Star Trek: Voyager - General Discussion

[legaleagle53]

2 hours ago, BlossomCulp said:

I know this place isn't too active but I am hoping a fan or two is reading here who can answer a question for me.  I've just rewatched the time travel episode where we first meet Capt Braxton.  He says at the end that he "never lived that timeline" yet a few years later when he reappears it's because obviously he had and had been really screwed up by it.  Anyway that aside why does he act like Janeway did something so terrible?  She only refused to let him destroy her ship and kill all her crew but he talks as if she didn't pass him the salt at dinner and that created chaos in his life.  So is it that the writers of the later episode forgot what he'd asked her to do or were they hoping the viewers would?

Because their initial skirmish caused a temporal rift to open that sent his timeship back to 1967, where someone found it, used its technology to create scientific advances that shouldn't have existed in the mid-late 20th Century, and ultimately tried to pilot the timeship back to the 29th Century, where it destroyed the solar system because it wasn't properly calibrated to return to its native era.  As a result, Braxton was trapped in the 20th Century, where he ended up in a mental institution because nobody believed his stories.  That's a little more serious than not passing the salt at dinner.

[John Potts]

It's implied (if not outright stated) that basically Braxton lost his mind in failing to deal with Voyager and blamed them for it. I don't think we were meant to see his actions as being reasonable. You do have to wonder why his crew didn't mutiny, though.

[legaleagle53]

3 minutes ago, John Potts said:

It's implied (if not outright stated) that basically Braxton lost his mind in failing to deal with Voyager and blamed them for it. I don't think we were meant to see his actions as being reasonable. You do have to wonder why his crew didn't mutiny, though.

Well, that was why his hunky first officer (whom I wouldn't have minded seeing in a spinoff) recruited Seven of Nine and Janeway to catch Braxton when Braxton somehow made it back to the 24th Century to try to destroy Janeway and Voyager. 

[BlossomCulp]

But I guess my point is that Janeway at the moment when she is first confronted by Braxton had no way of knowing what was going on - no one would have expected her to meekly agree to have her ship destroyed but in the later episode Braxton makes it sound like he asked her to do him this simple little favour and she refused!  I guess the answer here is that he had lost his mind and all sense of perspective but for some reason his attitude has always rankled me and seeing the first episode with him again made me remember how annoying I found him!

Edited June 3, 2017 by BlossomCulp

[Maverick]

 The Braxton who first confronts Janeway had just seen his Earth destroyed from an incident involving Voyager.  Then he's forced to spend 20 years in a mental institution 400 years in the past, so yes that Braxton was not fond of Janeway.  At the end of that episode, after Janeway stops Starling and Earth isn't destroyed but a different version of Braxton (one that didn't encounter Voyager in the Delta Quadrant) detects them interfering with the past and shows up to take them home.  That contradicts Braxton's appearance in Relativity where he blames Janeway for his time in the asylum, which her obviously remembers.  The only explanation is that the Braxton that spent 20 years on year was 'reintergrated' with the Braxton that shows up at the end of 'Future's End'.  

[CherryAmes]

Speaking of things we don't understand - in the episode "Macrocosm" where Janeway and Neelix come back to the ship to find that it has been invaded by a macrovirus - early on Neelix is attacked and Janeway goes to get medical supplies to help him.  What happens to Neelix?  I must have looked away from the screen at the wrong time but I don't remember them showing him or mentioning him again.  Did Janeway forget about him and leave him sick somewhere?  This is one of my favourite Janeway-centric episodes but I can't see her abandoning Neelix!

[Maverick]

 I think Neelix fell into the same coma as the rest of the crew, so her leaving didn't make him an worse off than the rest of them.  

[blueray]

If I remember correctly Janeway was on the way to get him medical supplies when she heard him scream. When she turned around one of the things grabbed him and dragged him away. He ended up like the rest of the crew.

[friendperidot]

Since we're asking questions, just what happened to Naomi Wildman's father? I remember an episode when she was born and a second Voyager and catastrophes and one baby dying and the other one being brought over from the Voyager that was destroyed. And I remember an earlier episode where it was mentioned that the crew was starting to form relationships and that Samantha Wildman was pregnant. But I don't remember anything about a father.

