Star Trek Generations
"Two captains. One destiny."

In the late 23rd century, the USS Enterprise-B is on her maiden voyage, and Kirk is no longer in the captain's chair. The ship must rescue El-Aurian refugees from a mysterious energy ribbon, but the rescue seemingly costs Kirk his life. Seventy-eight years later, one of the El-Aurian survivors leads the crew of the Enterprise-D into a deadly confrontation with the Duras sisters as he plots to re-enter the paradise of the ribbon that nearly destroyed him years prior.

Summary

Prologue

23rd century (2293)

Floating in space, a bottle of Dom Pérignon, vintage 2265, cracks against the hull of the new   at the starship's christening ceremony. On the drydock facility, various gathered civilians and  applaud the christening. On the Enterprise-B bridge, three guests of honor, of the crew of the original , Captains James T. Kirk and Montgomery Scott and Commander Pavel Chekov, emerge from the turbolift and are immediately surrounded by reporters asking the three legends of Starfleet questions all at once.

Their frantic questioning is interrupted by Enterprise-B's commanding officer, Captain John Harriman, who says there'll be plenty of time for that later – and welcomes the new arrivals to the bridge. He then tells Kirk how he's pleased to have welcomed a group of living legends aboard and how he read about their exploits when he was in grade school. After a rather awkward moment, Kirk asks if they can look around, and Harriman obliges. As the three men disperse, Chekov sees a young female Starfleet ensign and calls out her name.

Kirk is asked by a reporter about how he feels for the first starship Enterprise in thirty years to be launching without him in command. Kirk says he's fine with it and that he's happy to be aboard to send the Enterprise-B on her way. Before he can be grilled further, an Enterprise-B crewman asks the reporter to let Kirk look around first and the former Enterprise captain stares longingly at the captain's chair.

Chekov then calls Kirk over and introduces him to the Enterprises helm officer, Ensign Demora Sulu. Demora tells Kirk that her father has told her some interesting stories about him, which surprises Kirk that Hikaru Sulu is her father. Chekov reminds Kirk that he's met her before – which Kirk remembers, but didn't think it to be that long ago. Chekov tells Kirk it was twelve years previous. Kirk shakes Demora's hand and tells her, "It wouldn't be the Enterprise without a Sulu at the helm." She thanks Kirk and Chekov tells her that her father must be very proud of her. She says she hopes so.

As Demora returns to the helm, Chekov marvels at her, remarking to Kirk that he was never that young. Kirk agrees, but tells Chekov that he was younger. Scott walks by and remarks that the new Enterprise is a "damn fine ship." Kirk tells Scott he's amazed that Sulu found time to have a family. Scott says that just as Kirk would say, "If something's important, you make the time." He then wonders if that might be what Kirk's problem is and that he might be finding retirement a little bit lonely. Kirk remarks that he's glad Scott is an engineer – because with tact like that, he'd make a lousy psychiatrist. Just then, Harriman steps up and tells Kirk and Scott it's time to go and if they would please take their seats.

Kirk – somewhat reluctantly – and Scott move away from the captain's chair and Harriman starts to order the ship out of dock. But then, Harriman turns and asks Kirk to give the order to get them underway. At first Kirk begs off, but Harriman persists. Kirk continues to try to get out of it, but Harriman insists and with the reporters all there, Kirk finally stands and orders to the helm, "Take us out." After everyone on the bridge applauds, Chekov says "very good, sir" and Scott remarks "brought a tear to my eye" in regard to his choice of words, whereupon Kirk tells them both to be quiet. Then, the Enterprise-B leaves drydock on its maiden voyage around Earth's solar system.

As the Enterprise-B cruises out of drydock and into open space, Kirk, Chekov, and Scott complete a full tour of the ship. Upon returning to the bridge, they're asked how it feels to be back after having seen the whole ship to which they all rather awkwardly reply "Fine." Harriman informs the reporters that the Enterprises course today will take them out just beyond Pluto and then back to spacedock, "Just a quick run around the block."

Just then, a distress call comes in over the com. The voice on the distress call notes that their ship, the , is one of two ships in their convoy that are currently trapped in a severe gravimetric distortion. They cannot break free and need immediate help. The voice also reports that it is tearing their ships apart before the transmission is cut off. Ensign Sulu tells Captain Harriman that the ships are only three light years away. At first hesitant, Captain Harriman asks that the Enterprise signal the closest starship; stating that they are currently in no condition to mount a rescue. At this, Kirk jumps up from his chair and stares at Harriman. The captain tells Kirk that they don't even have a full crew aboard. The operations officer notes that they are the only ship in range. Faced with this, Harriman reluctantly orders the Enterprise into action, having the ship be accelerated to maximum warp. Kirk nervously shifts around in his chair. Scott notices this and asks if there is something wrong with his chair, implying that he knows of Kirk wanting to take over the situation. Not far out, they encounter the two El-Aurian refugee ships, the Lakul and the , caught in a strange energy ribbon.

Faced with gravimetric distortions that threaten to destroy his ship, Harriman – at the urging of Captain Kirk – resolves to take the Enterprise into the ribbon. Once they get close enough, the ship finds both ships being battered by the energy ribbon. Kirk immediately suggests that the Enterprise use its tractor beam to pull the ships away, only to be told (much to his disbelief) that it hasn't even been installed yet, not until Tuesday. Harriman then tries a couple of safe maneuvers to try and free the ships, but to no avail before the Robert Fox explodes, killing all 265 people on board. Admitting that he's out of his depth, Harriman turns over control of the situation to Captain Kirk who immediately leaps into action and suggests they attempt to get close enough to meet transporter range and beam the El-Aurians off the Lakul. When Harriman points out the hazards, Kirk replies that danger is part of a Starfleet officer's life, especially if one is aboard the Enterprise and sitting in the chair. Harriman orders the ship in, however the initial attempt is made difficult as the El-Aurians life signs phase in and out of the space-time continuum. Scott begins a transport from the Lakul as it, too, explodes. He manages to save 47 – out of 150. Shortly afterward, the Enterprise herself gets trapped by the energy ribbon.

In sickbay, Chekov and two of the reporters he wrangled to be nurses attempt to help wounded refugees as the ship is rocked by the gravimetric distortions (as the Enterprises medical staff also hasn't arrived). A distraught, middle aged man is particularly violent in his desire to return, and has to be sedated by Chekov. Also among the refugees is Guinan, whom Chekov notices standing in the corner of the room in distress and takes her to somewhere where she can lie down. On the bridge, Kirk, Scott, and the Enterprise crew frantically work to free the ship to no avail. Scott determines that a photon torpedo blast would free the ship… but once again, no torpedoes are present. "Don't tell me… Tuesday?", Kirk retorts to Harriman. Scott suggests using the navigational deflector to simulate the effect of a torpedo blast. Initially Harriman volunteers to go to deflector control to make the necessary modifications, and asks Kirk to take command, but after Kirk savors the moment of sitting in the captain's chair one last time, he quickly realizes it's no longer his place and tells Harriman that he will go instead: Harriman's place is on his bridge.

In the bowels of the Enterprise, Captain Kirk charges to the rescue, climbing into the guts of the ship to modify the main deflector. The ship shakes and shudders under the stresses of the ribbon. When Kirk finishes the modifications, Harriman orders the deflector activated, creating a resonance burst that pushes the Enterprise free. As the ship begins to move away, an arc of energy lashes out, opening a gash along the hull. When they get free, they find out in the damage report from Ensign Sulu that the hull breach was located in the engineering section on decks 13, 14 and 15 – including the very section Kirk himself was in. Failing to contact Kirk by communication, a horrified Harriman and Scott rush to the scene.

When they get there, joined shortly by Chekov, they find nothing but mangled technology and empty space, with no sign of Kirk. Chekov incredulously asks if anyone was in here, and all Scott can muster is a grim sounding "Aye". Scott, Chekov, and Harriman stare somberly out through the enormous breach as the damaged Enterprise begins its journey back home.

Act One

24th century (2371) 

78 years later, Captain Jean-Luc Picard, Commander William T. Riker, and the rest of the senior staff of the  have gathered on the ship's holodeck. Acting as the crew of a 19th century sailing ship (also named Enterprise), the Starfleet officers celebrate the promotion of Lieutenant Worf to Lieutenant Commander. As a rite of passage, Worf is made to jump while balancing on the plank and retrieve his hat which he does successfully and smartly dons it, but is then purposely sent into the water when Riker orders the computer to remove the plank. While the rest of the crew laughs, Data admits to Doctor Crusher that he doesn't understand why Worf falling into freezing cold water is so amusing to people. Crusher tells him that it's just a bit of harmless fun, and he should try and get into the spirit of things and 'do something unexpected'. Data tells her he understands, then suddenly pushes her overboard, falling into the sea taking Worf back in with her. Data turns expecting laughing, only to find the faces of his horrified crewmates Geordi La Forge and Deanna Troi, with La Forge telling him that was 'not funny', leaving the android even more confused.

Savoring the simpler times the holographic ship represents, Captain Picard receives a personal message from Earth on the holodeck arch. While reading the communiqué, Picard's expression changes to one of obvious distress, which Deanna Troi picks up on. Picard looks out to sea in silence, and when Troi asks him if he is all right, he just replies that he's fine and abruptly leaves the celebration. Just after he's gone, a call comes in from the bridge: the Amargosa observatory is under attack. "Red alert! All hands to battle stations, Captain Picard to the bridge!", Riker orders while leaving the holodeck.

Arriving at the observatory orbiting the Amargosa star, Picard and company take their positions on the bridge still dressed in formal naval uniforms. Finding the station suffering from severe damage and casualties, a still visibly upset Picard orders the ship to stand down from red alert. He then has Riker and an away team head over to search for survivors and retreats to his ready room after snapping at Riker to "just do it" when his first officer tries to get more specific orders. This confirms Counselor Troi's suspicions that something is seriously wrong. Beaming over to the devastated Federation installation, Riker, Worf, Doctor Crusher, and security officers find an El-Aurian scientist, Dr. Tolian Soran, injured and buried among the wreckage. Elsewhere, Worf locates the remains of one of the station's attackers: a Romulan.

In his quarters, Data and Chief Engineer Geordi La Forge are sitting together at a table hard at work, despite frequent interruptions by the android's cat, Spot. Data ponders his difficulty with humor and other Human emotions and comes to the conclusion that he cannot continue to grow without the aid of Dr. Soong's emotion chip. Despite the risks it poses to his positronic brain, Data urges La Forge to install the chip. La Forge reluctantly agrees. Meeting with Picard in his ready room, Riker reports that its obvious from the initial investigation that the Romulans attacked the station looking for something but have left no clues as to what, but a recovered tricorder may yield some answers. Picard tells Riker this may indicate that the Romulans are increasing their presence in that sector and orders him to contact Starfleet Command. Riker is surprised, given that this is normally done by Picard himself, but agrees before reporting that Dr. Soran urgently wishes to meet with the captain. Picard complies, but coldly rebuffs Riker when inquired as to what is wrong.

Later in Ten Forward, Data is all smiles with his new emotion chip activated. He and La Forge approach Guinan at the bar and sample a new beverage from Forcas III. Immediately, Data experiences an emotional reaction: he hates it! As the two officers sample more of the revolting beverage, Captain Picard enters and finds Dr. Soran among the crowd. Soran implores the captain to let him return to the observatory to continue a critical experiment – time is running out and years of research will be lost. However, Picard is clearly not in the mood for an argument and tells him bluntly that he can only return once his officers have concluded their investigation. However, Soran cryptically tells Picard that "time is the fire in which we burn and right now, my time is running out. We leave so many things unfinished in our lives … I'm sure you understand."

