How Would You Have Handled Contact With The Vidiians?

[Thomas Eugene]

Wasn't it revealed in late Season 5 that a think tank found a cure to the phage for theVidiians?

Yes, it was. And to answer the original question of this thread, had I been a director/producer of this show, I would never have allowed the Think Tank to do that. It kind of killed one of the best villains of Star Trek for me.

BTW, if the Vidiians are cured now, it would be nice to know if they have become "aesthetically pleasing" people and I do not only mean their looks but rather their personalities.
Or it would be nice to know if the Think Tank lied about this. Going by his/their "morals", this is conceivable, I think.

Any idea, relaunch book authors?

 

[Prax]

It's just the way people perceive. In the Vidiian case, their real ugliness is on the inside.

Yes, in cases where humans have suffered as such, some do horrific things. A comparable, real world analogy would maybe be starvation. It makes me think of Josephus' "The Jewish Wars" where he describes the siege of Jerusalem. Everyone is suffering, and gangs go out mercilessly killing anyone who has any morsel of food.

The Vidiians have institutionalized this harvesting and bring death and destruction wherever they go, just so they can prolong their own miserable lives a little longer.

 

[Refuge]

I didn't realize that compassion should be limited to the beautiful...

Frankly I'm dubious that our own civilization would maintain it's already rather dubious, IMO, moral high ground if we were faced with such a pandemic.

The Think Tank did claim they'd cured the phage, though we were never given corroborating evidence one way or another.

That is over simplifying. The wearing of the face because it was so crudely done.. and was of a ship mate.. illustrated the horror and ugliness of the harvest ethic. The Vidiians were not beautiful after the Phage and that is pitiful but they adopted an ugly practice. If they looked good and still did what they did it might be less obvious to the eye but it would still be sick.

 

[Prax]

They were so eager to harvest Voyager it makes me think that maybe they don't have many would be victims left. Like Vidiian space is a place where no one goes, and those in the surrounding area know better than to travel alone.

 

[M.A.C.O.]

Yes, it was. And to answer the original question of this thread, had I been a director/producer of this show, I would never have allowed the Think Tank to do that. It kind of killed one of the best villains of Star Trek for me.

Well this is Voyager. Where both Species 8472 and the Borg were neutered by the writers and producers in order to ensure Voyager survived to make it to the Alpha Quad. The Hirogen weren't nerfed nearly as bad, but bringing them back in season 7 was a mistake.

 

[DonIago]

I wish we'd gotten more insight into how many Vidiians were really keen on the more ethically dubious aspects of their attempts to save their race, versus the ones who had more reservations about it. While it's certainly creepy to have a race out there eager to harvest your organs, that side of the Vidiians came across as so prevalent that they became a bit one-note.

By the time we met the Think Tank the Vidiians were an antagonist of the past in any case, so I don't really see how the Think Tank possibly curing them has any real bearing. Though it might have been interesting to encounter some Vidiians again, either to see how their race was reacting to being cured, or to find out that the Think Tank had been somewhat less than honest.

 

[M.A.C.O.]

Wrapping up the Viidian story line by the VOY production team, was similar to wrapping up the Maqui story line by the DS9 production team, I imagine. Both wrap ups occurred long after those respective arcs/groups had relevance to the current agenda of the shows and it happened mainly off screen.

After thoughts.

 

[Prax]

The Vidiians certainly got their fair share of screentime. They were in a bunch of Episodes, but eventually Voyager is beyond their territory, and out of range of their harvesters. After Kes pushed Voyager super far away, we should never have seen them again. Getting them in "Fury" and the mention in "Think Tank" is just a bonus(and wherever else they may have been brought up.) Costanza, whether being honest or not, was using the Vidiian story to peak Janeway's interest, which it did. I'm guessing he was lying as he had access to Voyager database. He says "You'd hardly recognize them now" He lied about other things in his initial visits with Janeway. The Vidiians are still cursed with the page most likely

We also WERE given a sympathetic side to the Vidiians in the episode with the EMH's Vidiian girlfriend...who shows up again to help Voyager in the episode where Janeway and Chakotay have to stay on "new Earth"

I really can't see what more treatment was necessary.