Edited June 6, 2017 by friendperidot

[Maverick]

 Her father was in the Alpha Quadrant (a passing line of dialogue may have established he was stationed on DS9).  

[craziness]

Just watched Counterpoint on H&I, and noticed a mistake. After Kashic (sp? The lead inspector looking for telepathy who pretended he wanted to defect) went back to lead the 4th inspection/betray Janeway, Tuvok was on the bridge. In earlier inspections he, Voreck, and 2 Betazeds went into the transporter pattern buffers too. But during this inspection, why didn't they hideout again?  The inspectors said they didn't find any telepaths, then Janeway tells Kashic the fake location of the wormhole and everything else happens. Still could have confiscated the ship based on Tuvok being there.

[John Potts]

On ‎06‎/‎06‎/‎2017 at 2:04 AM, friendperidot said:

Samantha Wildman was pregnant. But I don't remember anything about a father.

Wasn't it Samantha who TPTB thought they had killed off and then realised they never had? Seriously, if they didn't care to remember what happened to their own characters, it's not surprising the audience didn't care either.

[MaKaM]

I've been watching on BBC America and man, I wish we could just reboot Voyager (though not with the stupid lens flare). I liked it when it aired, hated it 10 years ago, but like it again now. It was exactly what we expected of our TV in the 90s but neutered by UPN's fear of financial collapse and adverseness to any interesting conflict/ideas. Start with the first episode--interesting plot, so many holes. Water is rare? In space? How about capturing a comet or two, Caretaker, instead of ships? Maybe relocate the Ocampa to a new planet. But thanks for (apparently) cleaning all the dead bodies off the ship because after 3 days, they sure would start to stink and doing some repairs (I mean, check out the difference between when they were kidnapped out of sickbay and when they returned and we all know the Doctor didn't do the repairing) while the crew is probulated. Oh, and Useless Original First Office--"brace for impact" doesn't mean run across the bridge like a fool. Etc. 

 

The bones were there for some really interesting stories, conflicts, relationships, etc but they chickened out each time. With the benefit of hindsight, they could tighten up the stories, make things that happened the previous week impact the second week, etc. It could be more serialized rather than "alien/conflict of the week". Like the whole first season could have been the integration of the crews. Dealing with their dead. Picking up Kes some other way that doesn't include a relationship with Neelix. Decide if they are going to do the "resources are limited" thing constantly or never because doing it only for the first few seasons and then just dropping it was half-assed. Set out a final number of shuttlecraft that the ship has and don't let lazy writers destroy one for the hell of it. Stop sending senior officers out in shuttlecrafts for reasons to get into drama lazily. Find a job for Harry. Reuse extras more to bring home the fact that the ship is limited in people. Hell, mention that you are having trouble filling duty rosters because of all the people killed in random away missions.

 

After rewatching, Threshold was awful (oh, God, it really was Star Trek V bad) but had some good dialog that saved it for me. Twisted and Coda are my two least favorite episodes on rewatch. Twisted is stupid and lazy with a dose of extra stupid as these idiots can't find their way around their own ship and still keep bumblefcking around like it ain't no big thing. And at the end they just give up and and it is over. Coda was just a mess--what parts were in Janeway's head, what was the point of killing her a few times, why bother with the father figure junk, etc. Awful. Threshold had a point (a stupid one that made no sense) and it followed a logical order. Coda hopped around with no point until the end and the bad guy is defeated by being told to go back to hell. Yawn.

 

But overall, it is a sense of an opportunity wasted. 

[msani19]

On 6/11/2017 at 8:13 PM, MaKaM said:

 

I've been watching on BBC America and man, I wish we could just reboot Voyager (though not with the stupid lens flare). I liked it when it aired, hated it 10 years ago, but like it again now

 

It was so interesting to read your perspective on Voyager. I've also been watching it occasionally on BBC America. I watched when it was first on and I was indifferent about it but got increasingly annoyed with how lazy and predictable the show was every week.

Rewatching now has only made me dislike it even more! I see so much more clearly the wasted opportunity with Voyager. It really could have been one of the great series but, as you correctly said, they chickened out and played it so safe to the point of ridiculousness. They had the bones and the basis of some exciting and fresh stories while staying true to Star Trek themes. It's really disappointing. All the elements were there they just didn't follow through. The Kazon storylines for those first few seasons didn't help either, those were and still are terrible.

