Star Trek: Voyager villains the Kazon have returned in Star Trek: Prodigy, where they’ve become even more detestable antagonists than before. Introduced in the earliest days of Voyager, the Kazon were a warlike species based in the Delta Quadrant. The Kazon would give Captain Janeway and her crew continual headaches over the series’ first two seasons.
The Kazon were largely reviled by viewers, critics, and even much of Voyager‘s production staff. Not only did they look somewhat ridiculous with their elaborate hairdos, they came across as toothless knockoffs of the much more imposing Klingons. As such, they were essentially phased out of the show after the season 3 premiere. However, the villains have made a surprising return in Star Trek: Prodigy, where they’ve been reimagined as child slave traders – which has made them seem like much nastier villains than they ever were on Star Trek: Voyager.
The Kazon Were One Of Voyager’s First Alien Villains
The Kazon debuted in the very first episode of Voyager. Series co-creator Michael Piller envisioned the Kazon as being a major recurring nemesis for the Voyager crew, much like the Borg were for The Next Generation and the Cardassians were for Deep Space Nine. The Kazon had a significant initial presence, but never emerged as either a serious threat or compelling characters.
Many of Voyager’s primary writers, such as series co-creator Jeri Taylor and showrunner Brannon Braga, were critical of the Kazon and eager to move on from them. Voyager would eventually find its primary recurring adversary by borrowing the Borg from TNG. The Borg were native to the Delta Quadrant, so Voyager would have to navigate through entire fleets of Borg cubes, rather than the smaller scale on which Jean-Luc Picard’s Enterprise usually took them on. Ironically, the Kazon are one of the few species the Borg chose not to assimilate, as they viewed them as too inferior of a species to integrate.
Why The Kazon Enslaved Children For The Diviner
The Kazon’s motivation for condemning alien children to the Tars Lamora slave colony seems to be fairly straightforward – profit. In the Star Trek: Prodigy series premiere, “Lost and Found,” a Kazon slave trader expects monetary payment for the aliens he’s delivering to the Diviner. The Kazon on Voyager never seemed particularly interested in money, as they were more of a generic warrior race bent on conquest.
This evolution of the Kazon has an interesting parallel to the Ferengi. The Ferengi infamously debuted in The Next Generation season 1, where they were depicted as boilerplate bad guys who were evil for no real reason. DS9 would redefine the Ferengi as ultra-capitalists, a much more interesting and entertaining interpretation. Similarly, Star Trek: Prodigy may end up righting one of the biggerst mistakes in Star Trek: Voyager by remolding the Kazon into legitimately nasty villains.
