Gates McFadden Discusses Crusher's STAR TREK: PICARD Return and How She "Loves Kicking Ass"

Gates McFadden is back as Dr. Beverly Crusher in the upcoming third season of Star Trek: Picard, and this time around she’ll be kicking some ass. McFadden played Crusher over the course of six seasons of Star Trek: The Next Generation, and it’s so awesome that she is returning to play this character again after all these years.

During an interview with The Wrap, she opened up and revealed how she felt returning to the role in Picard and it sounds like she had an incredible time, saying: "I love kicking ass first of all. It was really a lot of fun. I had a fantastic time working on this show."

Patrick Stewart jumped in and said that he wished they'd dug into the aspects of Crusher seen in Picard Season 3 sometime sooner, and McFadden said: "I tried… I always wanted to do more action. As a choreographer, I've done dance, combat, I really did want to not have a makeup kit on me while on the away team. I wanted to actually have some things I could use to be helpful."

McFadden went on to talk about Star Trek: Picard Season 3's showrunner, Terry Matalas, and the ideas he had for Crusher in the series: "I really loved Terry's ideas and he had these ideas for where Crusher would be now. I love that they had me at the beginning doing something active… I think there was a much bigger range to Crusher in this season."

Writer Jackson Lanzing went on to talk about being able to revisit the character, saying: "We thought it was really time for her to get her own ride, to get a place where she got to do her thing, where she got to live in an investigation of her own. One of the things that I always really loved about Beverly Crusher fundamentally is that she is a kind of a mad scientist. The only time we ever see her get really excited about anything other than motherhood is when she meets a scientist who she's a huge fan of, who she saw at that conference that one time. She loves that stuff."

Season 3 also brings back Will Riker (Jonathan Frakes) and Deanna Troi (Marina Sirtis), who appeared in the first season of Picard, and it also featured Data (Brent Spiner). But, now he’ll be joined by LeVar Burton as Geordi La Forg, Michael Dorn as Worf, Michelle Hurd as Raffi Musiker, Gates McFadden as Beverly Crusher, and Jeri Ryan as Commander Seven of Nine.

Star Trek: Picard Season 3 premiers on Paramount+ on February 16th.