By now, Q and the Continuum are superficial, if not outright
Flanderized. But, yeah, the scenes between Q and Janeway, jocular as they were, always created a decent chuckle when in the right mood. But the rest of the story and reasons for the sophomoric humor? That's when I turn the channel, but at least it's one episode down with 25 to go. Not to mention, warts and all, I'd put Q² above this one and not because it's the only episode title of the only show to use a squared value in its name anywhere... apart from maybe "The Big Bang Theory" but I have my doubts and am ² lazy to look it up...
Essays are great! More people should do it. Like the song lyrics, not everybody does it but everybody should!
Seeing ST6 given a slight retcon as well as focusing more on a secondary plot that the movie could or would not actually do allows for some interesting plotting. Not sure on how Tuvok's imagining things seamlessly fit in, but it is a bit more creative than asking for a holodeck program, and as holodeck malfunction episodes were really trite by now it's a clever way to get around it. It's an anniversary story so it really is about sitting back and enjoying what it is trying to do, even if it stumbles. Like your new puppy not understanding the difference between newspaper and hardwood floor...
The episode did have a couple of clunker lines that made most of TNG season 1 stand out positively by comparison, what with Janeway badmouthing the crew of 100 years prior to her. An interesting moment, it's both a sledgehammer and a moment of inspiration as, in Trekland, what happened 100 years ago was quite a different context and genuinely wasn't as perfect as Janeway's time was. Janeway's a bit of a historian then and she's not necessarily wrong, either... plus, a year or two later and she gets to put down the "no fraternizing" law on Harry despite centuries of Rikers and Kirks creating new disease strains across the galaxy...
