Your views on Species 8472?

[2takesfrakes]

Personally, I thought everything about the species was daft and I particularly hated the atrocious CGI renderings employed to realize it. The STAR TREK special effects staff is under tremendous time and budgetary constraints, I know that. But they bit off more than they could chew, with species 8472. The idea, itself, of Humanity facing an adversary even more badass than the Borg is an intriguing one and was worthy of investigation. It should've been, maybe, investigated a little further, before they unleashed this travesty upon us.

 

[Triskelion]

Well any excuse to see Ray Walston on the screen is OK by me. But 8472 started out as genocidal bigots, too, a fact conveniently overlooked. Ray made them nice and cozy like an episode of "My Favorite Species 8472". I kept waiting for him to give Chakotay dating advice.

So like the Borg, their unstoppable malevolence was soon rendered a formulaic technobabble technicality and foregone conclusion. This is one of my main criticisms of this series: the plot dictated the effectiveness of the scitech, and not consistently.

For example, in Latent Image, they needed a death so they made Jetal's injury so improbably technical that only a surgeon could provide triage, and only to one patient at a time. Yet all he does is wave a device at her - and Tom couldn't have even tried doing that? It is all so convenient and rushed almost an afterthought. Did the aliens who shot them even need a motive? A MacGuffin? Any reason at all? They disappeared as mysteriously as they appeared once their plot point was set in motion.

Too formulaic, which is why the series had ratings issues by season 4, IMO. (Solution: More T&A! More T&A! Yeah, that's the ticket)! They had everything down too pat. IT WASN'T FRESH, it was predictable, it was a technobabble manipulation called plot. Oh, Rachel has a new job! Oh, she didn't get it and she was fired! Oh, she got another offer in Paris! Oh, her old job asked her back! Oh, her Paris job offered more money so she refused! Oh, her NY job offered more money and she accepted! Oh, now she is whining about her never-before mentioned lifelong dream of living in Paris! Oh, Ross flip flops and tells her she should go! Oh, she will, will she? Will she?? She's ON THE PLANE - GUESS WHAT?? Ugh, such cheap manipulation that is somehow supposed to hold viewer interest throughout a series?

Well what do I know, Friends was huge. I think it was the clothes, saturated colors and the dialogue; but the plots were paper thin. Anyway, what was I on about? 8472. Trapped in the Neutered Zone. Like the writers.

 

[Catarina]

I wanted to like the 'we're just misunderstood nice aliens' but I couldn't. it seemed like a cop out to move the alien out of the way for a new story arc.

 

[jpch]

By far the most intimidating race of all Star Trek. To clarify something about the Episode '' In the Flesh'' during VOY season 5, Janeway managed a deal with 8472, specifically the commanding officer there only, but we had no idea the way it went.
In addition it is referenced by producers that Star Trek online is canon, in that continuation the 8472 are revealed to be called Undine and they attack the Alpha Quadrant and begin another invasion of our Galaxy.
So! the 8472 character is not ruined nor are they turned into weak Aliens !

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

In addition it is referenced by producers that Star Trek online is canon

No, it isn't.

The backstory of Star Trek Online is only applicable to the game itself, and nowhere else.

 

[Paradise City]

My view on species 8472 is that they are a contrivance. They were put in to be the all-powerful antagonist that can beat the Borg and they were not really well thought through.

They go from being space hornets promising galactic apocalypse to catching the federation flu and then they wind up having a heart to heart in the conference room dressed in Starfleet uniforms! Talk about being defanged.

So I think species 8472 are a bit silly tbh.

 

[Spot261]

In addition it is referenced by producers that Star Trek online is canon,

Where is this reference?

AFAIK CBS's policy has always been quite clear that games and novels are licensed and not part of canon, although the canon policy has been removed from their site. From Star Trek.com, this:

As a rule of thumb, the events that take place within the live-action episodes and movies are canon, or official Star Trekfacts. Story lines, characters, events, stardates, etc. that take place within the fictional novels, video games, the Animated Series, and the various comic lines have traditionally not been considered part of the canon.

 

[Anwar]

My view on species 8472 is that they are a contrivance. They were put in to be the all-powerful antagonist that can beat the Borg and they were not really well thought through.

The Borg themselves were never that well-thought either, but no one held that against them.

 

[Paradise City]

The Borg themselves were never that well-thought either, but no one held that against them.

I think the Borg not being thought through hurt the Borg as well. It's a common criticism of the Borg post-TBOBW.

 

[Anwar]

I think the Borg not being thought through hurt the Borg as well. It's a common criticism of the Borg post-TBOBW.

The Borg as they were in Q Who? and BOBW were really only good as a one-shot enemy.

They should've explained that the Cube seen in Q Who? and BOBW had gotten its hands on some piece of ancient alien tech it found on some dead world that augmented its power several times over, and that no other Borg Vessel was that strong. It would've made them easier to re-use later.