I think I already watched the reboot of this when they called it Battlestar Galactica.

[Athena]

On 2017-06-11 at 8:13 PM, MaKaM said:

I've been watching on BBC America and man, I wish we could just reboot Voyager (though not with the stupid lens flare). I liked it when it aired, hated it 10 years ago, but like it again now.

 

3 hours ago, msani19 said:

Rewatching now has only made me dislike it even more! I see so much more clearly the wasted opportunity with Voyager. It really could have been one of the great series but, as you correctly said, they chickened out and played it so safe to the point of ridiculousness. They had the bones and the basis of some exciting and fresh stories while staying true to Star Trek themes. It's really disappointing. All the elements were there they just didn't follow through. The Kazon storylines for those first few seasons didn't help either, those were and still are terrible.

I can empathize. I watched the show's last half in the original run and liked it. When I rewatched about ten years later, I found it boring. It did not hold up well. Unlike TNG (which to be fair is probably one of my fav sci fi shows) where I have many episodes I can choose to rewatch, I struggled to find a good dozen Voyager ones that I would rewatch again. It wasn't that most of the show was bad and I actually really liked some of the ridiculous episodes, but there were definitely issues. The cast wasn't bad either, but again, I think there were drastic inconsistencies especially over time. The plots and writing really lacked cohesion. Maybe in a few more years, I'll go back to liking it as well.

[BlossomCulp]

I've always liked Voyager, have right from the get go.  I was living in England when the finale aired and my mother taped it for me and sent it over.  Loved it.  There are definitely some episodes I won't watch and I found the first couple of years pretty uneven but when it hit its stride it was must watch TV for me then and now.  Looking at the series as a whole I've noticed if an episode is Janeway-centric it's usually one of my favourites!

Edited June 14, 2017 by BlossomCulp

[BBHN]

The main issue for me regarding Voyager is similar to what many have said, was how disappointing it was overall. So much squandered potential.

[MaKaM]

Oh yeah, you have to just accept each episode basically as a stand alone. Don't expect any grand storytelling like you would get from an HBO or AMC show. You can't expect too much growth from characters other than the Doctor or Seven and continuity was definitely abandoned all over the delta quadrant. They tried some interesting things that often didn't work, but some things did. Really, if they had spent another year developing the characters and the story instead of having to rush it to launch with the UPN start, man, what coulda been. I don't love the "feature film" look of the trailer for the new series but maybe I'll come around. I like my Star Trek slightly campy somewhat logical. I know TOS timeframe is the current hotness but maybe someday they could redo VOY in the new alternate universe. Ah dreams.  It is also possible to romanticize the other series--the first two seasons of TNG were nonstop duds (Code of Honor and Justice need to be wiped from the collective intelligence), you can't forget the Yangs and the Kohms from TOS or the number of "developed exactly like Earth but with this one difference!" episodes, and well, I don't remember any DS9 episodes I truly hated but I haven't watched in 15 years but there were probably one or two. Maybe one. Enterprise had the gel rubdown scenes and the male-pregnancy trope to trip over (there might have been more/worse episodes, but the town I was in at the time didn't have a UPN station so I missed most of that show). Voyager suffered mostly from unevenness and timidity of vision (or hand tying from the network).

The only characters I disliked were Jealous!Neexlix who luckily lost that ugly trait early on and Playboy!Paris which also stopped being a thing early. I was not a fan of Kes and her phonesex voice so I wasn't upset when she was kicked to the curb though she was criminally wasted as a character.

Slightly OT: I am putting VOY above the reboot movies. While there were stupid parts of VOY, they never took a suspended cadet who snuck aboard a ship and promoted him to Captain within a day or two--Hell, Harry couldn't get a promotion from Ensign in SEVEN YEARS. Oh, and no VOY Captain tried to goad the first officer into murder while the rest of the crew just stood around with their thumbs up their butts. I won't even start on the heckles for the second reboot movie. That was Star Trek V bad too. Hell, that was Star Trek NEMESIS bad. Haven't seen the third and have no desire to see it based on the quality (or lack thereof) of the first two.

