Best/Worst of Season Two

[AdmiralScreed]

I started one of these threads for season one, so it's only logical that I start one for season two.

What do you consider to be the best and worst episodes of Season Two?

Here are my picks:

Best:
Alliances
The Thaw
Investigations
Basics Part 1
Cold Fire
Death Wish
Meld
Maneuvers

Worst:
Tatoo
Elogium
Threshold
Initiations
Persistence of Vision
Innocence

What are your picks?

 

[Lynx]

Best of season 2:

Cold Fire

Persistence Of Vision

Projections

Worst of season 2:

Threshold

 

[Misco]

I don't think there's anything shockingly bad in Season 2, and yes I'm including that favourite whipping boy of Voyager fans, Threshold, in that statement. I discovered, as with Season One, that I had much more patience with Season 2 overall this time around and found something to like in every episode more or less.

In approximate order:

Outstanding
Death Wish (One of the best episodes in all of Trek for me.)
Prototype (Not sure how this is regarded by most people but I've always found the menacing atmosphere that hangs over the entire episode particularly effective.)

Good
Resistance
Deadlock
Resolutions
The Thaw
Meld
The 37s
Elogium
Tuvix
Basics, Part 1
Dreadnought
Alliances
Lifesigns
Non Sequitur (Would have marked this down in the past but I found it weirdly enjoyable on last viewing. Against all the odds perhaps this has become my favourite Harry episode?)

Average
Twisted
Innocence
Cold Fire
Persistance of Vision
Parturition
Projections
Maneuvers
Threshold (I confess I never had the hate for this episode that most others seem to. Yes, I know it's stupid and contradicts established canon or whatever, and the science is appalling and Tom's makeup is bad and y'know the lizards... oh the lizards.... but.... I actually really like the rest of it; the stuff inbetween those other crappy parts.)

Below Average
Initiations (This is not *that* bad but I struggle to care about it, the Kazon are lame and 'Nog' is distracting.)
Tattoo (The Sky Spirits tosh is explanation enough.)

 

[You_Will_Fail]

Season 2 was a mixed bag for me. I liked that there was a Kazon arc going on but at the same time, it annoyed me because as I've mentioned before, I always thought it was unrealistic Voyager hadn't left Kazon space going at high warp.

I'd classify the episodes thusly

Excellent
Meld
Lifesigns
Deadlock
The Thaw

Good
Projections
Persistence of Vision
Tuvix
Cold Fire
Maneuvers
Resistance
Alliances
Death Wish
Basics Part I

Mediocre
Elogium
Non Sequitur
Prototype
Dreadnought
Investigations
Resolutions

Poor
The 37's
Initiations
Twisted
Tattoo
Parturition
Threshold
Innocence

So Season 2 had less "excellent" episodes than season 1 even though the season was longer. There was just a sense of mediocrity in this season for me with lots of episodes that were either stupid ideas (The 37s, Tattoo, Twisted, Parturition, Innocence) or good ideas and concepts but badly executed (Resolutions, Threshold, Non Sequitur).
It felt like there wasn't enough quality control overall and the writers were getting away with some really bad scripts that obviously needed redrafting or throwing out. I refuse to believe that among the best stories that came out of that room that year were "Race that ages backwards", "Tom and Neelix steal an alien's baby" and "Chakotay finds out native Americans are aliens".

 

[Admiral Shran]

Excellent
Meld
The Thaw

Good
Projections
Maneuvers
Dreadnought
Death Wish
Lifesigns
Innocence
Resolutions
Basics, Part I

Average
The 37s
Initiations
Parturition
Persistence of Vision
Cold Fire
Resistance
Prototype
Deadlock

Poor
Elogium
Non Sequitur
Twisted
Tattoo
Alliances
Threshold
Investigations
Tuvix

Season Two is much more balanced for me. It has less excellent episodes than Season One, but all the others are fairly well evenly distributed (with eight a piece).

 

[Lynx]

Season 2 is my favorite season. all episodes are great except "Threhold" and that one is actually funny here and there. I can accept it if I imagine that it was a nightmare Janeway had after eating too much of Neelix's food.

 

[The Caprican]

Excellent:
Projections (I believe this was a Brannon Braga ep. He was a great writer. Horrible show runner and basically an overgrown manchild. But a heckuva sci fi writer.)
Twisted (Ok, I know a lot of people hate this ep. Not "Threshold" hate, but still. I love it because it was a great character piece. Not a lot of plot, but some really great crew moments. Since Voyager was less character driven than DSN, it was a great intimate character episode.)
Cold Fire
Maneuvers
Resistance
Alliances
Death Wish (maybe one of the 10 best eps of Trek ever.)
Deadlock
The Thaw
Resolutions (I think it's my Chakotay/Janeway romance fever in action, but I liked this one.)

Good:
The 37s
Initiations
Elogium
Tattoo
Prototype
Meld
Dreadnoght
Investigations
Basics, Part I

Meh:
Non Sequitur (blah blah something about Harry Kim. He had a nice apartment though.)
Parturition (If I had a get out of canon free card, it would be used here.)
Persistence of Vision (Kes is attacked by angry roasted marshmallows in Engineering. Ack!)
Threshold
Lifesigns
Innocence
Tuvix (I tried so hard not to hate this episode. I'd almost rather be watching The Real Housewives of some such city.)