This eerie statement breaks through Picard's stony resolve and he agrees to see what he can do. After Picard leaves, Soran checks his pocket watch and starts to look around, and is shocked when he spots Guinan behind the bar and makes a quick exit. As he leaves, Guinan senses that something isn't right, but Soran is gone by the time she looks around. In engineering, Commander Riker checks on the status of the analysis of the retrieved Romulan tricorder that Farrell is examining. Worf reports that the Romulans were searching for a compound called trilithium, a substance capable of destroying a star. However, the Romulans never found a way to stabilize it. Riker doesn't understand why the Romulans would ransack a Federation facility for it, but orders Data and La Forge to have the observatory searched.

On the station, Data and La Forge use tricorders to search for trilithium. As they perform their scans, Data laughs incessantly and tells stupid jokes, including one he had heard La Forge tell on the bridge seven years previously during the Farpoint Mission that he just finally understood. He congratulates La Forge: "Very funny!" The punchline is "The clown can stay, but the Ferengi in the gorilla suit has to go." Despite the distraction, La Forge finds a large hidden doorway that is magnetically sealed. Data is able to open it by reversing the polarity by attenuating his axial servo found on his wrist. After Data waves his wrist in front of the large door, it opens up. Found behind the door is a secret lab, filled with solar probes that show signs of trilithium. Data is doing nothing but laughing now and when an annoyed La Forge finally asks him to knock it off, Data says, while laughing, that he can't help it and something must be wrong and starts reeling in pain, before collapsing as his neural net has been overloaded by the emotion chip. Unable to contact help through a dampening field protecting the lab, La Forge is confronted by Soran, who knocks the engineer out and turns a phaser on Data, who is filled with fear and begs him not to shoot.

In the captain's quarters, Picard sits with his family photo album. Counselor Troi enters and he begins to tell her about his brother and nephew and his plans to get together with them on Earth in San Francisco the following month so he could show René Starfleet Academy. As he affectionately describes his nephew, he breaks down in tears and tells Troi that both Robert and René have burnt to death in a fire. Troi comforts him and Picard tells her that when he was growing up, he was always told about the Picard family line and his famous ancestors. When Robert got married and had a son, he no longer felt the responsibility to carry on the family line and as he has got older and felt time creeping up on him, he took comfort in the fact that his family would go on. But now it won't and once Jean-Luc is gone, there will be no more Picards. The somber mood is interrupted when suddenly the Amargosa star flashes brightly out the viewport. Arriving on the bridge, Picard and Troi learn that the observatory has launched a trilithium probe in the sun. The star has collapsed, all fusion reactions arrested, creating a level 12 shock wave that will destroy everything in the system. With the away team still on the station, Picard orders Riker and Worf to retrieve Data and La Forge.

On the observatory, Riker and Worf find Data and La Forge held hostage by Soran who responds to the appearance of the Enterprise officers with phaser fire. Suddenly, a route to La Forge opens and Riker asks Data if he can get to the engineer, but the android is clearly paralyzed by fear and tells him he can't. Entering coordinates into a computer, Soran disappears in the transporter beam with La Forge… transporting aboard a Klingon Bird-of-Prey, de-cloaking near the observatory and warping away. As the away team returns to the ship with Data, Picard orders the Enterprise to warp just as the shock wave obliterates the Amargosa observatory.

Act Two 

On the bridge of the Klingon getaway ship, the Duras sisters, Lursa and B'Etor, are admonished by Soran for allowing the Romulans to attack the Observatory (it emerges that the trilithium was stolen from a Romulan outpost by the sisters), reminding them that their plans to use trilithium to conquer the Klingon Empire are dependent on him. The El-Aurian demands they set course at maximum warp for a planet in the Veridian system and the sisters grudgingly comply. In the bowels of the ship, Soran holds La Forge captive. Marveling at the engineer's VISOR, Soran interrogates La Forge to learn all he knows about trilithium.

Back on the Enterprise, Dr. Crusher has done some research into Soran's background, telling Commander Riker that he was one of the survivors rescued by the Enterprise-B eighty years ago after the Borg destroyed their world and that Guinan was also listed on the passenger manifest. To learn more about the scientist, Captain Picard visits Guinan in her quarters. There she describes the energy ribbon as the "Nexus", a blissful realm where time has no meaning, and a place Soran must be desperately trying to get back to. The experience left such an impact on Guinan that she suspects it has turned Soran into a dangerous threat. As he is trying to get back to the Nexus, this raises the question: Why destroy a star? Picard leaves after thanking Guinan for her help, but she warns him that if he goes into the Nexus, he will not care about anything. Not his ship, Soran, nothing. All he'll want is to stay in the Nexus – and he will not want to come back.

"Captain's log, stardate 48632.4. Dr. Crusher has informed me that Data's emotion chip has been fused into his neural net, and cannot be removed. However, she believes he is fit for duty so I have asked him to join me in ."

In the cavernous stellar cartography section of the Enterprise, Picard and Data work in front of a huge projection of space, and Picard asks for everything affected by the destruction of the Amargosa star. Data is clearly distracted and doesn't immediately respond, and when Picard asks the android if he's all right, Data admits that he is feeling intense guilt over his failure to save La Forge in the observatory. Composing himself, Data reports that one of the things affected was that the  had to make a minor course correction due to a change in the gravitational field. Picard asks Data to chart the ribbon's course. Data stands up and tells Picard that he cannot continue with the investigation, and asks to be deactivated until the emotion chip can be removed. Picard tells him that he is not willing to allow it and tells Data he must attempt to integrate the emotions into his life.

Data tries to argue with this, but Picard matter-of-factly tells him that he will not be deactivated as he is a Starfleet officer on his ship and orders him to continue to perform his duties. Data agrees to try, and resumes his position at the console. Picard tells him that it takes courage to try and that courage can also be an emotion. Data is able to chart the ribbon's course, and Picard asks if the Amargosa star's destruction was taken into account when he charted the course. Data tells him that he didn't, and makes the adjustment. However, when this is done, it becomes clear that the gravitational change has altered the ribbon's course.

Unable to fly into the ribbon with a ship, Soran is attempting to make the ribbon come to him, and they find that the ribbon comes close to Veridian III. Data then simulates the course if the Veridian star was destroyed, and this causes the ribbon to come into direct contact with the planet. Now they know where Soran is going. Data points out that if the Veridian star is destroyed, it will also produce a shock wave that will destroy the system, similar to the one produced by Soran at Amargosa. This will claim the lives of the 230,000,000 people living on Veridian IV. Knowing they have to stop Soran, Picard taps his combadge and orders Worf to take the Enterprise to the Veridian system at maximum warp.

Finished with the interrogation, Soran returns to the bridge of the Klingon vessel as they enter orbit of Veridian III. Soon, the Enterprise also arrives, transmitting a message to the cloaked ship demanding the return of La Forge. Irritated by the interruption, Soran orders the sisters to destroy the Enterprise but they remind him that their Bird-of-Prey would stand no chance in battle against a  starship. Soran cryptically has a solution in mind to give the sisters the edge, an idea which involves La Forge's VISOR…

On the bridge of the Enterprise, the Klingon vessel decloaks on screen and Lursa and B'Etor greet the captain. Claiming they have merely had La Forge as a guest aboard their ship, they agree to a "prisoner exchange", taking Picard in his place. First, however, they agree to allow Picard to beam to Soran's present location, somewhere on the planet's surface. As the captain beams down, a stricken La Forge rematerializes on the Enterprise transporter pad and promptly collapses. Dr. Crusher and Nurse Alyssa Ogawa rush to his aid.

Appearing on an arid desert mountain top, Picard finds Soran hard at work on a solar probe launcher. Attempting to reach the scientist, Picard is blocked by a huge force field. Keeping his distance, the captain appeals to Soran, but the El-Aurian is unconvinced. On the Enterprise, Data visits La Forge to apologize for being too frightened to help him on the observatory, but La Forge assures the android he understands and notes that Data is now acting a lot more like a Human. Full of happiness, Data reports to his station to aid in the search for Picard and is so jubilant he plays his console like a piano as he scans for lifeforms causing the whole bridge crew to stare at him.

In space, the Duras sisters watch their viewscreen and see from the perspective of Geordi La Forge's modified VISOR. They watch impatiently as he moves from sickbay, to his quarters, then finally to engineering. As the engineer checks several readouts, the sisters discover what they have been looking for – the exact shield modulation of the Enterprise. With this new knowledge, they will be able to fire through the Enterprises shields by adjusting their torpedo frequency.

On the Enterprise bridge, the search for Captain Picard on the planet below is interrupted as the Bird-of-Prey opens fire with photon torpedoes, which pass straight through the shields to hit the secondary hull. Disruptor blasts likewise pass directly through, hitting the portside nacelle. The Enterprise returns fire, but the Klingons' shields hold up against phaser fire. The bridge is engulfed in explosions, injuring Jae, the conn officer. Riker orders Counselor Troi to take the helm and to get the ship out of orbit, but the Duras sisters' assault is relentless and they pursue the helpless Enterprise, firing non-stop. Riker asks Worf if their ship has any exploitable weaknesses, and Worf remembers that their Bird-of-Prey is an older model that was retired because of defective plasma coils.

Riker asks Data what effect an ionic pulse aimed at the plasma coil would have. Enthusiastically, Data realizes that the pulse would trigger the ship's cloaking device, disabling its shields and weapons. As the Duras sisters continue their onslaught, Riker orders Worf to target their primary reactor with photon torpedoes; they will only be vulnerable for a few seconds at best and this is the Enterprises only chance. Making a few quick modifications, Data triggers the pulse just as a direct hit from the Klingons causes an aft bridge terminal to explode, hurling the hapless crewmember manning it over the tactical station and down onto the command chairs.

Aboard the Bird-of-Prey, Lursa and B'Etor triumphantly order the weapons targeted at the Enterprises bridge to deal the death blow, when their bridge officer reports with alarm that their cloaking device is engaging and their shields are dropping. The sisters are allowed only a few seconds of horrified realization, before the Enterprise fires a single photon torpedo, and their vessel is completely destroyed, killing Lursa and B'Etor in a fiery explosion.

The Enterprise crew stares silently at the remains of the destroyed ship, as Data triumphantly exclaims "Yes!"

Meanwhile, on Veridian III, Picard carefully walks around the force field's edge as Soran continues to work on his probe. Picard nonchalantly throws a small rock into the force field, prompting Soran to look up and ask if Picard hasn't got anything better to do. At that, Picard sits down and Soran resumes working. While Soran is distracted, Picard notices a small hole in the rocks and tosses another rock through it and sees the force field doesn't cover it, providing a way in. Picard waits for Soran to move away so he can try to get through that hole unnoticed.

In engineering, La Forge finds a new problem: the magnetic interlocks have been ruptured, and while he's reporting this to Riker, plasma coolant begins violently leaking out of the warp core. Evacuating engineering, La Forge tells Riker that he can't shut it down and gives an estimate of five minutes until a warp core breach, rolling out of engineering as the last one out just in time before the isolation door comes down to the floor. On the bridge, Riker orders Troi to evacuate everyone to the saucer section and Data to prepare to separate the ship. The crew and their families hurry to evacuate their doomed stardrive section with Dr. Crusher leading her staff and patients out of sickbay and La Forge guiding the crew to safer locations. As the breach nears critical and with the crew cleared of the stardrive section, the ship separates and begins to move out of range. However, just as Troi begins engaging the impulse engines the core breaches prematurely, completely destroying the damaged stardrive section of the Enterprise and creating a ion shock wave that disables the entire saucer section including all helm controls and pushes the saucer into the atmosphere of Veridian III. On the bridge, the Enterprise crew watches in horror as they begin to plummet toward the surface of the planet. Data, for the first time, swears.

As Picard climbs through a hole in Soran's force field, he jostles the rocks which set off the field. Soran, spotting Picard caught in the hole, fires his weapons, sending rocks raining down on the captain. Careening out of control towards the planet, the bridge crew desperately attempt to regain control of what's left of their starship as the rest of the crew seeks safety as best they can on the lower decks. Data is able to route the remaining auxiliary power to the lateral thrusters in an attempt to stabilize the Enterprises descent as Riker warns the crew to brace for impact. As the ground rushes towards them on the viewscreen, the saucer impacts off a slight rise in the terrain, briefly forcing it back in the air. As the crew fights to regain control, the saucer nosedives into a large hill, destroying all remaining ship functions and knocking the crew to the deck.

