When did voyager go wrong?

Discussion in 'Star Trek: Voyager' started by WesleysDisciple, Mar 27, 2013.

  1. Third Nacelle

    Third Nacelle Captain Captain

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    Seven sometimes seems to me like a child in a very dysfunctional family who has to raise herself. And I think she does a pretty good job with the resources available to her. A starship stranded on the other side of the galaxy with a mentally ill captain and a holographic doctor as your mentors is just not the best scenario for becoming human.
     
  2. Guy Gardener

    Guy Gardener Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    A hologram whose personality was programmed by Reg Barclay.
     
  3. Anwar

    Anwar Admiral Admiral

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    Again, I think that if they'd given the show an actual plot beyond "Lost ship" there'd be more for the writers to work with.

    And the second crew should have been Romulans, instead of the Maquis. Genuine enemies.
     
  4. Captain McBain

    Captain McBain Captain Captain

    It would have been nice if the show didn't end when the ship returned to the Alpha Quadrant. Maybe if they had 6 or 7 episodes (or even a full season) of encountering Cardassians, Romulans, Andorians, etc., that would be a welcome surprise. A friend of mine years ago said that this was his major beef with the show: you knew that Voyager was never going to return to the Alpha Quadrant until the end of the show, so all of the efforts they were making to get there would ultimately fail, until the very end.
     
  5. Anwar

    Anwar Admiral Admiral

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    Exactly, it's Gilligan Syndrome.

    If they'd given them a plot that could be accomplished WITHOUT ending the show, then there's something more interesting.
     
  6. Guy Gardener

    Guy Gardener Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    Harry had to fall in love.

    Unfortunately week after week, his lovelife went tits up.
     
  7. bullethead

    bullethead Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    Too bad they didn't come up with Lindsey Ballard until late in the show and were determined to screw Harry over.
     
  8. Guy Gardener

    Guy Gardener Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    What do you mean?

    She was there since the pilot.

    They wouldn't just "invent" new characters half way through the show, and then pretend that they had been cleaning conduits out of camera shot for the past three years.

    What you are suggesting is cheap and reprehensible!
     
  9. stj

    stj Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    Ashes to Ashes was not a Kim episode. It was about the reality of death. Kim was just there to dramatize that the best you can hope for in the end is to say goodbye. And Mezoti showed up at the end because the young always continue to live their lives after others die. No doubt they would have preferred Paris to have been the lover but he was taken by Torres. The only unattached male of the right species was Kim.

    And I strongly suspect they wrote a new dead character because they didn't want to call back a glorified extra. The thing is, it doesn't matter if Ballard was previously obscure because in truth many lives go unnoticed and unremarked and only after they are gone do we (sometimes) notice we've lost something.

    The key scene in Ashes to Ashes is when Janeway cannot justify her decision to the dead. This is true for all military commanders whose soldiers die following their orders. The implicit lesson? It's left for you to draw.

    A fair amount of Voyager is this kind of story. The insistence on some sort of survivalist epic crossed with a right-wing critique of humanitarianism is just irrelevant to what was on screen. It's like people keep watching the insides of their foreheads.
     
  10. Guy Gardener

    Guy Gardener Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    I figured out deductively recently that Ashes to Ashes was probably a rejected "Return of Kes" episode that got tabled at some point in the process after they started thinking about bring Lien back.

    If so, then this story was supposed to be about Neelix and Kes having one last booty call.
     
  11. teacake

    teacake Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    We got something much more science fictiony and weird.
     
  12. Zameaze

    Zameaze Commodore Commodore

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    Where Voyager went wrong:

    B'Elanna Torres is Meg Griffin;

    Paris is Eddie Haskell;

    Chakotay is Iron Eyes Cody;

    Ensign Kim is Opie;

    Neelix is Alf;

    Janeway is Mommie Dearest;

    Tuvox is Token Black;

    The only interesting characters were the Doctor and Seven.
     
  13. Third Nacelle

    Third Nacelle Captain Captain

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    ^Now I have an image in my head of Janeway beating Kes with a wire hanger.
     
  14. Crazyewok

    Crazyewok Vice Admiral Admiral

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    WOW what I would have said. If this had been doe it would have been the BEST trek!
     
  15. Vulcan Logician

    Vulcan Logician Lieutenant Commander Red Shirt

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    Voyager had a few flaws but it was nonetheless a great series.
    Strengths:
    -characters were in a new predicament (stranded)
    -Janeway: very awesome captain (2nd only to the Sisko)
    -just plain "Star Trek" goodness and wholesomeness
    -I like how they moved to distict portions of the Delta quadrant throughout the series
    -eventually they dropped the borg children off

    Flaws
    -the bad episodes were REEEEEEEEEALLY bad
    -Overuse of 7, elimination of Kes, return of Kes and (shudder) the borg children
    -(continued shudder) the borg children
     
  16. Anwar

    Anwar Admiral Admiral

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    I don't see what the problem is with Borg kids. We saw Borg babies in the very first Borg episode.
     
  17. Bry_Sinclair

    Bry_Sinclair Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Someone brought up Lindsay Ballard a few posts ago, and that is an excellent example of where VOY messed up. Rather than have a long line of recurring characters, who would have pretty steady work for seven years as they popped up from time-to-time (and didn't do a Carey), interacted with the mains, who we got to know and care about over time, they just created her and expected us to give a damn about her from the word 'go'.

    Had Ballard been introduced in S1 (maybe even the second or third episode) as an Academy friend of Kim's, who he was attracted to but felt guilty about due to Libby back home, who came on the occasional away team or what not of the next few years before she was killed off, her death and its impact on Kim would have been something they could have used.

    The lack of continuity really screwed up VOY, I think. Given their situation, you could have had just about every crewmember named and given a duty station, to be brought out and used when needed, but instead all they did was give us more of the Seven and Doctor Show.

    Such a shame really.
     
  18. TheSubCommander

    TheSubCommander Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    Mostly agree, except on Janeway and Sisko. Not saying I didn't like her, just saying my favs are Kirk and Picard.

    I have to agree with you on too much emphasis on Seven and Doctor. Liked both, but became too lopsided by season 7, which is my least favorite season, overall. I liked seeing Seven and/or Doctor-centric episodes, but not almost every week.

    Also agree Kes should not have been booted off completely. I think there was room for Kes to be a recurring character, sort of like a "caretaker in training" where we get to see how she has progressed since leaving voyager on each visit...sort of like Q. And I would have liked to see Kes having something to do with Voyager getting past the Borg and getting home. It was sad to see no Kes at all in the finale.


    There was continuity and there were references to past events, but if you mean lack long story arcs and lack of serial feel, I agree. Too many episodes were too self contained, IMHO. THat is where DS9 succeeded and where VOY could have been better.

    I think VOY had great characters overall, yes I even think unpopular ones like Chakotay and Kim were alright, just that other than Janeway, Doctor, and Seven, the characters were often underutilized or could have been written better.
     
  19. Anwar

    Anwar Admiral Admiral

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    I don't see the real problem with this. I mean, TOS only had three main characters and was always pulling new crew members out of nowhere and expected us to care about them. No one complained then.
     
  20. The Overlord

    The Overlord Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    TOS was a show from the 60s, VOY was a show from the 90s and by the time the 90s came along, things like continuity and story arcs became more important, shows like X-Files and Babylon 5 made focus on contiunty and story arcs popular, so having Voyager ignore that makes it seem like it was behind the times in the 90s. Voyager seemed like an 80s TV show in the 90s.