Does It Get Better???

[You_Will_Fail]

Season 4 is doing really well so far, only a single episode out of 17 rated below 5.
Season 4 definitely is Voyager's highpoint for me

[AdmiralScreed]

You_Will_Fail wrote:

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Season 4 is doing really well so far, only a single episode out of 17 rated below 5.
Season 4 definitely is Voyager's highpoint for me

Season 4 is definitely my favorite season so far. I think that has a lot to do with 7 of 9, who is currently my favorite character on the show (and not just because she's hot )

I hope that the high ratings continue.

EDIT: And to answer my original question, I think season 4 is where the show gets A LOT better. I'm finally excited to sit down and watch Voyager every night. There hasn't been a single bad episode since season 3.

[AdmiralScreed]

Also, thanks everyone for the info on Kim.

It still doesn't make a lot of sense to me though. I figured being a "senior" officer meant that you'd had a lot of experience in the field and you were qualified for a position of some authority. It doesn't make much sense to me for an ensign to be made a senior officer right out of the academy. Especially someone as incompetent as Kim...or maybe I'm just biased against him because the actor can't act...

[You_Will_Fail]

It never made sense to me either, and yes, he couldn't act and should have been jettisoned at the end of season 3 like originally planned. The show would have been much better for it.

Glad you're liking Seven of Nine, she's definitely my favorite character in the show and possibly my favorite ever.

[Guy Gardener]

AdmiralScreed wrote:

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Also, thanks everyone for the info on Kim.

It still doesn't make a lot of sense to me though. I figured being a "senior" officer meant that you'd had a lot of experience in the field and you were qualified for a position of some authority. It doesn't make much sense to me for an ensign to be made a senior officer right out of the academy. Especially someone as incompetent as Kim...or maybe I'm just biased against him because the actor can't act...

In most navies, air forces, armies etc... There's at least ten enlisted personal for every officer, and the same is probably true for Starfleet. Just because Kim was the lowest ranked officer, he still outranks 90 percent of Starfleet, who are extraordinarily more qualified and experienced in their particular fields than the people telling them what to do, as in the case of lads like O'Brien who've been at this for 20 years but still have to take orders from children still wet behind the ears.

Below is two years old, referencing the US Navy.

As of today's date there are:

51,577 Officers

273,865 Enlisted Personnel

Which equates to about a 5:1 ratio of enlisted to officer.

[AdmiralScreed]

I just averaged all of my episode scores for each season. To give you an idea of where I stand on a season by season basis, here are my average scores.

Season One: 5.06

Season Two: 5.65

Season Three: 5.62

Season Four (so far): 6.56

As you can see, season four is my favorite by far.

[tighr]

AdmiralScreed wrote:

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It still doesn't make a lot of sense to me though. I figured being a "senior" officer meant that you'd had a lot of experience in the field and you were qualified for a position of some authority. It doesn't make much sense to me for an ensign to be made a senior officer right out of the academy. Especially someone as incompetent as Kim...or maybe I'm just biased against him because the actor can't act...

It never made "sense" to me either, and I chalk it up to bad writing (or, since it was a series decison, a bad series bible). There is no reason, even on a ship as small as Voyager, to make a green Ensign a department head. Absolutely no reason. I don't care how many enlisted crewmen there are, it doesn't make sense.

On that note, we saw more Enlisted crewman on Voyager than we did on any other show (which is remarkable, considering the ship only had 150 people to begin with!) and less senior officers. There were no Commanders on Voyager (unless you consider Chakotay a Commander, despite wearing Lt. Cmdr insignia) and very few if any Lieutenants.

Captain Janeway
Cmdr/Lt. Cmdr Chakotay
Lt. Cmdr Tuvok
Lt. j.g. Paris
Lt. j.g. Torres
Ensign Kim

The XO in Caretaker was Lt. Cmdr Cavit, he died while falling down the steps on the bridge
Lt. Stadi was the Senior helmsman, she was hot but died at her post. Also a Betazoid, so Tom's charms didn't work on her
The Doctor has no rank, the dead doctor was a Lt. Cmdr

There were various background characters throughout the show with various ranks. Interestingly enough, there were several "Lieutenants", including Joe Carey, that should have been department heads instead of Tom or B'Elanna (and certainly Harry). Ayala was seen with both Ensign and Lieutenant insignia, but I'm sure fans would prefer he was a Lieutenant. Most of those could probably be due to costume errors. It must have gotten boring in the costume department giving every background character an Ensign or no rank.