[msani19]

6 hours ago, Athena said:

Unlike TNG (which to be fair is probably one of my fav sci fi shows) where I have many episodes I can choose to rewatch, I struggled to find a good dozen Voyager ones that I would rewatch again.

1

There are so few episodes I would rewatch voluntarily, in fact, I can't recall any off the top of my head right now. Mostly, I see the name of the episode & roll my eyes or absolutely won't watch it at all. I  would say that there are maybe 10 excellent/great episodes of Voyager out of over 200 episodes. I don't seek out Voyager, while for TNG or DS9, I'll put them on either from Amazon/Netflix just to catch a few episodes or see a particular scene that I like. Watching Voyager on BBC America is mostly cause the alternative is news and I'll take terrible ST.

[jzygayle]

Kazons = Really Tall Brown Oompa Loompas.

[MaKaM]

Today's episodes:

Random Thoughts: B'Elanna is convicted of passing on violent thoughts to a telepathic race. Meh. Seemed like a retread of the one where Paris was going to get his mind tinkered with after he committed a "murder". And if you were part of a society that was so damn sensitive to violent thoughts, why wouldn't you warn visiting aliens? Or, you know, not visit with aliens?

Concerning Flight: Janeway and Da Vinci go flying. Fluff. The story was stupid and contrived and if you were fleeing bad guys who were shooting at you, would you really stop and argue philosophy with a hologram? Tap, tap, tap on the mobile emitter and he is deactivated. Also, maybe you don't want to blow up a ship that just stole a bunch of your stuff. And letting everyone just get away with stealing your stuff calls you out as a sucker.

Mortal Coil: Neelix dies and is brought back but has lost his faith in his afterlife. I'm going to have to watch it again, but I think this one is going up on the shelf with DS9's The Visitor as a best episode. It was subtle and touching and thought provoking. A+ episode. Both Neelix and Chakotay got real stuff to do and did it well. Too bad about the rest of the series. I really loved this one.

Waking Moments: Aliens put everyone in a dream sleep to kill them (?). Motivation was unclear. Waking people were mean to them when they inserted themselves into nightmares? I don't know. It was weird. Chakotay got to carry on being a bit more mystical from the last one and it worked okay. The fact that everyone ended up afraid to go to sleep seemed very realistic.

Message in a Bottle: Doctor transfers to a ship in the Alpha Quandrant and thwarts a Romulan takeover. A romp. Lots of fun. Andy Dick was even bearable.

Hunters: The Hirogen don't like Voyager using their communications array. 7 and Tuvok get to try bondage if that's your thing. Harry worrying about not getting a message was just stupid. Like his helicopter mother wasn't going to send a note and he was going to be left out. No one believed that for a moment. Though it was a lost character development moment because seeing how he would react if he didn't get one could have been interesting.

Prey: The Hirogen hunt Species 8472, 7 gets all insubordinate. It looked like it was an action episode but it was really a cerebral one. Janeway learned she can't compel someone in the crew to do her whim and Seven learned that individual actions have consequences. Good acting. And the Hirogen are somehow really good looking despite the rubber. Maybe it is the eyes? Somehow their spots and lumps work significantly better than Neelix's do. Or am I just hallucinating from Star Trek OD? Maybe it was just Tony Todd I love (and damn, he is a tall dude).

Edited June 18, 2017 by MaKaM

[Avon.Blakes7]

On ‎6‎/‎15‎/‎2017 at 0:56 AM, jzygayle said:

Kazons = Really Tall Brown Oompa Loompas.

...and "whipped!" Seska treated them all like weak, 2nd husbands! How tough were they? ;-)

[readster]

9 hours ago, Avon.Blakes7 said:

...and "whipped!" Seska treated them all like weak, 2nd husbands! How tough were they? ;-)

Or the fact they were known to be back stabbers and liars, other worlds listen to them when they said: "Don't trust Voyager, they are worst than us!" 

[John Potts]

On ‎14‎/‎06‎/‎2017 at 7:30 PM, Athena said:

I watched the show's last half in the original run and liked it. When I rewatched about ten years later, I found it boring. It did not hold up well.

