Well, I don't, and, even if I would, I would prefer if such a drastic change would be better explained.
Kes Returns - what episode would you have made?
- Thread starter Admiral Jean-Luc Picard
- Start date
You're entitled to your opinion. For me, it made perfect sense that this person who looks like a 60/70ish year old woman but who is really just 6 has come to the conclusion that her family abandoned her and she is throwing a tantrum about it, which is how a child would react if they were put into that situation.
Let's play that out. "Fury" is happening pretty much as it was aired. You are on staff and your objections have been noted but now you are in the writers room and are ordered to come up with a rational reason for the drastic change in Kes. You've got a few minutes of dialogue and screen time to play with. What's the play?
I'll go with she bumps into Suspiria and that psychopath brain washes her into attempting to destroy Voyager. Suspiria did not forget what Janeway did to her a few years earlier. Payback.
I say she had a drastic experience. Maybe what you proipse or she lived among some people after leaving voyager but they were destroyed and her grief caused her to go mad... Or, inspired by Prodigy, maybe she looked into the real form of a Medusan or something like that. That could work.
Interestingly, Suspiria was initially meant to just be a plot device to get Voyager home by the middle of the second season, since UPN immediately began to be wary of the whole 'ship lost in space' trope. But then they apparently changed their minds. I think that after that episode, none of the producers or writing staff ever considered bringing her back.
Probably right. It's another of VOY's dangling plot threads never resolved. UPN towards the end of S3 beginning of S4 basically said screw it to the premise of the show and decided to do story of the week type stuff. Essentially doing what they wanted to do from the beginning with it and turned VOY into TNG-Lite.
I don't care about what some people think of the character.
What bothers me is the way they present their opinions.
If people can come up with their opinions in a nice and constructive way, they get nice and constructive replies from me.
No, I'm never wrong. Not in this case.
Thise who are wrong are those who like that a good actress was fired for no reason at all and a good character was destroyed. That's called malice and is wrong.
Not to mention those who have misunderstood the purpose of this thread which is Kes returns-what episode would you have made? They must be wrong since they have misunderstood that.
And I'm not the #1 member of the club, maybe the #4 or the #member. Crowded or not, its still an important one.
During the first three seasons of Voyager, there was no hatred or dislike against the character.
The most disliked and even hated character was Neelix. I was surprised when I started to watch Voyager, visit some forums and found all those comments about him.
Janeway was controversial. A lot of fans liked her but there were also many who didn't. As for the others, not much controversy or debates.
When Kes was dumped, some people started pecking on the character and actress on certain forums. maybe it was easy to pick on someone who was dumped.
Some people just like to hate, I guess.
I do think that your comments about the character were nasty and out of topic too.Nothing about my critique of the character Kes or the way the writers treated her was hateful, insulting, or "nasty." Just because you disagree with my opinion doesn't make it so.
But thank you for walking back your initial opinion of my opinions.
Walking back? The right description is "tactical retreat"!
I call it terribly wrong because I think that it's wrong.
And you are wrong when it comes to Neelix too. He was about 18-20 years old when the war between Talax and the Hakoonian Empire started and most likely 20 or 21 when it ended, when Rinax was destroyed in 2356. So he was about 30-35 years old then, not 50.
And the obsession with numbers which shows up in many comments about Kes and Neelix are wrong because Kes was equivalent to a human 20-year old. Relationships between prople who are 35 and 20 are not so uncommon as the number obsessed people might think. Just look at all those celebrities, politicians and others who are married or have relationships those who are 10 years younger or so.
I agree. Kes was a great character with a lot of potential who could have been even better with better writers.
And I see no reason why she couldn't have stayed among the main characters even when Seven was added, even if she would have been shoved in the background, just like Chakotay, Tom, B'Elanna, Tuvok, Neelix and Kim.
I would have done it like this:
"Hey Mr. B and B, don't you think it is stupid to come up with an episode like this, I mean turning the character into an old witch and a soulless monster and kill her off at the end (as they intended to do) when there is a letter campaign going with the purpose to have her back in the series.
OK, I know that you feel insulted and challenged by these ungrateful low-lives who interfere in your divinal plans but showing the finger at them like you plan to do with this episode will only increase their anger and make things worse.
So I have an idea which will give them what they want and make them be grateful to you as well!
Why not bring back Suspiria, you know that evil entity from Cold Fire and let her try to destroy the ship and kill off the crew? Then Kes returns at the end of the episode, defends Suspiria once and for all.
I could write your names under the story so the two of you would get the credit. Wouldn't that be nice?
