B'Elanna Torres
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B'Elanna Torres, played by Roxann Dawson, is a character in Star Trek: Voyager. She is the Chief Engineer of the USS Voyager.
Torres is the only major Star Trek character with a Hispanic background.
Creating B'Elanna
When the producers first began creating Star Trek Voyager, they originally asked Michelle Forbes to return to the role of Ro Laren, but just like with Deep Space Nine, she declined the offer and many have speculated that the role of B'Elanna Torres was created instead.
The Official Star Trek Voyager companion describes B'Elanna as a young half human, half klingon in her twenties who is a member of the Maquis Rebellion.
The producers wanted to hire an actress that could portray B'Elanna's inner struggle between her human and klingon halves and when Roxann Biggs Dawson read for the role, she became the first member of the Voyager actors to be cast.
Originally B'Elanna's makeup was very different to what the final design became. Roxann Dawson explained she had a much more pronounced Klingon forehead and nose and had to wear a set of Klingon teeth, which made her feel uncomfortable. She asked the producers and makeup artist Micheal Westmore if they could the perhaps make her more attractive and tone down the Klingon makeup. Eventually they came up with a design Roxann was happy with, something she describes as her 'beauty monster makeup'.
During the first season episode "Faces" Roxann's initial reaction to the script was one of doubt. She felt like it was too early in the series and that she didn't know the character well enough to play her as two separate people, but instead she used the episode as a learning experience and got to know a lot more about her character from that episode and in turn, it became one of her favourite shows. At the time, after the episode aired, she called up her parents to ask their opinions, and they replied. "You were good, but the girl that played that Klingon was really great!". Roxann took that as a compliment and knew from then on that she had done her job.
Although B'Elanna was 25 years old when the series began, Roxann the actress was 36 when the series started.
During the fourth season of the show, Roxann became pregnant with her first child. The writers decided they did not want to get B'Elanna pregnant and have B'Elanna be a mother personae and have to deal with those issues, so for the remaining time of her pregnancy, B'Elanna was given an engineering lab coat and that was used to help cover her growing pregnancy. Something the other actors found amusing in season 7 was when the writers of the show decided to write in a pregancy storyline for B'Elanna, even though Roxann herself was not pregnant.
During Voyager's fifth season, Roxann had a meeting with the producers and writers to discuss B'Elanna. Roxann explained to them that she felt B'Elanna had an extreme dark side to her character that hadn't been explored and from that discussion, the episode "Extreme Risk" was created. Roxann explained after that episode aired she had a lot of fan mail praising the issues of depression and inner conflict raised in the episode and that a lot of people who watched could identify with it.
In the sixth season episode 'Barge of the Dead' Roxann finally got the chance to explore B'Elanna's Klingon side. Thanks to an episode originally conceived by Ronald D Moore to be a Deep Space Nine episode about Klingon Hell. In the episode B'Elanna has a near death experience and travels to Klingon Hell (Grethor), there she meets her mother and discovers that because of the dishonor she caused her, her mother would spend eternity in Grethor. The episode explores not only fascinating aspects to B'Elanna's character but also gives further insight into Klingon Mythology. Roxann believed the episode had many layers to it and she believed it was essentially a coming of age story for B'Elanna and her finally accepting her Klingon heritage.
At the end of the series, Roxann described B'Elanna's character arc from being an unruly young woman who grew into a mature woman over the course of seven years.
Character Overview
Born in 2346 on the Federation colony Kessik IV, Torres had a troubled childhood. Her human father and Klingon mother often fought, and her father ultimately left the household when she was five years old (later on it is said to be when she was twelve). He returned to Earth, leaving her to be raised by her mother.
A mixture of Klingon and human progeny, Torres was prone to aggressive outbursts. She once attacked schoolmate Daniel Byrd after he repeatedly taunted her, calling her "Miss Turtlehead" (because of her cranial ridges). Torres retained this aggressive behavior throughout her life, but she eventually learned to control it.
Starfleet Academy and Maquis
After Torres dropped out of Starfleet Academy in early 2366 at age 19, she drifted around the galaxy before becoming a member of the Maquis renegade group, where she developed a profound hatred of the Cardassians. Torres became associated with Maquis captain Chakotay, and was serving as chief engineer on his ship, the Val Jean, when they were brought to the Delta Quadrant by the Caretaker.
During her time with the Maquis, Torres reprogrammed a Cardassian missile known as "Dreadnought". The missile, built with artificial intelligence, was originally targeted at Maquis installations. Torres reprogrammed it on a course for a Cardassian installation, but "Dreadnought" was swept into the Delta Quadrant by the Caretaker.
