My VOY reviews

[CoffeeCat]

I remember that Kate Mulgrew was so upset by the way they were writing her character that she went half-time during the 6th season, though.

Of course, she never said that directly. She said that the writers hadn't a clue how to write women and then publicly stated that she needed some time off for family.

But I think we can all read between the lines. The actresses personality clashes too much with the morals of Captain Janeway.

[Kevin Thomas Riley]

Season Two overview

Voyager's second season manages the feat of actually being worse than the first. The average season grade is 3.79, or 4-, whereas season one averaged 4.40. In comparison Deep Space Nine's second season was 5.64 and The Next Generation's 3.83. Normally one would expect a show to pick up in quality but it's a testament to Voyager's failure, chief among them not to be able to live up to its premises, that it slid back instead.

Season two starts slow with a whole stretch of mediocre episodes only to begin to pick up in the middle (with the notable exception of Threshold). Alas it doesn't manage to keep the momentum but starts to slide back towards the end.

It's telling that while I generally don't like the Kazon, some of the season's better outings have featured them - like Maneuvers and Alliances. I suppose it might be the action that allows for a break with the tedium.

The only character that stands out is the Doctor, who actually grows as a character and even finds love, but I don't really care about the rest, with the possible exception of Tom Paris and B'Elanna Torres. The former's bad boy attitude is unfortunately toned down and the latter is saddled with the brunt of the show's copious amounts of technobabble. I now actively dislike, bordering on loathing, Captain Janeway, especially after Tuvix. Chakotay is bland and boring, Janeway's pet. Neelix is so annoying I want to do to him what Tuvok did in that holo-simulation in Meld. Tuvok himself succeeds in making one of my favourite Trek species - the Vulcans - seem like a snorefest (apart from when he loses his temper in the aforementioned Meld, coincidentally my favourite episode of the season). Kes and Kim are practically non-entities.

This is not good but I'm sorry to say that this is pretty much the standard for Voyager. I'd like to quote a fellow reviewer from a message board I frequent, where he says that the show "has the unique ability to not be able to overcome its own mediocrity." That is both hilarious and sad at the same time.

For now, I'm just waiting for the moment they enter Borg space and picks up Seven of Nine. That was the time when the quality actually got a little better. Until then there's a whole season to plod through.

*****

And I think I'll pause my reviewing for a couple of weeks now, since I'll be going on a vacation trip. But have no fear, I'll be back!

[CoffeeCat]

This is not good but I'm sorry to say that this is pretty much the standard for Voyager. I'd like to quote a fellow reviewer from a message board I frequent, where he says that the show "has the unique ability to not be able to overcome its own mediocrity." That is both hilarious and sad at the same time.

What I don't understand is how they managed to make such a bland show with such an interesting idea for a premise.

Go home, Star Trek, you're drunk!

[CX]

SF Debris's take on:

The Thaw

Tuvix

[CoffeeCat]

You know, for a bunch of people lost in the Delta quadrant, they sure as hell run into a lot of stuff from the Alpha quadrant:

Ferengi, Klingons, random space debris, probes, time ships, other Starfleet vessels...

It's kinda like Enterprise. For a prequel they sure as hell ran into a lot of 24th century things.

Bunch of lazy, burnt out TNG writers, they were...

[panyasan]

I agree that there seems to be a sort of tiredness in their writing, but to their defense when it comes to familiar species, the audience likes familiar things. It takes more energy to get to know a new specie and more: to start to like or love a specie. But they could have developed more story lines on that specific new specie in the Deltra Quadrant: the Ocampa. As a writer you have to like and love your specie as well, something I personally felt was missing in regards to the Vulcans in ENT. Or maybe I am prejudices because I thought they didn't like (a certain) female Vulcan.

[CoffeeCat]

I'll admit, I wish they had more Klingon episodes in Voyager because I just love B'Elanna. I also wish they did something else with Tuvok since I've loved the Vulcans since I was originally a Spock fan growing up. But I don't think all that other crap was necessary. I did think the Borg stuff made sense in Voyager, but not Enterprise.

Anyway, I'm slowly trying to make my way through season 6, and I must say, it's the worse season since season 2. I can't wait to see if KTR agrees.