While we're talking about rank, it drove me nuts that in 7 years of Deep Space Nine, Bashir never got promoted to Lt. Cmdr. Nearly every other doctor we'd ever seen in Starfleet was at least a Lt. Cmdr (both Crusher and Pulaski were full Commanders), and he was supposed to be wicked smart.

[AdmiralScreed]

It had never crossed my mind, but I guess you're right about Bashir. That's a real shame, considering everything he accomplished during and before the war. What was his actual rank? Lt. Jr. Grade?

And about Joe Carey, if I remember correctly Janeway gave the position to Torres instead of Carey because she wanted the Maquis to be represented in positions of leadership along with Starfleet Officers. I can understand and respect that decision. As for Kim......nope, doesn't make any sense. Why can't someone sabotage his tactical console so that the next time he turns it on it explodes in his face? That would solve a lot of problems on Voyager......

[tighr]

AdmiralScreed wrote:

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It had never crossed my mind, but I guess you're right about Bashir. That's a real shame, considering everything he accomplished during and before the war. What was his actual rank? Lt. Jr. Grade?

Bashir was promoted to full Lieutenant during the off-time between season 3 and season 4. Jadzia Dax was also promoted to Lt. Cmdr during this time. Sisko was promoted to Captain right at the end of Season 3, so presumably he used his new rank to promote the two of them.

[You_Will_Fail]

AdmiralScreed wrote:

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I just averaged all of my episode scores for each season. To give you an idea of where I stand on a season by season basis, here are my average scores.

Season One: 5.06

Season Two: 5.65

Season Three: 5.62

Season Four (so far): 6.56

As you can see, season four is my favorite by far.

SMH @ your low score for season one!

I graded every episode out of 10 and took my averages as well.

Season One: 6.8
Season Two: 6.0
Season Three: 6.0
Season Four: 7.3
Season Five: 6.8
Season Six: 6.9
Season Seven: 6.7

Surprised that S6 was higher than S1 but there are quite a few gems to be had waiting for you in S6 too - 3 of my top 6 episodes are in Season six. But as far as I rank, its never as consistently good as in season 4.

[Worf'sParmach]

tighr wrote:

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While we're talking about rank, it drove me nuts that in 7 years of Deep Space Nine, Bashir never got promoted to Lt. Cmdr. Nearly every other doctor we'd ever seen in Starfleet was at least a Lt. Cmdr (both Crusher and Pulaski were full Commanders), and he was supposed to be wicked smart.

Good observation! I'm betting the writers just never thought about it.

As far as Harry goes, I'm guessing the writers kind of worked themselves into a corner. They wanted to showcase a "green" officer, such as in "Lower Decks" from TNG. But since this person was part of the major cast, he needed to which be a part of the senior staff and in the middle of all the action to make the show work. It would be weird if they were constantly cutting to young Harry Kim stuck on Deck 5 with no clue what was happening. So you end up with an Ensign who's also a department head.

[tighr]

You_Will_Fail wrote:

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Surprised that S6 was higher than S1 but there are quite a few gems to be had waiting for you in S6 too - 3 of my top 6 episodes are in Season six. But as far as I rank, its never as consistently good as in season 4.

My favorite episode of the series is in Season 6 also, but it's not really a fan favorite around here and I suspect Screed will similarly vote it down as such. I'll keep the suspense until we get to the episode so as not to give away my secrets.

[You_Will_Fail]

Hmm yeah, 4/10 of my favorite Voyager episodes are actually in season 6.

Ah yes, "Blink of an Eye" is my 4th favorite Voyager episode. The other 3 are "Barge of the Dead", "Muse" and "Tinker, Tenor, Doctor, Spy". "Survival Instinct", "Pathfinder", "One Small Step" and "Child's Play" are also excellent episodes, "Ashes to Ashes" I would consider to be excellent if it wasn't so ridiculous to have Lindsay Ballard completely retconned into Harry's life.

[tighr]

How'd you guess? I must have brought it up in another thread.

[Guy Gardener]

Is it me or is a show that isn't averaging out at at least 7 or 8 an episode, that you should drop it?

However Smallville was consistently scoring a 2, and I tuned in every week.