With their fate now left to chance, the bridge crew protects themselves any way they can as the Enterprise skids through a heavily forested area, cutting a large swath of destruction. Fires burn and structural supports rain down from the top of the bridge as the crew weathers the horrific ride, completely sensor blind and only lit by the fires and emergency lighting. With one final violent lurch forward, the momentum slows and the saucer finally comes to a stop. Data and Troi regain their senses first and survey the damage. What was once an immaculate nerve center for the flagship of the Federation is now completely destroyed; the large viewscreen has been shattered, consoles and displays are burnt out, chairs have been ripped out from the deck and the only light comes from the broken top of the bridge dome as the blue Veridian sky shines in from above. The USS Enterprise-D is a total loss.

Miles away from the crash site, Dr. Soran looks out over the rugged terrain of Veridian's desert only to be surprised by Picard who attacks him outright. The two men struggle, and Picard manages to disarm Soran quickly, but is knocked back by Soran's blows and thrown down a hill, landing face down in rock and sand as the Nexus appears in the sky. Picard recovers, and tries again to get up to the launcher to stop the countdown… however he is too late as Soran's launcher engages and his solar probe streams into the sky. Watching from the surface, Picard is horrified as the probe finds its target and the star is destroyed, darkening the sun in seconds. Soran climbs to a high platform and throws his arms into the air as the Nexus changes its course. Sweeping down toward the ground, the ribbon envelops everything, taking Soran and Picard along with it. Gliding away from the planet and out into space, the Nexus departs the system just before the shock wave hits, which destroys the entire planet, taking the Enterprise saucer section, its crew, as well as the rest of the solar system, with it. Soran has succeeded.

Act Three 
"What… where is this?! Where am I?" Captain Picard's voice echoes as he transitions from the real world to the Nexus. A hand reaches toward him from space and removes his blindfold to suddenly find himself in a Victorian-style house where his wife and children greet him on Christmas morning. Picard quickly allows himself to be absorbed into the fantasy, enjoying a perfect life with a wonderful family. René, also present, gives Picard a gift. Picard happily receives it, then remembering what happened gives his nephew a loving hug before sending him to help his aunt.

Later Picard strolls through his home, into a study and to large bay windows overlooking snow-covered trees, decorated with colorful lights and bulbs. Standing at the windows, Picard finds himself staring into a strange, surrealistic world, the bulbs on the trees containing small stars that flash brilliant bursts of light and begins to realize that something is wrong. Suddenly, he turns to find Guinan standing behind him in the study. The El-Aurian bartender tells the captain that she exists both here and in the real world, a part of herself she left behind so many years ago – an echo of her former self. Picard is unable to believe how perfect the fantasy is around him, knowing that although he never had a family, he knows the children are his own. Guinan tells him in the Nexus time has no meaning, so he can travel to any point in his children's past or future as he wishes.

With the appearance of Guinan, Picard is at first divided, tempted by the prospect of staying in the Nexus and living out this fantasy life. But he soon realizes that action must be taken to save the hundreds of millions of people who would be killed if Soran destroys the Veridian star and asks Guinan if he can leave the Nexus. Guinan tells him that the timeless nature of the Nexus would allow him to go any place, any time. Picard knows exactly where he wants to go: to the mountaintop on Veridian III to stop Soran from destroying the star, but he will need some help. As she already exists in the real world, Guinan tells the captain that she cannot go with him. But she says there is somebody who can help, who as far as they are concerned, just arrived in the Nexus themselves…

Suddenly Picard finds himself standing outside a rustic cabin in the woods, daylight shining down through the trees. A few feet away, James T. Kirk stands, chopping wood with an ax. Seeing Picard, Kirk smiles, "Beautiful day." Picard agrees and helps Kirk chop wood. Kirk is then drawn inside the cabin, hurrying into the kitchen where eggs are burning on the stove. Kirk tells Picard to come on in, this is his house – at least, it used to be. He had sold it some years prior.

Picard steps inside and into the kitchen, helping Kirk prepare a fresh set of scrambled Ktarian eggs on the stove. Picard hesitates momentarily, then introduces himself as captain of the Enterprise, from what Kirk would consider the 24th century. Kirk is too distracted by the memories of the past to fully take in what Picard is telling him, excited to be in his old home, with his beloved dog , who seemingly died years ago. A woman calls down to him and he instantly knows who it is: Antonia, a lost love. While Kirk is preparing breakfast, Picard asks "How long have you been here?" Kirk isn't quite sure; one second he was aboard the Enterprise-B, the next thing he knew, the bulkhead in front of him disappeared and he was here, chopping wood, right before Picard walked up. Picard then tells Kirk that history records him as dying while saving the Enterprise-B and that both of them are caught in some kind of temporal nexus. He then tries telling Kirk of the dire situation on Veridian III, but as Kirk tries to get his head around the situation, he realizes that he has gone back to the day he told Antonia he was leaving her to rejoin Starfleet… but this time he won't make the same mistake, now he intends to go upstairs and propose to her. The two argue, as Picard tells him that as a Starfleet officer he has a duty to help him, but Kirk argues that all duty ever got him in the end was an empty house and figures the galaxy owes him a favor. Kirk then enters Antonia's bedroom, noting that this time, it is going to be different.

Picard follows Kirk up the stairs and after a moment's hesitation, opens the bedroom door and walks into a barn on Earth. "This is not your bedroom," Picard half asks Kirk, who says that it is even better: his uncle's barn in Idaho. Noting this as a spring day eleven years prior – the day he met Antonia – Kirk grabs a saddle, jumps onto a horse, and gallops out into rolling hills. Picard, no stranger to horseback riding himself, grabs a saddle and rides after him. Ahead of Picard, Kirk and his horse come to a deep ravine. Without equivocation, Kirk jumps the ravine, then turns around and jumps it again, stopping to consider it. As Picard rides up, Kirk knows something is wrong: "I must have jumped that fifty times, scared the hell out of me each time. Except this time, because it isn't real. Nothing here is. Nothing here matters." He looks up and sees Antonia mounted on her own horse on the horizon, waiting. "She isn't real either." Kirk moves his horse next to Picard and gives the new Enterprise captain a once over. "Captain of the Enterprise, huh?"

The two men sit on horseback and discuss the situation. Kirk admits that he does not miss the house or the family he never had, he misses his days on the , and offers Picard some advice; to never retire, accept a transfer, or get promoted out of the command chair of the Enterprise, because it is only as the Captain of the Enterprise that they can truly make a difference. Picard appeals to Kirk, "Come back with me, help me stop Soran – make a difference again." Kirk considers it, then agrees, "Who am I to argue with the captain of the Enterprise?"

"I take it the odds are against us and the situation is grim," Kirk says. Picard admits that it is. Kirk continues, "You know, if Spock were here, he'd say that I'm an irrational, illogical Human being for taking on a mission like that…" and then grinning, adds, "sounds like fun."

Together, they ride off and a beam of light envelops them as they exit the Nexus.

The immediate past replays; the Enterprise-D saucer section crash-lands and Picard crawls through the hole in the force field. Soran stands on the Veridian III mountaintop and checks his pocket watch when a lone figure steps toward him. Soran looks up at the man and scowls, "Just who the hell are you?" Behind him, Picard appears, "He's James T. Kirk. Don't you read history?" Soran knows he is in trouble and jumps away, down onto the rocks below and makes a quick retreat. Picard heads for the launcher as Kirk sets off in pursuit of the El-Aurian.

Rounding a corner, Kirk is caught by Soran who shoves a phaser in his face. "Actually I am familiar with history," Soran growls, "and if I'm not too mistaken… you're dead!" Picard jumps down behind Soran, catching him off guard long enough for Kirk to get in several blows. Kirk and Soran fight, exchanging punches until Kirk is able to knock Soran off a cliff. Grabbing onto a dangling rope, Soran saves himself, entering a command into his PADD that cloaks his rocket launcher. Suddenly the rope snaps and Soran drops suddenly, then jolts to a stop, losing his control PADD which falls onto a metal bridge spanning a chasm.

Realizing they must decloak the launcher in order to prevent it from launching, Kirk and Picard run onto the bridge toward the PADD. A volley of phaser fire flies through the air, narrowly missing the two Starfleet captains and slicing the bridge in half. Picard is thrown clear, but Kirk hangs on to what is left of the bridge. With all his might, Picard pulls Kirk to safety and the two collapse on the ground, noticing the PADD intact on the other half of the bridge, a deep chasm away. They then see the Nexus begin to appear in the sky. Kirk volunteers to go, telling Picard to get to that launcher and prepare to deactivate it once it is decloaked. Picard maintains Kirk will never make the jump himself and that they should work together to get the PADD. Kirk reminds Picard that they are working together and to trust him. He tells Picard to call him "Jim." Picard smiles at the Starfleet legend and heads for the launcher.

Gingerly stepping out onto the broken bridge, Kirk stands at the edge, preparing to jump over the chasm to the other half. As the delicate bridge collapses under his weight, Kirk leaps, catching himself on the other half of the bridge and grabbing hold of the PADD. Entering in a command, Kirk decloaks the rocket launcher and begins to try to climb up. But it is too late. The bridge buckles and careens down the rock face, taking Kirk with it.

Running up a platform and onto the launcher, Picard frantically works the controls, trying to prevent it from launching. Aiming his phaser at Picard, Soran demands the captain step away from the launcher. Picard jumps down and runs around a rock face and out of sight. Soran heaves himself onto the launcher, just in time to read the display screen: the locking clamps have been engaged. Soran only has time to recognize his doom as the launcher fires and explodes in an enormous fireball that covers the entire area in a thick cloud of smoke and dust. With the Veridian sun still intact, the Nexus passes the planet, never making contact.

Emerging from the cloud, Picard makes his way down into the chasm where the bridge has collapsed. Digging through the twisted metal wreckage, Picard uncovers Kirk, laying broken among the debris. Kirk is bloody and faint, "Did we do it? Did we… make a difference?" Picard assures him they have and thanks the captain. "The least I could do," Kirk says, "for the captain of the Enterprise." He manages a weak smile, "It was… fun," then turns and faces his destiny, "Oh my."

Burying Kirk on the mountaintop as the sun sets, Picard stands and keeps silent vigil.

The following day, Picard begins trekking through the desert until a  locates the captain and picks him up.

"Captain's log, stardate 48650.1. Three Starfleet vessels have arrived in orbit and have begun to beam up the Enterprise survivors. Our casualties were light, but unfortunately the Enterprise herself cannot be salvaged."

At the saucer crash site, Starfleet rescue shuttles have begun a salvage effort. In the ship's destroyed cargo bay, crewmembers carry out salvageable equipment, belongings, and patients out while Deanna Troi and Data use tricorders to search for survivors. Data tells Troi that after experiencing thirty-nine distinct emotional states, he believes that he will be able to control his feelings in future so he has decided not to remove the emotion chip. As Troi wishes him luck, her tricorder detects a faint lifeform in the wreckage. Tearing through the debris, Data finds his cat, Spot, alive and well. As he cradles his pet in his arms, Data begins to break down in tears. When Troi asks if he's all right, Data tells her that he believes the emotion chip is malfunctioning as he is happy to see Spot, yet is crying. Data thinks that perhaps the chip is malfunctioning but Troi kindly reassures him that she believes the chip is working perfectly.