My two favorite Voyager seasons are season 4 and season 7. And I also can't wait to see if KTR agrees.

[CoffeeCat]

Just watched "Virtuoso". Add it to the list of completely horrible Voyager episodes. Not quite the same lvl as threshold and Elogium, but it made me wish that someone went in and deleted the Holodoc's singing ability before it got this much out of hand. I mean, c'mon, I watch Trek because I want to see these people explore strange new words, not cater to Robert Picardo's singing talent. If they're going to do that shit, they might as well just have Voyager the Musical since half the cast also has some musical ability (Roxanne Dawson, Robbie McNeil, and Tim Russ have been know to sing at cons). This episode was like that really bad TOS episode with the space hippies that used the Enterprise to sit around and have a sing-along as if we all wanted to watch another hour of the Lawrence Welk show with Mr. Spock as the guest star.

This episode deserves

[Weeble]

Come on Coffee...tell us what you really think. And thanks a bunch for putting the image of that TOS episode in my head. I need a drink

[CoffeeCat]

YW.

Hope you enjoy your drink and I'm glad I drove you to it

[Kevin Thomas Riley]

Picking up the torch I left before going on my vacation trip...

Season Three


3-01 Basics, Part II

It was a foregone conclusion that Basics, Part II would be about the retaking of Voyager. It was predictably set up like that in the first part, with the Doctor and Suder remaining on board and Paris having taken off in a shuttle to go find help from the Talaxians. The rest was just going through the motions of accomplishing the predetermined outcome, and thus the episode lacks any suspense.

But I must admit I thoroughly enjoyed seeing the Doctor and Lon Suder conspiring against the Kazons. And I loved how the Doctor sparred with Seska with his usual acerbic wit. The odd thing, from a storytelling point of view, is that you have secondary characters saving the day, while the ostensibly main characters just wait by the sidelines. Not that I mind since I don't care much for main characters like Janeway and Chakotay.

In fact, that whole sequence with the crew stranded on the planet, fighting off cavemen, giant eels and lava flows are just so tedious. They even have the clichéd plot about initially hostile aliens they befriend through a selfless act of heroism. Yawn! I seriously doubt the crew would have survived long under the inept leadership of Janeway and Chakotay. Chakotay summed up his own incompetence in the following sentence: "Trapped on a barren planet and you're stuck with the only Indian in the universe who can't make fire by rubbing two sticks together."

I didn't like the way Seska was killed, by some explosion. A stand-off between her and Chakotay, or even Janeway, would have served the purpose better. Apparently it was decided very late that she was going to be killed off. I can understand why the did it though, since they will be moving out of Kazon territory and there wouldn't be any plausible reasons for future encounters. In fact, this is the last time we see the Kazons as active adversaries, and I won't miss them. But I'll miss Seska.

Another cop-out was the revelation that Seska's baby isn't Chakotay's son after all. That's a neat way to tie up a loose end, but unfortunately it makes a mockery of the Seska plotline, and the rescue mission/trap utterly meaningless . Now Chakotay won't have to worry about having a baby in Maje Culluh's hands since it really is Culluh's son.

They also killed off Lon Suder, but at least he went away in a heroic fashion. I can't help but chuckle at the irony of having a sociopath saving the day. While his character was interesting - and again I have to laud Brad Dourif's performance - there just wasn't anywhere for him to go from here.

I'll give Basics, Part II a grade of 6- out of 10. That's slightly less than the first part, and that mainly comes from having to endure the extended sequences down on the planet with Janeway and the crew.




3-02 Flashback

Of course Flashback is a gimmick, and episode conjured up to celebrate the 30th anniversary of Star Trek, but what a fun and glorious gimmick it is (Deep Space Nine made Trials and Tribble-ations). The plot device of a brain parasite masquerading itself as a repressed memory of a falling girl is pretty nonsensical, but I didn't care. I got to see Captain Sulu (George Takei) at the helm of the USS Excelsior during the events of Star Trek: The Undiscovered Country. It also made me realise how much I miss the original series and movies.

