Standalone Or Serialized...

[DigificWriter]

Not to beat a dead horse, but this idea that Voyager is not Serialized is a fallacy perpetuated by people who haven't actually watched the series in its entirety... or even in its proper order.

There exists a subgenre in television programming that I refer to as the "Serialized Procedural", and Voyager is a seminal example of it (other examples being Bones, Fringe, Elementary, The X-Files, Chicago Fire, and Haven, just to name a few).

 

[BillJ]

Not to beat a dead horse, but this idea that Voyager is not Serialized is a fallacy...

It is very, very loose serialization.

Personally, if I can pick an episode at any point in time across seven seasons and not be lost, I consider it episodic.

 

[DigificWriter]

It is very, very loose serialization.

This is not correct.

Voyager's serialization manifests itself in the form of the overall progression of the ship's journey homeward, the development and progression of individual characters' personal stories, and a reliance on multipart episodes and interconnected arcs that progress and build on one another.

if I can pick an episode at any point in time across seven seasons and not be lost, I consider it episodic.

That's an extremely outdated and very "black-and-white" viewpoint that actually misses the point of what Voyager and the other shows I mentioned above offer.

Yes, you can watch almost any given episode of Voyager and get a basic understanding of what's happening , but that's all you're getting: a basic barebones picture that has no nuance and doesn't actually allow you to enjoy and appreciate the series.

The thing that makes "Serialized Procedural" series like those I mentioned appealing is that they offer, if you'll pardon the expression, the "best of both worlds" because casual viewers can come into an episode and not be lost while those who have been following along week-to-week are able to track the progression of the larger "meta-narrative" as it pertains to the characters and the overall premise of the series.

 

[CorporalClegg]

That's not serialization, that's conceptual pretense.

 

[BillJ]

This is not correct.

Of course it's not.

 

[jaime]

It is very, very loose serialization.

Personally, if I can pick an episode at any point in time across seven seasons and not be lost, I consider it episodic.

I can do that with most ‘serialised’ television now, to roughly the same extent doable in Voyager, so on this one I disagree.

 

[DigificWriter]

That's not serialization, that's conceptual pretense.

In the interest of not derailing the thread, here's two quick examples of how Voyager's serialized elements manifest themselves:
- Despite Jennifer Lien's departure, the episode Year of Hell is a direct sequel to the episode Before and After

- The events of the episode Basics are the culmination of a seasons-spanning narrative arc involving Seska and the Kazon that begins, in general, with the episode Caretaker and, in specific, with the episode State of Flux

 

[BillJ]

- Despite Jennifer Lien's departure, the episode Year of Hell is a direct sequel to the episode Before and After

And "The Trouble with Tribbles" and "The Day of the Dove" are both direct sequels to "Errand of Mercy", as the Organian Peace Treaty plays a part in both.

- The events of the episode Basics are the culmination of a seasons-spanning narrative arc involving Seska and the Kazon that begins, in general, with the episode Caretaker and, in specific, with the episode State of Flux

And Spock is an evolving character throughout TOS, and into the movies.

Voyager is about as serialized as either TOS or TNG. That was exactly what UPN wanted.

 

[eschaton]

Not to beat a dead horse, but this idea that Voyager is not Serialized is a fallacy perpetuated by people who haven't actually watched the series in its entirety... or even in its proper order.

Voyager's only real attempt at doing a plot arc was in Season 2, with the whole Seska/Suder/Kazon stuff. It was a terrible season of Voyager overall, which might be why they abandoned this embryonic serialization thereafter. I suppose you could count recurring characters like Naomi Wildman and the borg children later in the series as well.

Otherwise, there really wasn't much. For example, Seven and the Doctor had no real forward character movement. Initially they both began developing into more "human" characters, but then they would regress as was needed for the plot. And then there were the "no arc" characters like Kim, Chakotay, Neelix, etc. Paris/Torres eventually happened of course, which changed Tom's character, but it didn't really do much to change Bels.

