Does It Get Better???

[MacLeod]

^Well unless her delayed reaction is down to something like PTSD or similar

[AdmiralScreed]

MacLeod wrote:

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^Well unless her delayed reaction is down to something like PTSD or similar

Hmmm......now that might be a possibility. Speaking from my own experience, there have been times when terrible things have happened in my life, like the death of a loved one, and sometimes it's taken weeks or months for me to feel the full impact of it. That could very easily have been the case with B'Elanna. Thanks for pointing that out.

[tighr]

Her "delayed" reaction could also be due to storytelling license. They've been focusing on other stories for a while, and B'Elanna could have been taking these extreme risks for several months before anyone noticed.

Since receiving the letters from home in Hunters, there has been:

An 8472 episode
three 7 of 9 episodes
a 2-parter where most of the crew has virtual memories
a Tom Paris episode
two Janeway/7 episodes
a Chakotay episode
a Doctor episode
a Harry Kim/Tom Paris episode
and the Night episode (kinda Janeway-ish, I guess).

So this is the first episode to feature B'Elanna since the letters from home. On top of that, Roxann Dawson was pregnant during this stretch of episodes. She didn't even appear in Unforgettable or Living Witness, and several of her scenes in The Omega Directive were cut when she went into labor.

It would have been kind of tough to film a skydiving B'Elanna or show her fighting Cardassians when she's visibly pregnant (hence the engineer's lab coat she wore in season 4).

[You_Will_Fail]

Drone - I somewhat enjoy this episode but it never really excites me much. I did love the intro and outro to the episode though.

Extreme Risk - Despite the odd placement in relation to when she heard the news, its an enjoyable episode for me as most B'Ellana episodes are. Although I still don't like how Voyager appears to have the productive capacity of a small spaceyard. The idea you can just replicate whole new warp engines is annoying to me.

[Guy Gardener]

I broke a rib laughing when I finally realized that they thought I was too stupid to notice her baby bump.

I mean, the I dream of Jeannie producers hid a pregnancy flawlessly 20 years before the invention of blue screen.

No excuses, that belly was half arsed.

[Harvey]

Don't get me wrong, I like that "Extreme Risk" brings up the massacre of the Maquis, but the end of the episode is too tidy. There are no indications that Torres has been affected by the news before this episode, and no indication that it has any effect on he after it.

[Guy Gardener]

Other than sleeping with a trainwreck manchild liike Tom?

[tighr]

Harvey wrote:

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Don't get me wrong, I like that "Extreme Risk" brings up the massacre of the Maquis, but the end of the episode is too tidy. There are no indications that Torres has been affected by the news before this episode, and no indication that it has any effect on he after it.

Like I mentioned earlier, there are 13 episodes between Extreme Risk and Hunters. She's obviously affected in Hunters.

She doesn't even appear in two episodes (Unforgettable and Living Witness), and is only in a handful of scenes in another (Omega Directive). In two other episodes, she's got the mind of a hologram who is currently in a precarious situation (The Killing Game I & II). She's in stasis for a whole episode (One), and her scenes are holograms made by 7of9's interactive program.

She has limited screen time overall in the other seven episodes:

In Vis-a-Vis, she gets super pissed-off at fake-Tom, in her Klingon bitchy kind of way. In Demon, she wants to go to the surface (of a super-dangerous planet) but Chakotay overrules her because she's too hotheaded. She probably starts going bat-shit crazy like everyone else on the ship in Night, where she's got plenty of free time to sit and think about her dead friends. Extreme Risk is two episodes later, and again like I said earlier we don't know how long she had been using extreme holodecks. A lot of that could have taken place off screen.

So, when exactly were they supposed to show her being upset at her dead friends?

[Harvey]

There's no way to get around Dawson's time off due to the pregnancy, but that doesn't mean the writers couldn't have thrown in a scene or two showing Torres with a greater attitude problem than usual. They managed to do this with Paris' attitude problem in the second season; a few small moments here and there is all you need. Of course, even if they had been thinking ahead in that fashion, I still think the end of "Extreme Risk" is a bit too tidy. Star Trek: Voyager can set up conflict, even internal conflict, but equilibrium is almost always restored by the closing credits.

[Lord Manitou]

Klingons, like the Vulcans, consider themselves the superior race over humans and, from time to time, need to be disciplined or to receive counsel about how to act. B'Lanna sensed the deep felt wrong and hurt and just shucked it away until she found reprise on the holo-deck. If it wasn't for Chakotay she probably killed herself.

