"Fury" Kes, a Mirror Kes?

[Lynx]

Akiraprise wrote:

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I actually do like the episode "Fury." Even as a fan of Kes. It's a fun episode, action packed, and it features the Vidiians again who are one of my favorite villains. For my own personal canon, if you will, I accept the String Theory books explanation for the Kes we saw in "Fury." Just because I don't see the friendly Kes we last saw in "The Gift" twisting so far evil as to want to kill all of the friends she made on Voyager. Not just kill them but actually torture the crew by having the Vidiians remove their vital organs.

Sorry, but I can't see any "fun" in that sadistic episode where a favorite character was destroyed in the most diabolical way.

The Vidiians were great villains in seasons 1 and 2 but it was only stupid to have them back in this horrible episode.

And no, the real Kes would never do such things to her best friends. Only a sadist who really hate the character (and obviously her fans too) would come up with such an insane scenario.

Without being too melodramatic, I will never forgive Rick Berman, Brannon Braga and Bryan Fuller for that episode. Did you know that Braga and Fuller actually did spend a Christmas, figuring out that diabolical scenario? The true spirit of Christmas, wasn't it? And a real Christmas gift to the Kes fans. But what can be expected from such ?

[Lucy of Nine]

Lynx wrote:

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^^
Doesn't matter. The Voyager story continues in the books and the explanations in the "String Theory" books are plausible.

And acceptable for many fans.

LOL - read the above post from Lynx, but do it in a Borgified accent... ta dah... it sooo sounds like Seven! I love it! LOL

BTW like I said in the other thread... I am not a great fan of ole Kes, but I thought Fury was a bit ridiculous in my humble opinion...

[teacake]

No it was OUR Kes and she finally, finally leaves forever.

Kes is my least favorite character so it's a toss up as to whether having her dissipate into whatevuh in "The Gift" or turn into Psycho-harridan in "The Fury" is better.

[Lynx]

teacake wrote:

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No it was OUR Kes and she finally, finally leaves forever.

Kes is my least favorite character so it's a toss up as to whether having her dissipate into whatevuh in "The Gift" or turn into Psycho-harridan in "The Fury" is better.

Well, I guess that malice can be fun but consider the fact that there are many fans who like Kes and who were very unhappy by the way she was treated.

What would you say if your favorite character would have been destroyed in the same way?

Lucy of Nine wrote:

LOL - read the above post from Lynx, but do it in a Borgified accent... ta dah... it sooo sounds like Seven!

Oh, I guess that the assimilation process has begun.

[Lucy of Nine]

LOL, Lynx... resistance is futile...

BTW good point about someone's favourite character... I would have been mortified if anything like that had happened to Seven or B'Elanna... or Janeway... or Tuvvie... or Chakotay... or hell any of them!

[teacake]

Yes I realize that some people love Kes. However I'm not going to take back my honest response to her demise(s). Just as I dislike Kes I accept that others despise Neelix etc.. such is fandom.

Look at it this way--if you love a character you are likely to look for their redemption or a way out of something unsavoury that happens to them. See alt.Trip.Tucker. Heck go back in time nearly 15 years and see Captain Kirk. The anger and alternatives offered to explain his death.. well many have forgotten it now but it was a big deal for some. And yet I know other fans who were like "Kirk was a jerk! He's dead, YAY!"

[Lynx]

teacake wrote:

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Yes I realize that some people love Kes. However I'm not going to take back my honest response to her demise(s). Just as I dislike Kes I accept that others despise Neelix etc.. such is fandom.

Look at it this way--if you love a character you are likely to look for their redemption or a way out of something unsavoury that happens to them. See alt.Trip.Tucker. Heck go back in time nearly 15 years and see Captain Kirk. The anger and alternatives offered to explain his death.. well many have forgotten it now but it was a big deal for some. And yet I know other fans who were like "Kirk was a jerk! He's dead, YAY!"

I agree with your point about us who looks for redemption for certain characters. I remember the anger about what happened to Captain Kirk and I strongly support those who were p***ed off with what happened to the character in "Generations". It was rude and unnecessary to bring back the character just to kill him off like they did. If they wanted Kirk in a TNG movie, they could have used some time-travel story instead, maybe some combination between "Generations" and "First Contact".

However, the fans of Kirk can actually dismiss "Generations" if they want because Kirk remains the icon of Star trek (together with Spock). There are three seasons with episodes and six movies available with Kirk as the main character. There are a lot of TOS books available and there will probably be more books written about Captain Kirk with adventures which takes place in the TOS timeline.

As I see it, Kes was treated ten times worse than Kirk. She was dumped after three seasons and then brought back only to be destroyed. Kirk did after all leave as a hero while Kes left as a maniac and pathetic wreck. The fact that there was a letter campaign going to have Kes re-instated as a main character again and that "Fury" was the response from those in charge is further fuel to the flame. Kirk will still be remember as a hero while Kes will be remember as the one who became a whacko and there will be no books written with Kes as the main character.

