Tribbles Used To Be Cute & Cuddly Before Star Trek Changed Them

Tribbles were originally cute and cuddly little balls of fluff before Star Trek kept changing them. Tribbles famously made their Star Trek debut in Star Trek: The Original Series season 2, episode 15, "The Trouble with Tribbles," when Captain James T. Kirk (William Shatner) and his USS Enterprise crew encounter them aboard a space station. When Lt. Uhrua (Nichelle Nichols) brings one of the little creatures up to the Enterprise, one Tribble quickly turns into thousands of Tribbles with truly hilarious results.

Tribbles emit a pleasant cooing sound when held by most humanoids (aside from Klingons), producing a tranquilizing effect on human nervous system, in particular. Tribbles have appeared in numerous Star Trek television shows and movies, both in the background, and as central plot points. Star Trek: Deep Space Nine even revisited "The Trouble with Tribbles" in the excellent season 5 episode, "Trials and Tribble-ations." Although Tribbles were a nuisance to the United Federation of Planets, they were a true menace to the Klingons, who destroyed the Tribble homeworld sometime in the late 23rd century.

Star Trek Revealed Tribbles Were Changed By A Starfleet Officer’s Dumb Mistake

Lt. Edward Larkin Defied Orders To Keep Experimenting On Tribbles

Star Trek: Short Treks season 2, episode 2, "The Trouble with Edward" revealed more about the origin of the Tribbles seen in Star Trek: The Original Series. In the 2250s, a foolish Starfleet officer aboard the USS Cabot named Lt. Edward Larkin (H. Jon Benjamin) hatched a plan to turn Tribbles into a viable food source. When Larkin first found the Tribbles, the creatures bred extremely slowly. Wanting to make Tribbles a quickly replenishing source of food, Larkin proposed his plan to genetically alter the Tribbles to make them breed faster.

Captain Lynne Lucero (Rosa Salazar) raised several moral objections to Larkin's plan, questioning whether the Tribbles were intelligent. As Larkin was dismissive of her concerns and could not provide a clear answer to her inquiry, she ordered him to halt the project. Larkin kept working on it anyway, modifying the Tribbles with his own DNA. His modifications worked far too well and Tribbles soon overran the Cabot, forcing the crew to abandon ship. Larkin refused to leave the ship and was killed when the Cabot was destroyed, but his modified Tribbles found their way into Klingon space, where they continued to wreak havoc.

Starfleet Genetically Engineered Tribbles Again To Attack

Section 31 Has A Scary Attack Tribble In Storage

Another genetically altered Tribble popped up in Star Trek: Picard season 3 among the many Easter eggs glimpsed at Daystrom Station. In Picard season 3, episode 6, "The Bounty," Captain Will Riker (Jonathan Frakes), Captain Worf (Michael Dorn), and Commander Raffi Musiker (Michelle Hurd) transported to Daystrom Station in search of answers regarding a recent attack on Starfleet. When Raffi wondered what Starfleet stored at Daystrom Station, Worf replied: "Section 31's most nefarious table scraps." One of these so-called "table scraps" included an aggressive new kind of Tribble.

Cyrano Jones (Stanley Adams) also attempted to genetically alter Tribbles in Star Trek: The Animated Series season 1, episode 5, "More Tribbles, More Troubles."

The Tribble was kept in a glass cage aboard the station, and it violently attacked the glass when Worf approached. Tribbles have always reacted negatively to Klingons, but this "attack Tribble" displayed at least five separate mouths, each with multiple rows of very sharp teeth. Riker joked that Worf was a "mighty Klingon taken aback by the even mightier attack Tribble," but this genetically modified Tribble was genuinely frightening. It remains unknown what purpose Section 31 planned for their attack Tribbles, but an army of those creatures would be truly terrifying.

 

Klingons Also Genetically Engineered Tribbles

The Klingons Sent Out Warriors To Hunt The Tribbles

As seen in Star Trek: Prodigy season 2, the Klingons also dabbled in genetic manipulation when it came to Tribbles. In Prodigy season 2, episode 13, "A Tribble Called Quest," Captain Chakotay (Robert Beltran) and the young crew members of the USS Protostar encounter giant and unusually aggressive Tribbles. They soon learn that a Klingon scientist named Dr. K'ruvang (Jorge Gutiérrez) was attempting to stop the Tribbles from breeding so rapidly. His experiments, however, resulted in surprisingly "voracious" Tribbles that move more quickly, have more teeth, and get much larger than regular Tribbles.

Thankfully, Rok-Tahk (Rylee Alazraqui) had studied Tribbles for her Starfleet admission thesis and had devised a way to stop them from multiplying. Rok-Tahk helped K'ruvang alter his Tribbles yet again, shrinking them back to normal size and slowing them down. This "victory" over the Tribbles allowed K'ruvang to regain his honor and return home to Qo'noS. Despite the Federation's ban on genetic engineering, Starfleet and the Klingons can't seem to leave Tribbles alone. Tribbles have gone through several changes since their Star Trek debut, with most of these alterations making the creatures worse.