• Welcome! The TrekBBS is the number one place to chat about Star Trek with like-minded fans.
    If you are not already a member then please register an account and join in the discussion!

Biggest problem with "Voyager" is that they didn't really take any chances.

They'd think "Wait, this happened to James Kirk and Jean-Luc Picard too and they got out of it fine...I have to hold out hope that the same will be for us."

No they wouldn't.

They'd be cowering in their quarters, weeping. Because based on Kirk and Picard's precedent, anyone who doesn't spend a majority of their time on the bridge is probably gonna be fucked.
 
All I can see is the mind numbing word 'docking'. Voyager goes in for a service and gets stuck on some dreary planet or station.
"All I can see is the mind numbing word 'exploring.' Enterprise goes to explore something and gets stuck in orbit of some dreary planet or station."

You can pretty much make ANYTHING suck if you try hard enough. You're being obnoxiously disingenuous with your replies, but you didn't actually answer my question.

Can you spot the difference there?
 
Hang on I have to go back and find the question again, but interesting comment about making anything suck if you try hard enough.

Right time to be noxiously ingenuous.
 
Exactly.

There's only one plot line I DON'T want to see:

Ship docks for repairs, but the station's power source uses a phased-modulated quantum inverter that somehow reacted with our bio-neural gel packs to produce a resonance field, and now the entire crew is regressing back to their childhoods.

See if you can spot the difference there.
You want to see a docking of the ship in both scenarios, yes? (And I mean it when I say docking is boring. Exploring not boring).
One docking is for repairs alone. A story develops.
One docking is for repairs but an incompatibility with the Intrepid Class technology of Voyager (eg. its gel packs) and the systems of the docking station.. creates the story.

One example is old school broken deck and planetary mayhem. One example is broken deck and Voyager's technology and planetary mayhem.
 
I am not too keen on the idea of self-building starships, no. When the Enterprise-D got thrashed by the Borg, they had to put into space dock for a few weeks just to make all those repairs.

Voyager, on the other hand, had four entire decks TORN OUT and the entire ship converted into an enormous holodeck by the Hirogen...

Yeah, that's not exactly "lightbulb" work right there.:whistle:
What's this about 4 entire decks AND the entire ship turned into a holodeck? Which is it?

Voyager has 2 holodecks. They are either 2 or 3 decks tall. In The Killing Game, they enlarge those two holodecks by cutting through the surrounding walls, but are still using just the two holodecks. They also began adding holo-projector things in the corridors all over the ship, but never had a chance to use them.

At the end, Janeway mentions that the damage is extensive, and we don't hear about it again. The next episode could be a month later. Since this is the only instance out of 172 episodes, I think a little forgiveness is reasonable. It's not as though the Jem Hadar launched a surprise attack, blew to pieces one of Voyager's warp engines, only to have it appear back on the ship a week later with no explanation.

This isn't an HBO miniseries, or a soap opera after all. It's a Star Trek 26 episode science fiction series.

EDIT: It might also be useful to point out that the 26 episode season is divided into 4 parts. 6 episodes (weekly)in the early fall with a break in October, then six more episodes and a break around Christmas to January, and so on.

The Killing game was the final episode of the third seasonal quarter. It aired on March 8th, 1998. The first episode of the fourth seasonal quarter(Vis-a-vis) aired on April 8th, 1998. Almost a month later.

It was followed by 5 more episodes, plus the season finale(Hope & Fear) which concluded the seasonal arc.
 
Last edited:
The next episode could be a month later.

Killing Game stardate 51715.2. The following episode was Stardate 51762.4

So according to STOnlines stardate calculator, the gap is around two weeks. Take away a day or so, to allow for the 3rd Part of Killing Game.
 