In what is left of Picard's ready room, Commander Riker and Captain Picard retrieve the Picard family album under broken pieces of the room's furniture and then move out onto the bridge, a burnt-out shell of its former glory. Riker laments that the Enterprise went before her time, and Picard relates to his first officer his thoughts, "Someone once said that time was a predator that stalked us all our lives, but I rather believe that time is a companion that goes with us on the journey, and reminds us to cherish every moment because they'll never come again." They stand near the center seats and survey the damage. Picard holds his family album close and smiles, "What we leave behind is not as important as how we lived. After all, Number One, we're only mortal." Riker grins mischievously, "Speak for yourself, sir. I plan to live forever."

Riker is disappointed that he will no longer have the chance to command this Enterprise and stands near the ruined captain's chair, but Picard assures his first officer that he very much doubts that this will be the last ship to bear the name. After nearly eight years of calling the Enterprise-D home, Picard and Riker take one last look around their destroyed starship and Picard signals the  starship  for two to beam up. The Farragut, along with a  and an  starships go to warp leaving Veridian III behind, and while the Enterprise-D may be gone her legacy, like the name, will live on.

Log entries 
"Captain's Log, Stardate 48632.4. Doctor Crusher has informed me that Data's emotion chip has been fused into his neural net and cannot be removed. However, she believes he is fit for duty, so I've asked him to join me in ."

"Captain's Log, Stardate 48650.1. Three Starfleet vessels have arrived in orbit and have begun to beam up the Enterprise survivors. Our casualties were light, but unfortunately, the Enterprise herself cannot be salvaged."

Memorable quotes 
"I remember reading about your missions when I was in grade school."
"Oh, really?"
 - Harriman and Kirk

"It wouldn't be the Enterprise without a Sulu at the helm."
 - Kirk, to Demora Sulu

"I was never that young."
"No. You were younger."
 - Chekov and Kirk, after meeting Demora

"Finding retirement a little lonely, are we?"
"You know, I'm glad you're an engineer. With tact like that, you'd make a lousy psychiatrist."
 - Scott and Kirk

"Captain, is there something wrong with your chair?"
 - Scott, to Kirk

"Tractor beam."
"Hmm?"
"Tractor beam."
"We don't have a tractor beam."
"You left spacedock without a tractor beam?"
"It won't be installed until Tuesday."
 - Kirk offering a suggestion on how to rescue the El-Aurian refugees to John Harriman

"Don't tell me, Tuesday?"
 - Kirk, after being told the Enterprise-B has no photon torpedoes

"Risk is part of the game, you wanna sit in that chair."
 - Kirk, to Harriman

[sarcastically] "Удивительно! [Surprising!] You and you, you've just become nurses. Let's go."
 - Chekov, instructing two journalists to come with him to sickbay

"Scotty, keep things together 'til I get back."
"I always do."
 - Kirks final words to Scott on the Enterprise-B bridge

"If there's one thing I've learned over the years is never to underestimate a Klingon."
 - Picard, during Worf's promotion celebration

"Just imagine what it was like. No engines. No computers. Just the wind and the sea and the stars to guide you."
"Bad food, brutal discipline. No women!!"
 - Picard and Riker, in the holodeck

"The best thing about a life at sea, Will, was that no one could reach you."
 - Picard, to Riker

"Number One, will you begin an investigation? I'll be in my ready room."
"Sir, I…"
"Make it so."
"I thought you–"
"Just do it!"
 - Picard, wracked with grief, gives an order to Riker

"I hate this! It is revolting!"
"More?"
"Please."
 - Data and Guinan, as Data tests his emotion chip and drinks

"They say time is like the fire in which we burn."
 - Soran, to Picard

"Open sesame!"
 - Data, using his arm to open a door

"You could say… I have a magnetic personality."
 - Data, after opening a magnetically sealed door

"Helm, warp one. Engage!"
 - Picard, ordering the Enterprise away from the shock wave

"I hope, for your sake, you were initiating a mating ritual."
 - B'Etor to Soran, after he punches her

"Without my research, the trilithium is worthless, as are your plans to reconquer the Klingon Empire."
 - Soran, to Lursa and B'Etor

"It was like being inside joy."
 - Guinan to Picard, describing the Nexus

"All you'll want is to stay in the Nexus… and you're not gonna want to come back."
 - Guinan, to Picard on the addictive nature of the Nexus

"Normal is what everyone else is, and you are not."
 - Soran, to La Forge

"Part of having feelings is learning to integrate them into your life, Data. Learning to live with them. No matter what the circumstances."
 - Picard

"Human females are so repulsive!"
 - B'Etor, seeing Crusher through La Forge's implant

"I have not been behaving like myself lately."
"No Data, you haven't. You've been behaving like a Human."
 - Data and La Forge

"There's no time for this. Eliminate them."
"(incredulous) That is a  starship! We are no match for them!"
"Perhaps it's time we gave Mr. La Forge his sight back…"
 - Soran and B'Etor

"You must think I'm quite the madman, hmm?"
"The thought had crossed my mind."
 - Soran and Picard

"There was a time when I wouldn't hurt a fly. Then the Borg came."
 - Soran, to Picard

"It's like a predator. It's stalking you."
 - Soran to Picard, describing time

"Time has no meaning there. The predator has no teeth."
 - Soran, on the Nexus

"He bathed. Now he's roaming the ship. He must be the only engineer in Starfleet who doesn't go to engineering!"
 - B'Etor, about La Forge

"Lifeforms, you tiny little lifeforms, you precious little lifeforms. Where are you?"
 - Data, tapping out a tune on his Ops console while scanning Veridian III – 

"Now, you'll have to excuse me, captain. I have an appointment with eternity and I don't want to be late."
 - Soran to Picard, shortly before entering the Nexus

"Ohhhhhh, shit!"
 - Data, as the Enterprises saucer section plunges down to Veridian III

"Go on… go on without me."
 - Picard, leaving behind the family he never had in the Nexus

"Kirk… James T. Kirk."
 - Picard, when the legendary captain appears to him

"Something's missing."
 - Kirk, right before the toast pops out of the toaster

"You say history considers me dead. Who am I to argue with history?"
"You are a Starfleet officer. You have a duty."
"I don't need to be lectured by you. I was out saving the galaxy when your grandfather was in diapers. Besides which, I think the galaxy owes me one."
 - Kirk and Picard

"This not your bedroom…"
"No, it's not; it's better."
 - Picard, to Kirk after the mountain cabin changes to a horse stable

"You know, maybe this isn't about an empty house. Maybe it's about that empty chair on the bridge of the Enterprise. Ever since I've left Starfleet, I haven't made a difference…"
 - Kirk, in a moment of reflection

"Captain of the Enterprise?"
"That's right."
"Close to retirement?"
"Not planning on it."
"Let me tell you something. Don't. Don't let them promote you. Don't let them transfer you, don't let them do anything that takes you off the bridge of that ship, because while you're there, you can make a difference."
 - Kirk and Picard

"Who am I to argue with the captain of the Enterprise?"
 - Kirk, to Picard

"You know, if Spock were here, he'd say I was an irrational, illogical Human being for taking on a mission like that. Sounds like fun."
 - Kirk, on stopping Soran

"Just who the hell are you?"
"He's James T. Kirk. Don't you read history?"
 - Soran and Picard, as Kirk reveals himself to Soran

"I thought you were heading for the launcher."
"I changed my mind. Captain's prerogative."
 - Kirk and Picard

"We have to work together!"
"We ARE working together!"
 - Picard and Kirk

"Good luck, Captain."
"Call me Jim."
 - Picard and Kirk

"Did we do it? Did we… make a difference?
"Oh, yes. We made a difference. Thank you."
"Least I could do… for the Captain of the Enterprise."
 - Kirk, mortally wounded, asks Picard if they were successful in stopping Soran

"It was… fun… Oh, my."
 - Kirks dying words to Picard

"I am happy to see Spot, and yet I am crying. Perhaps the chip is malfunctioning."
"I think it's working perfectly."
 - Data and Troi, after recovering Spot from the Enterprise wreckage

"I'm going to miss this ship. She went before her time."
 - Riker, on the late Enterprise-D

"Someone once told me that time was a predator that stalked us all our lives, but I'd rather believe that time is a companion who goes with us on the journey and reminds us to cherish every moment… because they'll never come again."
 - Picard, to Riker

"What we leave behind is not as important as how we lived. After all, Number One, we're only mortal."
"Speak for yourself, sir. I plan to live forever."
 - Picard and Riker

"Somehow I doubt this will be the last ship to carry the name Enterprise."
 - Picards final moment with the Enterprise-D

Background information

Development 
 Executive Producer Rick Berman was approached by Paramount Pictures executives (first by Brandon Tartikoff, and subsequently by his immediate successor Sherry Lansing) in the fall of  (during the series' sixth season) in regards to a seventh Star Trek film. While the studio intended Star Trek VII to be a TNG vehicle, Berman and Tartikoff felt the outing was an opportunity to "pass the baton." In , Berman and the studio commissioned two stories and three writers. A fourth, TNG writer and  co-creator Michael Piller, passed, objecting to what he viewed as "competition" for the assignment.

As written by former TNG writer/producer Maurice Hurley, the film had Captain Picard recreating Captain James T. Kirk (William Shatner) on the holodeck to help him solve a dilemma involving an interdimensional species wreaking havoc by crossing into our realm.  Then-current TNG writing staffers Ronald D. Moore and Brannon Braga, whose script was ultimately greenlighted, chose to feature Kirk appearing in the flesh, as well as (initially) the entire  cast.

Though Moore and Braga at first bandied about ideas which involved the two Enterprise crews battling each other, the pair of writers quickly abandoned this concept. Ron Moore explained, in :

"The best possible poster you could ever hope to have for this picture would show you the two Enterprises battling against each other. We all tried our best, but we were never able to come up with any scenario that made both crews look heroic. No matter how we played around with this thing, somebody was gonna come off looking like the bad guy. So then we returned, a little more solidly, to the 'mystery that spans two generations' idea that would allow Whoopi Goldberg, as Guinan, as the tie that binds the two."

Braga and Moore nonetheless continued searching for a major "event" to anchor the film. Recalled Moore:

"One of us just kinda threw out, 'What if we kill Kirk?' And we all kinda looked at each other and said, 'Wow. That would be amazing.' …From that point on, Kirk's death became part of the fabric of our story, and as a big surprise to us all, there was never a moment where it really came into question."

As proposed by Moore and Braga, the film would feature Kirk and his  shipmates in a prologue, with Kirk later appearing at the film's climax. Berman later recalled the process:

"In both scripts, the stories that we developed, were stories that entailed to different degrees members of The Original Series along with The Next Generation. First, we went through the story development on both, and both stories were submitted to the studio. We got a lot of notes from the studio, the stories were revised, and then we went to first draft on each. Eventually, it became quite obvious that the studio and I were leaning toward Ron's and Brannon's script. That's not to say Maury's script wasn't terrific, it just was far less advanced by the time we really had to make a decision." (; ; Cinefantastique, Vol 26 #2, p. 16)

Berman and the studio pursued the Moore/Braga story. Early drafts of the script took shape under the guidance of Rick Berman and with input by Shatner. The film's villain, "Moresh", was later changed to Dr. "Soran" to avoid recalling , the infamous cultist.  (Information from Larry Nemecek)

A first draft script was completed during TNG's sixth season hiatus, dated . As of 1 October of that year, the scripted prologue contained Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Scott, Uhura, Sulu, and Chekov. The script was in its third draft by , and the third draft's first revised pages (colored blue) were added to the screenplay on that date. (Information from Larry Nemecek)

The early scripts featured large action set pieces that were later removed. Among them was the Romulan attack on the Amargosa observatory, cut when TNG writer (and  co-creator) Jeri Taylor suggested something more "charming".  Another major revision to the script revolved around the Duras sisters and their crew: surviving the destruction of their ship, they would have battled the Enterprise-D crew in the jungles of Veridian III. 

