Welcome back to Character Insight! This week, we cover Number One, the original first officer of the Enterprise from the TOS pilot episode The Cage, and a character who will appear again in the next season of Discovery, just like Captain Pike, who we covered last week.
In The Cage, Number One is a female human Starfleet officer who serves as a second in command to Captain Pike on the Enterprise. In addition to her first officer duties, she also serves as the helmsman in this episode. In this manner, she sets the mold for future characters like Sulu who take similar joint roles in Starfleet.
Number One is a lieutenant, but she is described to be one of the most experienced officers on the ship, perhaps knowing more about ship operations and equipment than even the Captain. As we learn from the Talosians who capture her and the Captain during The Cage, she has exceptional intelligence and rationality, and she rarely shows emotion. These qualities of the first officer were transferred into the character of Spock when that character was promoted to the role of first officer in episodes following the pilot episode. To this end, the Spock that we know is a bit of a hybrid between the original Spock from The Cage and the Number One character. So she sets the character mold for another major character in this way.
In The Cage, Number One is in command when Pike is kidnapped by the Talosians. She uses a number of options to try and rescue him, but she ends up being kidnapped herself. The Talosians wanted to mate her with Pike to keep a race of humans as their slaves. Number One sets a laser pistol to overload to kill all of them to prove humans will not be kept as slaves anymore, which was a strong commentary on real world events when The Cage was airing.
QUOTE - from The Cage
Number One is a lieutenant, but she is described to be one of the most experienced officers on the ship, perhaps knowing more about ship operations and equipment than even the Captain. As we learn from the Talosians who capture her and the Captain during The Cage, she has exceptional intelligence and rationality, and she rarely shows emotion. These qualities of the first officer were transferred into the character of Spock when that character was promoted to the role of first officer in episodes following the pilot episode. To this end, the Spock that we know is a bit of a hybrid between the original Spock from The Cage and the Number One character. So she sets the character mold for another major character in this way.
In The Cage, Number One is in command when Pike is kidnapped by the Talosians. She uses a number of options to try and rescue him, but she ends up being kidnapped herself. The Talosians wanted to mate her with Pike to keep a race of humans as their slaves. Number One sets a laser pistol to overload to kill all of them to prove humans will not be kept as slaves anymore, which was a strong commentary on real world events when The Cage was airing.
QUOTE - from The Cage
"It's wrong to create a race of Humans to keep as slaves."
The name Number One is a naval slang term used by Captain Pike to refer to his first officer, and it is not the character's real name. Indeed, because this character was dropped from the series following the pilot episode screenings, we never learn her real name. But the moniker Number One would live on, as Picard refers to his first office William Riker as "Number One" frequently, and Michael Burnham is also referred to this way by Captain Georgiou in the initial episodes of Discovery.
And that brings us to last week's news about Discovery season two, where Captain Pike and Number One will be playing a big role in that new season. It will be interesting to see if Number One finally receives a name in canon this time, and whether the Spock-like qualities originally associated with this character are carried over from The Cage.
Majel Barrett played Number One in The Cage, and this footage also appears in The Menagerie episodes later in TOS. In addition to her numerous roles on Star Trek series, she is also known for playing Miss Carrie in the original 1974 movie version of Westworld, which has recently been converted into a big sci fi HBO series. Rebecca Romijn, who is probably best known as a model and in her Mystique roles of the original X-Men movies, will take over as Number One in the new season of Discovery.
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