She doesn't have to stay on the ship if you don't like it. I mean, I have another story about a Kes come-back in which she is restored from being an energy-being by Q and gets a human lifespan in the process and then joins a Maquis crew who have also been stranded in the Delta Quadrant. It would fit into the concept with Suspiria as well, maybe you can use it at the end of the season if you like. I can give you the credit for that one too and it would give you a break from Voyager while your work on the coming gift to humanity, the glorious series Enterprise in which you make TOS the way it should have been done from the beginning.
Come on now, it will be great and the fans will loooooooooooove you even more!"
Last edited:
I probably would have just not used Kes as much instead of ditching her altogether. Same with Neelix. Neelix would have been seen as much as Guinan if he was just the mess hall guy. Kes I would have made the head of Voyager's civilian group, other Delta Quadrant residents who came and served aboard Voyager or were just passengers.
What surprised me the most was that people who, back during the Voyager run, shipped Seven/Harry actually liked Kes, or at least respected and not hated her. I mean, this ship would probably never exist if Kes stayed, as both Seven and Harry are needed for it in the show (or would exist as a rare ship mande of characters who never met, as I know such things exist).
Yes, obssesion with numbers is tiresome. As I said, people like that should ask themselves: do you consider relationship between 20 years old human and 20 years old Vulcan right just because numbers matches (since Vulcan, I think, grow twice as slow as humans)
No offence, but I often have the feeling that you sometimes present your opinions on Kes as facts and then dismiss any opinion that doesn't match yours in a way that sometimes comes off as rather aggressive to me. Maybe the intent is not there and that's just how I interpret it, after all, it's very difficult to judge someone's intent over the internet where mimic and tone of voice are not available, but it does come across like that to me.
And stuff like that tends to invite people to bite back in kind.
I agree. Fury made little sense with what we saw of Kes at the end of The Gift
Now that would have been an excellent episode! I retract my statement earlier about not wanting a return episode. If it was made as a n episode where Kes defends the Voyager against Suspiria like this, I'd love it!
This makes me think another possibility would have been to have her return for the finale and have her be the one who gets Voyager home.
Still I feel we were really robbed of a friendship between Kes and Seven. It would have been so much more wholesome than the My Fair Lady pastiche thing with the Doctor where he simultaneously thinks of her as a sort of daughter and is kinda into her while she is oblivious...yuk!
I really think those two characters would have worked well together. Judging form her character ins seasons 1-3 Kes would have been the first to accept Seven, and the first to defend her against any suspicion or prejudice by the crew.
Last edited:
Yes, because older man/inexperienced young woman power dynamics don’t exist in the Delta Quadrant…
Apparently a bit of an unpopular opinion, but I was always a fan of Kes. Now I don’t like everything about the character — the 9-year lifespan was ill-conceived and only leads to unpleasant implications, and I felt the writers quickly lost interest in the character and never really figured out how to best incorporate her in stories — but I liked how she played off the other characters (most importantly the Doctor and Janeway), how she was curious about the universe, but wasn’t overly naive or childish, how she was warm and caring, but also had a sense of self-determination and would speak up if she felt someone was treated unfairly. I liked her look, her voice and how Jennifer Lien, through an often understated but also authentic performance, made her come to life. I also usually enjoyed the few episodes that featured her as the main character.
And conceptually, while the short Ocampan lifespan didn’t make much sense to me from a logical point of view, the premise of having the opportunity to witness someone go through all stages of life — and even possibly die — during the run of the show, was fascinating to me, but I don’t think they ever really figured out what to do with it. And while I think it ultimately was a wrong decision to write her out of the show instead of finding ways to best write for the character, I’m not someone to dwell on this kind of stuff. I was miffed to see her go, but it was what it was.
As for the way they brought her back in “Fury”, I’m going to copy/paste something I said just a few weeks ago in another thread when this popped up: No-one has to like “Fury” and it’s certainly not my favorite episode, but lets not misrepresent what actually happens in it. I don’t see the character assassination that some claim the episode is guilty of. And I don’t think I ever really understood what’s supposedly so incredibly bad about “Fury”. It’s not particularly special, but it’s a perfectly entertaining hour of Voyager. The whole concept of time traveling back to the beginning of the show is pretty cool and I would argue that Kes suffering from some form of Ocampan dementia is interesting, even if admittedly not realized to my full satisfaction.
I’ve worked with old people suffering from dementia and it’s absolutely a condition that can completely change someone’s character and behavior. It’s particularly hard for the family members of that person who have to witness this change and that person disappearing, So if anything, having Kes go through some version of that is actually pretty apt and sorry, I just can’t view the episode as all bad because of that.