I think that was Voyager's greatest failing: it had hardly any memorable episodes, either good (Scorpion?) or bad (Threshold?), they were mostly just blah. Plot threads went nowhere rather than getting resolved (either well or badly). Better to try and fail than just play safe (as Q taught Picard in Tapestry)!

On ‎15‎/‎06‎/‎2017 at 1:30 AM, MaKaM said:

While there were stupid parts of VOY, they never took a suspended cadet who snuck aboard a ship and promoted him to Captain within a day or two... Haven't seen the third and have no desire to see it based on the quality (or lack thereof) of the first two.

I thought the 3rd film (Beyond?) was actually better - it certainly felt more Trekkian than the first two (which seemed to portray everyone at Starfleet as complete idiots for promoting a cadet to Captain after a week in the Academy, who then proves to them WHY that was a terrible idea by making stupid mistakes). The snarking between Bones and Spock really did feel like the original characters, the alien space babe (Jayla?) they meet IS temporarily accepted into the crew but is still expected to go to the Academy once they get back if she wants to keep that position and even the acknowledgment of Leonard Nimoy's passing was sensitively handled. Then again, I am an old fogey (or at least, a middle aged fogey).

[MaKaM]

On 2017-06-27 at 0:22 PM, readster said:

Or the fact they were known to be back stabbers and liars, other worlds listen to them when they said: "Don't trust Voyager, they are worst than us!" 

The thing that irked the hell out of me was that in 2/3 years, they were still meeting Kazon but they think that the "northwest passage" will get them safely through all of Borg territory. Then, after a few days of working with the Borg in Scorpion and beating Species 8472, they were acting like they were home free. Yes, Kes had to send them ahead 10 years but at the end of that episode and the start of The Gift, they don't give any indication that they will be spending years going through Borg space. Just putzing along at impulse and de-borging the ship. Like, there was no indication of preparations or shoring up resources, coming up with ways to hide/mask the ship, it was just lalala, oh! borg space! We shall just waltz on through! And, there were no terrorized planets prior to running right up to the Borg. Like, the guys that just swap people out of their ships 2 epsiodes earlier--no indication that they are worried about the borg expanding into their territory or were even aware that the Borg were a thing. But, the Kazon have 3 years worth of territory and are known throughout them? And even if they are just far-flung sects, why did Voyager keep running into them? (Writer laziness, obvs.)

8 hours ago, John Potts said:

I think that was Voyager's greatest failing: it had hardly any memorable episodes, either good (Scorpion?) or bad (Threshold?), they were mostly just blah. Plot threads went nowhere rather than getting resolved (either well or badly). Better to try and fail than just play safe (as Q taught Picard in Tapestry)!

I thought the 3rd film (Beyond?) was actually better - it certainly felt more Trekkian than the first two (which seemed to portray everyone at Starfleet as complete idiots for promoting a cadet to Captain after a week in the Academy, who then proves to them WHY that was a terrible idea by making stupid mistakes). The snarking between Bones and Spock really did feel like the original characters, the alien space babe (Jayla?) they meet IS temporarily accepted into the crew but is still expected to go to the Academy once they get back if she wants to keep that position and even the acknowledgment of Leonard Nimoy's passing was sensitively handled. Then again, I am an old fogey (or at least, a middle aged fogey).

Well, if it comes on TV, I won't actively avoid it. ;-)

[Maverick]

 Yes, encountering the Kazon and Viidians for so long was stupid.  But time to traverse space has always been an issue in Trek (the Enterprise travelling from the Romulan border to Earth before the battle with the Borg was done, anyone?).   But Voyager was the worst.  Encountering the Hirogen in season 6 (Janeway mentions detecting a hunting party as if it's perfectly normal they're in that region of space) and worse, in season 7 encountering the same Hirogen she gave the holo-technology to in season 4.  As if it wasn't bad enough they had been travelling away from the Hirogen for 2-3, both of these encounters occurred had made multiple 'jumps' in Night, Dark Frontier, Timeless, The Voyager Conspiracy and Dragon's Teeth that had taken them almost 20 years closer to home.  They encounter he Heirarchy almost 2 years after their initial run in with them, also after the jumps in The Voyager Conspiracy and Dragon's Teeth.  And of course there's the Talaxian colony 35,000 lights from their home plant that they dump Neelix on.  DS9 was the only one that was halfway realistic with travel times.  It's mentioned a couple of times it takes two weeks to get to Earth.  In The Ship, Kira says it will take a week to retrieve Sisko from the Gamma Quadrant.  And Kassidy mentions it takes 8 weeks to traverse the Federation (meaning Voyager should have been done with Kazon in less then 8 episodes since it's unlikely they're as big as the Federation).   Of course even it broke the timing logic when it met the story (in Paradise Lost, Sisko has the Defiant come to Earth and it's clear the elapsed time wasn't anywhere near two weeks).

