Showing what happens after they return to Earth would be very anticlimatic. A good resolution to the show would have been to develope Chakotay/Seven throughout the final season, feature the birth of Miral in the penultimate episode, then have "Endgame" focus on Admiral Janeway's future, fighting the Borg, and going home. The episode should have ended the way it began, Voyager descending toward San Francisco with fireworks. Show the ship land one last time, then slowly zoom to a landing leg as the senior staff climb down. Janeway takes a few climbs down, looks at the city, and states into the camera, "We made it." Slowly pull back to reveal the whole ship as more crewman exit, then fade to black.
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For a story to work, there has to be a conflict. Where would the conflict be in an episode about family reunions? It would be boring! Now, if the finale were like DS9 where the first half was action packed with the second half featuring everyone saying goodbye... I'd be cool with that. Unfortunately, this would necessitate the removal of future Janeway and the future scenes.
No thank you!
Rumor has it one of the discarded ideas was to make Chakotay Janeway's lover on Quarra. This would have given the two characters a nice arc thru the remainder of the show as they resolve what happened with their roles on Voyager. Would they go back to how they were before and remain friends? Decide to pursue a relationship? It would have resolved their relationship either way which would have been nice to see.
As for Seven the interesting thing about her character was that she could never be fully human. However, just how close could she get and would she even want to go there? Claiming that a magic operation to remove her chip and acquiring a boyfriend now makes her fully human is a disservice to the struggles the character has been going thru. Gee, if all it took was a magic operation why wasn't it done earlier?
This is why I say that the Chakotay/Seven relationship should have been developed over the season. Instead of the magic opperation in the finale, we could have seen Seven get the several invasive proceedures.
You can't lead up to something that isn't planned for in advance. I read somewhere that when they were filming the episode where Chakotay and Seven are stranded on the primitive planet ("Natural Law"), Beltran and Ryan asked the writers if they should play up a romantic relationship between them. They were told "no" in no uncertain terms. There is really no spark between them in that episode, and remember, "Natural Law" was at the end of Season Seven--followed only by "Homestead" and "Renaissance Man" before the finale. The C/7 relationship was literally a last minute addition IMHO and a disservice to both characters.
"Human Error" and "Natural Law" are preludes to the Chakotay/Seven romance. It was not a last minute addition. I'm not saying it was executed properly, but the intent is clearly there.
There is endless opportunity for conflict, because good conflict happens between people, not programmed CGI images.
* Janeway has to deal with her ex-fiance who remarried, and with Starfleet admirals who want to talk about some of her more questionable command decisions.
* Chakotay has to deal with the fact that all his ex Maquis mates were slaughtered and face some leftovers, plus re-evaluate his relationship with Seven.
* Tuvok has to meet his family, who have grown and changed without him, and get his noggin straightened out.
* B'Elanna has to reconnect with her father and deal with those issues.
* Tom has to deal with his father, who hated him the last time they met.
* Seven has to deal with suddenly joining a "collective" even bigger than before, plus lots of people poking and prodding her like a lab rat.
* Doc has to deal with lots of people who don't think he's a real person and face the "holo revolution."
These are stories that could have filled half a season, never mind ten minutes at the end of "Endgame."
You don't need conflict for a story to work, you need an emotional connection between the viewer and the characters. Can you as a view empathise with the character and what it would be like to return home after seven years with barely any contact with your family?
If the answer is yes then you don't need conflict. Drama comes in many forms, conflict is just one of them.
I'm sorry, but drama without conflict bores me to tears. An hour of hugging would as bad as ENT's finale.
Yeah, and there have been hints about the possibility of C/7 throughout the entire four seasons that Jeri Ryan/Seven was on the show, starting as far back as "Scorpion, Part II".
By that rationale, they wouldn't have any time to do anything on any episode ever. You *DO* realize that most TV shows don't operate like "24" and skip ahead minutes/hours/days/weeks and in some cases, even years for the sake of moving the plot forward, I hope?