USS Voyager
In 2371, B'Elanna Torres joins the Voyager crew with the rest of the Maquis from the Val Jean, as Captain Kathryn Janeway offers them the opportunity. She is placed in the engineering department, which has no clear department head because the original chief engineer was killed during the trip to the Delta Quadrant. As a result, Torres often comes into conflict with one of the department's most senior officers, Lieutenant Carey. Captain Janeway eventually promotes Torres to chief engineer over Carey, choosing her based on Chakotay's recommendation.
Shortly after becoming chief engineer, however, Torres disobeys the captain's orders when Voyager encounters a race known as the Sikarians. The Sikarians have advanced transporter technology that could drastically shorten their 70-year journey, but Sikarian law prohibits them from obtaining it legitimately. Torres becomes involved with a small group of officers that obtain the technology on the Sikarian black market, and perpetrate a failed attempt to integrate it into Voyager's systems.
Torres, along with Tom Paris, is later kidnapped by the Vidiians. A Vidiian scientist extracts the Klingon DNA from Torres, splicing her into two separate people: one human, one Klingon. He believes the Klingon DNA has a specific biochemical property which could lead to a cure for the Phage, a disease affecting his people. The human Torres is fraught with fear and timidity, while the Klingon Torres is overly aggressive. When they escape from the Vidiians and return to Voyager, the Klingon Torres suffers a fatal wound from the Vidiian energy weapon and dies, but the Doctor uses her DNA to restore the human Torres to her original half-human, half-Klingon state.
In 2373, Torres is the target of telepathically-inspired dreams from a member of a race called the Enarans. The dreams are actually memories of a great massacre that took place on the Enaran homeworld, and are the elder Enaran's method of making sure that the memory of this massacre lives on, even if in the mind of an alien.
Later that year, Vulcan engineer Vorik accidentally triggers Torres's mating instincts when he initiates a telepathic bond with her while he is experiencing the pon farr. Torres and Tom Paris are trapped on a planet together during an away mission, and Torres attempts to get Paris to mate with her, but he resists. Eventually, Vorik and Torres engage in ritual battle and purged the blood fever.
Torres later begins a relationship with Paris after a complicated and stormy courtship. During an incident in 2374, Torres confesses her love for Tom Paris to him, when they are left floating in space in environmental suits, with almost no hope of rescue ("Day of Honor"). Although Voyager is soon able to rescue them, Torres realizes that her courage in admitting her love has brought her one step closer to discovering what she considers true honor. Their relationship first flourishes on-screen during "Scientific Method". They marry in 2377, and have their honeymoon aboard the Delta Flyer.
When Torres and Paris conceive their child in mid-2377, she learns from The Doctor that the child will have distinct Klingon cranial ridges as well as other Klingon traits. Torres, remembering painful events from her own childhood, urges the Doctor to perform gene therapy to reduce this phenotype, and even goes so far as to reprogram him to do so. Her husband and Captain Janeway both disagree, and manage to prevent the Doctor from performing the genetic modifications. When Paris succeeds in getting her to open up, she admits she's afraid that her husband will find living with two Klingons too difficult and will leave her the way her father did. Once he allays her fears, admitting he wants even more children just like their mother, Torres is finally free to enjoy the pregnancy.
Although only a quarter Klingon, Torres's unborn child is later deemed the Klingon savior by a cult of Klingons that have journeyed deep into the Delta Quadrant on a generational voyage in search of a messiah to bring peace to the empire. The Klingons eventually settle on an uninhabited world, but during their time on Voyager, they re-awaken Torres's interest in her Klingon heritage.
Torres' and Paris' daughter, Miral Paris, is born in 2378, during Voyager's trip through a Borg transwarp conduit back toward the Alpha Quadrant. In an alternate timeline where Voyager makes it home through different means, Miral is shown as an adult serving in Starfleet, with the rank of ensign.
Birthdate
There are many references in Star Trek Voyager episodes that lead to the conclusion that B'Elanna was born in 2346. Torres stated in "Extreme Risk" that she was nineteen when she quit Starfleet Academy. Ten years had passed between her breakup with her old Academy boyfriend Maxwell Burke and their reunion in 'The Equinox, Part I' in late 2375. Torres quit the Academy in her second year at age nineteen in early 2366, and back tracking over nineteen years makes her birth year 2346.
The Official Star Trek Voyager Companion gives further evidence to Torres' age. This is a passage taken from the book: "B'ELANNA TORRES is a half Klingon, half Human in her twenties who is frantically working at the consoles of the barely spaceworthy craft..."
References
- The Official Star Trek Voyager Companion.
- Star Trek Voyager Complete Series DVDs Special Features. Crew Biography of B'Elanna Torres, interview with Roxann Dawson.
- Star Trek Monthly Magazine, Roxann Dawson Interviews.
- Star Trek The Magazine, Roxann Dawson Interviews.
- Star Trek Voyager Wrap Party Interview, 2001. Star Trek.Com