How would you change the show?

[Farscape One]

I'll agree there are far better episodes than "THRESHOLD", and from the same writer. ("PHAGE", "PROJECTIONS", "DEADLOCK", "PREY")

But I don't think it's any more illogical than "BLINK OF AN EYE", for instance. A planet that spins so fast time moves faster for them than the rest of the universe? By all rights, it should be the exact opposite, but that can be overlooked because it's such a phenomenal episode.

Or "MESSAGE IN A BOTTLE"... Voyager finds the station network that just happens to reach right at the edge of the Alpha Quadrant that also just happens to have the Prometheus warping by at just the right time? But that can be overlooked because, again, an excellent episode.

Scifi by its very nature requires us to suspend our disbelief for some things. Otherwise, we would not enjoy it as much. At least for me, I find I enjoy things better if I just go along with it until the end. Now, there are some things I can't suspend the disbelief for, but it's pretty few and far between. As long as the story works overall and the characters work, the rest is easily negotiable or can be overlooked.

 

[Jedman67]

I just rewatched Non Sequitor the other day and....
it was bad. I give it a 5/10 because the plot was compelling, just the execution, acting and dialog were lacking.

 

[Farscape One]

My issues with Threshold...

1. It screws with Trek canon in that W10 is an infinite, unattainable speed. With this new dilithium, a shuttlecraft can hit it. That's like saying you can put an engine in your mom's minivan that will get it to go 300 mph.

2. It presents a ridiculous inconsistency. If the W10 salamander mutation is so easily preventable or reversible, just ferry everyone home and antiproton them later.

3. The captain and Paris turn... into... @*$#!-ing... salamanders. And they have babies, who are abandoned and never mentioned again.

No other episode is even close to being this ludicrous.

Actually, two of those points are addressed in the episode.

1. The fuselage was being torn from the nacelles in the simulations, but once they figured that out, it was attainable. It's the structure that prevents it from going faster, not the engine itself.

2. Navigation was an issue. Torres said this... they were not able to figure out how to navigate at warp 10. At least, not within the episode.


I think, ultimately, the reason why this episode is looked so badly is because this would have changed the entire nature of the franchise, much like TNG's "Force of Nature" would have done. In that case, it imposed warp limits so severe that it would hamstring the writers, which was why it was basically forgotten in the same season.

With "THRESHOLD", it would have made the entire universe easily attainable, and while that does open up massive possibilities, I don't think they wanted the writers to have that level of unfettered access to the universe. It would also make things too easy... easy to get anywhere, easy for threats to come to Earth, etc.

 

[DigificWriter]

My issues with Threshold...

1. It screws with Trek canon in that W10 is an infinite, unattainable speed. With this new dilithium, a shuttlecraft can hit it. That's like saying you can put an engine in your mom's minivan that will get it to go 300 mph.

2. It presents a ridiculous inconsistency. If the W10 salamander mutation is so easily preventable or reversible, just ferry everyone home and antiproton them later.

3. The captain and Paris turn... into... @*$#!-ing... salamanders. And they have babies, who are abandoned and never mentioned again.

Threshold doesn't have to make any scientific sense, IMO, because it's a character showcase for Tom, and as far as the ending goes, the existence and survival of the salamander babies is a narrative trapdoor, which is a storytelling technique that a lot of Procedural-type series - and even some serialized series, such as Babylon 5 and Buffy the Vampire Slayer - use to give themselves open avenues for future stories.

The fact that the show never utilized the 'salamander babies' trapdoor isn't - and shouldn't be - an indictment of the existence of said trapdoor.

 

[Sci]

Star Trek: Voyager is not and should not be a procedural.

I disagree.

In a procedural, the cops aren't stuck in a mobile precinct building that has been magically transported 75 years away from their city.

 

[fireproof78]

. It screws with Trek canon in that W10 is an infinite, unattainable speed. With this new dilithium, a shuttlecraft can hit it. That's like saying you can put an engine in your mom's minivan that will get it to go 300 mph.

This is my biggest issue is that it upends the warp scale to create this boundary for Tom to surpass, while ignoring what it does to the rest of the franchise.

Now, there are some things I can't suspend the disbelief for, but it's pretty few and far between.

Same but this is one of them.

 

[DigificWriter]

In a procedural, the cops aren't stuck in a mobile precinct building that has been magically transported 75 years away from their city.

The Procedural is a structural format, not a subject.

Procedurals can be about a ship lost in space, a vampire trying to atone for his sins, a believer and a skeptic investigating the paranormal, a recovering addict moving to New York to solve crimes with the help of his sober companion, or, as you described, cops dealing with the solving of crimes.

 

[Sci]

The Procedural is a structural format, not a subject.

Procedurals can be about a ship lost in space,

The very fact of it being a ship lost in space disrupts the nature of the procedural, which is predicated upon the protagonists acting as apollonian forces of the morally justified or preferable status quo acting in response to negative disruptions to the status quo created by dyonisian antagonists.