 As for the Borg, that's one thing they made a half-assed attempt to explain.  They invented the Nekrit Expanse which was supposed to be a sort of border.  They start to encounter signs of the Borg shortly after crossing it and the races on the other side are generally more technologically advanced).  

[Athena]

Man, the Kazon were so boring.

I liked the whole arc with Species 8472 because the shows did not have enough non-humanoid aliens who were very unusual, powerful, and a viable threat. I also liked how the species was at times, an enemy, witnessed one being hunted by the Hirogen, and finally, humanised in that weird In the Flesh episode. On one hand, I liked that they gave the species extra dimensions, but they defanged the species. It was an anticlimactic ending to that arc. Typical of Voyager to be honest.

I didn't find most of the species in the Delta Quadrant interesting when I was watching it the first time. The Borg arcs were good except I could never get into the Unimatrix 0.

[friendperidot]

Last night's H&I episode was the Fairhaven, let's kill the fairies that have invaded our little town episode. Where the townspeople of the holodeck program become aware that there's something different about their visitors. But I was reminded of Brigadoon, the Scottish town that only appears 1 day every 100 years. Probably because after the problem with the townspeople wanting to burn Tom and Harry and the Doctor at the stake and the decision was made that they were going to have to shut down Fairhaven until the glitches could be repaired. I don't think it made another appearance. 

But I liked Fairhaven much better than Arachnia stuff.

[CherryAmes]

I liked the first Fair Haven episode, not crazy about the second one.  I heard someone complaining about Fair Haven once and how overused it was but IIRC there only ever were two episodes so I think what they were complaining about was overusing the holodeck.  I can see that point but since some of my favourite episodes involve the holodeck I guess I don't agree :).

[craziness]

Last nights H&I episode was Kim and Seven being taken prisoner by some aliens that didn't like photonic, so Seven hides the Doctors program in her system and he takes over her personality. I thought Jeri Ryan did a great job as the Doctors personality, a little over the top but very Doctor-like.  But at the end, she brings food to him and says she'll describe eating it to him so he can enjoy it vicariously. Why didn't she just put his program back into her again, so he could enjoy it himself?  I wonder why they never used that plot device again?

I always liked when JR got to act as someone else, especially when she had all the assimilated personalities coming out of her in that one episode.

[readster]

7 hours ago, craziness said:

Last nights H&I episode was Kim and Seven being taken prisoner by some aliens that didn't like photonic, so Seven hides the Doctors program in her system and he takes over her personality. I thought Jeri Ryan did a great job as the Doctors personality, a little over the top but very Doctor-like.  But at the end, she brings food to him and says she'll describe eating it to him so he can enjoy it vicariously. Why didn't she just put his program back into her again, so he could enjoy it himself?  I wonder why they never used that plot device again?

I always liked when JR got to act as someone else, especially when she had all the assimilated personalities coming out of her in that one episode.

That's a favorite of mine too, I remember in the WW II hologram from the Herogians episode when she got to be a lounge singer. Jerri Ryan said how much she wanted to do the big hair and big lips lounge singer for a retro movie type for a long time. You could tell she was having a great time and even when her regular persona came back, she flipped between the two very seamlessly. 

[CherryAmes]

That was the thing with Jeri Ryan, I know she was at least partially brought in as "eye candy" but man she could act and IMO the show got better with the introduction of Seven of Nine.  I find some of the shows though where she is channelling personalities that were assimilated by the Borg to be heartbreaking.

[craziness]

2 hours ago, CherryAmes said:

I find some of the shows though where she is channelling personalities that were assimilated by the Borg to be heartbreaking.

