Except in "Tapestry," sort of...
Anyway, I think that's a distinction that the Q would consider trivial.
My own take on Janeway in Before Dishonor (spoilers)
- Thread starter Darth_Pazuzu
- Start date
Except in "Tapestry," sort of...
Anyway, I think that's a distinction that the Q would consider trivial.
Perhaps it would be safe to say that overconfidence is one of the pitfalls of being a starship captain?
Janeway wouldn't!
I think it's more a matter of a pitfall of ours as non-starship captains and not having that burden on our shoulders. I'm betting (if they were real people) that they'd all think that each other are not at all overconfident, but simply doing their job.
I mean really... if we could actually be in their shoes would we REALLY do something different? Or is it that outside viewpoint and hindsight that is making us say "well, this and this and this, so I'd have done this instead" when in reality (lol "reality") they didn't know any of that at the time.
That's a good point. You have to wonder if the digs at "the admirals who make judgements without knowing what its like" are actually digs at the audience.
I don't agree. We all owe the universe one death; life's only inevitability is that it ends. So it might as well be a good one. Ideally, it would come at the end of a long and full life, but if I had to die earlier, I would want it ('want', because, obviously, we don't have much control over the issue) to mean something, to be purposeful, and not something random, pointless and stupid. After all, the fact that you only live once means you only die once, too. We want to make our lives worth something; why not our deaths? Surely you can see the distinction between a death that befalls when pulling people out of a burning building, and being mowed down by some drunk-driving asshole?
Yes, that was bullshit. Kimc, you have no basis to be calling Defcon a sexist and promoter of double-standards and impunging his motivations when he hasn't said anything of the sort in this thread (or anywhere else that I know of). If he thinks Janeway was overconfident he is perfectly entitled to think so; it isn't exactly a radical hypothesis based on what we saw on the show. Frankly, I would expect better of someone in green than to be making baseless accusations about another poster, and then demanding they defend themselves from that accusation.
Personally, I don't think Janeway was overconfident, or at least not anymore so than the other captains we've seen (confidence, of course, being a requirement of command). I agree that Janeway took decisions rather unilaterally, but I see that as stemming from her powerful desire to protect her people rather than overconfidence. And by that I don't just mean that she trusted herself the most to make the necessary decisions (although that's partly the case), but also that by claiming decision-making power for herself, she subconsciously seeks to spare her subordinates from having to take responsibility for those decisions. After all, it was Janeway's choice to protect the Ocampa (a decision I agree with, by the way) that stranded the crews; she, more than any other C.O., is hyper-aware of the burden of command. If she felt guilty, if she tortured herself over what she had done to her people (and I surely think she did), then as part of protecting her people she would want to take it all on herself; if she and only she has to make the hard decisions, then the rest of the crew won't have to live with the guilt that she does, with the psychological consequences of command choices. It's worth keeping in mind, when thinking about Janeway's frequent tendency to 'go at it alone', that she is one of the most isolated characters of the Trek series, that her guilt occasionally manifests as a kind of self-flagellation; she takes all the deicisons onto herself, but she also wants to take all the punishment onto herself. So I think, rather than being sourced in a superiority complex, her unilaterism comes from something like an inferioty complex (a penitence complex?).
One of the problems with Janeway in the TNG-R is that where such an attitude should have dissipated, or at least become less pronounced when she got her crew back home, the fiction has, if anything, taken as standard the Janeway of "Equinox" and "Friendship One", and exacerbated it. I finally got around to rewatching Nemesis the other day, and remarked that Janeway, in her cameo, actually looked happy. Before Dishonor's Janeway, however, is a bitter, joyless woman who seems more alone now then she did in her 'command bubble' on Voyager.
And while on the topic of "Equinox", it's worth mentioning again that it was an extreme circumstance. We don't continously judge Sisko from his actions in "For the Uniform", for instance, and these are similar circumstances of betrayal and obsession. And, of course, it was necessary for the thematic integrity of the episode that Janeway get darker as Ransom became lighter, both captains moving towards the equinox between them.
Fictitiously yours, Trent Roman
Well you've obviously read Defcon's posts now please go back and read mine.
This is why many Janeway fans aren't reading the books. The character is not at all the character we remember from the series. