Star Trek's Wildest Storyline Cloned A Main Character – And Then Promptly Forgot It Happened

One of the best things about "Star Trek" is that it can get really, really weird. Science fiction stories always lend themselves to bizarre situations, as the technology of the future allows us to explore ideas that would be totally impossible in our own world. Time travel alone has given the various "Star Trek" crews all kinds of (entertaining) headaches, but in a season 6 episode of "Star Trek: The Next Generation," a teleporter accident introduced a fantastic new headache for the crew of Captain Picard's (Patrick Stewart) Enterprise: Thomas Riker.

After a teleporter accident during an away mission while William Riker (Jonathan Frakes) was stationed aboard the U.S.S. Potemkin, he was rematerialized as two separate Rikers, and one of them ended up stranded for eight years before reappearing in the episode "Second Chances," claiming to be the "real" William Riker. Doppelgangers from teleporter accidents had happened before, like when Captain Kirk (William Shatner) was split in two in the original series episode "The Enemy Within," but this seemed to be something new. After all, Kirk had been split into good and evil versions, whereas both Rikers appeared to be the same man, just with eight years of different experiences. And instead of fusing the two Rikers back together, like what happened to Kirk, the "new" Riker took the name of Thomas and went off to lead his own Starfleet career aboard the U.S.S. Gandhi. But what happened next?

Thomas Riker returned in pretty spectacular fashion in the "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine" episode "Defiant," revealing that he was even more rebellious than his teleporter-clone by stealing the newly commissioned and highly important ship, the Defiant. (It's hard to blame him, because the Defiant is probably the coolest ship in the entirety of "Star Trek," even if it looks like a horseshoe crab.) It turned out that he was sympathetic to the Maquis, a Federation separatist group who rebelled against the Cardassian occupation of former Federation planets, and he tried to use the Defiant to try and find a secret fleet of Cardassian ships. He was then captured and sentenced to life imprisonment in the Lazon II labor camp, though Major Kira (Nana Visitor) understood his rebellion because of her own anti-Cardassian terrorist past as a Bajoran resistance fighter and promised to get him out someday.

It seemed like the "Star Trek" franchise forgot about Thomas after that, however, and he was only mentioned in the "Star Trek" novels that are technically outside of the canon. Fans of one of the property's wildest storylines were left to ponder what happened to Thomas after his imprisonment. Did Major Kira make good on her promise and get him out, or was he (rather unfairly) stuck there forever? Thankfully, the team behind the animated series "Star Trek: Lower Decks" have given us hope that there might be answers in the future.

On "Star Trek: Lower Decks," Ensign Brad Boimler (Jack Quaid) ends up having his own twin-creating teleporter accident, and the clone Boimler chooses to take the name William, likely to try and impress the ship's captain, Will Riker (voiced in a cameo by Frakes). William Boimler ends up staying on the Titan with Will Riker, and Brad goes back to the U.S.S. Cerritos. Unfortunately, William Boimler was then recruited into Section 31, the sketchy espionage branch of Starfleet, and the organization faked his death.

"Lower Decks" might be planning to unite the two transporter twins in the fifth and final season, as the Federation was looking for Thomas Riker in season 4's penultimate episode. If they were looking for him, that means he's likely not still in a Cardassian labor camp. The search for Thomas was left a bit of a mystery by season 4's end, as a different character burned by Starfleet took center stage, but the pieces have been set into play. If anyone has the right to be upset with Starfleet, it's Thomas Riker, but he could also try to do right by Starfleet in the end anyway, redeeming himself fully in the eyes of the Federation. Either way, there's some major drama that could be mined from this double trouble situation, and plenty of comedy too. Here's hoping that "Lower Decks" finally gives us some answers to decades-old "Star Trek" questions.

"Star Trek: Lower Decks" will premiere its fifth and final season on October 24, 2024, on Paramount+.