Star Trek Voyager - A Thread for Fans - Page 4

I finished season 6 last night and I never did figure out what the ugly ship in the menus was.  Any ideas?

Hey guys,

Chiming in. I've not participated in a Voyager thread for some time. I've begun watching it again about a week and a half ago. I sort of jumped in in Season 3 and watched a chunk of Season 4 and now I've gone back and saw most of S1 and am almost through S2.

I think for some reason, I wanted to see Futures End. The 2 parter on Earth.

It's been a long time. I saw the series during broadcast and once when I got the DVD sets as they came out. So not too many times. I've been enjoying it. I never hated the series, though it didn't have as strong an impact as TOS.

Watching these spin off Star Trek series is sort of like any series that's been on for decades! Hawaii Five-0, Gunsmoke, etc. So I kind of see these shows like they're intimate stories from that Universe where the original luster has gone and they are exploring a broader palate within it. Nothing wrong with it and it has been an enjoyable ride!

So about Voyager, I find myself in a different place today compared to when I first saw the series in 1994-5. I'm seeing other stuff now that I didn't see. Overall, my reaction to each episode is pretty much the same as it was when I first saw them. Though there are some I enjoy more now then I originally did. Like Lifesigns. I am surprised, I like that one more now then originally. But my reaction to Deadlock is the same, I couldn't buy the idea, it was trying to be too high brow science fiction. The Quantum theory stuff is nice in theory, but it's basic idea is what I didn't lie about the 2009 Star Trek film. They are the same characters, duplicated. Yet the Harry Kim that lives and joins the other Voyager has the same dilemma I have. He's the same yet he's not. He's not on his real ship. But I did enjoy the acting and the characters. Though I have been avoiding The Thaw. I'll probably watch that one with an open mind, but I recall it didn't work for me.

To quote what someone said above, Janeway is hawt. I like her. She's a female Kirk in my view. Feminine yet strong. I saw Tuvix today. Seems like Memory Alpha had little to say for that episode's entry. I'm surprised. The producers called it goofy and I can see how fans didn't care for it. Too similar to The Enemy Within. But wirh the hindsight of Enterprise's Similitude, they both had a strong idea, do you have the right to take a life to save others. I felt the actor playing Tuvix nailed it. I thought Kes's situation was really rough on her! And Janeway had to play the role of the executioner at the and and I appreciate her take on it. She had to be the cold dispassionate person who has to do this dirty deed, it wasn't the perfect solution, but the one that had to be done.

Deathwish was another terrific episode, though I thought some bits were overplayed by the Voyager crew. They acted too much like the Enterprise crew would when they first meet Q. They've never met him before, I can see them being careful, but not so dismissive of him at first. I like how Q1 had to play the role of towing the company line this time as Q2 wants to kill himself!

There's more stuff I probably can't recall right now, But I may chime back if more post here. I'll end it for now by saying that I may have restarted my viewing of Voyager in S3 and 4, I chose to go back and review S1 and now S2. And I thought the first 2 seasons were very good and watchable.What I forgot and may not have noticed as much is the humor of some of the characters. Garrett Wang complains a lot of his role, but he had a lot to do. Sure, he may have wanted to push the envelope, but it wasn't his job. He sort of seems like the Wesley Crusher, he seems to know how to work out so many technical problems. I enjoy Tim Russ's take as a Vulcan now more then originally. I have more time away from TOS's Spock and can accept seeing other actors do Vulcans. I like Paris and his jokiness. Nelix isn't so bad, he's funny too. Torres I like too. Though In Faces, which I thought was a really strong show, I thought it would have been braver to leave her human in the end and make her character adapt and grow to be fully human.

More later.

"I think for some reason, I wanted to see Futures End. The 2 parter on Earth."

 

Nelson,

 

Good choice.  I've always loved that entry in the series.

 

"Agent Tuvok, what's up?"

 

 

"Breakfast is up."

 

 

Such a "freakasaurus."

Ha, Ha.  Cool Scott!

 

There was definitely some fun stuff going on in that episode. Now you see one reason I haven't had time to watch that Outer Limits episode. I'm sort of in Voyager mode now.