The producers eventually chose to pare the appearances of the TOS cast down to two select cameos. This decision was made by , when the fourth draft of the script was issued, with Kirk, Spock, and McCoy in the prologue. (Information from Larry Nemecek) The producers then sought their guest stars. While William Shatner agreed to appear pending script approval, Leonard Nimoy and DeForest Kelley – the two preferred cameo appearances – were less eager to return. Stating that they had felt their characters made sufficient exits in , both actors declined to appear in Star Trek VII. Leonard Nimoy – having been offered the director's chair – reportedly requested script changes, but was rebuffed. In his memoir Star Trek Movie Memories, William Shatner wrote:

"Leonard, surprisingly, wasn't all that upset with this unusual turn of events. As you know, on Treks III, IV and VI, Leonard had been very involved very early on, nursing his projects through the story level and the scripting process, while simultaneously functioning as director and ultimately producer. However, this time around, that simply wouldn't have been his job. This story came from Rick Berman. It was written by his own handpicked writers, and essentially, Leonard was being asked to shoot their script as written, and he wasn't all that interested."

In an interview with 's Anthony Pascale in , Nimoy explained the issues he had with the Generations script and why he declined to appear. After proclaiming that "there was no Spock role in that script", he elaborated:

"There were five or six lines attributed to Spock […] but it had nothing to do with Spock. They were not Spock-like in any way. I said to Rick Berman, 'You could distribute these lines to any one of the other characters and it wouldn't make any difference.' And that is exactly what he did. There was no Spock function in the script. I have always tried to make a contribution to these movies. There was no contribution to be made in that movie. It was just sort of 'let's get Nimoy in here too.' I said there is nothing here I can do so I said 'thanks, but I'll pass'." 

After DeForest Kelley and Leonard Nimoy declined to appear, the final draft of the film's script was submitted on . Its prologue featured Scott and Chekov along with Kirk, as it stayed from then on. (Information from Larry Nemecek)

Later drafts of Generations and the full TNG finale  were written simultaneously. This often led the writers to mix the stories up. In their joint  commentary for the Star Trek Generations (Special Edition) DVD, they admitted that they felt "All Good Things…" turned out to be the superior effort. During the scripting stages, however, the studio had few qualms and pre-production proceeded even as filming on Star Trek: The Next Generation was winding down and Deep Space Nine continued.

Preproduction 

With the start of pre-production, Berman battled the studio over budget figures, the film cut in cost to an estimated US$35 million.  Hopes for location shooting in Hawaii and Idaho were dropped in favor of more local shoots in Hollywood, Marina del Rey, Pasadena, Lone Pine, and the Valley of Fire State Park near Las Vegas, Nevada. By , Moore and Braga's script reflected budget and cast changes.

In place of first choice Leonard Nimoy, veteran TNG and DS9 director David Carson was hired, in turn recruiting veteran cinematographer John Alonzo of Chinatown and Scarface fame. Herman Zimmerman – who designed the initial TNG and DS9 sets – was called back into service on the film, working with Alonzo and illustrator John Eaves to refresh the aging TV sets. Budgetary constraints reined in some of the proposed sets; the new stellar cartography set reduced from three levels to two. As with most of the previous Trek movie installments, visual effects giant Industrial Light & Magic was hired to produce space and spaceship shots, while TNG mainstay CIS Hollywood was brought in for phaser shots, transporter effects, cloaking and decloaking transitions and the Picard family Christmas ornament.

Last minute decisions included the hiring of actor Malcolm McDowell as the man who would (at least in the final draft script) gun down Captain Kirk, reportedly later receiving death threats from obsessed fans.  The actor's nephew and DS9 star Alexander Siddig later said during an interview that McDowell thought the script was "shit".  McDowell had previously explained his reason for accepting the role:

"When Rick asked me to be in this film, I was thrilled! I said, 'I'd LOVE to do it. I want to be THE man to kill Kirk.' And when I read the script I thought Soran was an interesting and wonderful character, and obviously he would ultimately be given the honor of pulling the trigger that kills the good Captain Kirk. I'd immediately become a trivia question at Star Trek conventions all over the globe."

Sets 

Despite its reuse of sets built, in some cases as early as  for , production designer Herman Zimmerman and his art department – namely John Eaves – began designing and redesigning as early as . One of the first and most elaborate sets generated from Paramount's motion picture art department was the two story stellar cartography room. Initially conceived of after a visit to Griffith Park's Laserium in Los Angeles, the room was imagined as a large sphere, eventually becoming a more budget-friendly cylinder. John Eaves described the process in his book, Star Trek: The Next Generation Sketchbook: The Movies:

"[Illustrator] Clark Shaffer had just started on the film at this time, and he helped out with the immense load of drawings that had to be done. He took a rough console design I did for the cartography platform, and did a breakdown of the way the console should be put together. Again, I have to say that one of the exceptionally nice things about working on the Star Trek films is that everyone is so involved and helpful with design ideas. Mike [Okuda] and Herman [Zimmerman] contributed a number of wonderful ideas of how this room should look, and I have to say that the final set was an impressive thing to see (not only in the finished film, but in real life)."

While a hoped-for floating platform proved to be too expensive and impractical, the set was realized with a combination of large, back-lit graphics and blue-screen projection created at ILM. The set was created in sections with wild walls that could be moved in and out. Lighting elements were integrated into the ceiling requiring little modification from shot to shot. A small section of Enterprise-D corridor was erected behind the upper level platform.

Also conceived of in December, the Enterprise-B's deflector control room was designed to be a large, vertical area dominated by large machine elements, a second-level observation balcony and access panels built into the stage floor. Again, as the film's budget tightened, the design team returned to the drawing boards in  to design a smaller, vertical access shaft. David Carson recalled:

"That gave us the most wonderfully interesting camera angles. Making the approach different, from horizontal to vertical, meant dealing with the budget in a creative way like that. Herman had a good time designing that; he ran through it about four times by himself just to make sure he had plenty of stuff for Shatner to do."

Regarding the most visible section of the Enterprise-D, the main bridge, Zimmerman and Eaves took the opportunity to alter the set. Echoing modifications it received in the TNG episode , the bridge gained additional computer stations situated along the port and starboard bulkheads. John Eaves:

"Herman wanted to make the bridge more functional. To accomplish that, we raised the captain's chair slightly (symbolically putting his authority higher than those sitting in the two chairs flanking him). For functionality, we also split the ramps on either side of the commander center. We still had a ramp going down, but added two elevated stations, one against either wall, where crew members could work. We also replaced an alcove filled with lockers and storage panels with a new graphics station (courtesy of Mike Okuda). At one point, we had added some new stand-up stations behind the captain's chair, where Worf works. It was a nice design, but it wound up being simply too much of a modification, so we dropped it."

Worf, however, did finally receive a chair to sit on at his post. The set was also repainted and recarpeted with handrails added near the doors to the observation lounge and aft turbolift, working video monitors were incorporated into many of the ship's status displays. The captain's ready room, adjacent to the bridge, received a new, larger fish tank built into the wall and a larger window. Other sets aboard the Enterprise received only minor reworking. Engineering was connected to another corridor set by removing the "plugs" from the walls. The four red-alert lights in the hallway of the engineering set were also illuminated during the engineering scenes, even when the ship was not in battle, as well as some of the beige beams being painted a darker copper colour around the engineering pool-table. Overhead lighting was reduced in all of the sets, with display screens popping from the darkness. Of the modifications, Zimmerman said:

"I hope the fans will say, 'Oh that's what I've been seeing on that little TV screen all these years'!"

Following the end of production, the interior sets of the Enterprise were struck and replaced with those belonging to a new starship, the , for the upcoming series . Of the original sets, only small sections of the corridors, sickbay, transporter room and engineering were left standing, although the new sets were constructed directly over the basic framework and floor plan originally designed and built for the aborted Star Trek: Phase II. Of those remaining sets, only a small piece of the Enterprise-D sickbay (the ceiling) remained in use during . However, the Enterprise-D observation lounge set (the only TNG set not used for the film) was spared the wrecking ball and saved against future need, eventually appearing (in modified form) as the observation lounge of the Enterprise-E in First Contact and Nemesis.

The interior of the Amargosa observatory was a redress of the Enterprise-B main bridge, which was itself a redress of the  main bridge from Star Trek VI. Details built into the observatory set were meant to imply that it had been built around the time of TOS, with jeweled buttons and labels similar to those used on the original Enterprise. A half-globe map of the cosmos used in the Enterprise-D stellar cartography lab on the TV series appears in the wreckage of the observatory, along with an elevator from Data's lab.

Costumes 
As his first task when recruited for the pre-production phase of Star Trek Generations, John Eaves created several new combadge designs, first creating a flip-top version like the communicators of TOS. Told to first review tapes of TNG to become more familiar with the new show, Eaves ultimately redesigned Rick Sternbach's oval-shaped communicator badge that appeared in the TV series and early DS9, refining it into the oblong-backed design later used in DS9, VOY, and later TNG movies: , , and , as well as the early flashback episodes of PIC.

Costume designer Robert Blackman, working simultaneously on the outgoing, current and incoming series as well as the film, reworked Starfleet's uniforms.  The uniforms, however, were all scrapped at the last minute for fear of introducing too many new facets to the universe. Unaware of the change, Playmates Toys went ahead with production of action figures for the film, depicting the TNG cast in the unused uniforms. The producers opted instead to use a combination of the  from  and the  from the early episodes of  and throughout . Because filming was set to begin shortly, Jonathan Frakes and LeVar Burton had to borrow Avery Brooks and Colm Meaney's costumes respectively, but neither of them fit very well on Frakes and Burton as Frakes had the sleeves on Brooks' costume rolled up and the sleeves on Meaney's costume was way too big on Burton.

The new Starfleet uniform worn by Patrick Stewart was auctioned off in the It's A Wrap! sale and auction  along with LeVar Burton's.  Also auctioned off was Dr. Soran's costume upon arriving on the Enterprise-B.

Effects 

Between the release of Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country and the preproduction phase of Star Trek Generations, several advancements had been made in the art of motion picture visual effects. Primarily spurred by steps forward in computer-generated animation in films like  and , Generations marked the first Star Trek production in which many starships were rendered digitally by ILM. Despite this advancement, physical models were utilized for the majority of effects shots.

Unpacking the original six-foot model they built for  in , the ILM effects team completely overhauled the Enterprise-D. In order to stand up to high-resolution film cameras and a big screen project, the starship was repainted and redetailed, receiving a new interior lighting scheme. Once again resulting from budgetary cuts, stock footage shots of the Enterprise-D were interspersed with new model photography and CG imagery, specifically during the first captain's log segment and the start of the saucer separation sequence. Stock footage from the previous film was also used to depict the destruction of the Duras sisters' Bird-of-Prey, as well as that ship's escape from Amargosa.

Also reusing the original  miniature from , ILM and John Eaves were tasked with redesigning the ship to be used as the Enterprise-B:

"First I took a photo that showed the Excelsior in spacedock, did a rendering, and started putting add-ons on the ship. When I met with Mike [Okuda], he pointed out that we needed to design an area that protruded from the ship, so that the energy ribbon could whip out a section while leaving most of the ship intact. So we built a section of decks extended out from the main body, which tapers gently on the bottom and flares out dramatically on the top. We also did a detail sketch of the area around the deflector dish, designating one area as the reactor room. The addition of the decks gave the B's belly section a look similar to that of a P.B.Y. Catalina (a flying boat of the 1940s). The added girth increased the overall size of the vessel, while still retaining the original Excelsior design. We made a few other changes, such as taking two fins off the top of the saucer, and putting in two major impulse engines (we figured these stronger engines would be needed when the saucer detached). As for the nacelles, we added a cap to them, plus a dorsal fin on top and a running fin on the outer edge."

For the single shot of the Enterprise-B at warp, footage of the Excelsior from the previous film was re-used. A computer-generated model of the Enterprise-B was also created for scenes that required it to interact with the digital Nexus energy ribbon.

