I, Borg and Descent

[Rageforthemachine]

Voyager might have been better served if they confined the Borg to the fourth season. They did a good job of introducing them in Scorpion. By having a greater threat introduced it saved us the experience of having to see how little Voyager would fair going up against the mighty Borg. But having them appear over and over was just completely unrealistic. If the Borg really wanted them destroyed all they had to do was send one cube, fire, and Voyager is gone. I don't think the writing staff was prepared to write an enemy that really didn't talk or do anything interesting either. So they ramped up the Borg Queen as the mustache twirling villain and made her the focus instead of the Borg which completely gutted the whole concept of the Borg and made the drones into basically robot puppets. It would have been better if Kes had sent them out of Borg territory completely and the only Borg episodes we got were ones like Unity or Survival Instinct.

[Anwar]

Kev wrote:

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Then the writers collectively failed on two counts - creating 'new' enemies or antagonists and preserving an 'existing' one as the danger they had been established to be.

Perhaps the mistake was in trying to have 'enemies' in the first place instead of making more out of the journey of discovery through a massive uncharted region of space.

There was nothing wrong with the enemies VOY created, it was the negative audience reaction that got rid of all of them (whether that reaction was justified or not). The audience was just pre-disposed to giving VOY's creations a harder time than the other shows.

Basically, this would've been like if DS9 had stopped mentioning the Dominion after "Jem'Hadar" because there was a bad reaction to them (and if the episode was written EXACTLY the same).

So it was a chain reaction: VOY has to stop using their original creations, meaning they have to keep using the Borg, which causes inevitable villain decay.

If the audience had just accepted the original aliens VOY made, then it would be a different story and they'd have more than the Borg to fall back on.

[RyuRoots]

Anwar wrote:

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There was nothing wrong with the enemies VOY created, it was the negative audience reaction that got rid of all of them (whether that reaction was justified or not). The audience was just pre-disposed to giving VOY's creations a harder time than the other shows.

Basically, this would've been like if DS9 had stopped mentioning the Dominion after "Jem'Hadar" because there was a bad reaction to them (and if the episode was written EXACTLY the same).

So it was a chain reaction: VOY has to stop using their original creations, meaning they have to keep using the Borg, which causes inevitable villain decay.

If the audience had just accepted the original aliens VOY made, then it would be a different story and they'd have more than the Borg to fall back on.

*facepalm* Or maybe, ohhh....I dunno. Maybe people just DIDN'T LIKE the Kazon or Vidiians. Durrrrrrrrr. That happens here in real life, Anwar.

And no, the villain decay isn't 'inevitable'. I originally said that, but I thought about it. I thought about the Dominion. And throughout DS9's run, the neither the Jem'Hadar nor the founders lost the menace they had when they were introduced. And because of the Dominion War, we of course had a lot of run-ins with them. I chalk up the Borg's failure in VOY in a lot of ways to the queen. Like Dark Journey said, focusing on the Borg as a single moustache-twirling villain kind of gutted them. And then there's just plain bad writing. I can't remember what ep it was, but Janeway just strolls up to a Borg cube and aims for parts of it in the same way you see captains do against conventional ships.

[RobertScorpio]

I Borg, on the surface, is a great episode. But, unfortunately, it started the Borg down the slipper sloap of ruining the best thing about them; the Zombie angle. I think what made the Borg so cool was the fact they were going to come for you....and there was no way to barter with them because all individuality was taken away once you were assimilated....

Descent is just an awful episode that ruins the Borg, and made them just another DORKY villain, and also ruins Lore, turning him into a baffoonish bad guy.

Rob

[Emnabtond]

Descent was awful.

[RyuRoots]

RobertScorpio wrote:

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and also ruins Lore, turning him into a baffoonish bad guy.

"turning him into"?

He was a horribly corny character to begin with if you ask me. The evil twin robot. Would've been better if TNG had just let him fall off the edge of the universe like he apparently did after Brothers and before that point.

[RobertScorpio]

RyuRoots wrote:

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"turning him into"?

He was a horribly corny character to begin with if you ask me. The evil twin robot. Would've been better if TNG had just let him fall off the edge of the universe like he apparently did after Brothers and before that point.

I totally agree with that idea...

Rob

[Kev]

Anwar wrote:

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There was nothing wrong with the enemies VOY created, it was the negative audience reaction that got rid of all of them (whether that reaction was justified or not). The audience was just pre-disposed to giving VOY's creations a harder time than the other shows.

Basically, this would've been like if DS9 had stopped mentioning the Dominion after "Jem'Hadar" because there was a bad reaction to them (and if the episode was written EXACTLY the same).

So it was a chain reaction: VOY has to stop using their original creations, meaning they have to keep using the Borg, which causes inevitable villain decay.

If the audience had just accepted the original aliens VOY made, then it would be a different story and they'd have more than the Borg to fall back on.

But Voyager was in the theoretical position of having the greatest freedom to create and finesse and discard what wasn't working (either for the writers or the viewers).

The whole idea is that the ship is constantly moving, so if the must have enemies (and since the writers apparently felt that was something the show simply HAD to have, which I don't agree with) then you have the perfect get out every time - the ship moves past their space!