 

[Refuge]

And the 'lesson' aspect was made with Danara albeit using the Doctor. When she goes to him on the holodeck at the end she is no longer living within a holo-image, she is once more in her damaged form. He dances with her and she carries herself with dignity. (Though to return to the shallow once more, the actress playing Danara projected an appeal about her that you could see behind the Phage).

 

[DonIago]

I fear Danara was sort of played as "the exception that proves the rule".

 

[LJones41]

Well this is Voyager. Where both Species 8472 and the Borg were neutered by the writers and producers in order to ensure Voyager survived to make it to the Alpha Quad.

Species 8472 was "neutered" so to speak when it was discovered in early Season 4 that it was the Borg who had began the war against them, when the latter tried to invade their territory.

As for the Borg being "neutered", well that process began with the "Next Generation" episode called "The Best of Both Worlds" and the TNG movie "Star Trek: Contact".

And from a narrative point for me, to allow the Borg to continue as this unrelenting and unbeatable antagonist strikes me as rather boring and repetitive. It's one thing to have an antagonist like this in the real world, but in a fictional story . . . I don't think so.

 

[Tenacity]

The Vidiians have institutionalized this harvesting and bring death and destruction wherever they go, just so they can prolong their own miserable lives a little longer.

This description reminded me of the aliens in the 1970 British series UFO.

 

[Triskelion]

The moment the first Vidiian decided another species did not have a right to survive in order to sustain the Vidiian survival - the Vidiians forfeited their own right to survive. They drew their own civilization down into the dog-eat-dog level. It is morally sound to put a rabid dog out of its misery and everyone else's danger.

Now that they have been "cured" - the moral repercussions of what they have become have become a stain on their very evolution; a simple physical cure won't quickly undo the damage they did to their own higher being. It is a price their descendents will pay for centuries, millennia, perhaps forever.

Sympathy for the wasted potential, and the humanoid suffering - sure. And also, an ass full of buckshot if you come sniffing around me and mine.

 

[The_Baroness]

With latex gloves

 

[Herbert]

The moment the first Vidiian decided another species did not have a right to survive in order to sustain the Vidiian survival - the Vidiians forfeited their own right to survive. They drew their own civilization down into the dog-eat-dog level. It is morally sound to put a rabid dog out of its misery and everyone else's danger.

Now that they have been "cured" - the moral repercussions of what they have become have become a stain on their very evolution; a simple physical cure won't quickly undo the damage they did to their own higher being. It is a price their descendents will pay for centuries, millennia, perhaps forever.

I don't remeber if this was ever touched upon during the series but you have to wonder if the Vidiians were ruthless and so utterly selfish before the Phage and their survival tactics were just an extension of what they already were, or were they a noble race driven to extremes? The latter would have a tragic element to it. However, it doesn't engender even the least bit of sympathy for them.

 

[DonIago]

I thought Danara, at least, suggested that the Vidiians became what they became largely out of desperation to save their species.

Also, while I won't debate the moral reprehensibility of involuntarily harvesting organs from others, I don't believe it's ever stated that they'd committed genocide in the process. Indeed, wouldn't wiping another species out entirely be counterproductive to their own goals?

Sadly, I have doubts that Humans would perform any better under such circumstances.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

I don't believe it's ever stated that they'd committed genocide in the process.

Since the lion's share of Vidiian attacks must not leave any survivors (Neelix is the sole exception), then the result is the same. It's effectively genocide.

 

[DonIago]

We never hear about them attacking entire planets though...at least, that I recall...

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

^ But it's definitely in their wheelhouse.

 

[Gary Mitchell]

I would have hosed them down with hydrogen peroxide just to watch them fester.