An all-new miniature was created by ILM, designed by John Eaves, to represent the Amargosa stellar observatory. The model was later reused with minor alterations in DS9's  as the wormhole relay station. The Enterprise-B model also turned up on that series as the . () Yet another refurbished model appeared as the drydock the Enterprise-B was moored in, repainted and reconstructed from its first appearance in Star Trek: The Motion Picture.

Arguably one of the film's most memorable sequences, the crash of the Enterprise-D was shot almost entirely live by ILM. Storyboarded by Mark Moore, the shots were achieved through the creation of a twelve-foot model of the Enterprise-D saucer section and a large landscape model. Suspended by large cables, the saucer model was repeatedly flown into the landscape, shot with high speed cameras and then slowed down in post production and mixed with several composite shots of Veridian III. A major sequence in the script, the crash of the Enterprise saucer section was inspired by drawings of an emergency saucer landing in the Star Trek: The Next Generation Technical Manual.

Following the crash, effects master John Knoll and his team donned Starfleet uniforms to appear as crew members of the Enterprise-D, standing on a large blue tarp draped over the ILM parking lot. Footage of the team was later integrated into shots of the Enterprise hull and the Veridian landscape.

Production 

With production on TNG's final season still underway, cameras rolled on Generations.  Principal photography began on . (Information from Larry Nemecek) Scenes focused on Scotty, Chekov and Kirk aboard the USS Enterprise-B and the later deleted orbital skydiving sequence. A ten-day hiatus followed the conclusion of production on The Next Generation before that series' cast went to work. Shot on a relatively short schedule, the film was slated for only fifty days of production.  The last day of the main filming was . (Information from Larry Nemecek)

Location filming in the Valley of Fire was required for reshoots, which took place over eight days in September. (Information from Larry Nemecek) For these reshoots, Director David Carson's production offices temporarily moved to a Las Vegas hotel. Suffering through the 110-degree heat and dust storms of the Nevada desert, the behind-the-scenes crew quenched their thirst with Gatorade until the sports drink began attracting bees. Carson was forced to wear an eye patch for at least one day of filming when his cornea was damaged during a surprise sand storm. More comfortable filming days were spent in Pasadena at the Nexus fantasy Picard home, a week aboard the Lady Washington for Worf's promotion in Marina del Rey, and in the mountains of Lone Pine for Kirk's cabin – a real residence that acquired a new kitchen and staircase built specifically for the shoot.

Reshoots 

Completing principal photography in the summer of , rough cuts of Star Trek Generations were screened for test audiences. Despite generally favorable reactions to the bulk of the film, audience comments reflected negatively on the film's finale. In their joint DVD audio commentary, Ronald D. Moore and Brannon Braga recalled a feeling of disconnect washing over the audience, "We'd lost them."

Returning to the motion picture head Sherry Lansing's office on the Paramount Lot, Rick Berman, Moore and Braga were told, "You have a great movie, but a bad ending." The production was given a budget of US$5 million and told to reshoot the ending, specifically scenes in which James T. Kirk is shot in the back by Soran. Forced to utilize the same location, the writers struggled to insert a brand new finale into the framework already established. In late , the production crew and cast of Generations returned to the Valley of Fire and James T. Kirk was killed all over again. Having recently grown his hair for another project, Patrick Stewart wore a specially fashioned hairpiece which covered his longer hair during these scenes. Additional shots at the Pasadena "Picard family home" location were also required to clarify plot elements. Ronald D. Moore commented:

"By the time of the test screening, we knew that this sequence wasn't working – we'd already seen dailies, of course, and had watched several rough cuts of the picture and everyone knew this wasn't playing the way we thought it would.

Hope springs eternal, however, and we all went into the test screening with the hope that maybe we were over-thinking the problem or maybe we were too close to the film to really be objective at that point. Unfortunately, the test audience reaction pretty much confirmed what we all suspected. We were disappointed that our original vision didn't work, but we were grateful that the studio was willing to give us the time and money to go back and fix it. The executives believed in the picture and said basically, "You've got a good movie here, but you need to fix the ending." So Brannon, Rick, and I put our heads together and struggled to come up with a workable way to reshoot the death of Kirk and then to tweak the Christmas sequence and make it a little more coherent and meaningful. It was a very difficult task because of the time, money, and set constraints.

Brannon and I talked over many, many different sequence involving various weapons, devices, hidden underground laboratories that Soran may have hidden under the mountain, phaser fights, cat and mouse chases, etc. but ultimately they all proved impractical, uninteresting, prohibitively expensive, or all of the above. The bridge gag came to us as we watched the footage over and over and realized that we might be able to use the established set pieces to our advantage. The studio, the director and the actors all liked the new version and so that's what we went with."

Deleted scenes 

Along with the original ending, several minutes of footage were left on the cutting room floor. Some of this footage is available on the Star Trek Generations (Special Edition) DVD. Most of the deleted scenes were minor character moments set following the crash of the Enterprise-D. Among the deleted material were sequences involving Dr. Crusher and Nurse Ogawa returning to sickbay, Geordi La Forge and Worf piloting a damaged shuttlecraft to rescue the captain, additional footage aboard the Enterprise sailing ship and an alternative version of the Nexus Christmas segment.

Scripted and shot at the request of William Shatner, the film's original opening featuring Kirk skydiving from orbit to find Scott and Chekov waiting on the ground below was also cut, replaced with the champagne bottle opening.

The original script also called for a more extensive torture scene between Soran and La Forge, involving Soran injecting nanoprobes into La Forge's chest which caused his heart to stop for 5 seconds. While this scene did not appear in the movie, Soran's comment of "his heart just wasn't in it" references the torture as does Doctor Crusher's medical examination where she discusses how she has "removed the nanoprobes" and that La Forge has suffered some myocardial damage.

Official site 
The official website for Star Trek Generations, created on 28 October 1994, was the first site on the internet to officially publicize a feature film. After being personally approved by then-Paramount Motion Picture chairman Sherry Lansing, the site was constructed by a team at Paramount Media Kitchen in Palo Alto, California, using press kit materials, videotapes of the film's trailer, and two dozen slides. The site was an immediate success and prompted Paramount and other motion picture studios to create sites for their own films.

Two versions of the official site were available for view, a graphics-rich version and a text-only version. Upon entering either version, the viewer was taken to a brief synopsis of the film followed by a greeting and an explanation of the site. From there, the viewer could watch the two movie trailers, view production stills, and listen to clips and music from the film. A behind-the-scenes page included sections on the history of Star Trek, cast and crew biographies, production notes, film credits, and a downloadable interactive multimedia kit. In addition, there was a Star Trek shop promoting Star Trek merchandise and an input page where viewers could send comments via forms or email.

The site was a collaborative production of Paramount Pictures,  Consumer Products, and Viacom Interactive Services. The site credits are as follows:
Executive Producer Leonard Washington
Art Director David Pettigrew
Technology Director Paul Resch
Internet Consultant Seth Skolnik
Technical Producer Randy Taylor
Online Producer Marc Wade
Technical Support Dwight Bufford, Keith Gibbons, Stefan Lisowski
Production Assistant Stephanie Wilson

The site was last updated on 23 November 1994. It has since been removed and a section at StarTrek.com has become the film's official web destination.  StarTrek.com, before its recent overhaul, provided a copy of the original 1994 site, along with commentary. Portions of it are still accessible.

Reaction 
The release of Star Trek Generations was widely covered in the news media, with Patrick Stewart and William Shatner appearing in character on the cover of Time Magazine in the winter of . On its opening weekend, the film reached number one at the box office with a first weekend gross of US$23,100,000.  Critical reception, however, was mixed.

The film earned a split decision from ; Gene Siskel gave the film thumbs up, while Roger Ebert gave it thumbs down. Writing for the Chicago Sun Times, Ebert said of the film, "The "Star Trek" saga has always had a weakness for getting distracted by itself, and "Star Trek Generations," the seventh film installment, is undone by its narcissism." Giving the film two stars out of a possible four, Ebert concluded:

"Star Trek seems to cross the props of science fiction with the ideas of Westerns. Watching the fate of millions being settled by an old-fashioned fistfight on a rickety steel bridge (intercut with closeups of the bolts popping loose and the structure sagging ominously), I was almost amused by the shabby storytelling. Why doesn't more movie science fiction have the originality and imagination of its print origins? In , the alien god Ra was able to travel the universe, yet still needed slaves to build his pyramids. In Star Trek Generations, the starship can go boldly where no one has gone before, but the screenwriters can only do vice versa." 

The film review website  calculated a 47% overall approval rate for Generations.  BBC reviewer Tom Coates ranked the film at two out of a possible five stars' "Generations feels like three lacklustre episodes of the TV series mashed together with one of the earlier Star Trek movies. Devotees may find it necessary (if depressing) viewing, but there's little here for anyone else."  FILM.COM's Lucy Mohl however said of the film, "The meeting of Patrick Stewart's Jean-Luc Picard and William Shatner's James T. Kirk is worth the price of admission or video rental: it's the clash of the titans, Shakespeare meets the Sixties." 

Regarding some of the oft-mentioned plot discrepancies within the film, Ronald D. Moore commented:

"Our reasoning (and it's admittedly thin) is that Picard didn't want to go back any further in time than absolutely necessary since he knows the extreme dangers of unexpected results from any tampering with the timeline. Okay, it's not much, but there it is." 

Moore and Braga further elaborated on this during the film's DVD commentary, saying that the question kept coming up and they even asked themselves, "Why would they go back to a point when their life would be in danger? Why not just go back a couple of months or so, find Soran in the bathroom or somewhere and take him out?" They also said that questions like that apply to films like  and you have to just hope that your film is compelling enough that the audience does not start asking questions like that.

The film went on to gross a total of US$75,668,868 in the US, totaling US$120,000,000 worldwide. 

Generations premiered in the United Kingdom on . It became the highest grossing Star Trek film in that territory up to that time with £7,340,239.

Notes

Cast notes 
 The only people, aside from the regular cast, to participate in both this film and the final TNG film, , are Majel Barrett and Whoopi Goldberg. In both films Barrett voiced the Enterprise computer and Goldberg appeared as Guinan.
 This is William Shatner's only appearance as Kirk without Leonard Nimoy.
 Though the film marks the final canon appearances of William Shatner and Walter Koenig (Chekov), both appeared again in the computer game .
 This is James Doohan's last appearance as Scotty, although he had previously appeared in the role in . The events of that episode chronologically take place well after the events of the first act of Generations.
 Uhura is the only major character from  not to appear or be referenced in dialogue.
 This is Whoopi Goldberg's first appearance as Guinan since .  (in which the name El-Aurians is first established) was originally intended to feature Guinan as Martus Mazur's mother, but Whoopi Goldberg was unavailable.
 Tim Russ appeared aboard the Enterprise-B in the opening of the film. He had previously appeared in  and  as different characters and would soon after be cast as Tuvok in .
 Robert and René Picard were portrayed by different actors in the photographs in Picard's album, and in the Nexus scene as in the episode .
 Christopher James Miller plays the film version of René, Captain Picard's nephew. He had previously portrayed William Shatner's son in an episode of .
 According to The Internet Movie Database (IMDb), Patrick Stewart was aided in his portrayal of Picard's grief by the script for , which he was reading on set.
 Shots of Picard standing over Kirk's grave did not actually feature Patrick Stewart, but rather Dennis Tracy. Tracy acted as Stewart's stand-in and appeared earlier in the film as an unnamed Bolian waiter in Ten Forward.
 Although Data is the owner of Spot the cat, Brent Spiner objected to the scene where Data finds Spot in the wreckage of the Enterprise, saying "Does he have to find the cat? Can't he find, like, Geordi or something?"
 The captain of the Lady Washington (the ship used for the sea vessel "Enterprise") appears during the holodeck sequence of the film, taking over the helm from Deanna Troi.
 Generations marks the deaths of several major characters: Captain James T. Kirk, Robert Picard, René Picard, and the Duras sisters, Lursa and B'Etor. It also marks the destruction of the Enterprise-D and the final appearance of La Forge's VISOR.
 After the release of Generations, William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy made a joint appearance on . Host Regis Philbin asked Nimoy if he would appear in another Trek film to which he replied "if he [Shatner] shows up, I'll be there." Shatner then quipped: "You are such a liar! I showed up and you didn't!" Ironically, Nimoy later appeared in both the 2009 film  and the 2013 film , without Shatner.
 Of the two Duras sisters, only Lursa's name is ever mentioned within the context of the movie. B'Etor's name is never spoken. The only time her character is actually identified is in the closing credits.
 Malcolm McDowell (Tolian Soran) is the real life uncle of Alexander Siddig, who played Julian Bashir throughout .