That way you can experiment with the scenarios and try different things, safe in the knowledge you have a way to write out anything not working.

Having a regular constant villian wasn't needed (we already had that on DS9) - and using the Borg as that crutch was outright laziness by the writing staff.

RyuRoots wrote:

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"turning him into"?

He was a horribly corny character to begin with if you ask me. The evil twin robot. Would've been better if TNG had just let him fall off the edge of the universe like he apparently did after Brothers and before that point.

And ironically, he was Gene Roddenberry's part-creation as 'Datalore' was the last officially credited episode Roddenberry co-wrote.

However, I agree that he didn't really need to appear again after Brothers.

[Myasishchev]

Nemesis: better with Lore instead or B-4 (or, for that matter, Shinzon)? I say yes.

[Hober Mallow]

Anwar wrote:

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Well, it was inevitable in VOY's case since because otherwise they'd all be dead in 15 seconds. And in case you'll say "then use another enemy", they tried that repeatedly and in every case it failed due to negative audience reaction (NOT because of the writing).

You can speak for yourself. My problem with Voyager's aliens was indeed the writing. The execution of a unique and interesting alien race all comes down to the writing.

[RobertScorpio]

Hober Mallow wrote:

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You can speak for yourself. My problem with Voyager's aliens was indeed the writing. The execution of a unique and interesting alien race all comes down to the writing.

Voyager created some cool aliens (Hirogen chief among them) but then ruined them by making them just another bland TREK alien race..bad writing, and only bad writing, can do that...so I agree with you..

Rob

[Hober Mallow]

RobertScorpio wrote:

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Voyager created some cool aliens (Hirogen chief among them) but then ruined them by making them just another bland TREK alien race..bad writing, and only bad writing, can do that...so I agree with you..

If it ain't on the page, it ain't on the stage.

[StarryEyed]

I didn't vote in the poll because I despise the win/fail slang. Sorry.

I thought I Borg was a decent enough episode. It's not one of my favorites but it wasn't a bad idea. It established that the Borg did not have as tight a lock on individuals as was previously thought. It weakened them but not much. I think that was a good thing because if they were as badass as they seemed in the early episodes, the good guys are dead. Do we really want that in the Trekversw?

I think it's incredibly naive to think that Geordi's plan would have in fact destroyed the Borg. Don't you think that races in the Delta Quadrant would have wiped them out if it were that easy?


Descent was a mess but more for reasons other than how the Borg were treated. This is just a continuation of the revelation in I Borg that the original assumption of, "once a Borg, always a Borg" was not true.

We got our first look at transwarp conduits here which was cool.


First Contact was an enjoyable movie. It reestablished the Borg as very dangerous opponents but it also showed that Starfleet had closed the gap. I think this was logical. The Federation is vast and powerful. The initial contact with the Borg scared the crap out of them and they got up off their butts and made some serious advances.

This movie gave us the queen. While I think Alice Krieg turned in an awesome performance in that role, I must defer to the arguments that this was a very bad idea. This was the move that cheapened the Borg - not what Voyager did.


Star Trek Voyager: This was a mixed bag. I loved Unity and I thought Scorpion was absolutely awesome. We had never seen more than a single Borg ship before. The fleet of cubes in Scorpion was a definite holy shit moment!

It went generally downhill from there. The low point was probably Unimatrix Zero. Voyager exchanges fire with a tactical cube here as if it were any run of the mill ship.

Endgame helped restore the Borg as very dangerous opponents. It went too far, actually. The transwarp network it revealed showed once and for all that the Borg could have effortlessly assimilated the entire Federation had it wanted to. This led to all the fan theories that the Borg farm technology by scaring opponents into developing tactics and technology that could defeat them and then assimilating it. This is perfectly logical - and scary. It suggests that the Borg could come for the Federation any time they want.

[Anwar]

RyuRoots wrote:

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And no, the villain decay isn't 'inevitable'. I originally said that, but I thought about it. I thought about the Dominion. And throughout DS9's run, the neither the Jem'Hadar nor the founders lost the menace they had when they were introduced.

That's because the Dominion were allowed to win battles and stuff. They could destroy hundreds of Fed ships and kill lots of people without harming the main characters, which allowed them to keep their menace. With the Borg they couldn't be allowed any victories because all VOY had was their one ship, and they couldn't let them destroy THAT.

So basically, VOY was again in a no-win scenario: Their dramatic situation meant their enemies couldn't be allowed victories that would endanger the ship and crew otherwise the show would be over. THus, their villains could never keep up a massive menacing aura.

And yes, you DO need a constant enemy (even in a show like VOY), NuBSG and Farscape had them as well.

And no, the writing wasn't the problem. The writing for guys like the Vidiians was no worse than anything on DS9.

...Which would make this...(gasp)...A double standard!

[Nerys Ghemor]

Awww, StarryEyed, have a sense of humor! I was just trying to keep things lighthearted, because I really didn't want to see this thread devolve into a flame war. (Pleeeeease everyone, keep that in mind!)