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Summary
Lt . Commander Geordi La Forge actor LeVar Burton explains what it was like to lose the iconic VISOR he wore for yr onStar Trek : The Next Generation . Geordi ’s VISOR was a definitive aspect of his character ’s feeling onTNG , butLeVar Burton was happy to trench the center appurtenance in favor of the much more virtual ocular implant . ThroughoutTNG , La Forge service as the Chief Engineer aboard the USS Enterprise - D under the command of Captain Jean - Luc Picard ( Patrick Stewart ) . Although Geordi continued to bear his VISOR inStar Trek Generations , he upgraded to hopeful blue robotic eyes inStar Trek : First Contact .
Star Trek : First Contact , which get word the USS Enterprise - tocopherol travelling back in time to cease the Borg , before long became the most successful and well - received of theStar Trek : TheNext Generationmovies . WhileGeordi ’s VISOR had face futuristic inTNG , it was dreadful to wearand severely limited Burton ’s mountain . In theStar Trekoral historyThe Fifty - Year Mission : The Next 25 Yearsby Mark A. Altman and Edward Gross , LeVar Burton speaks about recede the VISOR forFirst Contact :
" It was time . Eighty percent of my vision was issue off when I fatigue that matter , and it physically hurt , which was one of the more important reason I wanted to get out from underneath it . We hold on to it for so long , because , as Rick say , it was one of the way that we established in the minds of the audience the technology of the twenty - 4th century . On the series it became knotty because it was cost prohibitory . We were never able to show the interview what Geordi saw , because it was too expensive and we were on a squiffy budget . So it became a barrier to storytelling , physically painful for me , and on a spiritual level , it ’s really just a sin to cover an histrion ’s eyes . I was n’t really mindful of how much of a barrier it had become until we pullulate this movie , and in the absence of the VISOR , I noticed that the other doer were relating to me very otherwise . They were engaging me in a way that they never did in scene . So the visor is dead ; long live the visor ! "
LeVar Burton ’s Geordi La Forge fall apart his iconic VISOR for all of Star Trek : The Next Generation , but he afterward upgrade to ocular implants .
Losing Geordi’s VISOR Made La Forge A Better Character
LeVar Burton gained the full ability to emote with his eyes.
Many player convey emotion through their eye , andGeordi Le Forge ’s VISORlimited LeVar Burton ’s ability to emote . Losing the VISOR have Burton more freedom and range as an actor , and allowed the actors around him to considerably respond to his facial expressions . This variety made Geordi a more well - round down character , removing the roadblock between the character and the audience that was the VISOR . With his ocular implants , Geordi could still see differently than those with ordinary vision , and the implant had even more enhanced feature than his VISOR .
Wearing alike ocular implant , Geordi La Forge return inStar Trek : Picardseason 3 as a Commodore and the curator of the Fleet Museum on Athan Prime . Now with two daughters who had link up Starfleet , La Forge had even more reason to be emotional andBurton transmit much of that emotion through Geordi ’s eyes . Picardseason 3 also see Geordi reunite with his resurrected best protagonist Data ( Brent Spiner ) , another scene that would have been hampered by the VISOR . Geordi had always been a very human and relatable character , but losing the VISOR inStar Trek : First Contactallowed more of his humans to glow through .
Star Trek : The Next propagation , Star Trek : First Contact , & Star Trek : Picardare all available to stream on Paramount+ .
Source : The Fifty - Year Mission : The Next 25 year : From The Next Generation to J. J. Abrams : The unadulterated , Uncensored , and Unauthorized unwritten History of Star Trekby Mark A. Altman and Edward Gross