Oh yeah. In that same episode, when she was channeling the mother looking for her son(?) On Wolf359, heartbreaking. But when she was channeling the Ferengi, really funny and well done.

[Bort]

10 hours ago, CherryAmes said:

That was the thing with Jeri Ryan, I know she was at least partially brought in as "eye candy" but man she could act and IMO the show got better with the introduction of Seven of Nine.

This is very true. I know Voyager gets a lot of flack for "caving" to the T&A quotient, but the show was much better for it. Jeri Ryan was a way better actress than Jennifer Lien and the character of Seven opened up a lot of storyline options that they wouldn't have been able to do with Kes, who was an ill-conceived character from the beginning. I mean, really, a character who would only live 9 years? That was a terrible idea.

[readster]

14 hours ago, kariyaki said:

This is very true. I know Voyager gets a lot of flack for "caving" to the T&A quotient, but the show was much better for it. Jeri Ryan was a way better actress than Jennifer Lien and the character of Seven opened up a lot of storyline options that they wouldn't have been able to do with Kes, who was an ill-conceived character from the beginning. I mean, really, a character who would only live 9 years? That was a terrible idea.

I agree, my mother even said when the series was airing since I was wrapping up high school and had started college. "She has big boobs and no hips, but damn, she can act!" In a way she was the Data for Voyager, but with emotion and had been automosied where Data was trying to discover what it was like to be human and Seven had to rediscover what it was to be human.

[craziness]

The only Kes episode I liked was the one where she came back as an old lady and went back in time to "save" her young self and sell out the ship to the aliens with the Phauge(?) Disease. I loved when she was walking through the ship and stuff was exoding behind her. At work we have new lights that are on motion sensors, and when I walk through and a lot of lights are off and they turn on due my triggering the motion sensors, it makes me think of that scene.

[readster]

Outside of that episode, her life in a blink of an eye episode that was when she finally ditched the wig episode was also good. We saw her live her life from the end to the beginning. Too bad her warnings about The Year of Hell didn't work. 

[legaleagle53]

1 hour ago, readster said:

Outside of that episode, her life in a blink of an eye episode that was when she finally ditched the wig episode was also good. We saw her live her life from the end to the beginning. Too bad her warnings about The Year of Hell didn't work. 

Actually, that was "Before and After."  "Blink of an Eye" took place after Kes had left Voyager and had to do with Voyager's encounter with a planet where time passed many times faster than it did for Voyager, such that a second on Voyager was like one day on the planet.

Edited August 10, 2017 by legaleagle53

[CherryAmes]

"Blink of an Eye"  was an awesome episode.  Definitely in my top 5.

[Bort]

"Before and After" was probably the best Kes episode. I also liked the episode where she originally departs the ship ("The Gift"), because I loved the parallels of Janeway, faced with two crewmembers who wanted to leave the ship, Kes and Seven, and giving the former her blessing and letting her go, while having to decide that the latter was too mentally traumatized to be allowed to make her own decisions yet.

And it's why I really dislike "Fury" so much. It's like the writer didn't even SEE "The Gift," because Kes was acting like Voyager abandoned her? That's not what happened at all. Although the visual of the bulkhead's coming apart as Kes walked down the hall WAS pretty cool.

[blueray]

1 hour ago, kariyaki said:

 

And it's why I really dislike "Fury" so much. It's like the writer didn't even SEE "The Gift," because Kes was acting like Voyager abandoned her? That's not what happened at all. Although the visual of the bulkhead's coming apart as Kes walked down the hall WAS pretty cool.

I agree, I hated Fury. They totally forgot that the whole time Kes wanted to leave, Janeway (and others) were trying to get her to stay. She was the one that insisted on leaving and assisted them by pushing them forward as a "gift". In Fury she is senial and acts nothing like Kes. I wish they just left her story off at the gift and never brought her back.

 

I also love Blink of an Eye. As someone who loves Anthropology I loved seeing how the culture on the planet went from a hunter gather's society to an almost warp capable one at the end. And it is an interest take on a time travel like story without directly involving time travel (though I suppose Daniel Dae Kim's character does time travel in a way)

Edited August 10, 2017 by blueray

[readster]

On 8/10/2017 at 9:23 AM, blueray said:

I agree, I hated Fury. They totally forgot that the whole time Kes wanted to leave, Janeway (and others) were trying to get her to stay. She was the one that insisted on leaving and assisted them by pushing them forward as a "gift". In Fury she is senial and acts nothing like Kes. I wish they just left her story off at the gift and never brought her back.