 

By the way,I was going to post in a "Where is the Love for Voyager" thread that was started wayyy back by several older members here. But it looks like most of them are gone now and that was a very critical thread. I thought this one might be better to go with.

 

I'm also amazed by watching the episodes, how well the creative people rebuilt those sets that were originally built for Star Trek Phase II in 1977, then redone for Star Trek The Motion Picture, then the films, then The Next Generation and then Voyager. If you study the sets, you can see that 10 Forward is the Voyager mess, Janeway's quarters is Picards, or redressed for Tuvak, etc. And Kim, or Paris quarter's was Data's or LaForge, etc. The main corridor was added to to add some length. The sickbay is in the exact same place as McCoy's. As is the transporter room. The odd thing about the Engineering set on TNG is that the original corridor set runs right into it and I think they added tempt walls to conceal that. For Voyager, they re-routed the corridor around the engineering set with a proper entrance for it. And the cargo bay is the same cargo bay used on TNG. Same Holodeck set too, just new walls.

 

I think I posted this in another thread, but it's fun to see.

 

http://pat.suwalski.net/film/trek-stages/ 

 

Click on the Stage 9 button.

 

Will be wrapping up Season 2 this weekend and onto S3 for episodes I skipped last week. I totally forgot how the Seska plotline evolved and the Jonas character being the traitor. It was good to re-familiarize myself with that. That was pretty un-Gene Roddenberry. As we know, he wouldn't be too crazy about having Starfleet people, even if they are Marquis, to act like that.

Edited by Nelson Au - 8/6/10 at 9:03am

I started rewatching Voyager several months back, and am about to tuck in to the 6th season. I watched this show during its original run, and wasn't nearly as impressed or satisfied as I have been rewatching the show. Much, much better than I remembered, and I enjoyed it when it was on!

 

I saw Garret Wang at Comic-Con this year and snapped this shot...the longer hair suits him!

 

What was Wang doing at Comic-Con? He does not seem to be pursuing too much acting these days. He's still relatively young. I guess he either is doing well enough in other pursuits and was invited to run Dragon Con or he investing his Voyager earnings wisely!

I just got done with pretty much all of Season 3, not everyone, there were a few clunkers, like Darkling. But a lot of good ones! Like the above mentioned Future's End.

 

One episode I had forgotten about was Worst Case Scenario. That was really well done and similar to the DS9 show where Dukat had rigged a program to protect the station. And a fun way to bring Seska back to further torture the Voyager crew. And some good verbal bantering too.

 

Since I already saw most of Season 3 and 4 a few weeks back, I had gone back to see the ones I saved for later. I watch The Killing game . That was really fun, but I always find it a bit disturbing when they do shows where the ship and crew is taken over when they've been able to repel attacks before in the past. They did it a few times on TNG where an alien takes over and convinces the crew they are a battle ship sent to destroy their enemy. Regardless, this was a fun set of two parters in S3. I like Microcosom and the Q episode. Though the Q and Grey wasn't as strong as the earlier installment, still fun to see Q.

 

What should have been the highlight of the season was Flashback. It was good, but it felt like they had this idea for Tuvok's brain problem and mashed it together with Sulu. While it made sense and hung together, it still felt like a tagged on story and not a organic as DS9's Star Trek tribute show. It's one of those no-win things. 

Timeless was a better episode with a connection to another show.  Not that Flashback was terrible.  I need to get back started on my last season of Voyager.

Timeless was a good one, I saw it the other day!

 

Another thing I noticed about Worst Case Scenario. Janeway had a line at the end about one aspect of her re-writing Seska's program. She commented to the effect that "What was wrong with using Deux ex machina to save the day". I forget exactly how the line went. No doubt a sly comment by the writers to the critics of the show.