References to other series and films 
 According to Soran's file, he and Guinan were fleeing a Borg attack on the El-Aurian homeworld. That event was first referred by Guinan in the episode .
 Footage of the interior of the Bird-of-Prey being destroyed appeared again later in the  episodes  and .
 Though not heard on screen, the name of the Lakuls counterpart was the SS Robert Fox, named for Ambassador Robert Fox from .
 The scene in which Picard buries Kirk's body on a cliffside under rocks is reminiscent of Kirk burying Gary Mitchell in  and  in .
 After Data's emotion chip is installed, he references a joke La Forge told during their mission at Farpoint. The punchline of the joke had to do with a "Ferengi in a gorilla suit." That must have happened during the events of , the pilot episode of , although the actual joke was not heard on screen.
 Doctor Soran ridicules and uses Geordi's VISOR as a transmitter to gain a tactical advantage on the USS Enterprise leading to the ship's destruction. Geordi chooses to replace his VISOR with ocular implants for .
 Kirk's retirement, relationship with Antonia, and decision to return to Starfleet might have occurred in a (previously unreferenced) period of his life, between  and .
 When the past version of Guinan appears to Picard in the Nexus, she acts as if she already knows him. This is because, from her point of view, she sees him for a second time; she first met Picard when she lived in 19th century Earth in .
 The dress worn by Antonia was previously worn by Fenna.
 The film takes place one year after the events in the final episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation, .
 The destruction of the Enterprise-D is very similar to its alternate timeline counterpart from . Both ships meet their ends at the hands of a Klingon Bird-of-Prey and both as a result of a coolant leak. The main timeline Enterprise crew was able to escape because, unlike its counterpart, the battle was over when the coolant leak began.
 This is the only TNG film to not feature the gray-shoulder uniform or the , as they are not introduced until .
 Worf is the only male main TNG cast member from the main cast to not wear the DS9 uniform in this film. However, he wore it upon joining the main cast of DS9 itself in its Season 4 premiere episode, , albeit in command red rather than the operations gold that he wears in this film.
 None of the women from the TNG main cast wear the DS9 uniform in this film.
 Kirk's line to Picard, "I was out saving the galaxy when your grandfather was in diapers", echoes Scotty's line to Geordi from  (I was drivin' ships while your great-grandfather was in diapers), aired 2 years previously.
 The destruction of the Enterprise-D was mentioned by Worf and Sisko in the  Season 4 premiere episode, .
 This is the only time where the Enterprise battle bridge is not used during the saucer separation sequence, mainly due to the warp core breach in the stardrive section. It is also the only time where Wesley Crusher and Miles O'Brien are absent during the saucer separation sequence.
 Picard's DS9 uniform looks a lot different than the ones seen on the early seasons of  and  in this film as he wears a black velcro belt around the waist, making it the only time where a black velcro belt is worn on the DS9 uniform.
 Picard, Riker, Data and LaForge are the only four characters of the TNG main cast to wear the DS9 uniform in this film. Alyssa Ogawa is the only female to wear the DS9 uniform in this film.
 Riker's DS9 uniform in this film has his sleeves rolled up (similar to Miles O'Brien's in the early seasons of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine).
 Spock, Leonard McCoy, Hikaru Sulu, and Nyota Uhura are briefly seen in a photograph (along with Scott, Chekov, and Kirk himself) on Kirk's trophy wall when Kirk first enters his cabin in the Nexus. The photograph was a publicity photo for . The wall (including the photo) is only briefly seen in the film, though it is showcased in The Art of Star Trek on p. 288.  would later more prominently feature a publicity photo of the same crew members taken for .

Sets and props 
 A bottle of Saurian brandy can be seen in the reception room at the christening of the Enterprise-B.
 Captain Picard's chair was stolen from the set mere hours before shooting was scheduled to commence. A new one was quickly fabricated. This incident became infamous enough that novels relating to  written after the movie often have Picard's chair being stolen for one reason or another.
 Data's emotion chip has varied in shape and size since its last appearance in  (which, in turn, was different from its previous appearance in ). Also, Geordi inserts the chip into Data's head, while in "Brothers", Dr. Soong implanted the chip in Lore's (whom he thought was Data) neck. The piece itself seen in this movie was a gold-plated plastic weapon common in the  model kit line from Japan and America.
 Among the items visible in Captain Kirk's house are a painting of the original Federation starship , the ship's dedication plaque, a publicity photo of the cast of Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, a Klingon bat'leth, a Starfleet phaser from , and a Jem'Hadar weapon from Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.
 While searching through the wreckage of the Enterprise-D's bridge, Picard happens upon the top half of the Kurlan naiskos originally seen in  and places it back on the floor.
 A box of video tapes, which includes the graphic displays such as RADAR and subspace scan from the Enterprise-B's red alert sequence, was sold off on the It's A Wrap! sale and auction on eBay. 
 A tank full of water seen briefly in the background at the Enterprise-B's sickbay would later be reused in  in the 's sickbay.

Apocrypha 
 Coinciding with the film's marketing campaign, a hardcover novelization was released by Pocket Books. Written by frequent Star Trek fiction contributor J.M. Dillard, the novelization differed from the movie on a number of minor points, but was generally faithful to the structure and dialogue of the original screenplay. The reshoot of the climactic Kirk scenes meant that the hardcover, and the Simon & Schuster Audioworks adaptation, had already gone to press with the originally scripted version. Dillard was asked to rewrite the final chapters for the eventual paperback release of the novelization to agree with the theatrical version of the movie.
 In the novel all other members of the original cast are part of the story. Chekov contacts Sulu aboard Excelsior to tell him about Kirk. In their conversation, Chekov tells Sulu that Scotty is contacting Uhura and Kirk's nephew. McCoy and Spock are also seen arriving early to the memorial service for Kirk.
 Also in the novelization, but missing from the film, a scene between Chekov and Guinan occurs in which she tells him that his friend is still alive within the energy ribbon.
 In the novelization, Picard successfully defeats Soran hand-to-hand; however, by the time he defeats him the rocket takes off to plunge into the sun. The movie depicts Soran as being a better fighter than Picard.
 In the original ending of the film, the fight between Kirk and Soran is much longer and they are much more evenly matched in terms of fighting skills. In the original ending, it's Kirk who's knocked off the cliff and is forced to climb back up the mountain to stop Soran.
 Other spin-offs from Pocket, which took their lead from plot elements in this movie, included William Shatner's The Ashes of Eden and The Return – picking up at the crashed saucer on Veridian III, and Engines of Destiny by Gene DeWeese, telling of Scotty's guilt after the apparent loss of Kirk.
In Engines of Destiny, following the events of , Scott travels back in time to rescue Kirk in a Bird-of-Prey recovered from a distant solar system, believing that he can save Kirk by approaching the Enterprise-B in a shuttle and beaming Kirk to safety after he has reconfigured the tractor beam, thus preserving Kirk's disappearance while changing the exact cause of it. However, this change in the timeline allows the Borg to almost completely overtake the Alpha Quadrant, as, without Kirk's aid, Picard died during the confrontation with Soran. Consequently, Earth is conquered by the Borg during the time-travel events of . Aided by the Enterprise-D crew after they followed Scotty's stolen Bird-of-Prey through its slingshot maneuver and arrived in the new timeline, as well as alternate versions of Guinan and Sarek, Scott is forced to return Kirk to the Nexus, restoring the original timeline at the moment the Enterprise is destroyed by a Borg fleet.
In the novel The Return, the Romulans and Borg went back in time and copied Kirk's brain waves before he died. They later stole his buried body, inserting the brain waves and using some Borg modifications to re-animate his body, turning him into a killing machine to hunt down Picard. At the conclusion of the novel, Kirk is freed from the brainwashing and his life is saved after a final attack on the Borg central node, disrupting the connection that keeps every branch of the Borg Collective in contact with each other and thus limiting the threat they will pose in future.
 According to Star Trek Online, the unseen child of Lursa has been born by the events of the film; Online also establishes that his name is Ja'rod and he survives to become an influential soldier of the Empire.
 In the novel The Star to Every Wandering, Kirk's death is interrupted by a converging temporal loop, caused by an excessive amount of chronometric particles in Kirk's body and of his trip in and out of the Nexus destroying all of spacetime between the places where he entered and exited the Nexus (near Earth and Veridian III) and from those times as well (2293 to 2371). Kirk, pulled back into the Nexus just before he could die, has to find a way to stop the converging temporal loop and save untold billions of lives without altering the timeline, managing to do so with the aid of his own echo in the Nexus who leaves and travels through time via the Guardian of Forever in order to maintain the timeline without destroying it.

Merchandise gallery

Awards and honors 
Star Trek Generations received the following awards and honors.

Links and references

Credits

Uncredited

Performers 
 Sam Alejan as El-Aurian survivor
 David Keith Anderson as Armstrong
 Kimberly Auslander as journalist
 Lena Banks as operations division ensign
 Scott Barry as
 Enterprise-D civilian
 Klingon officer
 Joe Bauman as Garvey
 Rina Bennett as Starfleet officer
 Eddie Berman as Bolian boy
 Tom Berman as Vulcan boy
 Pam Blackwell as El-Aurian survivor
 Joey Box as Enterprise-D command officer
 Steven Boz as security ensign
  as Spot
 Debbie David as Enterprise-B crewman
 Cameron as Kellogg
 Tracee Lee Cocco as Jae
 Steve Diamond as command officer
 Andrew DePalma as El-Aurian survivor
 Elliot Durant III as
 Mizarian civilian
 operations division ensign
 Michael Echols as Klingon bridge officer
 Tarik Ergin as Medical technician
 Gunnel Eriksson as sciences officer
 Margaret Flores as civilian
 Kevin Grevioux as Starfleet security officer 
 Whoopi Goldberg as Guinan
 Darrell Hall as Enterprise crewman
 Star Halm as Enterprise-D lieutenant (uncredited)
 Adolphus Hankins as maiden voyage official
 Grace Harrell as
 Command officer
 Pelian
 Kerry Hoyt as security ensign
 Gary Hunter as Vulcan civilian
 Penny Juday as Woman in Ten Forward
  as sciences officer
 Dale Kasman as Starfleet officer
 Bill Larson as Enterprise helmsman
 Nora Leonhardt as civilian
 Stewart W. Lew as crewman in Ten Forward
 M. McCahill as Starfleet officer
 Mary Meinel-Newport as Bolian woman
 Lorine Mendell as Enterprise-B crewman
 Rad Milo as Enterprise-D ensign
  as Spot
 Karlotta Nelson as El-Aurian survivor
 Michael Papajohn as Enterprise-D command officer
 Jim Portnoy as Enterprise-D civilian
 Jerry Quinn as Enterprise-B crewman
 Keith Rayve as command crewman
 Raul Reformina as command officer
 Allen Rice as Enterprise-B crewman
 Richard Sarstedt as command officer
 Lou Simon as operations officer
  as Spot
 Noriko Suzuki as Enterprise-D engineer
 John Tampoya as Enterprise-B crewman
 Dennis Tracy as Bolian waiter
 Guy Vardaman as
 Darien Wallace
 Klingon officer
 D. Danny Warhol as engineering crewman in hallway
 Terryl Whitlach as civilian during saucer section crash
 Harry Williams, Jr.
 S. Williams as Starfleet officer
 Zoe as Spot
 Unknown performers as
 Alien evacuee
 Enterprise-B crewman
 Enterprise-B crewman
 Enterprise-D bridge officer (voice)
 Enterprise-D communications officer (voice)
 Three Human launch voyage officials
 Romulan corpse
 Six Starfleet officers
 SS Lakul com voice
 Starfleet officer
 Ten Human launch spectators
 Thirteen Enterprise brig crewmen
 Twenty-three El-Aurian survivors
 Two journalists
 Vulcan woman