You know it amazes me people can't imagine time passing IU between episodes

One can imagine time passing between episodes, but one questions were they got all these spare parts from. As we are told they have NO way to replace their torpedeos. This would tend to indicate large scale replication is impossible, even if they didn't have a replicator big enough i.e an Industrial replicator they could perhaps construct one. But if they could construct one they would have a way to replace their torpedeos. So logically they can't build one, perhaps because the replicators onboard couldn't replicate some components needed to construct one. As we know not everything can be replciated i.e latinum (after all if latinum could be replicated it would be worthless as a currency)

Now sure they could perhaps have salvaged/traded for the missing components but it's sloppy writting not to mention this i.e in a Ship's Log in an episode. Sure it might seem inconsequential to some but doing what they did basically says the viewers are idiots they'll never remember something we mentioned X period of time ago. And yes some audiance members won't but some will.

Take the trip home at TMP speeds it would take ~50 years to do the journey. Earth to Vulcan in 4 days as Vulcan is 16ly away this gives us a speed of 4ly/day. And we don't even know if that was at full speed or crusing speed. Or what about in TNG's WNHGB where it will take the Enterprise-D over three hundred years to get home, If it was over 400 you would expect to have been told over fourhundred so we could reasnable deduce that it would take between 300-399 years. Which would mean VOY journey would take at most ~20 years.

Now sure I guess VOY warp coils could have been damaged which limited their speed to say Warp 8 or so but they didn't do that.

And yes all the Trek shows have been guilty of this so don't feel I'm out to get VOY. Every TV show has it's flaws, and what each member of the audiance is willing to over look varies.

Sure I can enjoy VOY what it is but is it wrong to think it could have been so much more? And yes some of the charactes appealed to me, I would say the EMH and Seven.

As they intergrated new technology into the ship from various races to replace/repair what they had, we could have seen improvements in some system and the opposite in others. Give the ship a more lived in feel as the crew accepts this might become a more generational ship.

Question what if anything would VOY's most ardent fans change about it?
 
As we are told they have NO way to replace their torpedeos
That was said relatively shortly after the ship was brought to the delta quad and was heavily damaged in the process. Later much of the damage was repaired.

Although I've alway felt that they never completely repaired all the damage.
 
That was said relatively shortly after the ship was brought to the delta quad and was heavily damaged in the process. Later much of the damage was repaired.

Although I've alway felt that they never completely repaired all the damage.

But if it was simply a matter of repairing damage, then they would have a way to replace them. Now you can argue it was a bad line that should never have been there in the first place but that isn't the case. The writerrs drew our attention to it, it's nopt the fault of the viewer if they call them on it when they simply ignore it instread of say a line drop at the end of a log.

Cpatains Log starfdate 49345.2 We have just departed Boralis V where we have replensihed our supplies and Engineering reports they have found away to repleace our photon torpedeos.

The exact method doesnt really matter, but saying the situation has changed does.
 
Question what if anything would VOY's most ardent fans change about it?

I'd have made Voyager actually be an Ancient Alien Starship they got from the Caretaker (what he and his people used to come here to begin with). And I'd explain the ship had weaponry powerful enough to slice apart several Borg Cubes, an auto-repair system and was meant to sustain a crew of several thousand meaning a crew of mere hundreds can be sustained even better.

Unfortunately it's run by an AI that isn't always very cooperative with the crew, so they have to work out an arrangement with him since he's not that interested in taking them home to the Alpha Quadrant. He wants to fly around the rest of the Galaxy.
 
I mean it when I say docking is boring.
Not necessarily.
To view this content we will need your consent to set third party cookies.
For more detailed information, see our cookies page.

Exploring not boring.
ALSO not necessarily.

One docking is for repairs alone. A story develops.
One docking is for repairs but an incompatibility with the Intrepid Class technology of Voyager (eg. its gel packs) and the systems of the docking station.. creates the story.

One example is old school broken deck and planetary mayhem. One example is broken deck and Voyager's technology and planetary mayhem.
Almost there.

I'll give you a hint: one of them is a story that develops because of a conflict between PEOPLE, and is eventually resolved by the actions of people.

The other is a story that develops because of incomprehensible technobabble, and is eventually resolved by incomprehensible technobabble.

In the first story, the problem is caused by the competing motivations of protagonists, antagonists, and and possibly a moral dilemma that one or both of them has to deal with. In the second story, both the problem AND the solution are ex machina plot devices, and the characters are almost irrelevant.