Nelson,

 

My favorites from season three (non-prioritized) are Flashback, The Chute, False Profits (I loved the completion of this one, started in TNG), the aforementioned Future's End, Remember, Macrocosm (IMO one fo the best from this season), Alter Ego, Coda, Distant Origin, Worst Case Scenario, and of course, Scorpion (pt. 1).  I also liked Real Life and Blood Fever somewhat, but I'll have to watch a few of the others (e.g., Rise!, Before and After, Unity, and Displaced) again to refresh my memory regarding those episodes.

Scott, all those episodes I really liked too, with the exception of Coda. Coda was okay.

 

I thought Blood Fever was good, it was another look at Amok Time. And yes, False Profits was a natural for them to do! I skipped Before and After and Displaced. Perhaps I'll play those. Distant Origin was a stand out too.

Distant Origin is the kind of episode that Star Trek does best, a critical and evaluative reflection on society through the paradigm of science-fiction. One of the series' best!

Ive started watching Voyager again from the beginning but only on Season 1 so far. Forgotten about Eye of the Needle which I thought was really good and really enjoyed Emanations again.

 

FYI Emanations was the first episode of Star Trek I ever watched and it got me watching all the other shows. I remember buying it on VHS years ago and deciding to keep watching. Probably why I enjoy Voyager so much now though DS9 is still my favourite show.

 

Noticed Janeway's hair a lot more which they really cant seem to decide on episode to episode. The again I do like Kate Mulgrew a lot. I heard her do a talk for an hour once on the show and she was really great. I do like her voice too!!

Finished Season 1 and onto Season 2

 

Forgotten about the Jetrel episode - very few good Neelix episodes that I recall but this is one of the best of the series I thought.

^^^

 

Agreed, it is a wonderful episode.  Jetrel stars one of my all-time favorite Trek actors, James Sloyan.  His performance as Alidar Jarok in The Defector (TNG) is very good, as is his work on DS9 (I thought he was quite convincing as Mora Pol in The Begotten and The Alternate).  But I think his performance in the TNG episode Firstborn (as 'future' Alexander) is probably my favorite.

Edited by Ockeghem - 8/18/10 at 1:09pm

Those early Romulan episodes are my favorites from TNG and Jarok and was a great character. I thought Jetral was a heavy episode. I forgot Sloyan was "future" Alexander!

 

I just saw In the Flesh. Great to see Walston as Boothby again, though as a alien version! And I'm the 5th season now where they have developed the Delta Flyer and Paris has his "infantile" Captain Proton holonovel! Those are fun!

On to Season 2 - what the hell is Nog doing in Voyager ? (Initiations). Never realised he was in it.  Always love a good Doctor episode too (Projections) . You can see they realised the need to get the doctor out of sickbay more.

Twisted - terrible episode where nothing actually happens.

 

Up to this stage there has only been one episode which has really focused on Kes and it was only ok. I dont recall why Jennifer Lien decided to leave the show, but I would suspect lack of anything to do would have been a large factor. I hadnt realised on my first watch of the show how little her character is developed. Other than the jealousy thing from Neelix and a rapport with the Doctor, there has been ver little and even those two things have only been snippets in other episodes or where the focus is on the other character.

Funny! There didn't seem to be a point to Twisted.

 

I'm almost finished with S5. There have been a much more consistent number of better episodes here. I only skipped one episode, Nothing Human.

 

I thought Course Oblivion was an interesting visit back to an earlier episode, Demon Planet.

 

But I think the better shows were In the Flesh, Extreme Risk, Drone, 30 Day, Bride of Chaotica, Bliss and I liked Gravity much more this time around. Dark Frontier was a surprise, I forgot it was a two hour special episode. And I liked it. But I can see some who criticize it as being part of the declawing of the Borg. It seems natural now that they are in the Delta Quadrant that they would encounter the Borg more often. I do agree they didn't seem as much a treat to them!

Just finished Season 2. Overall I think it is one of the weakest seasons of the show but there are still some great ones in there

 

Best episodes : Projectons, Maneuvers, Meld, Deadlock, Tuvix, Resolutions, Basics Part 1.

Worst episodes : Twisted, The Thaw

 

The standout episode for me was Meld - would have loved to see more of Suder in the show.