 

I also love Blink of an Eye. As someone who loves Anthropology I loved seeing how the culture on the planet went from a hunter gather's society to an almost warp capable one at the end. And it is an interest take on a time travel like story without directly involving time travel (though I suppose Daniel Dae Kim's character does time travel in a way)

I agree on both, while Jennifer Lian did great acting in Fury, the story just made no sense. Who was this woman who came back after such a great send off in The Gift. Speaking of send offs, I was watching the final episode of Voyager and while I still loved the emotional ending in the finale. I really wish they would have had at least 10 extra minutes to the episode. I really wanted to see Tom with B'lanna and their baby and then have his dad walk in. See this emotional reunion and then have him hold his grand daughter and then see Voyager go into space doc and have Janeway in her ready room looking out her window at Earth and then putting her hand on the window and end it there. Would have been the final push for the emotional punch. 

[legaleagle53]

1 hour ago, readster said:

I agree on both, while Jennifer Lian did great acting in Fury, the story just made no sense. Who was this woman who came back after such a great send off in The Gift. Speaking of send offs, I was watching the final episode of Voyager and while I still loved the emotional ending in the finale. I really wish they would have had at least 10 extra minutes to the episode. I really wanted to see Tom with B'lanna and their baby and then have his dad walk in. See this emotional reunion and then have him hold his grand daughter and then see Voyager go into space doc and have Janeway in her ready room looking out her window at Earth and then putting her hand on the window and end it there. Would have been the final push for the emotional punch. 

Except that that last image would have been impossible to carry off, since starships don't have windows made of glass in the 24th Century (that would be impractical considering that starships are always getting knocked about). What's there is an invisible force field that is as solid as glass, but a heck of a lot more shatterproof.

[readster]

22 minutes ago, legaleagle53 said:

Except that that last image would have been impossible to carry off, since starships don't have windows made of glass in the 24th Century (that would be impractical considering that starships are always getting knocked about). What's there is an invisible force field that is as solid as glass, but a heck of a lot more shatterproof.

Well, I called it glass. Keep in mind, both Picard and Sisko had windows in their offices. 

Edited August 12, 2017 by readster
glass not class.

[Avon.Blakes7]

1 minute ago, readster said:

Well, I called it glass. Keep in mind, both Picard and Sisko had windows in their offices. 

What captain of anything wouldn't have a corner office/room with windows? lol! ;-)

[legaleagle53]

5 minutes ago, readster said:

Well, I called it glass. Keep in mind, both Picard and Sisko had windows in their offices. 

That were made of the same indestructible force field.  Otherwise, there'd be a hull breach every time a stray object struck one of them.  Space isn't exactly debris-free.

[Maverick]

 Starship windows are made of transparent aluminum, the same material Scotty barters for plexiglass in Star Trek IV.

[Avon.Blakes7]

21 hours ago, Maverick said:

 Starship windows are made of transparent aluminum, the same material Scotty barters for plexiglass in Star Trek IV.

I remember! When back in our time, they needed a tank fabricated for the whales and even though Scotty gave him the formula, he rationalized, "how do we know he didn't invent it?" ;-)

Edited August 14, 2017 by Avon.Blakes7

[craziness]

Watching Caretaker pt 1 on H&I tonight. I noticed something weird about B'elanna's lipstick when she was on the Ocompa planet. She only had lipstick in the center (1/2 inch or so) of her lower lip, the sides of her lower lip had the same foundation color makeup as the rest of her face. Now I'm going to have to pay attention in future episodes to see if that is a Klingon-thing.

[Mom x 3]

I'm doing a binge re-watch of Voyager now.  I agree with all of the above.  The holodeck was way overused.  The series got much better when Jeri Ryan came on, and she is a fabulous actress.  I kind of hate the fact that Mulgrew nixed any relationship with Chakotay, because dayum he has easy on the eyes.  I get her reasoning though.