Today’s question is for you fellow Trekkies.
As a geek, I can proudly say that one of our best qualities is our passion on any given subject. We are a passionate people, the geeks. When we love something, we love it deeply.
Of course, the same principle applies to the things we hate.
To make this list, I mostly just looked at several forums and saw which characters got bitched about the most. I tried to stick to main cast members for the most part, but a few guest stars seemed so wildly disliked that I felt compelled to include them as well. If your least favorite Trek character is not on this list, feel free to rant about them in the comments section. If your favorite character is on this list . . . sorry, buddy. There are some people I like here, too.
Voting is open one week. Results will be announced 11/21.
My Geek Blasphemy 
You can actually make an argument for literally every single crewmember on Voyager minus the Doctor and Early-Series Tom Paris (once he started dating B’Elanna, his character took a major turn for the worse), but the crown has got to go to Deanna Troi.
Here is a character whose only apparent skill is to state the blatantly obvious. She’s a gimped version of her own species…which could have been a cool thing to explore, but they never really bothered, and she spends the first 3-4 seasons of TNG as pretty much nothing more than Bridge Candy. A sort of biological bling the Picard keeps on his left in case he needs an emergency booty call or something. I don’t know.
Yet even once the writers break her out of her aloofness, she still manages to be singularly inept at her job. There’s also an entire episode dedicated to the fact that she has no goddamn idea about starship operations, and any time her empathic sense might actually be *useful*, she suffers from Plot Contrivitis and suddenly “can’t read the minds of _______” or whatever.
She got better in the movies (and somehow more attractive. Maybe because they stopped dressing her in the most hilariously unattractive outfits the 80s had to offer), but it couldn’t make up for 7 years of complete and total wasted space.
I remember an episode where she lost her empathic powers when the ship went through some cosmic cloud. She found that, because she’d slept her way through her counselor training (and up the ranks of Starfleet), she wasn’t able to counsel anyone without those powers.
Picard’s idea of having her as a bridge officer shouldn’t have lasted long when her insights were obvious even to the non-empathic, as Picard told her in that episode where Esley releases those nanites.
I don’t really hate any of the characters on this list, but I chose Ensign KIm because I find him a little annoying. My least favorite would actually be Q. He’s overpowered and not nearly as interesting as the Star Trek writers seem to think.
Chakotay. Totally and completely my least favorite Star Trek character. Everything about his made up generic “Native American” crap is almost insulting.. added onto the fact that Robert Beltran clearly despises almost every second he spends in front of the camera. I maintain that you could remove him from the series completely and there would only be a gain in quality.
See, I don’t think that’s the case. I think Chakotay was such a nothing character that his presence or absence would have a net zero effect on the show. He’s the definition of bland wallpaper. Whenever I think about Voyager, about 50 percent of the time I forget he was even there…that’s how much his presence affected me.
It’s Chakotay’s blandness that made me vote for him. *This* was the leader of the Marquis?!Who would have followed him? His spirituality could have been interesting to explore but, yeah, instead we got that crap.
And don’t get me started on the very forced last season relationship with Seven of Nine.
And I’m going to say it – I like Troi. I know she had a lot of stating the obvious moments but (other than the first episode and PAIN! *pained face*) I like the way the actress played her, especially when irritated. Could she have had better storylines, more to do in a crisis except say ‘we have to get out of here’ etc.? Sure. But I think Marina Sirtis tried to work with what she had, whereas Beltran fell waaaay flat and I think that makes his character even worse.
I wish I could nominate the writers of Voyager here because they managed to screw up every one of the characters somewhere down the line. But in terms of actual characters on this list, I have to completely agree with Patrick. Chakotay is by far the most uninteresting primary character in Star Trek history. Nothing about him was engaging, deep, funny, insightful or even mildly “huh” worthy. The pseudo-sexual tension storyline that the writers tried to create with him and Janeway pissed me off to no end, and as Patrick says, the whole shtick behind his character is stereotype at best, racist at worst. The spirit guide storyline? Gag me.
On the other hand, there are two characters that I would love to put on here — TNG Worf (a bit different than DS9 Worf — though I disagree with the whole theory that Worf ‘saved’ DS9) and Quark. Both of these characters should have remained or been only supporting roles, the way Ro Laren or TNG Miles O’Brien were. Come in a few times a season when there was a particularly interesting story to tell with them, or in Quark’s situation, if there was a particular need for comic relief. The worst episodes in DS9’s run are the Quark-centric. And Worf I just found dull for the most part. And what the hell was with the Worf-Troi hook up in season 7?
On a side note (third hand?) though, I’m very sad to see Malcolm and Ezri on this list. Malcolm was one of my favorite characters on Enterprise (he and Trip were great!) and Ezri, I think, gets a bum rap. It’s not her fault she replaced DS9’s female catsuit eye-candy.
I’d argue that DS9 saved Worf, rather than the other way around, since it allowed him to be taken seriously. I would dispute you on Quark, but I’m apparently one of the only people out there who liked the Ferengi episodes. (I still love “Little Green Men”.) The less said about the Worf-Troi romance, the better.
I don’t think Malcolm belongs on this list, although until the last two seasons, his only saving grace was his friendship with Trip. But then, that applies to the majority of Enterprise’s characters. Mayweather was treated as shabbily as Chakotay was, to the point of almost zero investment.
Neelix was okay in small doses. (Very small.) Wesley was a victim of 80’s writing. Pulaski was fun, and injected some much-needed conflict between characters, but ultimately was too similar to Bones.
I would heavily dispute Ezri or Barclay’s inclusion on this list, however. Both were excellently written, excellently performed characters.
I liked Quark but he would have been more interesting if they hadn’t made him too much of a loveable rogue – i.e. someone who’s into illegal dealings, but nothing really that bad so that it’s okay for us to like him. Of course they ruined the Ferengi at the end by doing away with all that made them interesting as a species when Rom became Grand Nagus.
I don’t know, I always liked Quark. Garak, too. But I can’t help it. I enjoy a good lovable rogue.
Rom becomes the Grand Nagus??? Good God. I can’t even imagine.
Had to vote for Pulaski. She was smarmy and unpleasant, a McCoy knockoff with none of the charm, but that wouldn’t have made her my least favorite on its own–but the behind-the-scenes reason the character even existed just makes my skin crawl. On the wrong day, watching one of her episodes can be triggering, because I can’t separate the character from those feelings.
I liked Pulaski, partly due to having seen very little of the original series at that point. She seemed more competent and lacked the blandness of Dr. Crusher. She did lack Bones’ charm, though, as she seemed to genuinely dislike Data.