the timeline’s Picard visits