A Semi-Hater Revisits Voyager

[Guy Gardener]

The basic premise of the forum and the basic premise of the Internet and the basic premise of life.

[The Grim Ghost]

Sacred Ground just straight out pisses me off.

Why don't these people keep dangerous areas sealed off from outsiders?

Why do these stupid people make Janeway jump through hoops to solve a problem that they created? Why are they so into playing headgames with people who aren't involved with their stupid religion?

What kind of message is this? Science can't solve everything. Great. Maybe science can't solve everything, but superstitious garbage solves NOTHING. Except in this episode I guess it does.

I hate hate hate this episode. It is in my top 10 most disliked Voyager episodes easily.

[Guy Gardener]

Think how much Janeway psychopolar bullshit we would have been spared in later years if the rest button had not annihilated this object lesson from Janeways skillset?

[Lynx]

"Sacred Ground" is an OK episode.

A bit slow in places and somewhat confusing but I like the fact that it shows Janeway being ready to sacrifice herself to save a member of her crew. Now, that's one of the things I like best with Janeway, he concern for her crewmembers.

Chakotay's concern for Janeway was also heart-warming.

I'll give the episode 3 points out of 5.

[Praetor]

GodBen wrote:

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I don't remember saying that, and I actually gave both episodes the same score; two stars, half a star deducted for being TNG-lite.

I can't help but think this was a reference to me saying this about 'Sacred Ground':

"It's watchable - maybe a little more so than 'Remember' if only because it is more ambitious in what it's trying to do."

[Jimmy Bob]

Praetorian wrote:

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However Jimmy Boy you might have gotten a little too personal in your criticizing of GodBen's position...
One must try to be civil in such discussions...

No, it wasn't personal but more of humorous exaggeration. Re-read it in John Cleese's voice, perhaps that will help to make the intended tone clearer.

"Now I'm lost.

If you are referring to my joke about wanting to kill all conservative people then that was a joke, as evidenced by the fact that I was advocating killing millions of innocent people.

And I've never watched a single John Wayne film."

I was refering to this: "For all we know the propaganda could be true, they could be unruly and trying to bring down normal society."

And this: "As I also said, the episode doesn't show us what life was like for these Regressives, we are just led to believe that they weren't really a threat to society. I don't agree with the death penalty, but I could understand why some societies would use it if there was extremist groups trying to undermine society."

Which to me reads: "In some cases genocide is great fun" and so I paraphrased it in humorous exaggeration.

I said how in the episode, a romantic idyll was created out of what really happened.

America has created a romantic idyll out of Wild West - of the progress of civilization, of Manifest Destiny, of uncivilized non-humans and great manly men who stand behind traditional american values, the idea that there has always been an american and like every american he surfs the chaos to bring order.

This romantic idyll has been built on the annihiliation of entire nations - but who cares - because westerns are so much fun. So what I was doing is that I said that your quotes above me sound like that: "sometimes genocide is great fun, especially if a brilliant romantic idyll is created out of that - like the early westerns."

"Lots of modern democracies saw vile acts during the struggle for their foundation, including my own. That doesn't make the acts right, but it doesn't invalidate the society which forms from them."

Yes it does, if them vile acts are hushed over to portray the founders as representatives of traditional idyllic family values and so on. "Thou shallt not built your house on bullshit, for bullshit is not solid, but on truth" it's in the bible somewhere.

"I can't help but think this was a reference to me saying this about 'Sacred Ground"

Yes.

[TheGodBen]

Jaespol wrote:

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Whats with all the frickin analysing?

Well roughly 6 million years ago a group of apes broke away and started using their brains rather than relying purely upon instinct, and eventually they evolved into a species known as homo sapiens sapiens, which roughly translates into "very wise man". I personally find that name to be incredibly arrogant and demonstrably false, but that doesn't stop me from attempting to live up to it.

Why don't you just rate it on the enjoyability factor?

