Re: A Hater Revisits Voyager
GodBen, it seems to me that logically, the only thing that could have happened was for the entire "da Vinci's Workshop" program to get loaded onto the mobile emitter. So wherever you go, you can push a button on mobile emitter and zing! instant workshop (with Leonardo in it).
That wouldn't have made for much of an episode, of course.
Oh, that really becomes the whole basis of my problems with a lot of Voyager's usage of holograms - the idea that every hologram is capable of awareness of the reality of their surroundings. I mean, the Doctor is a unique situation, being forced to become a fully sentient being due to the fact that he had to be the CMO, and Vic Fontaine was designed to be interactive and aware... At what point do photons and lights become sentient individuals? The stance Voyager seems to take is that the more they're used, the more intelligent and aware they get. To me, that feels like saying that if I play my video games often enough that the NPCs will start taking different actions - the mooks will run in fear when they should be swarming me, the party members will switch to the bad guy's team because they made the more convincing argument, as opposed to my one-line statement that, in the past, has always convinced them to stay on my team... It just doesn't make sense.
I am not prepared to believe that every hologram will become more intelligent and more aware. I am prepared to believe that, in-universe, the Doctor, Vic Fontaine, some of the characters from Fair Haven (ick!), and Professor Moriarty are able to do so because of their programming. Any fully-interactive hologram, as
GodBen puts it. (I guess we can treat this as an unwritten rule of the Next Gen universe, which the writers violated by doing what you said.)
The problem is that even if you stick to that rule, it is rather mind-boggling in its implications. At some point the Next Generation universe went from astonishment that holo-characters could exceed programming limitations and/or become aware of the world around them (Minuet, the Dixon Hill characters, Professor Moriarty), to the casual creation what is essentially holographic life. And no one noticed. Or if they noticed, they treated their creations with contempt.
The Doctor and Vic were not all that unique. There were other generations of holographic doctors, and it sounded like Felix made characters like Vic for fun. In his spare time. And set up "jack-in-the-box" routines that threatened their lives.
Janeway treated the Doctor like a second-class citizen at first, turning him off in mid-sentence and forgetting about him completely at times. "How flattering." This behavior took years to change, and only when the Doctor asserted himself. Later, when the Doctor started fighting for his rights as a sentient being, I figured someone would bring up Data's situation as a legal precedent. Did they do so? Nope.
It appears the precedents established by "The Measure Of A Man" and "Offspring" were conveniently swept under the rug by the Federation, in favor of doing exactly what was predicted in those episodes -- creating generations of artificial lifeforms to slave away on the holodecks and in the dilithium mines. So much for "exploring the possibilities of existence", when you treat the miracles going on under your nose with contempt. How come Q didn't show up and judge against humanity for this particular crime?
I don't think the shows intended to show this happening, but the writers and producers were just not thinking very hard. If you feature a character like the Doctor, you either 1) establish that he's absolutely unique and treat him accordingly, or 2) you acknowledge that there are others like him and figure out where he fits in the scheme of things. They tried to do both, or neither, and inconsistently.
The one thing they should have done, and never did, was to explore the ramifications of playing God with holographic life.
) just kind of likes the way that title sounds. If you read some of his reviews - and I recommend that you do because they are thoughtful and well-written - you'll see that there are things that he likes about the show. But he is someone who really disliked Voyager the first time around and he's giving it another chance. Nothing wrong with that, right?
That's it, I'm going back to stealing underpants!
) but I don't like like it when historical figures appear in Trek, it always feels contrived and this episode is no exception. The whole episode focuses on Leonard da Vinci trying to get to grips with a futuristic setting, and I don't want to see that. I'm more interested in following the piracy plot, but the episode isn't really about that, that's just used as an excuse for an action/adventure story involving Leonardo.
