My hot take (especially since I also haven't seen Picard): this might have been one of those very few exceptional situations where an AI deepfake would've been warranted. Still have Brent Spiner do the acting, obviously, but de-age him in post.
this post was submitted on 10 Nov 2025
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Just like in the more recent Terminator movies, the fact that a de-aged Spiner would sit in the uncanny valley, would only lean into the performance. We got some idea of what that might be like in Picard, but the scene was darkly lit (on purpose?)
Season 1 of Picard they did do a digital de-aging and it was fucking horrifying. Season 2 it was a Soong so de-aging wasn't really necessary. Season 3... I can't get into it without spoiling it but lemme just say that Data went kaboom in Nemesis. If they're making Data again, they might as well use new tech and upgrades. Whether or not that statement is accurate... I'll let you figure out
Season 1 Data, for the record.
They should have given him five huge dicks that he could use to fly around like tails from Sonic the Hedgehog. And the body of Niki Minaj. And the face of Betty White.
No complaints here
Some of the digital de-aging the VFX companies do is really impressive, and having the full catalog of TNG shows and movies to reference they could probably make it darn near seamless. I remember watching some behind the scenes feature on what they did for Captain Marvel and they were explaining they wanted to de-age Samuel L. Jackson to about the time he did Jurassic Park, but they couldn’t really use that footage for reference because he was using prosthetics and makeup to play a character older than he actually was at the time. They had to kind of cobble it together using films before and after for reference to approximate the age they wanted.
ai deep fake has been in use in the industry for a while now. I don't see a problem with it since it's done by VFX pros and they feed it with IP they own anyway.
I haven't seen the new stuff. What's the explaination for Data being older?
Without spoiling the hell out of Season 3 of Picard (which is well worth a watch), Organic Body.
Upgrades baby.
he also got fatter. i dint like picard series.
"You have to grow older, but you never have to grow up" -idk, peter pan or some shit
"I'm often confused for an adult because of my age" – certainly no Peter Pan