In Defense of Janeway as a Captain

[Anwar]

The Kazon reinforcements would have arrived before they got the Array working, and they wouldn't have survived the next attack. So it was either "blow up the Array now and run" or "stay, fight and probably lose so they get the Array AND our ship's tech."

No, I wouldn't, and do not presume to speak for me.

I guess you must hate "Family" for Picard crying over the Borg thing then, huh? Or Sisko for weeping for his lost wife, or Kirk for his "Klingon bastards killed my son!" moment either, hm?

 

[AuntKate]

There is a great big assumption there--that they would have been able to use the array to get home. The caretaker said it took too much effort and energy for him to do it in his condition, so who says that Voyager's crew could have done it without his help?

Tuvok.

TUVOK: Captain, I can access the system to send us back to Federation space, but it will take several hours to activate.
JANEWAY: Unless you help us.
CARETAKER: Oh, I wish I could but I have very little time left, so I have initiated a self-destruct programme.
JANEWAY: If you destroy the Array, we'll have no way to get home.

Pssssh. Tuvok couldn't have known that. Besides, they didn't have hours for him to puzzle over it or do a few tests before they risked their lives in the effort.

 

[USS Triumphant]

Ummmm, wait a minute. She didn't sulk in "Year of Hell," she sulked in "Night," and only when there was nothing to do for day after boring day. So they weren't having the "worst problems" while she was in her quarters. In fact, as soon as they had problems, she came to help with all guns firing! That's the sort of person she is.

You're right, it was "Night", but you've got the details wrong - I just refreshed myself at Memory Alpha. She was in there for weeks, and morale was abysmal. And the fact that you are right about the episode makes it even worse, since this wasn't an episode that got undone by temporal shenanigans.

Sorry I had the details wrong. My therapist has been working with me to help me block the painful memories of watching Voyager.

 

[froot]

I still stand by the fact that they should have mentioned that using the Array for a return trip would have been stupidly dangerous. I always thought it was silly they glossed that over - that wave killed a ton of people.

 

[USS Triumphant]

I guess you must hate "Family" for Picard crying over the Borg thing then, huh? Or Sisko for weeping for his lost wife, or Kirk for his "Klingon bastards killed my son!" moment either, hm?

In none of those cases was the captain in question actually being derelict in their duty. Kirk's attitude did surprise and disappoint me a little, but he redeemed himself.

Now, if you want to talk about another captain who had a more unforgivable blunder, how about (later) Captain Riker, who killed a woman when he had plenty of time to have her beamed to the brig, instead, in the TNG episode "The Vengeance Factor".

 

[Anwar]

I guess you must hate "Family" for Picard crying over the Borg thing then, huh? Or Sisko for weeping for his lost wife, or Kirk for his "Klingon bastards killed my son!" moment either, hm?

In none of those cases was the captain in question actually being derelict in their duty. Kirk's attitude did surprise and disappoint me a little, but he redeemed himself.

Now, if you want to talk about another captain who had a more unforgivable blunder, how about (later) Captain Riker, who killed a woman when he had plenty of time to have her beamed to the brig, instead, in the TNG episode "The Vengeance Factor".

Voyager really is just no-win with some people. They want the characters to be more "human" and give into despair, and when that happens all they do is complain.

 

[Guy Gardener]

I still stand by the fact that they should have mentioned that using the Array for a return trip would have been stupidly dangerous. I always thought it was silly they glossed that over - that wave killed a ton of people.

The "wave" didn't kill anyone. People died from falling over or stressed system exploding near crew.

If they were so scared of Caretaker Technology, then they wouldn't have been looking for Susperia and they would not have used that catapult built from Nacene tech, but they were and they did.

All they needed was seatbelts and to turn off the really explody technology.

Ransom didn't seem to lose any crew? He lost 39 crew going up against the Krowtonan Guard in his first week. Compared to that if one lad twisted his ankle and knocked his head on the side of a desk, it's hardly the technology fault more so than that dumb bastards faulty inner ear being crap.

 

[USS Triumphant]

Voyager really is just no-win with some people. They want the characters to be more "human" and give into despair, and when that happens all they do is complain.

If that had been her character - coping with depression while trying to keep it from the crew as much as possible, trying to hold it all together - and it had been well written, I could have been down with that. I might have wondered how this woman ended up captain of a starship, but, okay, sure. But s single episode that she snaps out of just in time to save the day seems both poorly written and disrespectful to real people with actual clinical depression.

And you're wrong about it being "Voyager", in my case. I liked the ship itself, I liked Tuvok, Paris, Kes, The Doctor, Seven, and heck, I even liked Neelix. I didn't hate Kim, but they could have done more with him. I hated Seska, but I was supposed to, so, hey, mission accomplished. I liked Naomi Wildman, and Icheb was alright - about on par with Harry. I even like Kate Mulgrew - I've enjoyed her work in well-written stuff. Chakotay was boring, and Torres was strangely whiny for a part-Klingon, but you know what? I can even accept that such people would exist, so whatever - and I can even ignore that I don't think much of Beltran.