Overall, VOY was the least serialized Trek other than TOS (which barely even mentioned events which happened in previous episodes). Even TNG, which is far from a serial, had a fairly large cast of recurring characters and gave Worf an actual character arc eventually due to Ron Moore's writing - far more than Voyager ever did.

 

[BillJ]

...TOS (which barely even mentioned events which happened in previous episodes).

Which really isn't correct. TOS did its fair share of callbacks to other episodes.

 

[DigificWriter]

Voyager's only real attempt at doing a plot arc was in Season 2, with the whole Seska/Suder/Kazon stuff. It was a terrible season of Voyager overall, which might be why they abandoned this embryonic serialization thereafter. I suppose you could count recurring characters like Naomi Wildman and the borg children later in the series as well.

Otherwise, there really wasn't much. For example, Seven and the Doctor had no real forward character movement. Initially they both began developing into more "human" characters, but then they would regress as was needed for the plot. And then there were the "no arc" characters like Kim, Chakotay, Neelix, etc. Paris/Torres eventually happened of course, which changed Tom's character, but it didn't really do much to change Bels.

Overall, VOY was the least serialized Trek other than TOS (which barely even mentioned events which happened in previous episodes). Even TNG, which is far from a serial, had a fairly large cast of recurring characters and gave Worf an actual character arc eventually due to Ron Moore's writing - far more than Voyager ever did.

There are multiple inaccuracies in this post, the least of which is the aforementioned Seska/Kazon arc, which as noted spans 9 episodes across 3 seasons.

Other Voyager story arcs, in specific, include the Q Civil War, the Borg Queen's personal obsession with Voyager, the Species 8472/Borg war and Voyager's role in it, and the Pathfinder Project and its role in getting Voyager home, all of which play out across multiple episodes and seasons.

 

[eschaton]

Which really isn't correct. TOS did its fair share of callbacks to other episodes.

They were, for the most part, blink and you'll miss them moments though. Nothing like a coherent character arc exists for anyone, even Kirk. Hell, it wasn't until TAS we even got true sequels to TOS episodes.

There are multiple inaccuracies in this post, the least of which is the aforementioned Seska/Kazon arc, which as noted spans 9 episodes across 3 seasons.

Other Voyager story arcs, in specific, include the Q Civil War, the Borg Queen's personal obsession with Voyager, the Species 8472/Borg war and Voyager's role in it, and the Pathfinder Project and its role in getting Voyager home, all of which play out across multiple episodes and seasons.

I don't think you understand what serialization is. A true serial is basically one long story which is told in smaller installments. It grew out of the Victorian habit of publishing books in magazines - or as standalone pamphlets - a chapter at a time. No Trek show has been a true serial. DS9, ENT, and DIS have played around with semi-serialization. Semi-serialized TV does not tell one big story, but the plot developments earlier in the series are integral to the plots going forward, and characters develop over time. A good example of this is the last season of DS9, where even if you discount the final serialized arc, every single episode builds on elements which were developed earlier in the series.

Voyager doesn't really even display semi-serialization, aside from the second-season arc that I noted already. The writer's room had no particular plans for the characters, or for the show at large other than getting home by the last episode. They just broke stories, which sometimes happened to bring back recurring characters. At the end of each show the status quo was more or less back to normal, and any realizations which happened to the characters would never be brought up again. A great example of how they messed this up was with Torres being "born again" into the Klingon religion in Barge of the Dead. Not only was nothing ever done with this, but in the final season in Prophecy she tells religious Klingons explicitly that she doesn't have faith. If VOY was truly serialized the ball wouldn't have been dropped like this.

 

[DigificWriter]

They were, for the most part, blink and you'll miss them moments though. Nothing like a coherent character arc exists for anyone, even Kirk. Hell, it wasn't until TAS we even got true sequels to TOS episodes.



