How do Niners feel about Voyager?

[TheGodBen]

I didn't have the internet back in the days that DS9 and Voyager aired, but I've heard stories about a "war" between hardcore fans of both shows making Star Trek boards intolerable for some people. But DS9 has been off the air for a decade now, and Voyager wasn't far behind it, so I am curious; how do Niners feel about Voyager?

(By Niners I'm refering to people who think that Deep Space Nine was the best, or their favourite, Trek series.)

For me, my recent rewatch of Voyager made me think that the show was okay, its negatives may have outweighed its positives but on the whole it was fairly well balanced. I certainly don't hate the show or its fans, but I do criticise the aspects of the show which I considered poorly developed or involved a lack of ambition, such as the Maquis integration issue.

Please everyone, lets keep this civil.

 

[Michael]

I'm not sure if I picked the correct option in your poll, but just like you I consider myself a Niner and like Voyager to a certain degree. I recognize its many flaws, but am still able to find a lot to like in it.

More than any of the Trek series (even Deep Space Nine) Voyager's premise provided the basis for a heavily serialized, continuity-driven show, and I will forever hold it against the producers/writers/studio executives that they didn't tap the full potential of that premise. I do, however, like the show for the characters and some individual episodes that rank among Trek's best (like Living Witness or Memorial).

 

[Kegg]

I didn't have the internet back in the days that DS9 and Voyager aired, but I've heard stories about a "war" between hardcore fans of both shows making Star Trek boards intolerable for some people.

Oh, you have no idea. This forum was pretty active in that regard in the years VOY was still on the air. I remember once being berated by 8-4-7-2 for criticising VOY, because at the time there was an armistice and I was screwing up their ceasefire, or something. (Despite his name, he was one of the more arch-Niners around at the time.)

I never really identified with either group, though, but I wound up in the crossfire more often than not.

As for the observation NCC-1701 made, I would also feel VOY dropped the ball with lack of serialisation, but as Michael Piller tells it this was due to UPN's interference. It seems the creators of the show wanted one thing and UPN wanted TNG Mark II and ultimately UPN got what it wanted.

You can't blame them, DS9, with its space station format and serial storytelling was not exactly the hit TNG had been. They wanted to stick with what worked, Trekwise.

 

[Eyes]

Voyager had a lot of wasted potential, it's true, but I like a lot of the characters on it, more so than some DS9 characters actually, and the theme that shows up now and again about the ship being a family is always very good.

Although it had several bad episodes, such as Innocence, Macrocosm, Darkling, Retrospect etc, some of its best - Message in a Bottle, Worst Case Scenario, Before and After, The Thaw, Deadlock, Living Witness, Timeless- are among my favourite episodes, and there seems to be more enjoyable episodes than boring ones.

As a show, there should have been more direction and less standalone episodes, and in the later seasons several of my favourite characters got shunted to the side (arguably, that's why they're my favourite characters, because when an episode focused on them, I really enjoyed it) but overall it was a good TV series, and fairly good Trek.

 

[Nerys Ghemor]

I used to really like both shows, but I ran into problems with some decisions that the VOY writers made and dropped the show about the same time I think Lynx (from the VOY forum) did.

The straw that broke the camel's back was when Kes was dropped in favor of Seven of Nine--a move that seemed like it was strictly for sex appeal. As odd as the whole Ocampa thing seemed sometimes, Kes seemed like a real woman. Someone you could almost expect to be living in your own universe, not this unrealistic person. Her beauty seemed like the healthy kind. Instead, they ditched her character for this forbidding canon violation of a Borg and dressed the actress in painful, claustrophobic cat suits for the sake of appealing to the teenage boy demographic.

The damn thing of it is, I actually LIKE Jeri Ryan. I thought her work in Boston Public to be far superior and I even remember a plotline or two that took on the objectification of women in a manner that really made you have to THINK about the subject. So this isn't Jeri Ryan hate, by far. It is what the show became because of what the writers chose to do with her that I did not like.

With the introduction of Seven, I also felt that the writers threw every bit of continuity about what happens with liberated Borg, what their natures, reactions, and so on are like, that had been established in "I, Borg" and "Descent." Now, I'm aware a lot of people hate those episodes, but I was a great fan of them, and to me Seven's lack of evolution as an individual flew in the face of all the evidence we saw in those two episodes. (Hell, if anything, Hugh's failing was that he typically erred on the side of too MUCH emotion, not too little, so Seven acting like she had no feelings at all just did not fly.)

And don't even get me started on the rest of what was wrong with the way VOY handled the Borg.

