message in a bottle

[Flying Spaghetti Monster]

Aw GAWD!

Listen to the dialog in this tripe... I've heard better dialog from a 9-year-old writer.

The Prometheus is a ridiculous, ship, all about the multi-ventral gimmick.. it's as if the writers thought, well saucer separation was cool, let's make it COOLER.

This is an awful immature episode with terrible comedic acting.

 

[Lynx]

I must also admit that I don't like "Message In A Bottle".

But not for the dialogue or the acting, more because it ruined the premise of the show.

Voyager was supposed to be about a ship which was LOST in the Delta Quadrant and suddenly, after only 3 years in an unknown quadrant, still more than 60 000 light-years from home, they are able to send and receive messages to Earth just as easy as a phone call from Los Angeles to San Jose.

If that contact had been established in season 7 when Voyager was supposed to reach Earth or at least reach the outskirts of the Alpha or Beta Quadrant, I would have accepted that but now it happened too early. Voyager's original premise went out there and then.

Not to mention later on when the TNG-holograms started to jump on and off the ship...

 

[Finn]

How did it ruin the premise? They were still lost, and they were unable to communicate back and forth regularly for a couple more years after that episode

 

[Akiraprise]

I agree. This episode didn't ruin the premise. UPN did that.
It was kind of a fluke thing that they came across the Hirogen array. Once they lost it AQ communication ended.

 

[sbk1234]

Often being in a minority oppinion, I must say I kinda liked it. I was never, however, a fan of the Prometheous, and would have preferred it to be a ship we'd seen before. One thing I really liked was the bit at the end when the Doctor comes back. I felt it was a very emotional scene when he confirmed that he made contact with Starfleet, and when he relayed the message that they were no longer alone. Yes, I'll say it. I got a little choked up.
Strange, some of the critisisms I've heard about Trek is the oft used reset button, but here is an episode where the reset button isn't pushed, and it's being critisized for that.

 

[Lynx]

I still think it ruined the premise for the series. They weren't supposed to get in touch with Earth for many years.

And as some of you have stated, they couldn't get in touch with Earth again for some yars so what's the point with making it possible for them in that one and only episode? It was just another dead end.

 

[Huntingdon]

It raises hopes and then dashes them - increases the pathos.

I enjoyed it. The Prometheus looked impressive even if it was absurdly impractical, and Andy Dick worked as a comic role even if he was not remotely convincing as a medical practitioner. I doubt that that was ever the intention though.

 

[jgdst]

I also seem to be in a minority of people who enjoyed this one...

Without the Alpha Quadrant angle, I think Voyager may have started running out of ideas sooner - at least this gave them a whole new avenue of Doctor and/or Barclay stories. Not to mention the Ferengi one... though that was a tad far-fetched, even for Voyager

I'll agree though, that I stopped enjoying the show so much after probably Season 5... was that down to this episode introducing contact with Earth? We'll never know. Ever.

To paraphrase Rick Dagless, MD - just to re-iterate, we won't find out later on.

 

[kimc]

Often being in a minority oppinion, I must say I kinda liked it. I was never, however, a fan of the Prometheous, and would have preferred it to be a ship we'd seen before.

Silly question but when was the Prometheous seen before?

 

[Tyberius]

Often being in a minority oppinion, I must say I kinda liked it. I was never, however, a fan of the Prometheous, and would have preferred it to be a ship we'd seen before.

Silly question but when was the Prometheous seen before?

I don't think we did. sbk wants it to be a ship that we had seen, not one that we had not seen.

 

[kimc]

Often being in a minority oppinion, I must say I kinda liked it. I was never, however, a fan of the Prometheous, and would have preferred it to be a ship we'd seen before.

Silly question but when was the Prometheous seen before?

I don't think we did. sbk wants it to be a ship that we had seen, not one that we had not seen.

You're right - dang stomach virus!

 

[Jack Bauer]

This episode was the only thing in which I've ever liked Andy Dick.

 

[propita]

This episode was the only thing in which I've ever liked Andy Dick.

True 'dat!

 

[sbk1234]

Often being in a minority oppinion, I must say I kinda liked it. I was never, however, a fan of the Prometheous, and would have preferred it to be a ship we'd seen before.

Silly question but when was the Prometheous seen before?

I don't think we did. sbk wants it to be a ship that we had seen, not one that we had not seen.

Yeah. What he said. As for Andy Dick, if you think he's brilliant on Voyager, you should check out The Hebrew Hammer.

 

[Triskelion]

I beg to differ, I liked the Prometheus. I think it made sense design-wise. It was designed as a deep-space tactical warship. That means that it would likely be engaging in battle with no backup. What's the alternative? A Galaxy-class? Or another Intrepid-class, with only shuttles for backup? The Prometheus had 3 warp-capable sections, two of which were designed for battle, one for getting nonessential people out of harm's way.

Personally I don't care for the "heads" of the bottom 2 sections, but I think the design is reasonable. Sovereign-style nacelles, not to mention ablative armor, etc. Designed to be manned by a skeleton crew. For its purpose it's perfectly reasonable.

I would love to have seen the EMH II being designed after Dr McCoy. That would have been a thrill ride!

 

[Tyberius]

I beg to differ, I liked the Prometheus. I think it made sense design-wise. It was designed as a deep-space tactical warship. That means that it would likely be engaging in battle with no backup. What's the alternative? A Galaxy-class? Or another Intrepid-class, with only shuttles for backup? The Prometheus had 3 warp-capable sections, two of which were designed for battle, one for getting nonessential people out of harm's way.

Personally I don't care for the "heads" of the bottom 2 sections, but I think the design is reasonable. Sovereign-style nacelles, not to mention ablative armor, etc. Designed to be manned by a skeleton crew. For its purpose it's perfectly reasonable.

I would love to have seen the EMH II being designed after Dr McCoy. That would have been a thrill ride!

I can't fully appreciate the design of the ship because, as I recall (and I am sure someone will correct me), the tactics that were used were wrong. Splitting the force of the ship into three would be used to flank and enemy and not multiply firepower. As I recall, they only split by a few meters and didn't have much difference in the attack vector for their multi-vector assault. The firepower of the ship would be the same in either mode, unless the fire ports were hidden in the joints of the whole ship, which itself would be a bad design. The splitting was more of a "golly gee whiz" moment which may have surprised the enemy but wouldn't have done more damage.

 

[nx1701g]

^ There were additional phaser arrays exposed when the ship separated. The Saucer section remained normal. The middle section had phasers exposed both on the ventral and dorsal hulls. The lower section had additional phasers on the dorsal hull.

 

[Guy Gardener]

Well they're bigger idiots than ever for keeping desperately needed phaser arrays in check and hidden and unusable...

Size doesn't count for much since they're hitting their targets from 30 thousand kilometers away, so what really got me bothered about this design was the reduced strength to the shields for each component, unless they were broadcasting power to each other like with those Cardassian gun inplacement drone satellites form tears of the prophets.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

I liked the story and the dialogue. Andy Dick ruined the whole thing. If only they'd contrived a way that Julian Bashir's EMH program could have been the co-star.

 

[Triskelion]

Well they're bigger idiots than ever for keeping desperately needed phaser arrays in check and hidden and unusable...

Size doesn't count for much since they're hitting their targets from 30 thousand kilometers away, so what really got me bothered about this design was the reduced strength to the shields for each component, unless they were broadcasting power to each other like with those Cardassian gun inplacement drone satellites form tears of the prophets.

The Prometheus has 3 warp cores that can function seperately when detached. Of course this information wasn't explored in the series.