The two things that killed the series for me were the crappy episode writing on a lot of episodes, and JANEWAY. And I think a lot of that can be laid at the feet of inconsistency in the way the writers themselves saw her. Now, she's a woman that is in command but fully in touch with her feminine nature. Now, she's Captain Kirk with boobs. Now, she's a woman so controlled by her emotions that she neglects her duty and mopes in her quarters for weeks. Now, she's the crew's den mother. It wouldn't even surprise me (I'm not saying this is true though) to find out that one of the writers was a sexist that doesn't believe women should command military units! They certainly didn't do much for the (in my opinion obvious) notion that they should.

 

[BillJ]

Voyager really is just no-win with some people. They want the characters to be more "human" and give into despair, and when that happens all they do is complain.

I think I'll quote a line from The Enemy Within here:

You're the Captain of this ship. You haven't the right to be vulnerable in the eyes of the crew. You can't afford the luxury of being anything less than perfect. If you do, they lose faith, and you lose command.

Janeway is the tone-setter for the ship she commands. She gets "lost" or unable to function, then the crew begins to lose focus.

You mean like how Kirk nearly did in "City on the Edge of Forever"?

And in the original draft (which folks here keep saying was better) he WAS willing to do so.

Of course he entertained it. He's human for entertaining the notion... he's also human for recognizing he doesn't have the right to speak for BILLIONS of people he's never met nor set the course for their future based on personal feelings.

I'm reminded of a line from the movie Drowning Mona:

You're supposed to have that thing in your head that says, "BAD FUCKING IDEA!"

There is no indication that there is anything wrong in the future that Admiral Janeway comes from other than Seven dies in it. Kirk had the fortitude to come the correct decision despite his personal feelings.

 

[Guy Gardener]

Seven is dead, Chakotay is dead, another 22 crew die during the journey, Tuvok is completely batshit because he couldn't get a medical mindmeld from a compatible telepath, and some *&^% promoted Harry Kim.

All Janeway had to do to reverse this specious grievousness is allow the contemporary Borg to assimilate future weapons tech allowing those bastards to create counter measures to weapons that the Federation hadn't even invented gods forbid installed yet.

 

[Anwar]

Janeway is the tone-setter for the ship she commands. She gets "lost" or unable to function, then the crew begins to lose focus.

So it's okay for Crichton on Farscape to break down, it's okay for Adama and Roslin to break down, but it's not okay for Janeway to break down.

Ain't double standards fine?

 

[ancientone]

I look at characters the same way I look at the series. I remove the top 5 best moments/episodes and the bottom 5 moments/episodes and see what I have. Janeway, on the whole, seems to follow the series. I found it mostly uninspiring, mediocre, forgettable. Things that do not even bring feelings of dislike or hate. I tend to especially remember the good shows and the bad ones. I could start Voyager all over again, because I've mostly forgotten it. I cannot say that about the other series except Enterprise. But, then, I remember quite a bit about that series for it was mostly bad.

Now, if you rate a captain on the basis of their interaction with Q, then Picard wins it all. They should have left Q out of the other series. It just didn't work. I still find those episodes of TNG with Q the most entertaining.

 

[Anwar]

One of VOY's problems is that it took things from other series and tried to shoehorn them into roles they were never meant for.

They tried to use the Borg as a Dominion type role when they were never meant to be used like that (Of course, the Borg were badly written back in TNG as well so it's equally TNG's fault for not defining them properly).

But then again, VOY didn't have the advantages that the other shows did when it came to inventing any new aliens so it was going to be hard regardless.

 

[Ninjacore]

Janeway is the tone-setter for the ship she commands. She gets "lost" or unable to function, then the crew begins to lose focus.

So it's okay for Crichton on Farscape to break down, it's okay for Adama and Roslin to break down, but it's not okay for Janeway to break down.

Ain't double standards fine?

Crichton was not an official captain, he gave himself that rank along with his friends, and he got his mind literally raped, chopped up and sewn back together with a scorpy mind clone in his brain, if that isn't a excuse to break down alittle, I don't know what is, hell he gets his dream woman stolen by a clone of himself, that has gotta fuck your mind up hardcore...Adema is a arrogant blowhard half the time he survives by his faded past and I don't even know who Roslin is...

 

[ancientone]

But then again, VOY didn't have the advantages that the other shows did when it came to inventing any new aliens so it was going to be hard regardless.

Why? Lack of budget? Lack of imagination? That was one thing I was looking forward to when the series was introduced. They didn't have to deal with anything the other series introduced. There was so much potential there. sigh

 

[AuntKate]

Ummmm, wait a minute. She didn't sulk in "Year of Hell," she sulked in "Night," and only when there was nothing to do for day after boring day. So they weren't having the "worst problems" while she was in her quarters. In fact, as soon as they had problems, she came to help with all guns firing! That's the sort of person she is.

You're right, it was "Night", but you've got the details wrong - I just refreshed myself at Memory Alpha. She was in there for weeks, and morale was abysmal. And the fact that you are right about the episode makes it even worse, since this wasn't an episode that got undone by temporal shenanigans.