I also have problems with seeing Janeway as a consistent and capable commander--a problem that is not a sexism problem at all: I have the same comment to offer when it comes to Archer and nuKirk (even old Kirk, to a much more limited extent). Sisko...yes, I am willing to call him on his bad decisions, and boy he made a few that still make me fume--but if you had to ask me who I'd want as my commander, he's my obvious choice, head and shoulders above any of the rest.

The lack of serialization, as others have pointed out, was a missed opportunity. When DS9 headed that way and VOY didn't, I really felt like an opportunity was missed. We should've seen, like nuBsG, the cumulative effects of their voyage. That doesn't mean having to be AS grim as nuBsG, by any means, but we should've seen SOMETHING. Instead, they apparently had a shuttlecraft-sized replicator stashed somewhere and endless power to run it, at the same time as they were under "replicator rations" for their food.

The concept began with a LOT of promise. But when the show foundered, and the poor ratings stunt of Seven of Nine was brought in to try and "save" it, it jumped the shark. It's a damn shame, too, because it could've been a lot better than the way it went out in the end.

Now that said, obviously I am a HUGE Niner and I do consider it the greatest Star Trek achievement. I have bones to pick about ENT, TNG, and TOS (in descending order), in addition to VOY, and I simply cannot enjoy those shows the way I do DS9. But I do not idolize DS9 to the point where I think everything is perfect about it.

NOR do I feel the need to go and proclaim some sort of "Niner superiority" all over the rest of the board. I am content to like what I like and let others like what they like. People's reasons tend to be very personal for that sort of thing (as are my reasons for no longer liking TNG). That's on me, not on everyone else. The reason I am saying all of this is because we are in the DS9 forum on our own turf. I would NOT go into anyone else's section of the board and trash what they like--that's not right at all.

 

[TeutonicNights]

Never really cared for that show. But I think DS9 and VOY mostly appealed to different parts of the TNG audience. I got my DS9 and was happy, and if people were happy with VOY, why not?

So yeah, I HATED all the characters, I hated the villains, I hated the "action for the sake of action", I hated the Talaxians and the foreheads of the week, but it always felt that it was a finished product. I thought the next Trek might be more for me again.
But when ENT came along and had the same problems and worse, I was annoyed.

What most Niners would disagree with however, is that I think they handled the Borg rather well.

 

[DevilEyes]

I have no strong feelings about Voyager either way. It's a watchable show, but it rarely had episodes I'd call great. And it could have been better if they had used the premise to its full potential.

 

[Pemmer Harge]

Dunno if I'm a Niner or not by your definition, but I'd say I like DS9 at least as much as I like TOS and TNG, so I voted in the poll.

There are some sci-fi shows that I love, such as TOS, TNG, DS9, Babylon 5 and Doctor Who. I'd never put Voyager on the same level as those shows, but I do like it. Certain Voyager episodes, such as Latent Image and Equinox are up there with the best of Trek in my opinion, but there were so many episodes that were dull, shot themselves in the foot or were just plain awful. Every show has episodes like that, but to me, Voyager seemed to have more than most. That said, I kept watching because I knew that it could be great. Also, though I didn't care for some of the characters, there were enough that I liked to help keep me interested.

 

[RyuRoots]

What most Niners would disagree with however, is that I think they handled the Borg rather well.

Indeed, I do not think it is possible for me to disagree with you more on that point. The Borg used to be fearsome and huge. Voyager turned them into a laughingstock. Even First Contact, which introduced the queen (an idiotic character that the Borg didn't need) managed to be a good story and still keep the Borg scary. When Scorpion didn't use her, I was excited. I thought maybe VOY was washing its hands of her. If only we'd been so lucky. And an even worse de-fanging happened with 8472.

As for VOY in general, I'll bitch and whine a lot, but I DO like the show. I only complain so much because I think it had a LOT of potential and a lot of cool things, just not many of them were ever capitalized on. "I berate you because I care" or something.

But seriously, if the show had its A-game on as often as DS9, and stuck with its initial premise like DS9 (instead of just throwing it out the window, which is what they did), it'd be nearly as good as DS9. I say nearly because I don't think VOY's cast was as good overall. I really liked the doctor, Tom, Seven, and Kes, and Tuvok but the others I could take or leave. On DS9, however, I enjoyed pretty much everyone, including guest character that probably should've been classified as mains by the end.

At its best, it holds its own with the best of TNG and DS9. At its worst, it makes TNG's first season look good. But the majority of the show is...okay. I'd classify myself as a Niner but also a Voyager fan. I just really wish VOY had done a lot of things differently.