The recreation of the Excelsior bridge was wonderful, and the scenes tied in perfectly with the movie. The interior scenes during the Praxis explosion had to be remade because some of the actors had, ehum, expanded in the intervening five years. But the exterior shockwave was lifted directly from the movie, as was the broken teacup (which was given to Sulu by a young Tuvok, much to this fan's delight). A lot of actors from the movie made it back to shoot this episode. I also loved the inclusion of Janice Rand (Grace Lee Whitney) as Ensign Tuvok's superior. Even Kang the Klingon (played by Michael Ansara, from the original episode Day of the Dove) made an appearance. He has also been on two episodes of Deep Space Nine. I really appreciate that continuity and don't care if it's a fanwank.

The mind meld between Tuvok and Janeway was a great way to be able to have a flashback to an earlier time without resorting to either travelling back in time or back to the Alpha Quadrant. My only gripe is the idea of repressed memories, which dates this episode to the 1990s, when this was a fad among psychologists and therapists. Now it's a discredited idea for good reasons. It makes no evolutionary sense to repress traumatic memories. If we are to survive we must remember them so we can avoid situations when they might happen again, whether they're failing to help a falling girl or staying clear of lurking sabre-toothed sehlats.

At one time Janeway talks to Ensign Kim about what it was like in the old days: "Captain Sulu, Captain Kirk, Doctor McCoy. They all belonged to a different breed of Starfleet officers. Imagine the era they lived in: the Alpha Quadrant still largely unexplored... Humanity on the verge of war with the Klingons, Romulans hiding behind every nebula. Even the technology we take for granted was still in its early stages: no plasma weapons, no multi-phasic shields... Their ships were half as fast."

And she goes on: "Space must have seemed a whole lot bigger back then. It's not surprising they had to bend the rules a little. They were a little slower to invoke the Prime Directive, and a little quicker to pull their phasers. Of course, the whole bunch of them would be booted out of Starfleet today." This pretty much sums up why I like the 23rd century much better than the 24th (apart from Deep Space Nine, which wasn't so rosy-tinted). It's sad but probably true that Kirk et al. actually would have been kicked out of Starfleet. They probably wouldn't even have been accepted into the Academy.

Surprisingly for a Tuvok-centred episode, his backstory takes a back seat to the rest. But I have to admit that it does give his character more depth, something he really needs.

Flashback gets a grade of 8- on my 10-graded scale.




3-03 The Chute

How many Trek episodes have we had where some of the crewmembers get wrongly imprisoned by some hard-assed alien government for no good reason? Too many, I say. And The Chute is one too many of those. I found it incredibly boring, drawn out and uninteresting as I was just waiting for the inevitable rescue.

It's a dark episode for Voyager but it's not dark where the show should be dark according to its premise. It's dark because Harry Kim and Tom Paris are trapped in an unescapable prison with cruel inmates. I'll admit that Garrett Wang did a good job; it's just that I could never get invested in their predicament.

Visually, I found the revelation that the chute led out to a hatch directly into space rather neat, but that's all. I also found it ridiculous that the alien government didn't guard that entrance to keep outsiders, like Neelix's ship, from docking.

So I can only give an uninspired grade of 1+ to The Chute.

[CoffeeCat]

I'm surprised that you gave "the Chute" such a low grade. I'd much rather watch that one than "Flashback". I'm curious: would you have given it such a low grade if it were Trip and Reed stuck in the same situation?

[Kevin Thomas Riley]

I'm surprised that you gave "the Chute" such a low grade. I'd much rather watch that one than "Flashback". I'm curious: would you have given it such a low grade if it were Trip and Reed stuck in the same situation?

Probably not, but then I like Trip and Reed much more than Tom and Harry. Still, I think I would have found it rather dull.

[Kevin Thomas Riley]

3-04 The Swarm

The B-story about the Doctor losing his marbles clearly overshadowed the main storyline about some mysterious aliens attacking Voyager with a swarm of smaller ships. And that was a good move since it was the more interesting one. It was inevitable that they had to address the issue on what effects a constantly active emergency medical hologram would have.

Since Robert Picardo is the best actor on the show, and his character the most fascinating, I certainly didn't complain. It was engaging and touching even if it was a foregone conclusion that he would return in proper working order by the episode's end. Alas, Voyager once again lost an opportunity to carry on this storyline in the following episodes, perhaps showing how he gradually regained his memories.