I do, and I have previously pointed out that I only start nit-picking episodes if I don't find it entertaining enough to prevent me from doing so. I didn't find Remember to be entertaining enough to stop me from poking holes in it while I was watching, and that resulted in me enjoying it less than I should have.

Remember was a great episode! Who cares if we didn't get to see how those people lived?

Me.

The old lady who transplanted the memory didn't see everything that was going on, obviously all we got to see was what she had experienced in her life.

And the biased viewpoint of one person is not a good standpoint to judge an entire civilisation.

Its unrealistic to say we should have seen the entire story whenever the old lady never did.

Which is why the episode shouldn't have judged an entire civilisation.

Jimmy Bob wrote:

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I was refering to this: "For all we know the propaganda could be true, they could be unruly and trying to bring down normal society."

And this: "As I also said, the episode doesn't show us what life was like for these Regressives, we are just led to believe that they weren't really a threat to society. I don't agree with the death penalty, but I could understand why some societies would use it if there was extremist groups trying to undermine society."

Which to me reads: "In some cases genocide is great fun" and so I paraphrased it in humorous exaggeration.

I'm still lost. How can that possibly be paraphrased into "genocide is fun"?

The Regressives could have been like the Amish in that they were a community which shunned modern technology and lifestyles, or they could have been like Islamic extremists who commit vile acts because they want to transform western society into their narrow vision of the world. Without exploring the Regressives properly we have no way of knowing which of these two groups they were closest to, so it is impossible to judge the supposed atrocities.

If you were to suggest to me that we should kill all the Amish because you fear their lifestyle then I would oppose you and think you are dangerous. If you were to suggest to me that we should kill all Islamic extremists because you fear them then I would also oppose you but I would understand your viewpoint and wouldn't judge you so harshly.

My position is a far cry from "genocide is fun", when it comes to matters like this I view them very soberly.

"Lots of modern democracies saw vile acts during the struggle for their foundation, including my own. That doesn't make the acts right, but it doesn't invalidate the society which forms from them."

Yes it does, if them vile acts are hushed over to portray the founders as representatives of traditional idyllic family values and so on. "Thou shallt not built your house on bullshit, for bullshit is not solid," it's in the bible somewhere.

The Bible holds no weight with me.

Every country in the world does this. You rightly said that the Americans do this, the British largely ignore most of the atrocities performed in the name of their empire, and there was horrible actions performed during Ireland's war of independence. It still doesn't invalidate the liberal democratic societies which those countries now are.

I saw a TV show once which told the story of a horrible act performed during the Irish WoI. There was a rich protestant who had a farm near a village of mostly catholics, and during the WoI there was rumours that the protestant land-owner may have been informing the British forces about members of the IRA. So the IRA and the catholics in the village stormed into his house, captured the family and burned the house down. They decided to execute the land-owner and his son, so they lined them up and shot them... in the balls. They left them to bleed to death with the most agonising pain imaginable over the next two days. Even if the man was guilty, and there is no evidence that he was, there is no way he deserved such a horrible death.

But I'm glad that there was a war of independence, even though I am sure there was many such vile acts carried out in the name of Irish freedom. Today is apparently the 60th anniversary of Ireland becoming a republic, and that wouldn't have happened had it not been for that war.

[Jimmy Bob]

And the biased viewpoint of one person is not a good standpoint to judge an entire civilisation.

Which is why the episode shouldn't have judged an entire civilisation.

When did the episode ever do that?

As for the rest of it, I still have the feeling that you would have rather seen them as islamic extremists, since the episode did strongly suggest that they were more like the Amish.

Because think about it - would extremists have let themselves being cattled of like sheep to the slaughterhouse?

The bible holds no weight with me.

Because it wasn't... ah never mind.

Every country in the world does this.

As I already said in my first post. And why I feel that a socially responsible entertainment should remind us this question - that how true the images of our heroic past really are. Propaganda of the past has a tendency to reappear in the most ugliest ways. Modern day Russia has adapted the image of World War II of the stalinistic propaganda movies, rather than the less-glorious and more accurate version.