 

[Deranged Nasat]

I like Voyager, as I like all modern Trek. I don't love it, the way I do DS9. DS9 is a great show, whereas Voyager is a perfectly enjoyable, watchable show but nothing special. Some of its episodes are very good, and most are worth the effort of watching as harmless entertainment. I always found the characters engaging, too, although they suffered a great disservice by not being given on-going arcs; they were just there. I find myself thinking "I like these characters you've got, now please do something with them, something that will have consequences next week". However, as many others have stated, Voyager was never very good at living up to its potential. It has good characters and an interesting premise, but while an individual episode is usually good, the series as a whole is somewhat disappointing- which is NOT the same as being bad. Ultimately, Voyager just doesn't generate the same sense of satisfaction as DS9 does, but it is likable.

Unlike DS9, where a lot of thought went into the progression of the series, Voyager was never sure what it wanted to do, likely because of the conflicting agendas of the writers. Is it about the Maquis and Starfleet learning to live and work together while facing diminishing resources, or is it TNG-style exploration? Overall, I think Voyager's potential was neglected. If any Trek show needed a strong arc and attentive continuity, it was Voyager. I wish, for example, that the Year of Hell had indeed been a season-long no-reset arc as originally planned. That isn't to say Voyager didn't have continuing plot-lines and episodes relating to earlier episodes in either subtle or overt ways- as with TNG, there's more continuity and arcing in there than a lot of people remember, particularly those of us used to DS9. Still, Voyager is a collection of episodes, whereas DS9 is a story. Ultimately, no matter how good many of those episodes are, a strong story is always more engaging.

 

[Photon]

There were a few pretty good episodes, but it was sorta like Gilligan's Isle-they're never gonna get off this island/quadrant.

To me the premise is all wrong, the magic reset button was wrong, never any ship damage.

Andy Dick(literally) ruined their best show. Picardo was great -to say something positive

 

[TheGodBen]

Well, it doesn't seem to have ruined anyone's life yet, so that's good.

More than any of the Trek series (even Deep Space Nine) Voyager's premise provided the basis for a heavily serialized, continuity-driven show, and I will forever hold it against the producers/writers/studio executives that they didn't tap the full potential of that premise.

A lot of my complaints fall into that category too. Voyager had my favourite premise of all the Trek series but it needed serialised story-telling to have it meet its potential, and since the writers were forced to make the show episodic it ended up not reaching the heights it could have. On the other hand, I think that DS9 had the poorest concepts in Trek, a space station near a religious planet with only a few runabouts to explore with, but the writers pushed themselves to come up with interesting story ideas for their show and they developed them to great effect. DS9 managed to capture my interest through good story-telling while Voyager lost it by being more of the same.

Oh, you have no idea. This forum was pretty active in that regard in the years VOY was still on the air. I remember once being berated by 8-4-7-2 for criticising VOY, because at the time there was an armistice and I was screwing up their ceasefire, or something.

What the FUCKERY?

I don't know whether I'm glad to not have to live through all that, or upset to have missed all the fun.

You can't blame them, DS9, with its space station format and serial storytelling was not exactly the hit TNG had been. They wanted to stick with what worked, Trekwise.

I agree, one of the things that I learned during my Voyager rewatch was that a lot of the writers wanted to do serialised stories as on DS9, but UPN wanted the ratings of TNG and when Jeri Taylor took over as showrunner in season 3 she decided to can the whole Kazon arc and have season 3 be episodic. I can't blame UPN for wanting more money, but they should have realised by how crap season 3 was that they were going to wrong way.

I also have problems with seeing Janeway as a consistent and capable commander--a problem that is not a sexism problem at all: I have the same comment to offer when it comes to Archer and nuKirk (even old Kirk, to a much more limited extent).

When Janeway was written well she was an excellent captain, up there with The Picard and The Sisko, but she was written so inconsistently that there were times when she was absolutely awful. Picard and Sisko had their bad moments too, but never as often as Janeway did.

That isn't to say Voyager didn't have continuing plot-lines and episodes relating to earlier episodes in either subtle or overt ways- as with TNG, there's more continuity and arcing in there than a lot of people remember, particularly those of us used to DS9.

Yes, Voyager did have more episodes than I remembered which built upon previous ones, I found that pleasantly surprising. But often those stories would take place months or years too late and they felt entirely different from the episode they are building on, whereas DS9 seemed to build its arcs more seamlessly. However, I would say that Voyager's quasi-arc about the Borg children in season 6 was fairly well handled.

 

[Pemmer Harge]

Re: the Borg episodes. I feel that often Voyager did a better job of the "small" Borg episodes like Collective and Survival Instinct than the "big" ones like Dark Frontier and Endgame. I appreciate that Scorpion may be an exception, but it's been years since I've seen that one.

 

[Deranged Nasat]

That isn't to say Voyager didn't have continuing plot-lines and episodes relating to earlier episodes in either subtle or overt ways- as with TNG, there's more continuity and arcing in there than a lot of people remember, particularly those of us used to DS9.