The episode also raised the question about the Doctor's sentience, his personhood if you like. Rebooting his program would solve the degradation problem but it would also effectively kill the person he has become. Kes made a very nice plea on his behalf, and we also saw Torres warming up to him as a real person while she tried to work out a solution to his holo-alzheimer's.

Philosophically one has to ask the question of when the Doctor actually became a life form in his own right. Other holo-characters are seen to be just soulless creations of light and force fields. But if you keep them running long enough at what point do they become something more?

I also loved seeing his creator, Dr. Lewis Zimmerman (or at least a representation of him in the diagnostic program). Of course the Doctor looks just like him, and their personalities are also extremely similar. I liked Picardo acting against himself much more than I did Janeway (Deadlock).

The Swarm aliens were actually rather interesting and quite different from the usual fare we normally get. I actually liked that they were kind of mysterious and that we never got a good explanation for them and their behaviour. The way Voyager escaped their predicament was weak however, resorting to the usual technobabble.

Janeway proves how inconsistent she can be here, when she for some reason decides that this is the time to ditch those regulations she at other times holds so precious, just so they can push on and avoid an additional 15 months on their journey. It seems utterly arbitrary but this will be her signature behaviour for the rest of the show. She follows the rules only when it suits her - and the plot - and then preaches about it, while ignoring it at other times - also when it suits her and the plot.

The Swarm also marks the first time Paris and Torres engages in flirtatious banter, and as I approve of that pairing I liked that. Paris even made a pass at her! This is the beginning of a long and tumultuous relationship that unfortunately wasn't very well handled at times. But that's how Trek often does them.

I'll give The Swarm a generous 7 on my 10-graded scale.




3-05 False Profit

One of the main advantages of setting a Trek show in the Delta Quadrant is that there'd be no Ferengis. Silly me! Of course the showrunners were able to figure out a way for us to see those stupid capitalist caricatures again. Here in the shape of the two Ferengi previously seen in The Next Generation episode The Price, where they got sucked into an unstable wormhole to the, you guessed it, the Delta Quadrant.

I've made it pretty clear how much I dislike the Ferengi (mostly with the exception of Quark) so it will come as no surprise that I didn't care for False Profit at all. It's stupid and pointless.

For some reason the two Ferengis have been able to con a primitive civilisation (who lazily looks just like humans) into thinking they are their gods. If you are such a gullible people you deserve what you get!

But I think that Janeway is even more stupid. She's known for invoking the Prime Directive in a wholly inconsistent manner and she can't seem to make up her mind here. First she wants to intervene and kidnaps the Ferengis, then she relents and sends them back, only to try another way of interfering again. All this comes at a price since the Ferengis escape into the wormhole that Voyager was planning on using to get home, rendering it unusable in the process. Of course it was inevitable that Voyager would remain, but failing for such idiotic reasons should lend every crewmember to seriously question their Captain's competence.

False Profit gets only a grade of 1- out of 10.




3-06 Remember

Remember is an allegoric story about how easy, or perhaps I should say convenient, it is to repress memories of past atrocities, like genocides. "This could happen again if no one knows it happened before", as B'Elanna rightly says.

While Voyager transports a group of telepathic aliens, B'Elanna Torres experiences dreams that turns out to be the memories of one of them who now feels guilt and remorse over what she and her people did to a now dead group of people. The rest of her society seems to not want to talk, or remember, about it.

The episode succeeds in conveying the important message, but unfortunately the story, notably the dreaming flashbacks, lacks a certain punch and feels soap-operatic at times. But Roxann Dawson did a good job as younger dream version of the alien woman.

So in the end I can only give Remember an average grade of 5-.

[CoffeeCat]

Probably not, but then I like Trip and Reed much more than Tom and Harry. Still, I think I would have found it rather dull.

Well, I can imagine that Reed would be making a bomb out of the pipe instead of whatever Harry was making and Trip would definitely be more tweaked out by the clamp than Tom was. I think it would make a more interesting story, actually. I can also imagine that Trip and Reed would find a way to climb out of the airlock themselves instead of waiting for a ship to rescue them. I kind of feel a fan fic challenge coming on...