The first season of Star Trek: Prodigy delighted Voyager fans as Kate Mulgrew and Robert Beltran extended the story of Kathryn Janeway and Chakotay — and to up the Delta Quadrant delights for year two, Robert Picardo returned to the final frontier to reprise his role as the Emergency Medical Hologram.
 
We had the chance to speak with Picardo as Star Trek: Prodigy beamed the Star Trek: Voyager star aboard the USS Voyager-A to mentor the animated series’ Starfleet hopefuls.
 

TREKCORE: How did you feel about reprising your role as the Doctor — and how do you think Prodigy handled the character?

ROBERT PICARDO: Well, because Kate Mulgrew and I are such close friends, I had heard the Prodigy team was thinking about Season 2 and were interested in bringing back the Doctor. She was very secretive, of course — we have to be with these sort of things – but I knew then that they were at least thinking about it.

So I wasn’t exactly surprised when they reached out to me. I didn’t know what I’d be doing, of course, but when I started to read the scripts, it was fun to see how well they used the character. How they played upon how much he loved talking about himself; that he was still self-absorbed and delighted to talk about whatever holo-novel he was working on.

They were writing very well for the Doctor as comic relief — but they also gave me some very nice dramatic moments, where his counsel is sought by Janeway… or hologram Janeway. Some moments where the chips are down, and he has to try and save Gwyn’s life, and all that. So I liked that it was fully fleshed out — there was his humorous side, but that in a dramatic situation, he still could make a serious contribution to solving the problem.

TREKCORE: Was it tricky to get back into character?

PICARDO: Well, the interesting coincidence is that during COVID — because this all started when they first approached me back during lockdown — I had started a YouTube channel, inspired by Brent Spiner who had done a hilarious video series. I just thought that was a great way to keep up your skills as a performer, but also give loyal fans little gifts of amusement.

My daughter Gina suggested I do something that was sort of Star Trek-related, and after thinking about it a bit I decided to start doing famous speeches from my time on Voyager, performed in a beautiful, natural setting. So I did these things I called ‘technobabble al fresco,’ like 20 or 30 of them. Most were word-perfect from Voyager episodes, but then I starting having some fun trying to fool the fans who were watching – and I would make up something that sound like it might have been from Voyager.

So when I heard from Prodigy, I had been doing this for a couple of months and the Doctor’s voice was already in my head — because I had reviewed some of Voyager, which I really hadn’t seen in a while, so that I could perform these videos in character.

 
TREKCORE: Did you have any input on the Doctor’s new animated look?

PICARDO: We get approval, so they sent it to me — and as I recall, only had maybe one note. I don’t remember what it was. They make us look trimmer and younger, obviously, so I like the way the character looks. I mean, I wish I looked that good!

You know, it’s more about capturing essences. Certainly they get a lot of our features right — I mean, Janeway is clearly identifiable as Janeway — but it’s important that we’re not photorealistic. That wouldn’t fit with the other art in the show.

So I think they found a very nice balance of taking all of our features and fitting them into the Prodigy world.

TREKCORE: Did you have to change your performance much to fit with the animated presentation?

PICARDO: Mostly I just tried to pitch my voice up into the same register as when I was doing Voyager. As I’ve gotten older, my voice has gotten lower, but even back in the day on Star Trek there was a lot of artifice that was intentional on my parts — like in Season 1 and 2, where the Doctor really talked like he was just listening to his own voice. I wanted him to be a bit more machine-like, in his posture and intonation, so that as he became more human everything would slowly and subtly change.

I don’t like my performance in the first two seasons of Voyager! (Laughs) You know, the rather snooty way that I talk, it just seems so mannered that now I think, “I can’t wait until I start to get a little more human!”

But I think it worked well for the character, because you wanted to see a newly-activated, never-tested artificial intelligence. It had to be something with a place to go. Once I understood the basic arc of what the writers had in mind, I was happy that I started with that artifice… but I still don’t enjoy most of my earlier episodes, for those personal reasons.

TREKCORE: Have you ever been approached about coming back to Trek in live-action — would you be interested in that at all?

PICARDO: I was completely enchanted and delighted by all of my Star Trek colleagues from The Next Generation coming back for Picard Season 3, which was a spectacular success. Terry Matalas was an assistant to Brannon Braga on our show; what a brilliant job he did in conceiving that.

I thought they had carefully thought out where the characters were now, what had happened in the intervening years — how they had changed, how they had stayed the same, how they had grown. All of that was done so well that I wouldn’t be surprised if in the future, they do consider bringing some of the other legacy actors back. I’ve seen videos where Kate has tried to put Alex Kurtzman on the spot about it. (Laughs)

It would be delightful, of course, but there is zero talk that I am aware of — ZERO! — of a Voyager reunion, as much as I would love that. (Laughs) The fans, I think, would like it, after seeing what Picard did… even as a one-off thing, now that Star Trek is doing kind of what Star Wars is doing, with Section 31 and the amazing Michelle Yeoh.

I loved her character on Discovery, and I think it’s great that they can now take something and do what never seemed possible before. A reunion movie made just for the streaming platform, and not need to do a theatrical feature release? All of that seems possible, but like I said there’s zero talk that I’m aware of. I can’t speak for my Voyager colleagues, but have to think they’d all be interested in doing something like that.

TREKCORE: Then if Prodigy were to continue, I assume you’d enjoy spending more time as the Doctor in animation?

PICARDO: I hope! The Hagemans are just very good writers, and lovely people. The love Star Trek, they love the show, and most importantly, they love the new characters they’ve created — these would-be cadets. Their looks are all so unique, and so are their voices. The great thing about animation is that you can do things that are so imaginative… but are still a bit beyond what you could do in live-action. The look of the show is just delightful.

You could tell how it not only captures young audience members, but it’s the kind of thing where adults could watch it alone, or sit down and watch it with their kids — I think it’s a huge success, and I hope that Netflix pays attention to the response it’s getting.

The fans seem to love it, and hopefully the numbers are good enough that Netflix would decide to produce a third season. That would be great.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Star Trek: Prodigy Season 2 is available to stream now on Netflix globally (excluding-Canada, Nordics, CEE, Netherlands, Spain, Portugal, Poland, Russia, Belarus, and Mainland China). The show can also be viewed on SkyShowtime in the Nordics, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain and Central and Eastern Europe.