[exodus]

Harvey wrote:

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There's no way to get around Dawson's time off due to the pregnancy, but that doesn't mean the writers couldn't have thrown in a scene or two showing Torres with a greater attitude problem than usual. They managed to do this with Paris' attitude problem in the second season; a few small moments here and there is all you need. Of course, even if they had been thinking ahead in that fashion, I still think the end of "Extreme Risk" is a bit too tidy. Star Trek: Voyager can set up conflict, even internal conflict, but equilibrium is almost always restored by the closing credits.

Much like TNG & TOS
It's implied that in "Gamesmaters of Triscallion" that Uhura is being sexually abused, yet she's right as rain by the end of the ep. as if it nothing happened.
Troi sure bounces back quick the next ep. after being mind raped. Exactly how many times was she mentally messed with and yet, she needed no therapy at all afterwards.
Worf could dance a jig by the next ep. have having his spine replaced and only about less than a week of physical therapy.

I don't see it as fair to blame Voyager for what has been the standard of story telling long before it. This is what Gene Roddenberry wanted Trek to be. This was noted when told Berman specifically that he didn't want the heroes of the show to have any lasting scars. be they mentally or physically because he didn't feel people could look up to these characters as heroes if they have long lasting issues. The idea of flawed heroes is a modern one, Gene & Berman are old school. This is why those that knew Gene personally(like George Takai) call DS9 "anti-Trek" Just sayin'.

[Guy Gardener]

Don't forget that baby she had who grew up in a day, truned into a glowing space fart and vanished.

It would have been far less traumatic if Ian Troi left her body as a glowing space fart.

[teacake]

Harvey wrote:

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There's no way to get around Dawson's time off due to the pregnancy, but that doesn't mean the writers couldn't have thrown in a scene or two showing Torres with a greater attitude problem than usual. They managed to do this with Paris' attitude problem in the second season; a few small moments here and there is all you need. Of course, even if they had been thinking ahead in that fashion, I still think the end of "Extreme Risk" is a bit too tidy. Star Trek: Voyager can set up conflict, even internal conflict, but equilibrium is almost always restored by the closing credits.

I always assume the remaining Maquis will be devastated by this news. I'm always surprised their reaction is so muted.

Yeah I know we'd all have PTSD if we had even one episode of events happen to us that Trek folk deal with but you can still show devastation for at least one episode. You know it's almost like there was a B n' B memo to writers.. "Don't take the Maquis seriously, ever."

7 of 9 has the greatest character growth in the show.

[AdmiralScreed]

In The Flesh: I loved getting to see San Francisco and Starfleet Headquarters again, even if it wasn't actually real. The main story was interesting, and it was very much in the spirit of Trek. Two enemies coming together, making peace, and emerging stronger than ever.
A fine offering.
7/10

Once Upon a Time: I know I'm going to get some flack for my score, but I enjoyed this episode quite a bit. The child actor for Naomi did a fine job, which is much more than I would say for most child actors on Trek. I liked the scenes on the holodeck quite a bit. As goofy and silly as they were, they did bring me back to when I was a kid. Good times......
Neelix also had a lot of nice and moving scenes. I must say that I've enjoyed his character much more since season 3 ended. He's a much more likable character.
6/10

[Harvey]

teacake wrote:

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7 of 9 has the greatest character growth in the show.

I think the Doctor has more growth than Seven (or anyone else among the cast). Seven of Nine had much to do in the final four seasons of the show, but her development was too schizophrenic for their to be much growth.

exodus wrote:

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Much like TNG & TOS

You'll excuse me if I don't hold an action-adventure series that was produced in the late 1960s as the standard-bearer for character growth in a show produced in the late 1990s. Star Trek: The Next Generation is more complicated. At times we had plenty of consequences ("Family," the Borg arc, the Klingon arc) and at other times the characters would ignore great ordeals from the previous episode as if they had never happened. It was obviously transitioning to being a more modern kind of drama, but it wouldn't be until Star Trek: Deep Space Nine that the franchise got there. Star Trek: Voyager was a total backslide.

I don't see it as fair to blame Voyager for what has been the standard of story telling long before it. This is what Gene Roddenberry wanted Trek to be. This was noted when told Berman specifically that he didn't want the heroes of the show to have any lasting scars.

Roddenberry repeatedly told the producers of Star Trek II (and III, and IV, and V...) that he wanted the movie to be about Kirk and co. preventing the JFK assassination. You'll have to excuse me again if I don't care what he wanted, especially when it comes to Star Trek: Voyager, a series which was conceived and produced entirely after Roddenberry's death.