Better example: Hollywood produes a film after film of the evil of Nazi's, letting everyone forget that America too had concentration camps in World War II, as it was the contemporary zeitgeist. Everyone had them, but giving the nazi's more spotlight gives us the chance to forget our own evils in WWII.

To me, Remember worked as that sort of illustration. To you it didn't. We both raised our voices and raged (or not, raged just rhymes with raised), now let's end this at Future's End.

[TheGodBen]

Jimmy Bob wrote:

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And the biased viewpoint of one person is not a good standpoint to judge an entire civilisation.

Which is why the episode shouldn't have judged an entire civilisation.

When did the episode ever do that?

When Janeway failed to chastise B'Elanna for her actions in the mess hall. When Janeway sympathised with B'Elanna's viewpoint and suggested that she take her case to one of the aliens before they leave the ship. You know, that whole final act.

As for the rest of it, I still have the feeling that you would have rather seen them as islamic extremists, since the episode did strongly suggest that they were more like the Amish.

It has nothing to do with what way I wanted the Regressives to be portrayed, I just wanted them to be shown to me as the society they were supposed to be rather than only seeing lover-boy. I can't judge a group of people based off of experiences with one individual, that is a message that Star Trek has shoved down my throat time and again, except in this case where they do just the opposite.

Answer me this; would it have ruined the episode from your point of view if they had one lousy scene where B'Elanna went to see lover-boy in his home and saw how these people lived? They didn't do that and it is a failing on the part of this episode that it chose not to explore the social issue as well as it should have.

Because think about it - would extremists have let themselves being cattled of like sheep to the slaughterhouse?

If people with guns told them to do so and they had no choice... well, they'd have no choice.

To me, Remember worked as that sort of illustration.

Fine, it worked for you and it didn't work for me. That doesn't make me wrong, it just means that I wanted something more than what we got. It failed to satisfy my demands.

...now let's end this at Future's End.

I just finished watching Future's End, Part 1 and I'm still thinking about it. The score is still in a state of flux.

[TheGodBen]

The man who brought you Threshold joins forces for the very first time with the man who brought you False Profits in order to bring you...

Future's End, Part 1 (**)

There is a popular PC strategy series called Civilization which has a peculiar trait when it comes to combat; every once in a while a modern battleship can be destroyed by a bronze-age spearman unit. When you think about this logically you realise that this is impossible; how does a group of men armed only with spears destroy a ship that could blow them away before they could even see it? Subsequent releases of the game tried to fix this problem, but every once in a while a spearman can still defeat a unit of tanks even though the probability of such an event is estimated as 0.0%.

The reason I bring this up is that Voyager somehow manages to beat a 29th century spaceship with the magical power of its deflector dish. Can you imagine a 16th century warship managing to defeat a modern destroyer craft? Or a WWI biplane managing to shoot down a F-16? You may think I am over-analysing the situation, but these were the thoughts going through my head during the scene where Braxton shows up in his time-ship and I found it to be incredibly distracting for the rest of the episode.

One thing which bugs me about Captain Braxton and his 29th century timeship is the dramatic implications this has for any future Star Trek series. We now know that the Federation will still be in existence in the 29th century, so any threat against the future of Earth or the human race is made less interesting because we know that everything will be okay. This was one of the big problems with the Xindi arc in Enterprise, and I honestly feel the Dominion War arc on DS9 suffered a little because Voyager had already confirmed that the Feds will win. This may seem like a really stupid thing to complain about, particularly within the context of Voyager, but it has bugged me for years.

And I'm not a big fan of time travel in general, I feel that Trek completely over-used the concept. I think that time travel should be reserved only for really original ideas, and Star Trek IV already did the Trek in a contemporary setting thing and it did it much better.

The episode itself is pleasant enough once it gets to 1996 Earth, although I would hardly consider it spectacular. If it wasn't for all the complaints I posted above I would probably give the episode 3.5 stars, but I feel that each of these complaints amounts to a half-star deduction because of how much they irritate me personally.