Many of us can't accept that, therefore we are looking for solutions. Not to mention that the pathetic wreck we saw in "Fury" was the total opposite to what Kes was and ever stood for in Voyager.

Or to make it short: We simply don't accept the events in "Fury".

[McCoy]

Lynx could you please spoiler-code the String Theory explanation? I love Kes and I'm curious but will probably never read the books.

[teacake]

Lynx I do understand what you're upset about. I was rather incensed at the treatment of a VOY hero of mine in a certain book:

Janeway lost to the Borg? Used as the Borg Queen? I know some say "well she would have been a dead character as Admiral, nothing for her to do.." but hey I don't want her borgified just so I can have her in a novel.

Your point about a long time character versus the dumb/evil get-rid-of demise of a short term character is good too.

As to what was going on in Fury.. I had some ideas last time I watched that ep (which was fairly recently). Firstly it highlights how we know NOTHING about Ocampans and how Kes herself knows very little about them. They are a stunted people as they exist on their own planet. They have enormous potential but when Kes begins to manifest that potential she has no role models, no idea what will come next. No training, no guidance, no clue.. imagine a Vulcan going through Pon Farr in a cave by himself without ever having heard about what it was or seen it. He would go insane! And might well try and kill the first people who approached him because he had no context for what he was experiencing so was highly threatened.

So Kes experiences changes for which she has no preparation and which terrify her--her lashing out and blaming it all on her family is typical of what adolescents go through--X 1000. For all we know it WAS a kind of adolescence, a maturing from youth into something greater. Obviously there is more to the Ocampans than the nine simple years Kes originally thought her lifespan would cover.

So Kes's response to her changes is much worse because she has no cultural context for it and it is terrifying. Her lashing out would not be as much of a problem if she was lashing out at other beings such as herself.. but she has no peers and the only ones she can blame are the only ones she has been in any kind of relationship with. Unfortunately they are in no position to rein in her anger because they are so weak.

[Ezri II]

I like Kes. Sad that she had to be evil in that show. Oh, I bet Kes has some cookies and milk to share with us.

Anyway, this was not the first time Kes was with Kes in a show. Kes I think had to deal with herself more often then any character in Star Trek. And when she did. It was so lame. Now how many times has Kes given Kes a medical checkup? Weird!

[Lynx]

teacake wrote:

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Lynx I do understand what you're upset about. I was rather incensed at the treatment of a VOY hero of mine in a certain book:

Janeway lost to the Borg? Used as the Borg Queen? I know some say "well she would have been a dead character as Admiral, nothing for her to do.." but hey I don't want her borgified just so I can have her in a novel.

Your point about a long time character versus the dumb/evil get-rid-of demise of a short term character is good too.

As to what was going on in Fury.. I had some ideas last time I watched that ep (which was fairly recently). Firstly it highlights how we know NOTHING about Ocampans and how Kes herself knows very little about them. They are a stunted people as they exist on their own planet. They have enormous potential but when Kes begins to manifest that potential she has no role models, no idea what will come next. No training, no guidance, no clue.. imagine a Vulcan going through Pon Farr in a cave by himself without ever having heard about what it was or seen it. He would go insane! And might well try and kill the first people who approached him because he had no context for what he was experiencing so was highly threatened.

So Kes experiences changes for which she has no preparation and which terrify her--her lashing out and blaming it all on her family is typical of what adolescents go through--X 1000. For all we know it WAS a kind of adolescence, a maturing from youth into something greater. Obviously there is more to the Ocampans than the nine simple years Kes originally thought her lifespan would cover.

So Kes's response to her changes is much worse because she has no cultural context for it and it is terrifying. Her lashing out would not be as much of a problem if she was lashing out at other beings such as herself.. but she has no peers and the only ones she can blame are the only ones she has been in any kind of relationship with. Unfortunately they are in no position to rein in her anger because they are so weak.

I can see your point when it comes to the adolescence thing but the events in "Fury" still doesn't make any sense.

OK, a situation could occur where Kes could be p***ed off with Janeway and the others. But she would never try to kill them or harm them in any way. Such behavior would clearly be caused by a mental disorder and I don't like to see Kes portrayed this way. No other main character of Star trek have ever been thurned into mentally sick people and remained that way.

Besides that, Kes wasn't the typical neglected teenage kid. First of all, she had nothing to blame her crewmates for. They, especially Janeway, treated her in the best possible way. Second, Kes was a smart, level-headed strong-willed person who did show several times that she could overcome evil temptation and attempts from evil forces to control her. She was probably the last one on that ship who would have gone crazy in any way.