If anything, the episode is when they finally deliver on the original premise of a character with such a limited lifespan. When they thought up the premise for Kes the idea was to show how someone like that would go through all stages of life in the span of the show’s run. Having written out the character in “The Gift” they avoided ever having to show Kes getting really old and suffering from what that entails. “Fury” at least gives us something to make true on the premise.
And because the end of the episodes is usually misrepresented or misremembered: they absolutely do revert Kes back to her old self in the end, making her remember that the crew of the Voyager were actually her friends and that they only ever helped her. It ends with Janeway offering her to stay on the ship, but she refuses and flies off to the Ocampa homeworld instead, having one last warm goodbye with Neelix in the transporter room.
And conceptually, while the short Ocampan lifespan didn’t make much sense to me from a logical point of view, the premise of having the opportunity to witness someone go through all stages of life — and even possibly die — during the run of the show, was fascinating to me, but I don’t think they ever really figured out what to do with it. And while I think it ultimately was a wrong decision to write her out of the show instead of finding ways to best write for the character, I’m not someone to dwell on this kind of stuff. I was miffed to see her go, but it was what it was.
As for the way they brought her back in “Fury”, I’m going to copy/paste something I said just a few weeks ago in another thread when this popped up: No-one has to like “Fury” and it’s certainly not my favorite episode, but lets not misrepresent what actually happens in it. I don’t see the character assassination that some claim the episode is guilty of. And I don’t think I ever really understood what’s supposedly so incredibly bad about “Fury”. It’s not particularly special, but it’s a perfectly entertaining hour of Voyager. The whole concept of time traveling back to the beginning of the show is pretty cool and I would argue that Kes suffering from some form of Ocampan dementia is interesting, even if admittedly not realized to my full satisfaction.
I’ve worked with old people suffering from dementia and it’s absolutely a condition that can completely change someone’s character and behavior. It’s particularly hard for the family members of that person who have to witness this change and that person disappearing, So if anything, having Kes go through some version of that is actually pretty apt and sorry, I just can’t view the episode as all bad because of that.
If anything, the episode is when they finally deliver on the original premise of a character with such a limited lifespan. When they thought up the premise for Kes the idea was to show how someone like that would go through all stages of life in the span of the show’s run. Having written out the character in “The Gift” they avoided ever having to show Kes getting really old and suffering from what that entails. “Fury” at least gives us something to make true on the premise.
And because the end of the episodes is usually misrepresented or misremembered: they absolutely do revert Kes back to her old self in the end, making her remember that the crew of the Voyager were actually her friends and that they only ever helped her. It ends with Janeway offering her to stay on the ship, but she refuses and flies off to the Ocampa homeworld instead, having one last warm goodbye with Neelix in the transporter room.
Kes: You don’t understand! I’m from the future, and I’m sick! That makes it OK for me to break the law! I’m not a bad person! (and Kes is dumped into the brig)
HOW STAR TREK VOYAGER: “FURY” SHOULD HAVE ENDED
Janeway: It took exhaustive research, sifting through teraquads of data, separating fact from rumor, but eventually I arrived at the truth. Happy birthday.
Tuvok: Captain, I never informed this to anyone in Starfleet. How could you find this out?
Janeway: BECAUSE I’M BATMAN!!
—---------------
Torres: Kes?
Seven: State your intentions
Tuvok: Vulcan nerve pinch
Seven: Whoa! That was a close one!
Torres: Yeah! One of us might have died! (and Kes is dumped into the brig)
—----------------
Neelix: I'm looking forward to tonight.
Kes: Actually, I have a lot of work to do in Sickbay.
Neelix: But I already reserved the holodeck. I thought we could take a moonlit stroll through the marshlands of Oshionian Prime.
Kes: Another time. I promise.
Neelix: Something wrong?
Kes: NOT TODAY, CREEP! I HAVE A HEADACHE!
—------------------
Tuvok: Identify yourself.
Naomi: It's me, Tuvok. Naomi Wildman.
Tendi: Aww, look, what a cute kid! Who wants to play Kadis-Kot?
Rutherford: We get to do a cameo on Voyager? Sweet!
Mariner: Wait a moment, the master of Vulcan meditation is having a seizure because he’s having visions of the future? Oh, boy, this is gonna be awesome!
Boiler: Mariner! We’re not supposed to be here, not even as a vision! Do you have any idea how many directives and protocols we are breaking?
Mariner: Well, duh! That’s what makes it so sweet! “Live long and prosper”, suckers!
—--------------------
Kes: My name is Kes. I'm aboard the Starship Voyager. Respond. I know you're receiving this transmission, and I also know that your attempt to capture this ship will fail. If you want to harvest Voyager's crew, I suggest you answer me now. All I want is safe passage to Ocampa for myself and one other.