[Jimmy Bob]

GodBen wrote:

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The man who brought you Threshold joins forces for the very first time with the man who brought you False Profits in order to bring you...

Future's End, Part 1 (**)

The episode itself is pleasant enough once it gets to 1996 Earth, although I would hardly consider it spectacular. If it wasn't for all the complaints I posted above I would probably give the episode 3.5 stars, but I feel that each of these complaints amounts to a half-star deduction because of how much they irritate me personally.

This two-parter episode will be the highlight of Season 3 for a while. It gets really really bad for a moment there. Personally I like it as a sort of timecapsule of 90's. TOS has one of the 60's and Enterprise one of the 00's - so I like the episodes because they allow one to compare these decades and how ST saw them. Nothing spectacular, but fun.

As Future's End is also not really over, so some irrelevant things. Ignore at will, but I can't get rest if I don't do this.

"When Janeway failed to chastise B'Elanna for her actions in the mess hall. When Janeway sympathised with B'Elanna's viewpoint and suggested that she take her case to one of the aliens before they leave the ship."

I didn't see Janeway as being supportive of B'Elanna, as she did say: "whatever the Anarians have done, it's not our problem." She was more like a experienced life-smart person would be around wanna-be Che Guevara. Some facepalms, some exaggerated sigh's, a suggestion that would allow the person to spread his truth in the least harmful way possible.

"I can't judge a group of people based off of experiences with one individual."

The episode's main focus was how a person can so easily kill the person she is in love with due to patriot acts and similar things. So I don't see the problem that the regressive-progressive thing was more in the background, as it was a personal approach from the oppressor's point of view - she killed her lover and then said it was good. To ease the conscience with lies.

"Would it have ruined the episode from your point of view if they had one lousy scene where B'Elanna went to see lover-boy in his home and saw how these people lived?"

No.

That doesn't make me wrong, it just means that I wanted something more than what we got. It failed to satisfy my demands.

I hope you understand, that that wrong wasn't meant as personal attack but as a joking jest.

[The Grim Ghost]

I agree that the set up of Future's End tends to drag down the rest of the episode. Like Godben, I find it incredibly unilikely that Voyager could do something like this to a 29th century ship. Either 29th century tech ain't all that, or the pilot was no good.

I think Futures End is kind of fun though. I enjoy seeing the Voyager characters in (what was) a present day setting. There is no denying that Star Trek IV did the whole thing much better though, with much more humor. Ed Begley Jr. does a nice job as Starling.

You kind of have to turn off your brain to enjoy most Trek time travel episodes. They are so all over the place with their rules. I (for the most part) am able to enjoy the episode for what it is.

This is complete bias on my part, but Sarah Silverman really brings the episode down a bit for me. I just can't stand this woman, she is like nails on a chalkboard to me anytime I see her.

[Praetorian]

Even if there's an entity called "Federation" in the 29th century, it doesn't mean it's a direct continuation of the 24th Century UFP. Like for example the (Western) Roman Empire and the Holy Roman Empire. For all we know the UFP was destroyed in the 25th century, constituting the beginning of a new Dark Age, that lasted until the 29th century when a new Federation appeared. This would also explain why the technology wasn't all that.
Of course this is merely speculation, even grasping a straws perhaps..but really..who knows? =P

All in all I thought Future's End was fun, even if somewhat ilogical. I rate it as enjoyable...

[Guy Gardener]

There is no woman more desirable than Sarah Silverman.

Enterprise might not have been lying to us Praetorian.

[The Grim Ghost]

^ The fall of and subsequent rebuilding of the Federation is quite possible.

But their tech WAS better. Using it Starling was able to create the mobile emitter for example which was far beyond what current Fed science could produce. The episode has many other examples of the superiority of 29th tech as well. Starling was able to use it to thwart the resources of an entire starship using it, at least for a time.