Add to that, that the whole "Fury" thing was obviously a response from those in charge to a letter campaign which was going to have Kes re-instated as a main character. People were sending in requests for having Kes back and those in charge responded with an episode where the character was humiliated and destroyed. They actually planned to kill off the character at the end but Jennifer Lien made them change that.

To be honest, they did more and less spit in the faces of the Kes fans so I do think that you understand why so many of the Kes fans simply can't accept "Fury".

As for the book "Before Dishonor", I haven't read it but I know that many fans are dissapointed with that book for certain reasons.

Didn't they kill off Janeway at the end of the book? How can they do such a thing? Janeway is a main character. They simply can't kill her off!

[Lynx]

McCoy wrote:

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Lynx could you please spoiler-code the String Theory explanation? I love Kes and I'm curious but will probably never read the books.

The text in the spoiler is quoted from the Memory Alpha Star Trek wikipedia site:

In the Strin Theory trilogy, Kes was called to Ocampa's distant past to help the Doctor and Q oversee the birth of an Ocampa/Nacene hybrid; the Ocampan mother lacked the life energy to carry the child to term, so Kes 'merged' with the woman to act as a kind of surrogate. This also revealed that the Kes who attacked Voyager in "Fury"was not actually the future Kes, but was instead the personification of the anger and rage in Kes's soul, created when she was forced to separate herself from the Ocampan she had merged with while fighting a rogue Nacene. As a result of the improper separation, Kes's "dark side" merged with the body of the Ocampan, although the spirit of the Ocampan herself passed on peacefully. Kes subsequently returned to Ocampa, where she and the hybrid were able to bring rain to the planet once more.

A somewhat strange but plausible and acceptable explanation for the events in "Fury". However, I would really like to see a book where Kes is brought back as a main Voyager character again.

[exodus]

teacake wrote:

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Lynx I do understand what you're upset about. I was rather incensed at the treatment of a VOY hero of mine in a certain book:

Janeway lost to the Borg? Used as the Borg Queen? I know some say "well she would have been a dead character as Admiral, nothing for her to do.." but hey I don't want her borgified just so I can have her in a novel.

Your point about a long time character versus the dumb/evil get-rid-of demise of a short term character is good too.

As to what was going on in Fury.. I had some ideas last time I watched that ep (which was fairly recently). Firstly it highlights how we know NOTHING about Ocampans and how Kes herself knows very little about them. They are a stunted people as they exist on their own planet. They have enormous potential but when Kes begins to manifest that potential she has no role models, no idea what will come next. No training, no guidance, no clue.. imagine a Vulcan going through Pon Farr in a cave by himself without ever having heard about what it was or seen it. He would go insane! And might well try and kill the first people who approached him because he had no context for what he was experiencing so was highly threatened.

So Kes experiences changes for which she has no preparation and which terrify her--her lashing out and blaming it all on her family is typical of what adolescents go through--X 1000. For all we know it WAS a kind of adolescence, a maturing from youth into something greater. Obviously there is more to the Ocampans than the nine simple years Kes originally thought her lifespan would cover.

So Kes's response to her changes is much worse because she has no cultural context for it and it is terrifying. Her lashing out would not be as much of a problem if she was lashing out at other beings such as herself.. but she has no peers and the only ones she can blame are the only ones she has been in any kind of relationship with. Unfortunately they are in no position to rein in her anger because they are so weak.

I think you explaination makes perfect sense in that fact that it's also real world believeable. We also have to take into consideration what was stated in "Before & After" and how we Ocamians get older the "morelogium" sets in, a period when their memory starts to break down.

Plus I don't in anyway believe TPTB ruined Kes and certainly not on purpose. Voyager was the flagship show of UPN, a brand new network. The show was already on a decline in viewership. Why would they ever wish to loose more by purposly alienating more fans by intenionally ruining a character? That doesn't make any sense logically or business wise. Loosing more viewers also hurts the show and Paramounts wallet.

[kimc]

I don't believe characters were intentionally ruined but writers/producers don't always have an accurate reading of what fans will find entertaining. Not only were Kes fans not happy with "Fury" but as mentioned above the book "Before Dishonor" made many unhappy and don't even get me started in this thread about my anger regarding "Endgame".

Yes, I get peeved too. I refuse to be egged on about it though.

[davidant32]

I doubt TPTB were purposely trying to enrage fans by ruining Kes.
We're lucky they even acknowledged the Kes fans at all. They're trying to run a tv program and can't cater to a vocal minority of the viewing audience. They probably thought it was a reasonable compromise that gave some closure to the character at the end of the episode. Obviously, they were not going to bring her back as a main character since Seven joined. And I don't think Jennifer Lien would've agreed to the episode if she thought its sole purpose was to intentionally ruin the character and piss off fans.