Stunt performers 
 Jane Austin as stunt double for Gates McFadden
 Joni Avery as stunt double for Marina Sirtis
 Jay Caputo as Enterprise-D bridge crewman
 Eugene Collier
 Erik Cord as stunt double for William Shatner
 Chris Durand as Enterprise-D bridge crewman
 Norman Kent as stunt double for William Shatner (deleted sky diving scene)
 Rusty McClennon as stunt double for Michael Dorn
 Jeff Mosley as stunt double for Michael Dorn
 Denney Pierce as Enterprise-D flight controller
 Mark Riccardi as stunt double for Jonathan Frakes
 Pat Romano – stunt rigger
 Lynn Salvatori as Antonia
 Cris Thomas-Palomino as Enterprise-D crewmember
 David Wendler as stunt double for William Shatner (horse jump)
 Brian J. Williams as stunt double for Brent Spiner
 Merritt Yohnka as Enterprise-B crewman

Stand-ins and photo doubles 
 David Keith Anderson
 Stand-in for LeVar Burton
 Stand-in for Tim Russ
 Margaret Flores – stand-in for Marina Sirtis
 Lauren C. Kim – stand-in for Jacqueline Kim
 Nora Leonhardt – stand-in for Marina Sirtis
 Lorine Mendell – stand-in for Gates McFadden
 James Minor – stand-in for Michael Dorn
 Kevin Reed O'Hara – photo double for Walter Koenig
 Keith Rayve – stand-in for Brent Spiner
 Richard Sarstedt – stand-in for Jonathan Frakes
 Dennis Tracy – stand-in for Patrick Stewart
 Guy Vardaman – body double for Brent Spiner
 Philip Weyland – stand-in for William Shatner

Production staff 
 Dave Archer – Artwork Provider: Paintings
 Rey Barrera – Rigging Electrician
 Rob Bloch – Animal Trainer: Critters of the Cinema
 Tom Bookout – Grip
 Kelli Cole – Animal Trainer: Critters of the Cinema
 Bernie Dresel – Orchestra Drummer
 Christopher Flick – Foley Editor
 Edward J. Franklin – Special Effects Artist
 Bill Hawk – Prop fabricator
 Jack Haye – Modelmaker
 Joe Lombardi – Special Effects Artist: Full Scale Effects
 Jim W. Pearson – Advisor
 Dan Purinton – Rigging Gaffer/Lot Best Boy
 Clark Schaffer – Production Illustrator
 Karen Thomas-Kolakowski – Animal Trainer: Critters of the Cinema
 Cogswell Video Services, Inc. – Visual Effects Unit Video Assist Company

References 
1743; 21st century; 2265; 2281; 2282; 2284; 2286; 2293; 24th century; 2337; 2351; 2364; 2371; ability; acceleration; all hands; alternate timeline; Amargosa; Amargosa observatory; Amargosa system; Amargosa system sector; amusement; antimatter containment; Antonia; arterial damage; Badge of Office; barn; bat'leth; ; Battle of Trafalgar; Battle of Wolf 359; battle stations; bearing; Bolian; "Bones"; Borg; ; ; "brace for impact"; Breen; buckling; ; ; cargo management unit (workbee); champagne; Christmas; cloaking device; clown; communications station; ; crew quarters; cup; damage report; dedication plaque; deflector control; deflector dish; diaper; dill weed; disruptor; doll; Dom Pérignon; drydock; Du'cha; duotronics; Duras sisters' Bird-of-Prey; Earl Grey tea; Earth; ebs terranews; El-Auria; El-Aurian; El-Aurian homeworld; emotion chip; emotional response; energy ribbon; ; ; Enterprise, USS dedication plaque; ; ; Enterprise-B, USS dedication plaque; ; ; Excelsior class decks; family history; family line; Farpoint Mission; Farpoint Station; ; fear; Federation; Ferengi; fly; Forcas III; force field; FPC; freedom; ; Galaxy class decks; Galileo-type shuttlecraft; gamma emission; gigawatt; GNN; God; gorilla suit; grade school; gravimetric distortion; gravimetric field; gravitational force; graviton field; ; heart; ; holodeck; horseback riding; House of Duras; humor; Idaho; ionic pulse; joke; Kirk's uncle; Klingons; Klingon Bird-of-Prey; Klingon Empire; Klingonese; Ktarian eggs; Kurlan naiskos; ; Lakul crewmembers; Lakul refugees; Leandra; level 3 diagnostic; level 12 shock wave; listener; Livingston; locking clamp; madman; magnetic field; magnetic interlock; maiden voyage; main engineering; Martian colonies; mating ritual; maximum warp; ; MCH; medical staff; megahertz (MHz);  (Miranda-class starship); ; mortality; myocardial degeneration; NAR-30974; NCC-7100; ; Nexus; NFT; Nobel Prize; number one;  (Oberth-class starship); oregano; Papa; passenger manifest; phenomenon; photon torpedo; Picard family album; ; ; Picard's grandfather; plank; plasma coil; plasma coolant; plasma generator; Pluto; pocket watch; polarity; predator; pre-industrial society; prisoner; prisoner exchange; prosthesis; psychiatrist; quantum implosion; RADAR; refugee; retirement; ; Romulans; Romulan outpost; Romulan tricorder; royal; San Francisco; saucer section; saucer separation; Saurian brandy; science station; SD-103 type (1, 2, and 3); shelf; shield modulation; ; sickbay; Sol system asteroid belt; solar probe; Soran's children; speaker; Spock; Spot; Starfleet; Starfleet Academy; Starfleet Command; Starfleet uniform; ; stirring; stunsail; subspace scan; ; System J-25; teeth; temporal energy; Ten Forward; t'garns'l; time; tractor beam; transport ship; transporter range; Transporter Room 3; tricorder; trilithium; trilithium weapon; Tuesday; type 3 disruptor; Type 6 shuttlecraft; Type 7 shuttlecraft; United Federation of Planets Press and Information; universe; Veridian; Veridian system; Veridian I; Veridian I moon; Veridian II; Veridian II moons; Veridian III; Veridian III moons; Veridian IV; Veridian IV moons; Veridian IV natives; Veridian V; Veridian V moon; Veridian VI; Veridian VI moons; VISOR; "walk the plank"; warp core breach; warp drive system; warp plasma; water; YPS pulse fusion

Other references 
 List of USS Enterprise-D personnel
 USS Enterprise dedication plaque: San Francisco Fleet Yards; Starship class
 USS Enterprise-B dedication plaque: Advanced Technologies; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; Engineering Division; Fleet Operations; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; Office of Science Ops; ; ; ; Starfleet Charter; Tactical Unit; ; UESPA; ; ; ; ; ; ; 
 USS Enterprise-B MSD: antimatter fill port; antimatter generator; antimatter storage; battle bridge; cargo bay; cargo conveyor; computer core; crew lounge; deflector grid buss; deuterium loading port; field geometry sensor; impulse reaction system; junior officers quarters; lateral sensor; lateral sensor array; main bridge; main engineering; ; main sickbay; navigational sensor cluster; observation lounge; phaser emitter; photon torpedo launcher; plasma injection system; primary navigation deflector; rcs mooring emitter; rcs thruster assembly; sensor module; sensor platform; subspace field coil system; tractor beam emitter; vectored exhaust direct assembly; warp drive nacelle; warp nacelle pylon; warp reactor core
 Stellar Cartography Star Chart: Angosia III; Antica IV; Antide Prime; Archer IV; Beta Renna system; Beta V; Betazed; Boreal III; Canopus Major; Chalna; Cheron; Clarus system; Coalition of Madena; Daled V; Daran V; Delta IV; El-Adrel IV; Epsilon Canaris; Gamma Eridon; Gravesworld; Halee system; Hayashi system; Hansen's Planet; Idran Star Cluster; Ilecom system; Janus VI; Jaros colony; Lauren III; Lima Sierra system; Lorenze Cluster; M24 Alpha system; Makus III; Manark IV; Manu III; Maxia Zeta; Melina II; Milika III; Miridian VI; Nimbus III; Ogus II; Omega Centus I; Organia; Pentarus system; Penthara IV; Razzbo system; Seiji Major; Septimus Minor; Serlay; Sherman's Planet; Straleb; Strnad solar system; Thasus IV; T'lli Beta; Torona IV; Turkana IV; Tycho system; Tyken's Rift; Vandor IV; Vaytan I; Wolf 359; Zeon Minor; Zeta Antaras IV

Meta references 
Intertitle

Unreferenced material
brain damage; crystalline trench; lava; orbital skydiving; rafting; Selar; Starfleet Engineering Corps; ventricle
 Picard Family album: Alpha Centauri; Andor; Appellation controlee; Apollo 11; Barbicon Theatre; Battle of Maxia; Bordeaux; Broadway; Brussels; Chateau La Barre; Cheron; Committee for Quadcentenial; Copenhagen; Copernicus City; Corps of Cadets; ; Danula II; Daystrom Institute; De La Barre; ; European Union; French language; Gallic-Klingon Debating Society; Gershwin; Golden Gate Bridge; Grankite Order of Tactics; Hippolyta; ; ; It's Federation Day!; ; KT; La Barre; Latin language; London; ; Louis XIV; Luna; major general; ; ; North America; : Onizuka Wing; Picard VIII; Picard XXII; ; ; ; ; ; Picard Maneuver; Picard Vineyards; Pinter; Phobos Inn; plomeek soup; President of the United Federation of Planets; Presidio; Risa; Romulan War; Romulans Repulsed; Sarahd; Saumur; Silver Spade; Sol; Sol system; Solar News Network; Starfleet Academy marathon; Starfleet Internet; ; Strasbourg; T'Jan; Tahiti; Tellar; Tellarite; Terran Winemakers Association; Tivoli Gardens; Trustees of Starfleet Academy; Tycho crater; UDF-RPR; ; UFP Council; UFP Constitution; United Nations; Vice-President of the United Federation of Planets; Vulcan; wine tasting; Yuri Gagarin Hall

Media 
 Star Trek Generations (Blu-ray)
 Star Trek Generations (Special Edition DVD)
 Star Trek Generations (DVD)
 Star Trek Generations (soundtrack)
 Star Trek Generations (novel)
 Star Trek Generations (game)

Sources 
 (3rd ed.), Larry Nemecek, Pocket Books, .
Star Trek: The Next Generation Sketchbook: The Movies, John Eaves & J.M. Dillard, Pocket Books, .
Star Trek: The Next Generation - The Continuing Mission, Judith & Garfield Reeves-Stevens, Pocket Books, .
Star Trek Movie Memories, William Shatner & Chris Krenski, Pocket Books, .
Star Trek Generations (Special Edition) DVD, Ronald D. Moore & Brannon Braga, audio commentary.
Star Trek Generations (Special Edition) DVD, Michael & Denise Okuda, text commentary.

External links 

 – features production history, concept art, and set design

bg:Стар Трек: Космически поколения
ca:Star Trek VII: La propera generació
de:Star Trek: Treffen der Generationen
es:Star Trek VII: Generations
fr:Star Trek: Generations
ja:スタートレック：ジェネレーションズ
nl:Star Trek: Generations
pl:Star Trek Pokolenia
pt:Star Trek VII: Generations
ro:Star Trek VII: Generaţii
ru:Звёздный путь VII: Поколения
sv:Star Trek: Generations

Star Trek films
Saturn Award nominees