Sorry I had the details wrong. My therapist has been working with me to help me block the painful memories of watching Voyager.

Her absence was not the main reason for the crew's poor morale--they were all suffering from the lack of stars and inactivity. Why should Janeway be immune? After four years of constant pressure and worry, who wouldn't take advantage of some quiet time to be alone. Anyway, she got regular reports on the ship and crew through Chakotay and reappeared instantly when trouble arrived.

I'm still in therapy for the painful exposure to the bogus Bajoran "religion" in DS9.

 

[Anwar]

Janeway is the tone-setter for the ship she commands. She gets "lost" or unable to function, then the crew begins to lose focus.

So it's okay for Crichton on Farscape to break down, it's okay for Adama and Roslin to break down, but it's not okay for Janeway to break down.

Ain't double standards fine?

Crichton was not an official captain, he gave himself that rank along with his friends, and he got his mind literally raped, chopped up and sewn back together with a scorpy mind clone in his brain, if that isn't a excuse to break down alittle, I don't know what is, hell he gets his dream woman stolen by a clone of himself, that has gotta fuck your mind up hardcore...Adema is a arrogant blowhard half the time he survives by his faded past and I don't even know who Roslin is...

Janeway and co got mind-raped on a regular basis, which is also plenty of justification for breaking down. And her fiance left her and didn't entertain the thought of them getting back together once he knew she was alive again.

Why? Lack of budget? Lack of imagination? That was one thing I was looking forward to when the series was introduced. They didn't have to deal with anything the other series introduced. There was so much potential there. sigh

They had no cannon fodder for their enemies to kill off to show off their strength, no one cared if random alien worlds they passed by got flash-fried by said enemies so that was no good, and they had no connection to the DQ so there was nothing tying them to local affairs (in Farscape most of the characters were natives to that area of space and had histories with the Peacekeepers so there was plenty of connection).

And even when they made allies and had them describe past encounters with new adversaries and said adversaries had good actors/characters, the audience STILL didn't like it (Year of Hell).

DS9 had the advantage of maintaining all of Trek's classic aliens (Klingons, Romulans), TNG's new aliens (Cardassians, Ferengi, Bajorans) and using them in conjunction with their new aliens (Dominion species). VOY had no classic aliens to use in conjunction with their new aliens, and thus no hope of acceptance.

 

[AuntKate]

I look at characters the same way I look at the series. I remove the top 5 best moments/episodes and the bottom 5 moments/episodes and see what I have. Janeway, on the whole, seems to follow the series. I found it mostly uninspiring, mediocre, forgettable. Things that do not even bring feelings of dislike or hate. I tend to especially remember the good shows and the bad ones. I could start Voyager all over again, because I've mostly forgotten it. I cannot say that about the other series except Enterprise. But, then, I remember quite a bit about that series for it was mostly bad.

Now, if you rate a captain on the basis of their interaction with Q, then Picard wins it all. They should have left Q out of the other series. It just didn't work. I still find those episodes of TNG with Q the most entertaining.

I commend you for your admission that you have largely forgotten about Voyager. I think many posters here have forgotten Voyager or have gone through a single viewing a decade or so past. This unfamiliarity, however, doesn't prevent them from drawing the usual inane conclusions about Janeway being "schizophrenic" or worse (if they truly understood what the term meant, they would realize how uneducated they sound in applying it to her). I would suggest that many posters should return and watch the series through before they draw conclusions based on a viewing that is incomplete or not clearly remembered.

 

[AuntKate]

I still stand by the fact that they should have mentioned that using the Array for a return trip would have been stupidly dangerous. I always thought it was silly they glossed that over - that wave killed a ton of people.

It clearly wasn't an easy trip--even if you were prepared for it. And I scoff at the ability to use such alien technology for such a huge undertaking with just a few hours' work. The writers should have emphasized how difficult a return would be, perhaps impossible, in order to make Janeway's decision a little less controversial. She did the right thing by destroying it.

 

[ancientone]

They had no cannon fodder for their enemies to kill off to show off their strength, no one cared if random alien worlds they passed by got flash-fried by said enemies so that was no good, and they had no connection to the DQ so there was nothing tying them to local affairs (in Farscape most of the characters were natives to that area of space and had histories with the Peacekeepers so there was plenty of connection).

And even when they made allies and had them describe past encounters with new adversaries and said adversaries had good actors/characters, the audience STILL didn't like it (Year of Hell).

DS9 had the advantage of maintaining all of Trek's classic aliens (Klingons, Romulans), TNG's new aliens (Cardassians, Ferengi, Bajorans) and using them in conjunction with their new aliens (Dominion species). VOY had no classic aliens to use in conjunction with their new aliens, and thus no hope of acceptance.

In all fairness, it takes many episodes to establish a character well. Something you pointed out the Voyager didn't have the luxury. Unless there is a combination of very talented writers and actors, which, they didn't have that luxury either.

Perhaps it was my expectations that were too high. I really, really wanted that series to be one that I would gladly watch again and again. It could have been so cool. sigh