Star Trek: The Next Generation Original Series" in 1969, the "Star Trek" franchise had continued with "" (1973–74) and a series of films, all featuring the original cast. In the 1980s, franchise creator Roddenberry decided to create a new series, featuring a new crew embarking on their mission a century after that of "The Original Series". "TNG" featured a new crew that starred (for the majority of its seven-year broadcast run) Patrick Stewart as Captain Jean-Luc Picard, Jonathan Frakes as Commander William Riker, Brent Spiner as Lt Commander Data, Michael Dorn as Lieutenant Worf, LeVar Burton as Lt Commander Geordi La Forge, Marina Sirtis as
Brent Spiner films. As a main character, he appeared in all but one of the series' 178 episodes; he was not in the episode "". He reprised his role in the spin-off films "Star Trek Generations" (1994), "" (1996), "" (1998), and "" (2002). Although billed as the final "Trek" movie for the "TNG" cast, the ambiguous ending of "" suggested a possible avenue for the return of Data. However, Spiner opined that he was too old to continue playing the part, as Data does not age, whereas Spiner had already aged considerably during the years in which he played the role.