Voyager's status as a lost ship trying to get home means that its characters cannot, by definition, act as agents of the status quo. Their presence is inherently going to be disruptive in some way towards the status quo of the cultures whose territories through which they pass -- functionally, in a procedural, the Voyager crew would be the antagonists.

There are a lot of implications for this, but the most basic is that the conventions of the procedural are absolutely not applicable to Star Trek: Voyager and should not be followed if the writing is going to be any good.

 

[Akiraprise]

I really don't understand the outsized hatred for Threshold espoused by people who otherwise identify themselves as fans of Voyager, and personally find it to be a fun, crazy Sci-Fi adventure that pairs up characters who wouldn't normally be paired together and that ends with a neat little 'trapdoor'.

Threshold was kind of fun. Taken on it's own. You basically need to pretend it was in some alt reality. Otherwise, by all rights, the crew should have been home in the next episode since reversing the salamander effect was so simple. Very similar to TNG's Genesis. Just a fun sci-fi story with characters we know.

 

[iliescu]

For, how would want to change the show? Hmmm...Would have them include a Season 8 with an upgraded Kaltoh for Tuvok in some of the Episodes...the new one is shown on this link here - hope it works and displays it. Like the pipe Kaltoh except made of rectangular Quadrilateral Blocks as the pieces.

 

[Oddish]

I think if any Trek show could have fielded an 8th season, it would have been DS9.

 

[at Quark's]

In terms of writing quality and 'not having run out of steam', yes, more so than any of the other 7 year shows. But the story itself felt pretty much closed and done (even if there still some ends that could have been wrapped up), and therefore an eight season probably still would have felt 'tacked on'.

 

[Oddish]

After a closer look at "Lifesigns", adding one more.

Given the EMH's genuine feelings for Danara, and that she was an essential milestone in his evolution from hologram to person... he should have adopted the name that she gave him.

The Doctor's namelessness and Harry's low rank were supposedly running gags... only they weren't funny.

 

[thribs]

I would have included more non humanoid aliens to it.

 

[Oddish]

I would have included more non humanoid aliens to it.

More aliens period. How many non- humans did Voyager have onboard? Ten, maybe? I liked how Janeway's "Dauntless" crew was far more diverse.

 

[Farscape One]

Torres, Tuvok, Neelix, Kes, Seska, Tabor, Tal Celes, Chell, Vorik, and Suder. (While he did look human, he was a Betazoid. Plus, the eyes.)

Naomi, Icheb, and the Borg kids.

Except for a very few random ones (a Bolian or Vulcan) here and there, that's it. As far as I can remember off the top of my head.

DS9 did FAR better with background aliens, though that setting essentially required it.

 

[Akiraprise]

DS9 did FAR better with background aliens, though that setting essentially required it.

DS9 sure did. Although I am sure most of the reason VOY did not have a lot of aliens in the crew was for budgetary reasons. A lot cheaper to just slap a set of ears or nose ridges on someone rather than full prosthetic. Being on UPN did not do the series any favors.

 

[Oddish]

How hard could it be to throw in more Vulcans, Betazoids, Bajorans, or other aliens with only modest prosthetic work required?

 

[Farscape One]

DS9 sure did. Although I am sure most of the reason VOY did not have a lot of aliens in the crew was for budgetary reasons. A lot cheaper to just slap a set of ears or nose ridges on someone rather than full prosthetic. Being on UPN did not do the series any favors.

DS9's budget was not much different than VGR's, so I don't buy that excuse. They just used the money differently.

 

[Anwar]

First off, if you read my post, I said 'of the character examples you listed', and Gowron's name was NOT there. And even if it was, okay TNG started him, but it doesn't matter because DS9 had a LOT more of their own characters.

Characters who had the pre-existing setup to build off of.

And the Cardassians and Ferengi are not characters. They are species. There are characters made up from those species

And those species were set up prior to DS9, meaning DS9 didn't have to make up characteristics or political scenarios from scratch.

And yes, the premise of VOYAGER lent itself to more recurring characters because they are on the same ship.

And when they gave us recurring characters like Suder or Seska, how did that go?

Also, my talking about many recurring characters having nothing or little to do with the Dominion War was in direct response to your statement of 'they needed the characters for their big Galactic War', which the Bajorans really were not part of it. (They signed the non-aggression pact.)

Them signing that Treaty was their part of the Galactic War setup. And even during the War storyline we got stuff from Bajoran characters who still played their part.

And by the way, FARSCAPE does explain how Moya was maintained. Or have you forgotten about the drds that appeared in EVERY SINGLE EPISODE, doing repairs, searching the decks for issues, being part of the solutions, etc.

Uh huh, and who maintained the DRDs? Where do they get their power?

The writers burned every bridge and did the bait and switch too many times. So, yeah, that's why.

Sorry, but the writers did it to themselves.

More like, the audience was ready to rip them to shreds before they did anything. Kind of hard to burn a bridge when the other side is already trying to chop it to pieces in the first place.