 

[at Quark's]

I agree with that first Anwar post. They felt like a species that was only invented to occupy the niche required for the story as a foe one-upping the Borg. They didn't really get any decent characterisation, or motives for their wish to purge our galaxy, beyond that vague Kes statement about our galaxy being impure and our proximity being a threat to their genetic integrity (what did they even mean by that, exactly? Were they afraid that future members of the 8472 species might be tempted to crossbreed with inferior humanoids from our galaxy?).

 

[Rambo]

Ah I loved species 8472. It was nice to see an interestingly designed alien for a change (instead of a bumpy forehead). I loved the idea of fluid space and their perceived lack of motive and the fact that they were not interested in communicating with humans at all. I agree that they may have been made a bit too powerful but I would have loved to have seen them in a few more episodes. What happened to them in that awful In The Flesh episode was pathetic and badly thought out. I loved the mystery behind them and the fact that we knew so little about them made them all the more interesting. So many alien races are humanised in star trek that after a while things start to get a little stale, it was nice to have a mysterious and powerful race to spice things up for once. I wish they had been kept that way.

 

[A Chimpanzee & 2 Trainees]

I liked In The Flesh. I understand the criticism that 8472 was neutered, but I treated it as us seeing the real 8472. When we meet them, they are already in a war with the Borg, so it gave the perspective that all this "Your galaxy will be purged" stuff was wartime propaganda. When Voyager stumbles into the conflict, the Borg is all they know of our galaxy, then the only other race they encounter ends up helping them.

The infiltration of Starfleet is precisely because they don't want to literally purge the Galaxy, but determine who is a threat and who isn't. Do the Borg have allies beside the Federation? Once we destroy the Federation, who else will come after us for it? From their POV, Voyager's all they've seen of (unassimilated) humanity. At the very least 8472 needed to spend some time up front figuring out the best way to attack this new enemy

 

[Terok Nor]

I loved Species 8472 in the Scorpion 2 parter and the Prey episode. They were menacing in Scorpion but sympathetic in Prey. There were so many directions the writers could have gone in with this bizarre race from fluidic space but then along came In The Flesh and that was that. Goodbye, Species 8472. Pick your balls up at the desk on the way to oblivion.

 

[fireproof78]

I love Species 8472. One of my favorite Trek aliens. I think "In the Flesh" was actually an interesting way to go, given how powerful they were. It showed a little more intelligence to then than simply "Kill everything" like they were with the Borg. I was more than a little annoyed by the fact that they were just dropped, but, that's VOY for you. Where potential goes to die.

 

[Anwar]

I love Species 8472. One of my favorite Trek aliens. I think "In the Flesh" was actually an interesting way to go, given how powerful they were. It showed a little more intelligence to then than simply "Kill everything" like they were with the Borg. I was more than a little annoyed by the fact that they were just dropped, but, that's VOY for you. Where potential goes to die.

Having a hypercritical audience and a constrained premise which didn't allow much room for storytelling don't help.

 

[fireproof78]

Having a hypercritical audience and a constrained premise don't help.

Sell that some where else. You haven't convinced me that the audience en mass had unreasonable expectations or was predisposed to be antagonistic to VOY. VOY shot itself in both feet all on its own.

The premise is workable, if you have an end game (no pun intended). Also, doesn't change the wasted potential or how many times this has been rehashed.

Also, I still love Species 8472 and wish I had seen more of them.

 

[Anwar]

Sell that some where else. You haven't convinced me that the audience en mass had unreasonable expectations or was predisposed to be antagonistic to VOY.

Every single detractor constantly blathering on about how VOY magically should've been the best Trek of all time if it had slavishly followed the original (unsustainable) premise for 7 years straight speaks for itself.

Of course when VOY DID do something out of the ordinary (Living Witness, Scorpion, the Void, etc), those same people tear the stories apart in ways no other Trek had to endure.

The premise is workable, if you have an end game (no pun intended).

DS9 put the kibosh on that happening anytime before the last episode.
By which point it's far too late.

 

[fireproof78]

Every single detractor constantly blathering on about how VOY magically should've been the best Trek of all time if it had slavishly followed the original (unsustainable) premise for 7 years straight speaks for itself.

They never tried to work the premise out so we'll never know...rehash...rehash...rehash.

Also, that isn't the only argument that's being made. So, let's not paint such broad strokes, ok?

DS9 put the kibosh on that happening anytime before the last episode.
By which point it's far too late.

DS9 handicapped the production team of VOY? Wow, that's some amazing power they wield.

 

[Anwar]

They never tried to work the premise out so we'll never know...rehash...rehash...rehash.

We do know, from all the other shows with similar premises that all got canceled in half of Voyager's production life and how nearly all of them ran out of steam before they got canceled anyways.

Also, that isn't the only argument that's being made.

What others are there?

DS9 handicapped the production team of VOY? Wow, that's some amazing power they wield.

If VOY got back while DS9 was still on, that would mess up DS9's storyline. So they had to stay lost and never get past that until DS9 was done. By the time DS9 WAS done it was too late.