 

I've gotten through S5 and am into S6 now. Some very good episodes here. Barge of the Dead, Dragon's Teeth, Tinker, Tenor, Doctor, Spy, Equinox, Alice and One Small Step. I forgot that Ron Moore was on the writing staff for a short time and didn't have a very good time and left. His episodes were strong ones.

 

I came across this youtube video, it's a 6 part piece on an E special for Voyager. I saw the first 3 and it was a pretty much puff piece to promote the show. Still interesting to see in hindsight.

 

What was the name of the episode in which we heard phrases like 'He glimpsed the before time" or something to that effect?  This is the episode where the inhabitants of a planet wanted to die with their faces facing the sun, if I'm not mistaken.  That was a wonderful episode, and I can't recall which season it is from, or the episode title.  Thanks in advance. :)

 

Now that I think of it, I can't even be certain that it was from VOY.

Hi Scott, I think I know that one, I won't give away one of the plot points, but yes, they didn't want to die facing down. It is Nemesis from season 4.

 

But the line you quoted sounded like Jahn from Miri! 

Nelson,

 

Thanks.  I couldn't recall the name of that one.  I want to watch it again.

 

LOL!  Yes, it did sound a lot like Jahn!  And, I love this line from Miri: "Them and their pills and things."

You're welcome Scott! I hope that was the one. It was interesting what they did in that show.

 

I'm into the 3rd disc of Season 6. I thought Season 5 was very strong and had some fun shows and some exciting ones. So it's interesting to see Season 6. It's going more in the same vein of S5. Exploring more broadly and doing character shows. The last 2 I watched was Pathfinder and Fair Haven. I was surprised to not see more comments in the Memory Alpha entry on this one. Did Mulgrew like this one for the more romantic side? I thought I recalled at the time of it's initial broadcast, there was a lot of positive buzz for Fair Haven. I liked it, nice change of pace.

 

And I thought Pathfinder was really good too, though it feels more like a TNG episode obviously and had shades of the Enterprise finale. But they brought it back to Voyager nicely and ended it on a high note.

Getting through Season 3 much quicker than Season 2. Enjoyed Basics but a shame they got rid of Suder so quickly. Really enjoyed the Future's End 2-parter.

Fair Haven is one of the eps that hardcore Trek fans bash Voyager for.

 

 

 

 

Please Kevin, elaborate! I consider myself a hardcore Trek fan, of TOS. But I like all the series, they are all good efforts and I like a lot of aspects of each. And I've sort of changed my mind on Voyager. I never hated it, but it wasn't my top favorite of the 5 series. Now that I'm revisiting it, watching an episode a day essentially, I'm finding it enjoyable. 

 

If you want to find fault with Fair Haven, I have to go back and ask a larger question. But first, I liked Fair Haven for a lot of the goofy aspects of it. I did look for reviews on the web. And some thought it was great and some thought it was the beginning of the end as from here onward to the end, it went downhill. And I can see why he said that. What I liked most of Fair Haven was Janeway's realization of what she let herself get into. You can't change a man to meet your needs. And the Doctor's speech about the Captain needing something like that when she cannot have affairs with the crew. Everything else, the storm and the other stuff was just background noise. I liked Mulgrew's performance at showing some embarrassment when Chakotay sees her letting her hair down and the Doctor when he calls her on it. I think for Janeway, she had a nice emotional affair, not a physical one. And that made her happy for a while, but she knew it wasn't real.

 

But the bigger picture for me is, how the heck can the Doctor have emotions and then have a kid? (Blink of an Eye, the other episode I really liked. Great to see such a young Daniel Dae Kim! I really like the subtle bits there about collecting the entire set of Sky Ship models. And as a story, I thought it was told well and I really liked the emotional tug at the end. But that's for another discussion)

 

