Star Trek: The Original Series

Characters who survive into the Next Generation era

The spin-off series, ', when it premiered in 1987, was initially controversial with some fans due to the fact that Roddenberry chose to set the series approximately 100 years after the events of TOS, thereby making it impractical for any TOS characters to be regulars on the new show.

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As TNG and its spin-offs progressed, however, several TOS-era characters made appearances:

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• Spock, now a Vulcan ambassador, is said to have gone underground in the Romulan Empire in hopes of fostering peaceful coexistence with the Federation and reunification with Vulcan society ("Unification, Parts I and II").
• McCoy, now a 137-year-old admiral, inspects the Enterprise-D during her maiden flight in "Encounter at Farpoint".
• Scotty, who is promoted to captain, is revealed to have spent about 70 years trapped in a transporter buffer before being rescued by the Enterprise-D crew and resuming his life in "Relics".
• Sarek, Spock's father, continued to be an ambassador for the next century, finally retiring to Vulcan where he passes away during the events of "Unification".
• Kang, Koloth and Kor, the three Klingons featured in "Day of the Dove", "Trouble with Tribbles" and "Errand of Mercy", continued to serve the Empire well into the 24th century. They appeared in the ' episode "Blood Oath" in which Kang and Koloth were killed. Kor later died fighting in the Dominion War. A younger version of Kang, from the era of ', later appeared in the ' episode "Flashback".
• James Kirk disappears in the mid-2290s during the maiden voyage of the Enterprise-B but 75 years later is recovered from an alternate plane of existence by Enterprise-D Captain Jean-Luc Picard. Kirk's emergence in the 24th century is short-lived, however, when he is killed in '.

Besides the above examples, there have been numerous non-canon novels and comic books published over the years in which TOS-era crew are depicted in the TNG era, either through time-travel or other means.

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