I actually like to watch "Threshold". If I think of it as a nightmare Janeway had after eating too much of Neelix's food and that it actually never happened, then I can enjoy the funny parts of it. And there are a lot of funny parts in "Threshold". Yes, there were episodes which were much worse. Episodes like "Fury", "The Gift" and "Endgame". At least, I didn't feel insulted by "Threshold"
Think of it this way, if there ever was a Mirror Universe version of Voyager "Threshold" show's that Mirror Paris would've been the "Captain's Boy".
I've said it before, and I'll say it again. This was the worst episode, but not even because of the salamander babies. The salamander babies part was actually more like Trek, and that's saying something. It was the removal of the tongue. The way it was presented, music and all, turned the show into a cheesy horror film for a few minutes. It was almost not even the same genre as Star Trek anymore... Some other episodes did this to a degree, but not nearly as bad as this one. For that reason, this is IMO the worst Voyager episode. Besides that, it was also gory and disgusting. When I saw it as a kid, my mom just thought the salamander part was stupid. We all laughed at that. But she almost had to turn it off during the tongue part. It was almost too much for prime time TV in that era. My reaction when I saw it was to gag real hard and almost spit tacos all over the floor.
Certainly no worse than a poor guy's head exploding from a phaser hit, then a giant parasite crawling out of his chest before getting blown up too, with the burning corpse left sitting there. I thought the tongue scene was just more a WTF moment than graphic or gross.
haha omg I remember tha scene. I think it was more funny than gross because of how bad the special effects were (but probably great for the time)
On a different note, I have always wondered why Janeway and Paris never mentioned their offspring again. In several episodes, such as "The Q and the Grey" and "Lineage" they deny that ever had children. Maybe they don't consider the hyperevolved beings to be their "children" because of the strange circumstances that lead to their birth.
I'm trying to put myself in Janeway's place.. Something horrible starts happening to her body and she loses all sense of self amidst probably great pain and then she's recovered and barely remembers it. What she does remember must be like a nightmare jumble and I'd imagine it starts to fade fast. She's told about the smaller, seemingly lower life forms that were seen near her when she was recovered and that they slithered away. She has no maternal instinct towards them and she also has no memory of a maternal instinct when she was transformed because salamanders do not care for their young. It's just something that happened and as baby salamaders care for themselves I don't think there would be any objective voice calling for someone to return and get them. Would they have returned for them if they were baby apes, and unable to live without care?
How is this what you are saying Teacake, science-fiction? That's the same as what every other woman in world goes through too.
There's an entire show about women who almost flush their babies down the toilet. Can you imagine pulling it back out of the ubend by the umbilical cord?
I really wish we knew whether those Janeway and Paris salamanders were super intelligent/developed.. whatever or if this was the end result of an inevitable de-evolution millions of years from now. If the babies were advanced super beings, like slimy Organians, then it might have been very dangerous to take them on board.
This is how I imagine it... Tuvok had to send a different aide at the end of the month to hand deliver the accumulated fines for Janeway refusing to pick all the Salamander scat from her morning walks with her children.
I've not seen it in years, but why does Paris kidnap Janeway in the first place? Instinct to breed? Seems he could have grabbed Kes or Torres. And how did Janeway mutate so fast when it took several days for Tom? More importantly, did Tom and his Dad dip into the same well?
Opportunity? he might have been able to delay his mating urge till the best possible female was proximal but, also his ability to make a successful escape would have been a much more important trigger than what woman he dragged off to his shuttle to ravage for days.