Had Voyager Stuck To Its Original Premise

[JirinPanthosa]

I wish that Voyager had stuck more to the premise of being stranded and alone instead of just being TNG-lite, but I don't think I'd want it to be super serialized and dark like early season Discovery.

I'd like it to be on the tone that it could be light and airy one week and dark and serious the next week. And I'd like it to be serialized enough that when a crew member dies the crew count actually goes down and they feel the absence. But not so serialized that you never get a pace breaker from the main thread.

 

[Mr J]

Voyager did waste some of its core concept, but in hindsight that may have worked in its favour. It's apparently the most rewatched Star Trek series in England, and I'd argue it's the only post-TNG Trek that really entered the wider zeitgeist. In a lot of ways, it became iconic precisely because it remained accessible, episodic, and light(ish) entertainment.

I do think the original plans for Year of Hell could have been a great middle ground, especially if handled more like the second half of Enterprise Season 3. The Xindi arc often felt like the version of Voyager's premise that we never got, and I think something along those lines for half a season would have been really interesting. I can literally imagine replacing the Xindi and the weapon with Annorax and the time ship, trying to evade the Krenim alone, temporal shenangians happening alongside, one-off stories dotted throughout, with the ship becoming more trashed over time and questionable decisions having to be made.

Heck, if they still wanted to keep things relatively episodic, they could even have used a Dead Stop-style reset episode as the eventual solution. Better than the "it never really happened" ending to the Year of Hell we got...

The real problem with Voyager's premise is that it was almost doomed to fall short on 1990s network television. Seven seasons of 26 episodes a year built around isolation, scarcity and constant hardship would have been incredibly difficult to sustain, both creatively and commercially. Even nuBSG, which was essentially "Voyager but played realistically", wasn't asking audiences to sit through seven years, 26 episodes a season of that level of misery, and when that did come out television was a very different landscape.

Striking the right balance was always going to be difficult while appealing to a mainstream network audience. It wasn't really until around the time of Enterprise Season 3 that network TV viewers began embracing heavier serialization and a bit more grit in their science fiction. In that sense, it's not surprising that Trek revisited aspects of Voyager's original premise later, when the audience was finally more receptive to it.

 

[SilvioDante]

They shouldn't have made VOY be a Federation ship to begin with.

And the majority of the crew shouldn't have been from the Alpha Quadrant. Janeway, Tuvok, Paris and Kim should've been the only Alpha Quadrant people on the ship while everyone else was a DQ Native.

I’m curious why there would be so many DQ natives on a ship heading to the AQ and away from their homes.

 

[Oddish]

I’m curious why there would be so many DQ natives on a ship heading to the AQ and away from their homes.

Neelix had been a wanderer for years, and living hand to mouth, and he saw Voyager as a way to live better. With Kes, it was the eagerness to try new things.

 

[Anwar]

I’m curious why there would be so many DQ natives on a ship heading to the AQ and away from their homes.

Neelix had been a wanderer for years, and living hand to mouth, and he saw Voyager as a way to live better. With Kes, it was the eagerness to try new things.

Well, I had my own ideas, but the DQ crew could be survivors from destroyed worlds who have no home to go back to and think the AQ might be a clean start. Or the AQ people could end up being stuck in the DQ unable to go home and eventually realize they have to make a new life in the DQ.

 

[UssGlenn]

They shouldn't have made VOY be a Federation ship to begin with.

And the majority of the crew shouldn't have been from the Alpha Quadrant. Janeway, Tuvok, Paris and Kim should've been the only Alpha Quadrant people on the ship while everyone else was a DQ Native.

Well, I had my own ideas, but the DQ crew could be survivors from destroyed worlds who have no home to go back to and think the AQ might be a clean start. Or the AQ people could end up being stuck in the DQ unable to go home and eventually realize they have to make a new life in the DQ.

How about the Caretaker never sent anyone home, so all these stranded crews from around the galaxy with damaged ships band together on the strongest ship that still works.

 

[DanCPA]

Could have been interesting to find other alpha quadrant ships. Could have made the Seska plot different if there was a cardassian ship to find.

 

[Boo-khat!]