And this has been my experience with Voyager since Caretaker. The series has some really great episodes, and it also has some really shit episodes, and it also has some really shit moments in otherwise great episodes. The shit moments/episodes all have one important thing in common: they happen when characters (and/or their dialog) are trying to be clever, at the expense of being relatable.

Much like the examples I gave in the post you didn't bother to read. Toskit telling Kim and Torres that their food is delivered "every one point four intervals" tells us that Toskit is very clever and really good at counting intervals. But it doesn't actually tell us how often the Caretaker feeds them, so the information is meaningless.

Imagine, on the other hand, if Toskit says "The food dispensers give us a random meal just after sunrise and just before sunset. Enough for our daily needs." This actually tells us three important things:
1) The Ocampa only take their meals at per-determined times of the day, and have for many years
2) The Ocampa have no say in what they get to eat or how much
3) On some level, even Toskit would like to get a little bit more, but elects to be satisfied with "enough for our daily needs."

Because the whole premise of "Caretaker" is that the Ocampa have become so dependent on the Caretaker that they can barely think for themselves and have become like a race of children, and going forward there's a question about how they are going to survive after their energy and food run out. These are questions you can ponder after the episode airs, and maybe revisit in a novel or a later episode. On the other hand, the question of "Exactly how long is one point four intervals?" isn't all that interesting; it's a complete waste of words, and ultimate, a wasted scene.

The spinoff series all had a tendency to waste words in this way, but only Voyager took it to such extremes that it became a distraction, or in some cases, the foundations of entire episodes.
 
Not necessarily.
To view this content we will need your consent to set third party cookies.
For more detailed information, see our cookies page.


ALSO not necessarily.


Almost there.

I'll give you a hint: one of them is a story that develops because of a conflict between PEOPLE, and is eventually resolved by the actions of people.

The other is a story that develops because of incomprehensible technobabble, and is eventually resolved by incomprehensible technobabble.

In the first story, the problem is caused by the competing motivations of protagonists, antagonists, and and possibly a moral dilemma that one or both of them has to deal with. In the second story, both the problem AND the solution are ex machina plot devices, and the characters are almost irrelevant.

Let me present to you a scenario, someone has hijacked Voyager's transporters and are using them to teleport people off the ship.

Janeway: Can you cut the power?

Paris: I cant! (teleported).

Wouldn't you feel a little peeved that they never explained WHY they can't stop this fellow and just "Can't"?

Wouldn't you want SOME kind of explanation?
 
Question what if anything would VOY's most ardent fans change about it?
Make their problems simpler, and make their solutions harder.

For all of these repetitive "It would be boring to watch an episode where they have to repair the ship!" it's kind of amazing that nobody remembers "Mudd's Women" or "Paradise Syndrome" where critical damage to the engines (and their inability to repair it on their own) was a major plot element. There's "Requiem for Methuselah" where the entire story hinges on their ability to convince Flint to give them a cure for virulent disease, and "Where No Man Has Gone Before" where their otherwise stranded starship has to fly to Delta Vega after getting thrashed in the great barrier.

In TNG, alot of their mechanical problems are caused by elaborate technobabble, but we STILL end up with episodes like "Contagion" and "The Last Outpost" where the crew is in very real danger of starving/freezing to death unless somebody can figure out how to correct the problem at great personal risk. DS9 had a few of these too; "Civil Defense" being one of the more amusing ones, where the basic problem is the fact that Cardassians are so fucking paranoid that they've rigged the entire station with booby traps that even its former commander didn't fully know about.

Drama doesn't need complex problems or complex explanations. It just needs a conflict, a solution, and an element of danger.
 
Let me present to you a scenario, someone has hijacked Voyager's transporters and are using them to teleport people off the ship.

Janeway: Can you cut the power?

Paris: I cant! (teleported).

Wouldn't you feel a little peeved that they never explained WHY they can't stop this fellow and just "Can't"?
Yes. Which is why I found it extremely annoying when Voyager did exactly this, repeatedly, in like a dozen episodes.

