Doubt it would matter... Janeway's died 17 times already, to no avail. A New York cockroach would be easier to kill than Kathryn Janeway.
I was disappointed when they didn’t make it home until the last episode. The show was begging for an episode or two of reunions, reassimilation, Maquis issues, then some sort of full circle finale that calls them back together one last time.
Crappy time travel episodes are awful. It is like the last 7 years were pointless. If you can time travel, then nothing really matters because you can just go back and change anything you need until you get the result you want. Any decision you make is pointless and irrelevant.
Tell me about it. What made it worse was that they DID show you what happened to everyone... and then they @#*$!-ing ERASED THE TIMELINE!! Instead of telling us what happened to the crew, they devoted a sizable part of the episode telling us what didn't.
Season 6? Was it the horrible Spirit Folk? Kes' unfortunate return? The Borg kids? Not a fan of The Rock?
The fact that there were so many potential choices is a bit of a commentary in itself, I think. DS9 could have done an 8th season, under the right circumstances. Might have even been better for it. TNG and VOY were ready to call it quits at 7.
Sometimes the worst episodes have some pretty funny bits, though. A few randomly chosen examples... Q and the Gray: Q's attempt to seduce Janeway, complete with ♡-shaped bed. Spirit Folk: Harry's date gets called on account of unexpected bovinity. A Night in Sickbay: The dream sequence, the bat bit, the chainsaw ritual...
That episode when they destroyed Kes. OK, I did quit earlier on too after "The Gift". But I changed my mind later on because of compassion for the show and interest for the characters and borrowed VHS tapes to catch up with the episodes I'd skipped. But that episode in season 6 was the end of the line for me. I only watched "Endgame" after that but "Endgame" was also a big disappointment.
Endgame made several mistakes, I think... One, it went to a well that had already been gone to, with better episodes: "The Visitor" and "Timeless", to name two. Two, Admiral Janeway's plan was questionable at best. Convincing her younger self to leave the Borg transwarp conduit intact, allowing the destruction of countless billions of lives, just to save a handful on Voyager... not a good trade. Three, as I mentioned, showing us the timeline that was prevented, not the timeline that really happened. We know Janeway became an admiral and Seven joined an organization that we hadn't heard of until "Picard". But does Tom get to write his holonovels? Does the Doctor find love (or even get a name)? Does Harry get to be captain (or even lieutenant)? We were emotionally invested in these characters, after all.
The former 26-year journey timeline doesn't seem so bad after witnessing what has happened in the 7-year journey timeline. The episode would have had more resonance if it had upped the stakes. Tell the story completely from the viewpoint of Admiral Janeway, 26 years in the future; the Borg have become a menace to the Alpha Quadrant, they are now assimilating Federation systems and Starfleet are losing. Life once returning to the Alpha Quadrant wasn't so rosy after all; despite endless attempts at pushing back, the transwarp hub the Borg finally completed in the Delta Quadrant put the Federation at a disadvantage. Janeway hatches the idea to go back in time, back to when it was under construction, when Voyager stumbled across it being built, and take back their own Borg technology to use against them. Everything else then can stay the same for the overall episode, but by changing the stakes it feels that Janeway would get away with it if the Federation was as doomed as she made out.
Or they could have done something different and not ended the journey. With a "the journey is more important than the destination" toast at the end. I wonder how the fans would have reacted to that.
Star Trek: Voyager is, was and always revolve around the greatest of all time Captain, Kathryn Janeway, she destroyed the best possible option to return them to the bad lands and in End Game she established only a few crewmembers were important to her for her to risk her life to go back in time. I would've liked the G.O.A.T. to have some hindsight of what happened and have her be conflicted to what part in time she would go. For her, I would like to believe she valued all of the crew who were lost because of her stupid decision in destroying the Caretaker station. Kim's promotion is irrelevant because he as a character doesn't care about those external accomplishments he wants to go home. Internally, what I would've love to know did or any of the crew, especially of Starfleet, blamed her for her decision? I would've liked the G.O.A.T to have some sequences from her anti-time age where it showed how difficult it was to make such a decision and whether the acts she made created all new sorts of problems for the past, the present, and the future. I would've liked her not to be so sure whatever she's doing is or was the right decision; everything she thought would go right all of a sudden goes horribly wrong. The reason being is the G.O.A.T. can't underestimate the human equation, there's no way of knowing how the crew from the past will react to whatever is exposed? What if the Doctor discovered the super shields installed on Voyager had some phase resonance where it was harmful or lethal to the crew? Something her big brain didn't calculate when going back. The G.O.A.T. then discovered there's a large some of the crew who purposely made it harder to get home because they considered Voyager as home. That's conflict. VOY was too invested in the superficial then going directly into the internal factors of a crew being lost in space. I don't care what became of the crew when they got home because they showed their journey wasn't unique enough to have any consequence. For the G.O.A.T. and the crew it was like any other day in the world of Star Trek.
Kim's lack of promotion is highly relevant because it showed that the writers of the show either lacked the intelligence to understand that an ensign is supposed to make lieutenant, or thought we were too stupid to notice. And Harry protests being stuck at ensign on two different occasions: once he is interrupted by an alert, and once Janeway deftly shuts him down by accusing him of "bucking for a promotion", something that every junior officer (except Beckett Mariner) does but must never admit to. I totally respect your right to your opinion, but do not share it. I wanted to see what happened to the characters. Except for Janeway making admiral and Seven getting a much more comfortable outfit, we never do.
Yeah, I see now... Kim was more concerned about promotions than getting back to Earth. Of course, it was just as important to see the crew's life after being lost in space with exceptions. Right to your opinion indeed.
*Sigh* Just because Harry cared about getting home does NOT mean he wanted to stay an ensign forever. Nor does it mean he didn't notice with Tom got promoted and he didn't.
Harry never getting a promotion on Voyager is just idiotic. It makes no sense. And Janeway giving him a formal reprimand the very first time he did something out of the ordinary is unconscionable especially from someone like her who did more than her share of transgressions.