I’m curious why there would be so many DQ natives on a ship heading to the AQ and away from their homes.

How about the Caretaker never sent anyone home, so all these stranded crews from around the galaxy with damaged ships band together on the strongest ship that still works.

Obviously, whether the ship was a Starfleet vessel or an alien vessel, makes not one bit of difference. In the end, the ship was still going to get the crap blown out of it every episode, only to miraculously be completely intact by the start of the next. So unless one of those alien ships had magical weekly healing properties (a plot device that would get old very fast), it doesn't matter.

 

[Anwar]

Obviously, whether the ship was a Starfleet vessel or an alien vessel, makes not one bit of difference. In the end, the ship was still going to get the crap blown out of it every episode, only to miraculously be completely intact by the start of the next. So unless one of those alien ships had magical weekly healing properties (a plot device that would get old very fast), it doesn't matter.

It worked for Blakes Seven, Farscape, Stargate Universe, Andromeda....

Making it an alien ship means they could have the ship not take much damage in the first place because of how it was more advanced than a Federation Scout Ship would've been and get away with it by virtue of being a super-powerful alien ship.

 

[Boo-khat!]

It worked for Blakes Seven, Farscape, Stargate Universe, Andromeda....

Making it an alien ship means they could have the ship not take much damage in the first place because of how it was more advanced than a Federation Scout Ship would've been and get away with it by virtue of being a super-powerful alien ship.

I still fail to see how UPN would have done anything different than how they did just because the ship was an alien ship and not a Starfleet ship. UPN didn’t give a crap about the ship. They just wanted standalone episodic stories that never deviated from the status quo.

 

[Anwar]

I still fail to see how UPN would have done anything different than how they did just because the ship was an alien ship and not a Starfleet ship. UPN didn’t give a crap about the ship. They just wanted standalone episodic stories that never deviated from the status quo.

Well yeah, the biggest problem was that UPN didn't want a "New" Trek show. It just wanted a TNG continuation, even though by TNG Season 7 it had clearly run out of steam.

 

[Cap'n Calhoun]

it's "likeable people have weird adventures on a grand journey home", same as something like Red Dwarf.

This. Voyager was designed to get back to the roots of TOS and TNG of boldly traveling to new places and not relying so much on all of the old familiar ones. The only difference was what direction they were traveling.

It was never meant to be what the Battlestar Galactica reboot ended up being.

If anything Farscape might be a closer comparison with Crichton having crazy adventures but still wanting to get home eventually. Not a strong comparison, but still a closer one to what they were aiming for.

 

[Cap'n Calhoun]

Making it an alien ship means they could have the ship not take much damage in the first place because of how it was more advanced than a Federation Scout Ship would've been and get away with it by virtue of being a super-powerful alien ship.

This seems like pretty arbitrary levelling, especially since the Enterprise-D was already routinely more powerful than a good chunk of the "alien" ships that it went up against to the point that sometimes it was almost a joke when they were attacked. Voyager may have been smaller, but it was meant to be more advanced than the D.

 

[Anwar]

This seems like pretty arbitrary levelling, especially since the Enterprise-D was already routinely more powerful than a good chunk of the "alien" ships that it went up against to the point that sometimes it was almost a joke when they were attacked. Voyager may have been smaller, but it was meant to be more advanced than the D.

It wasn't though, the D was faster, more sustainable reactor output and had more advanced facilities. Voyager was basically a Scout Ship.

The bigger problem was that the show didn't really have a plot beyond a vague "Get Home" thing. TNG and TOS already did the "Exploring for the sake of it" and exhausted it for a time, DS9 understood this and that's why it brought in the Dominion starting at the end of Season 2.

VOY needed something to make it more separate from TOS and TNG, and unfortunately it never really found that.

 

[Cap'n Calhoun]

It wasn't though, the D was faster, more sustainable reactor output and had more advanced facilities. Voyager was basically a Scout Ship.

Not really sure what you're basing that on.

From "Caretaker":
"Sustainable cruise velocity of warp factor 9.975. Fifteen decks. Crew complement of one hundred and forty one. Bio-neural circuitry."