Yes, Voyager did have more episodes than I remembered which built upon previous ones, I found that pleasantly surprising. But often those stories would take place months or years too late and they felt entirely different from the episode they are building on, whereas DS9 seemed to build its arcs more seamlessly.

On that, I agree with you entirely.

 

[Kinggodzillak]

I've been rewatching it recently, and it's...okay. Nothing more, often a lot less.

Back in my teens I was heavily into Voyager along with all the other Treks, simply because it had the Star Trek name on it and that therefore made it brilliant no matter which series I was watching. After burning out on Trek completely just before DS9 finished and having a rest from the franchise for a few years I gradually crept back to it, revisiting each series in turn without going overboard on it. Strangely enough (though this wasn't intentional) I did so in order of quality, from best series downwards, so I started with DS9 then moved onto the original and then to TNG. And then the animated series.

Finally decided to give Voyager another go, and while the lack of internal continuity or any kind of continuing acknowledgement of their situation are the biggest problems, what sticks out most to me now is that the crew of Voyager are often written to be exceptionally stupid. Having realised that I'm enjoying it much more - these are the wacky antics of the stupidest group of people to ever put on a Starfleet uniform rather than a noble group of brave explorers in the tradition of Kirk and co, and the fun comes from seeing what kind of goofy misadventures they get up to week after week...

 

[mattyhugh]

At the time it aired Voyager was my weekly Trek fix after DS9 ended. So back then I suppose I 'liked' it. As time has gone on, I've just fallen more in love with DS9, probably because now I understand more of the nuanced things that I didn't get back in Junior High. I know VOY has its flaws, but I don't despise it. But that being said, I have TOS, TNG and DS9 on DVD and really don't have plans to get Voyager.

 

[TeutonicNights]

What most Niners would disagree with however, is that I think they handled the Borg rather well.

Indeed, I do not think it is possible for me to disagree with you more on that point. The Borg used to be fearsome and huge. Voyager turned them into a laughingstock. Even First Contact, which introduced the queen (an idiotic character that the Borg didn't need) managed to be a good story and still keep the Borg scary.

Yeah, but TNG also had "descent" and "I, Borg".FC was "re-scarifying" them if anything.
Not saying it couldn't have been done better. But for such a family-friendly series, it was decent in my book.
VOY used the new elements from FC and turned the borg into a "regular" villain race that could be destroyed with weapons. they shouldnt have used the borg at all (and ds9 was wise to not use them), but it was a development that had begun in tng.

 

[PSGarak]

Voyager couldn't hold my attention. As someone else posted, for me it became Gilligan's Island in space, way too formulaic and blah. To be fair, I haven't rewatched it at all, but honestly, I don't have much motivation to try.

 

[Kira's Mom]

I enjoyed Voyager for the most part, but it just wasn't as good as DS9 was for me.

 

[PKTrekGirl]

I voted that I like VOY, but I prefer DS9.

VOY was a good show. I liked the characters, for the most part, and I loved the premise. VOY, IMO, also has the ONLY decent 'ship in all of Trek (J/C), and I liked the idea of a female captain. Plus, I LOVE Kate Mulgrew. Saw her speak at the Vegas Trek con the year I went and was hugely impressed. I also very much love Tim Russ and thought he was the best Vulcan in Trek, outside of Leonard Nimoy himself (and yes...as much as I love Zach Quinto, I include him in this assessment too).

VOY also had some outstanding episodes, a few of which would number in my top 25 episodes of Star Trek (VOY is the only show besides DS9 which has episodes in that top 25) - Deadlock, Death Wish, Timeless, and Year of Hell would all be included in my top 25 episodes of Trek....which is otherwise populated by only DS9 episodes.

Like any show (INCLUDING DS9), VOY has it's faults. I thought the premise was not fully realized (I'd have liked for VOY to have been alot more like nuBSG turned out) and I did not like the way the show focused so much on the EMH and 7 of 9 in later seasons. Also I REALLY hate two characters on VOY - Neelix (too sugary sweet) and the EMH (can you say 'treason'?). And finally, I was very distressed at how the show ended - especially since I was a Janeway fan and felt Endgame ruined the character.

But overall, it was a good show, and when I find myself wanting to watch Star Trek, if I don't watch a DS9 DVD, my next most often pick is an episode of VOY from my VOY DVDs.

I simply prefer DS9 because it was darker and grittier and has a long complex story arc. And I like dark and gritty...and I like long complex story arcs. Some of my other favorite shows are Babylon 5, nuBSG, and LOST...all of which are dark and gritty, and all of which have long complex story arcs (it doesn't GET anymore complex than the LOST story arc! ). So it should be no surprise that I prefer DS9.

This in no way takes away from VOY. It's just my personal preference.