Viidian: Why would you sentence your own crew to death?
Kes: They're not my crew. They abandoned me a long time ago.
Tuvok: Computer, open this door. Override code Tuvok Alpha. Kes, we have intercepted your transmission. You are detained for delivering sensible information about the Voyager to the Viidians (and Kes is dumped into the brig)
—---------------------------
Chakotay: Bridge to Captain Janeway.
Janeway: Go ahead.
Chakotay: We're approaching the vacuoles.
Janeway: You know, I thought that we may get across those dangerous vacuoles with the Viidians on our back and escape without problem… but then I thought “Nah!”. Let’s take the longer road and go around the vacuoles instead.
—---------------------------
Viidian: Where's the tactical data you promised us?
Kes: I'm downloading it now. I'll transmit it to you once you've arrived. Janeway's already suspicious. If I transmit it now, I'll be discovered.
Viidian: That's your problem.
Kes: Apparently it's yours, too.
Tuvok: Computer, open this door. Override code Tuvok Alpha. Kes, we have intercepted your transmission. You are detained for delivering sensible information about the Voyager to the Viidians (and Kes is dumped into the brig)
BUT THIS IS HOW IT REALLY SHOULD HAVE ENDED
Kim: Hull breach on deck nine.
Janeway: Emergency force fields.
Kim: Captain, a transporter was activated just before impact. She's beamed aboard.
Janeway: Transport me and the doctor immediately there!
Janeway: Kes! What the hell are you doing??
Kes: You won’t stand in my way… No! Not Janeway’s death glare!
Janeway: Kes. Explain. Yourself. Now.
Kes: I can't. I don't belong here. I need to be with my own people. I want to save myself at my childhood from the mistakes I would make.
Janeway: Oh, is that all? Take it easy! There’s a way to solve your midlife crisis, without destroying anything or breaking the temporal prime directive.
Holodeck Sigmund Freud: So, Kes, tell me about your childhood…
(Some hours later, at the Super Cafe)
Kes: …and so I faced my doubts about my identity, my mortality, the things I have achieved in my life and the things I won’t, and came to accept myself as I am.
Superman: Really? Is that all? And no deaths, no time travel, no viidians, no space traps? It sounds like a boring episode
Janeway: She was lost, and we helped her find her way. And now she’s a more complete and mature person.
Batman: Hay, babe. Wanna know… my secret identity?
Janeway: Oh, shut up
Tuvok: Captain, I have allowed Kes to indulge into psychoanalysis and into this “cafe scene”, but this is enough. Tuvok to Voyager, three to beam up. (and Kes is dumped into the brig)
HOW STAR TREK VOYAGER: “FURY” SHOULD HAVE ENDED
Janeway: It took exhaustive research, sifting through teraquads of data, separating fact from rumor, but eventually I arrived at the truth. Happy birthday.
Tuvok: Captain, I never informed this to anyone in Starfleet. How could you find this out?
Janeway: BECAUSE I’M BATMAN!!
—---------------
Torres: Kes?
Seven: State your intentions
Tuvok: Vulcan nerve pinch
Seven: Whoa! That was a close one!
Torres: Yeah! One of us might have died! (and Kes is dumped into the brig)
—----------------
Neelix: I'm looking forward to tonight.
Kes: Actually, I have a lot of work to do in Sickbay.
Neelix: But I already reserved the holodeck. I thought we could take a moonlit stroll through the marshlands of Oshionian Prime.
Kes: Another time. I promise.
Neelix: Something wrong?
Kes: NOT TODAY, CREEP! I HAVE A HEADACHE!
—------------------
Tuvok: Identify yourself.
Naomi: It's me, Tuvok. Naomi Wildman.
Tendi: Aww, look, what a cute kid! Who wants to play Kadis-Kot?
Rutherford: We get to do a cameo on Voyager? Sweet!
Mariner: Wait a moment, the master of Vulcan meditation is having a seizure because he’s having visions of the future? Oh, boy, this is gonna be awesome!
Boiler: Mariner! We’re not supposed to be here, not even as a vision! Do you have any idea how many directives and protocols we are breaking?
Mariner: Well, duh! That’s what makes it so sweet! “Live long and prosper”, suckers!
—--------------------
Kes: My name is Kes. I'm aboard the Starship Voyager. Respond. I know you're receiving this transmission, and I also know that your attempt to capture this ship will fail. If you want to harvest Voyager's crew, I suggest you answer me now. All I want is safe passage to Ocampa for myself and one other.
Viidian: Why would you sentence your own crew to death?