I don't think you understand what serialization is. A true serial is basically one long story which is told in smaller installments. It grew out of the Victorian habit of publishing books in magazines - or as standalone pamphlets - a chapter at a time. No Trek show has been a true serial. DS9, ENT, and DIS have played around with semi-serialization. Semi-serialized TV does not tell one big story, but the plot developments earlier in the series are integral to the plots going forward, and characters develop over time. A good example of this is the last season of DS9, where even if you discount the final serialized arc, every single episode builds on elements which were developed earlier in the series.

Voyager doesn't really even display semi-serialization, aside from the second-season arc that I noted already. The writer's room had no particular plans for the characters, or for the show at large other than getting home by the last episode. They just broke stories, which sometimes happened to bring back recurring characters. At the end of each show the status quo was more or less back to normal, and any realizations which happened to the characters would never be brought up again. A great example of how they messed this up was with Torres being "Born Again" into the Klingon Religion in Barge of the Dead. Not only was nothing ever done with this, but in the final season in Prophecy she tells religious Klingons explicitly that she doesn't have faith. If VOY was truly serialized the ball wouldn't have been dropped like this.

I think you're mistaking a narrative "status update" in which the writers let us know that B'Lanna's "aethiestic" point-of-view hasn't changed despite what she experienced in that episode for the writers forgetting that she actually had those experiences at all.

You're also overexaggerating the degree to which Voyager used the "reset button" and how it affected the overall progression of serialized character narrative for the series, as well as ignoring what I said about Voyager being a "Serialized Procedural".

 

[Rahul]

VOY had quite a few plot threads that developed over time - especially the characters grew and developed more than on any other Trek series except DS9. Prime example being the Tom Paris - B'Elanna Torres relationship and Seven of Nine's growth as a character and becoming part of the crew. Other, smaller relationships also developed over time, Tom's relationship with his father, the Janeway-Chakotay early romance/relationship, Janeway becoming a more hardened leader and later a more motherly mentor to Seven again, the Doctor starting out as the character that had to learn how humans work vs. him later teaching that same thing to Seven, Harry's growth from a greenhorn to a professional (although never raising in rank...), Chakotay reconciling with his spiritual side, Naom's growth, and many, many more.

There were some major plot changes to the status quo as well: The Doctor gaining his personal emmiter, the first contact with Earth was a major milestone as well, species and regions were left behind as the Voyager moved on during it's journey, and lots and lots of plot threads (Borg/8472, the Hirogen and holotechnology) all were visited and revisited multiple times and had a very clear story progress.

But all that being said: Every single episode was stand-alone.

After the episode was over (weather it was a two-parter or a single episode), that plot was resolved. If it was revisited, they had a completely new story that continued that plot. NOT a single, serialized story arc. The actual progression of characters and plots happened always in the background of the episdes, it was never the A-plot so to speak.

So yeah, @DigificWriter is right in that there were many serialized elements in that show. But the show itself as a whole surely wasn't.

 

[CorporalClegg]

None of that is indicative of serialization.

 

[gblews]

There exists a subgenre in television programming that I refer to as the "Serialized Procedural", and Voyager is a seminal example of it (other examples being Bones, Fringe, Elementary, The X-Files, Chicago Fire, and Haven, just to name a few).

Yes, I thought X-Files and Voy were particularly similar in the way they were structured. Both had an overall multi season arc, Voy trying to return to the alpha quadrant and the X-Files mystery of Mulder's sister and the alien story. Each show would carve out a certain number of arc episodes for every season, sandwiched around groups of standalones.

This format is actually pretty old. The old sixties show, The Fugitive was set up the same way. There was an over arcing story, Richard Kimble's hunt for the one armed man who killed his wife. The seasons would be filled out with a few arc stories and standalones.

All three of the shows wrapped up their over arcing stories in the shows' final season.