In Star Trek TNG, Data cannot have emotions. He's essentially a computer program, just like the Doctor. And they stressed this a lot. But I can see them explain it away as the Doctor's software for emotions was written in to his program. But even if it was, he'd just behave that way, but not necessarily feel. So the times that I thought Voyager went too far was when the Doctor fought for the rights for the Hologram characters. The time he fell in love with the Vidian girl he helped. And when he was helping Seven of Nine learn how to date and then falls in love with her.  The episode called Tinker Tenor Doctor Spy, I really enjoyed. It was totally goofy and fun. Which is how I took it. But if you think about it, how can a Holographic doctor have feelings of ambition and wanting to do more! (The  Emergency Holographic Captain's collar pips was a nice touch!)  And then the most recent one I saw, Virtuoso, which was a nice examination of Fandom, how could the doctor feel like he does there? Adoring the love he got from his fans, letting it go to his head and then wanting to stay on the planet, and his disappointment when his girlfriend was able to create a superior holographic doctor who has a higher vocal singing range. It was great stuff and fun to watch Robert Picardo run with it. It was what made him so lovable. But if you think about it, it is a little far fetched! But it is the 24th Century, so who knows how far artificial intelligence will go.

 

Another episode I really liked a lot was One Small Step. I feel bad for Beltran though. It seemed like it should have been his episode and it turned into Seven of Nine learning to broaden her horizons. 

 

PS, now that I think about it, perhaps Seven of Nine becomes the Voyager version of Data. She was human, but was struggling with emotions. I know there's an episode coming up that addresses this. But I haven't spoiled myself on the plot yet. I can't recall how it went, so I look forward to seeing it.

Edited by Nelson Au - 9/4/10 at 11:22am

After a pretty solid opening set of episodes, Season 3 is pretty disappointing in the middle and then much stronger for the last few episodes. Overall though Id say this seems weaker generally than Season 2 but there are far stronger individual episodes that I really enjoyed. When I had finished Season 2 I felt that was weaker but now Im not so sure. Shame as there are some great episodes in Season 3.

 

Best episodes : Distant Origin, Before and After, Scorpion Part 1, Future's End Part 1 & 2, Unity, Coda, Real Life, Worst Case Scenario, Displaced 

Worst episodes : Darkling, Favourite Son, Rise, Alter Ego

 

Since I remember Kes leaves pretty early in Season 4, its nice that the character finally got one good episode (Before and After). Not surprising in retrospect that she was the one who left or was got rid of as there was very little done with the character over the season.

 

Also had to comment on Scorpion which is every bit as good as I remember it for an end of season episode. And some beautiful effects shots of Voyager from the typical shots (I love the bit where it is hit by the bio ship and then jumps to warp :) )

 

Onto Season 4 which I remember as being one of my favourite

Edited by Simon Massey - 9/9/10 at 2:36pm

You know Im about halfway through Season 4 now and the jump in quality overall is quite striking. Even the average episodes are still entertaning enough.

 

Everyone points to the introduction of Seven on Nine as a major turning point in Voyager. Regardless of why she was appointed I have to give credit to Jeri Ryan, who cannot be stupid enough to not realise part of the reason she was given the job was down to her appearance. Whats great is how she (and I will give the writer's credit too) manages to overcome this and make her a much more interesting character. Kes was presumably intended to be the "fish out of water" with Neelix but she was far too bland a character.

 

But I dont think it is just that. Everyone seems to have grown into their characters far more and the theme of "family" is far more prevalent this season - there is a direction to the show that seemed to be absent in previous seasons. Whilst there may have been too much focus on Seven for Season 4 Im not complaining when u get better episodes as a result.

 

Whilst there are good episodes in the first three seasons, it wasn't consistent. Now there seems to be much more consistency and a much greater number of very good episodes too.

 

One other thing that struck me as I was watching Message in a Bottle and Hunters. The show up to Season 4 did not focus enough on Voyager's unique situation of being stranded far from home and trying to reach the Alpha Quadrant. Episodes like this tended to be far stronger. Reminds me of the episode Eye of the Needle from Season 1. I wasnt particularly interested in the Hirogen, more on the wonderful scenes of the crew dealing with receiving letters from home - Janeway's letter from her now ex-fiance ; Chakotay and Torres dealing with the end of the Maquis.

 

Good season so far:) Its been such a long time since I saw the show originally and I have only seen it once that most of the episodes Im watching now I have forgotten what happens.