Kes: They're not my crew. They abandoned me a long time ago.
Tuvok: Computer, open this door. Override code Tuvok Alpha. Kes, we have intercepted your transmission. You are detained for delivering sensible information about the Voyager to the Viidians (and Kes is dumped into the brig)
—---------------------------
Chakotay: Bridge to Captain Janeway.
Janeway: Go ahead.
Chakotay: We're approaching the vacuoles.
Janeway: You know, I thought that we may get across those dangerous vacuoles with the Viidians on our back and escape without problem… but then I thought “Nah!”. Let’s take the longer road and go around the vacuoles instead.
—---------------------------
Viidian: Where's the tactical data you promised us?
Kes: I'm downloading it now. I'll transmit it to you once you've arrived. Janeway's already suspicious. If I transmit it now, I'll be discovered.
Viidian: That's your problem.
Kes: Apparently it's yours, too.
Tuvok: Computer, open this door. Override code Tuvok Alpha. Kes, we have intercepted your transmission. You are detained for delivering sensible information about the Voyager to the Viidians (and Kes is dumped into the brig)
BUT THIS IS HOW IT REALLY SHOULD HAVE ENDED
Kim: Hull breach on deck nine.
Janeway: Emergency force fields.
Kim: Captain, a transporter was activated just before impact. She's beamed aboard.
Janeway: Transport me and the doctor immediately there!
Janeway: Kes! What the hell are you doing??
Kes: You won’t stand in my way… No! Not Janeway’s death glare!
Janeway: Kes. Explain. Yourself. Now.
Kes: I can't. I don't belong here. I need to be with my own people. I want to save myself at my childhood from the mistakes I would make.
Janeway: Oh, is that all? Take it easy! There’s a way to solve your midlife crisis, without destroying anything or breaking the temporal prime directive.
Holodeck Sigmund Freud: So, Kes, tell me about your childhood…
(Some hours later, at the Super Cafe)
Kes: …and so I faced my doubts about my identity, my mortality, the things I have achieved in my life and the things I won’t, and came to accept myself as I am.
Superman: Really? Is that all? And no deaths, no time travel, no viidians, no space traps? It sounds like a boring episode
Janeway: She was lost, and we helped her find her way. And now she’s a more complete and mature person.
Batman: Hay, babe. Wanna know… my secret identity?
Janeway: Oh, shut up
Tuvok: Captain, I have allowed Kes to indulge into psychoanalysis and into this “cafe scene”, but this is enough. Tuvok to Voyager, three to beam up. (and Kes is dumped into the brig)
While my feelings toward Fury are not that strong as Lynx's, and I think it can be salvaged, But I think that such a drastic change in a charatcer should be better explained.
Besides, Kes returning toVoyager to fight off some greater threat like Suspiria sounds like a much better idea. We can even have such greater threat pose as Kes for a time.
Also, Fury made a huge mess in the timeline. At the very least it should not be a time travel episode.
Besides, Kes returning toVoyager to fight off some greater threat like Suspiria sounds like a much better idea. We can even have such greater threat pose as Kes for a time.
Also, Fury made a huge mess in the timeline. At the very least it should not be a time travel episode.
You mean other than the fact that she obviously doesn’t behave like a human two-year old?
No, but she could have been a mature human 12 or 13 year old. She was clearly running away from home in "Caretaker", and found a "nice" older man to take her away from her home. Something that happens all too often in real life.
The more one thinks about it, the more "ick" becomes.
Still an opinion.
Why are people so obsessed with these numbers?
I mean, Kes behaves and looks like a 20 year old human. She may be a bit naive, but there are naive people on Earth of all ages.
Besides, while I understand that some people may not like Kes/Neelix, I advise to separate realtionship (whcih ended some tie before Kes left and wasn;t really mentioned all that often after Season 2 epsidoe "Partitution") and the charatcer. For me, it greatly improved my opinion on Kes (anbd also, separating Worf from his relationship with Jadzia greatly improved my opinion on Worf, for other example).
I mean, Kes behaves and looks like a 20 year old human. She may be a bit naive, but there are naive people on Earth of all ages.
Besides, while I understand that some people may not like Kes/Neelix, I advise to separate realtionship (whcih ended some tie before Kes left and wasn;t really mentioned all that often after Season 2 epsidoe "Partitution") and the charatcer. For me, it greatly improved my opinion on Kes (anbd also, separating Worf from his relationship with Jadzia greatly improved my opinion on Worf, for other example).
Because numbers are generally how we define things like laws and legal status.
My complaints aren't directed at Jennifer Lien, but at the creators and writers. She did the best she could with some pretty poor material.