From the Star Trek: The Next Generation Technical Manual p. 57:
"These specifications required the Galaxy class to sustain a normal cruising speed of Warp 6 until fuel exhaustion, a maximum cruising speed of Warp 9.2, and a Maximum top speed of Warp 9.6 for twelve hours."

(Not strictly canon, but written by the technical consultants on the show, including Rick Sternbach who designed Voyager.)

The D couldn't even attain Voyager's sustainable cruise velocity.

Also, while I'm assuming you're not the first to ever do so, I think this is the first time I've personally seen someone call Voyager a "scout ship."

But, anyway, my original point is that it's all extremely arbitrary. It's more powerful than the ships they run into if they want it to be more powerful. That's still true whether they're riding in an alien ship or crammed like clowns in a shuttlecraft. Borg cubes were destroyed with impunity in "Scorpion." It's all about how powerful the writers choose to make the people they run up against.

The bigger problem was that the show didn't really have a plot beyond a vague "Get Home" thing.

That's literally more of a plot than any of the other Trek shows had up to that point. Why is that a problem?

 

[Anwar]

Not really sure what you're basing that on.

From "Caretaker":
"Sustainable cruise velocity of warp factor 9.975. Fifteen decks. Crew complement of one hundred and forty one. Bio-neural circuitry."

From the Star Trek: The Next Generation Technical Manual p. 57:
"These specifications required the Galaxy class to sustain a normal cruising speed of Warp 6 until fuel exhaustion, a maximum cruising speed of Warp 9.2, and a Maximum top speed of Warp 9.6 for twelve hours."

Which doesn't match up with how early TNG gave us numbers like how the Enterprise could get back to Federation space from where they went in "Where No Man Has Gone Before" in centuries, which according to calcs would give it way better sustainable speed than Voyager.

That's literally more of a plot than any of the other Trek shows had up to that point. Why is that a problem?

Because by TNG Season 7 that form of "Planet of a Week" had exhausted itself. DS9 knew this and started doing longer arc storytelling.

VOY didn't do enough to differentiate itself from TNG, because UPN just wanted a TNG clone because they hadn't realized the TNG style was outdated by 1995.

 

[Scanlan]

UPN just wanted a TNG clone because they hadn't realized the TNG style was outdated by 1995.

With VOY and ENT that "style" went on for another entire decade, so it's not like there was no interest in it...

 

[Cap'n Calhoun]

Which doesn't match up with how early TNG gave us numbers like how the Enterprise could get back to Federation space from where they went in "Where No Man Has Gone Before" in centuries, which according to calcs would give it way better sustainable speed than Voyager.

And the Enterprise-A made Voyager's entire trip over the course of Star Trek V: The Final Frontier.

Again, it's all pretty arbitrary.

 

[Boo-khat!]

That's literally more of a plot than any of the other Trek shows had up to that point. Why is that a problem?

For me, it's like what happened with the Abrams films. A scenario is created whereby the story does not have to follow established canon or tropes, and yet in both instances, they just went back to the familiar. STID was about Khan, and VOY was basically little different from TNG. If someone just walked into VOY cold, they probably wouldn't even know that the ship was on the other side of the galaxy.

 

[fireproof78]

And the Enterprise-A made Voyager's entire trip over the course of Star Trek V: The Final Frontier.

Again, it's all pretty arbitrary.

Indeed. A lot of VOY does not work because it straight up ignores so much of Star Trek previously established lore. It ignores speeds from TOS and TNG, or any other aspects of the tech developments around speeds.

Voyager could have benefitted from a longer distance, or being completely in an unknown place in space, like Farscape, were we didn't initially know if he had left our galaxy or not until Scorpius confirms it. It creates a nice smaller mystery to build upon a little bit.

Similar with the Maquis, it isn't the idea of constant conflict, constant pain, constant resource lacking, but it is recognizing that in Star Trek, it's ok to carry things forward, like mistrust can still happen when you have Maquis having to work with Starfleet officers who were literally were hunting them suddenly are their friends. There's pragmatism and then there's, "I know I was trying to arrest you earlier, but nah we're cool." See also the Eraser with an informant being welcomed to call on old Mafia buddies to help a federal agent.