But it was harder to masturbate to.
I think either the network or the studio (essentially one and the same then) were pushing them to get her out of the ugly look as fast as possible.
I know they basically had to beautify Seven once she became part of the crew, but in retrospect, I think it would have been cool if they had spent the first few episodes of her first season she was on GRADUALLY transitioning her to look human, and just slowly started removing Borg prosthetics, maybe one an episode (IE one episode, the eye piece is removed, next episode, they grow her hair, etc) as a visual and outward embodiment to compliment her emotionally adjusting to becoming more human.
I completely agree. Though in universe EVERYTHING is instant, people morph back from total alien bodies.
As for my favorite Seven outfit, not sure I have any particular preference, but if I did,it probably would either be the sleeveless workout outfit, blue/light blue outfit:
here
http://trekcore.com/gallery/albums/sevenofnine/hopeandfear_011.jpg
but personally, I think this pic proves she should have been in a starfleet uniform all along
http://trekcore.com/gallery/albums/sevenofnine/relativity_079.jpg
She is much hotter in uniform. Blue suits her too.
Agreed on all there.
First off, I totally agree not only does Seven look good in Starfleet Blue, she is THE de facto science officer on Voyager. If every maquis was in starfleet attire, Seven should have also been in uniform from a protocol standpoint. Sexy outfits don't bother me at all. But it really would have made more sense if Seven had been in uniform, at least in later episodes. Hell, Jadzia Dax, who preceded Seven proved it could be done and have her natural beauty still shine through (she looked professional in a uniform and good doing it...plus we still got a few episodes where she was out of uniform for eye candy purposes...IE TOS uniform, bathing suit on Risa, etc), and TNG had the good sense to finally put Troi in uniform from Chain of Command forward (some of those Troi outfits were GAH! but I digress...that's a thread by itself!). Even Kira got her day in a Starfleet uniform.
But as Guy and Melekon point out, the obvious reason is, eye candy for the sake of ratings.
Also the transformation of Seven from techno-zombie to supermodel in one episode is another example of the obvious reason being ratings and spank bank (good one Guy!) material, but again, narratively, I think slowing down that process over at least part of the season would have been a great way to see Seven transform back into a human. They could have had DR EMH spout some technobabble about how he can only remove part of her Borg tech at a time because he didn't want to cause a shock to her system. Hell, as I recalled, he basically said as much, except it was borg tech we couldn't see. Again, from a narrative perspective, there were at least two other times Voyager encountered former Borg, who still retained their Borg prosthetics. Even Picard took a while to have his former eye piece scar heal. I just think it would have been a lot cooler if they had taken their time with Seven's appearance.
I suppose this is all moot, now, but I would have liked to see:
Season 4 could have focused on slowly transform Seven from full-on Borg, to what we ended up with with Seven, but still in a black suit.
Season 5, as Seven continued her adjustment to humanity and was basically a civilian at that point, they could have played around with her various cat suits along with other, more conventional civilian attire.
Season 6+, as Seven was made a formal member of the crew, she is given a field commission in the same way as Ensign Crusher was, and wears a Starfleet uniform from that point, on.
all that could have been a visual queue that Seven made the journey from Borg to human, then from civilian just along for the ride, to making a statement to the Voyager crew, "Hey, I'm one of you, now."