Of course, if you're not making technology do all of the work for you, there's an easy way around that:

Janeway: Cut the power!
Paris: Got it! Power's cut. Now I just... aw crap!... <teleported>

Wouldn't you want SOME kind of explanation?
Explanation, yes.
Exposition, no.
 
One can imagine time passing between episodes, but one questions were they got all these spare parts from. As we are told they have NO way to replace their torpedeos. This would tend to indicate large scale replication is impossible, even if they didn't have a replicator big enough i.e an Industrial replicator they could perhaps construct one. But if they could construct one they would have a way to replace their torpedeos. So logically they can't build one, perhaps because the replicators onboard couldn't replicate some components needed to construct one. As we know not everything can be replciated i.e latinum (after all if latinum could be replicated it would be worthless as a currency)

Now sure they could perhaps have salvaged/traded for the missing components but it's sloppy writting not to mention this i.e in a Ship's Log in an episode. Sure it might seem inconsequential to some but doing what they did basically says the viewers are idiots they'll never remember something we mentioned X period of time ago. And yes some audiance members won't but some will.

Take the trip home at TMP speeds it would take ~50 years to do the journey. Earth to Vulcan in 4 days as Vulcan is 16ly away this gives us a speed of 4ly/day. And we don't even know if that was at full speed or crusing speed. Or what about in TNG's WNHGB where it will take the Enterprise-D over three hundred years to get home, If it was over 400 you would expect to have been told over fourhundred so we could reasnable deduce that it would take between 300-399 years. Which would mean VOY journey would take at most ~20 years.

Now sure I guess VOY warp coils could have been damaged which limited their speed to say Warp 8 or so but they didn't do that.

And yes all the Trek shows have been guilty of this so don't feel I'm out to get VOY. Every TV show has it's flaws, and what each member of the audiance is willing to over look varies.

Sure I can enjoy VOY what it is but is it wrong to think it could have been so much more? And yes some of the charactes appealed to me, I would say the EMH and Seven.

As they intergrated new technology into the ship from various races to replace/repair what they had, we could have seen improvements in some system and the opposite in others. Give the ship a more lived in feel as the crew accepts this might become a more generational ship.

Question what if anything would VOY's most ardent fans change about it?
They can replicate bulkheads. They also mention replicating hull plates for the Delta flyer, and what materials to "add to the ingredients." Building torpedoes wouldn't be an issue at all. I think it's the Matter/antimatter warhead that was the issue.

The writers actually kept a running torpedo count until season 5. They had eleven left when the season began, but eventually said screw it, we need more. A line of dialogue would have been nice, yes. Perhaps there was one and it was cut during editing then forgotten, I don't know, but when they mention being unable to replace them, it was in one of the first episodes. Seven actually helped them create new torpedoes...maybe she had something to do with it.

As for the distance and time, there is simply no way to know. There's a million variables to consider. Voyager was pretty consistent in tracking it's own progress. In TNG, speeds and times were plot driven, especially in the later seasons
 
Killing Game stardate 51715.2. The following episode was Stardate 51762.4

So according to STOnlines stardate calculator, the gap is around two weeks. Take away a day or so, to allow for the 3rd Part of Killing Game.
OK. So that's 18 days. Enough time for Tom to fall into a funk. Maybe the who killing game experience had him questioning his existence. He was working like 18 hour days, every day. B'elanna was working just as much in engineering. I'm guessing it took a lot of double shifts to fix the ship.
 
Yes. Which is why I found it extremely annoying when Voyager did exactly this, repeatedly, in like a dozen episodes.

? I don't get your complaint. Are you pissed they DID explain stuff or that they didn't? Because you're complaining that they give explanations for everything.

Or are you not liking that they give fancy future-talk explanations instead of banal, straightforward ones?
 
There is heavy technobabble in early season 1, but that really mellows out fast. I think they were trying to create some realism using contemporary theories. If you watch episodes like Parallax, The cloud, eye of the needle, it's startling how techy they get compared to season 2 onwards, but those episodes still had stories to them that had nothing to do with the technobabble.
 
If you are not already a member then please register an account and join in the discussion!

Sign up / Register


Back
Top