 

[Krandor]

Voyager was designed to be very non-serial so that it could be sold into syndication. DS9 never really did that well in syndication because it was more serialized and you couldn't as easily hop in at any point. As was stated that is what UPN wanted becase at the time the money was in the syndication market and the most successful syndicated shows were one could could fine in on monday and then not again till thursday and not be lost.

I have also always thought that voyager was the show that really needed more serialization then they did. I could buy straight episodic in TOS/TNG because there is always the "out" of they just went to a starbase in between episodes for repairs. Voyager didn't have that. If something was broke in one episode it should still be broke the next. There was even an interesting option where you could actually have the ship itself change as over time it got more and more alien devices added to it because that is what was available and culminating in something like year from hell being a full season story where you saw the ship get in worse and worse shape from week to week. I also think with more serialization the story of the maquis could have been developed a lot more instead of what we got which was where just a few episodes in they were just regular members of the crew. That would have been a good story that could be done if you don't have to reset after each episode.

Voyager being out in nowhere with no way to easily get repairs, etc from starfleet could have not a lot more with serialized elements but UPN wanted it to be easily syndicated so we got a few two parters and mostly the TOS/TNG "reset switch" at the start of each episode.

 

[eschaton]

I have also always thought that voyager was the show that really needed more serialization then they did. I could buy straight episodic in TOS/TNG because there is always the "out" of they just went to a starbase in between episodes for repairs. Voyager didn't have that. If something was broke in one episode it should still be broke the next. There was even an interesting option where you could actually have the ship itself change as over time it got more and more alien devices added to it because that is what was available and culminating in something like year from hell being a full season story where you saw the ship get in worse and worse shape from week to week. I also think with more serialization the story of the maquis could have been developed a lot more instead of what we got which was where just a few episodes in they were just regular members of the crew. That would have been a good story that could be done if you don't have to reset after each episode.

Voyager being out in nowhere with no way to easily get repairs, etc from starfleet could have not a lot more with serialized elements but UPN wanted it to be easily syndicated so we got a few two parters and mostly the TOS/TNG "reset switch" at the start of each episode.

I'd agree with this. But I'd add to me the most important factor. The relatively small crew roster and the total inability to do crew rotations (unless more Delta Quadrant natives like Neelix came onboard) meant there was a golden opportunity to have lots of recurring guest characters who popped up as needed for plots. VOY did this a tiny bit, with Seska, Icheb and the other Borg children, Samantha Wildman, Hogan, Vorik, Micheal Jonas, etc. But it could have done this quite a bit more. Indeed, a stripped-down VOY cast with say 6 main cast instead of 9, and another dozen plus recurring characters as needed, would have fit the format better.

 

[CorporalClegg]

Voyager being out in nowhere with no way to easily get repairs, etc from starfleet could have not a lot more with serialized elements but UPN wanted it to be easily syndicated so we got a few two parters and mostly the TOS/TNG "reset switch" at the start of each episode.

Which is exactly why the show "trying to get home" isn't evidence of serialization. At any given time, the ship's relative position to home was every bit as arbitrary as it was in TNG. The trying to get home aspect was nothing more than a superficial pretext and never plot relevant.

 

[Rahul]

Well, the relative position at any time of the show dictated what type of aliens they met.

Once they left the Kazon and Vidiian space, those species only ever appeared in flashbacks or timetravel episodes anymore. The Voyager crossed the Borg space between season 3 and 4, after that the Borg continued to show up (because of their superiour travel speed), but only ever as single ships. Once they reached a point where communication with Earth could be established, that was a constant on the show.

However you spin it, the journey of the Voyager has very clear and obvious "steps", and the regions are more clearly defined by travel times than in any other Trek show ever, where a journey between Earth and Kronos could take everything from weeks to hours.

Again: Voyager is really not a serialized show. But that is because every single episode has a singular plot that is resolved one way or another at the end of the episode. But plot threads get revisited regularly, and have a clear progression. The series absolutely has serialized storytelling elements, period.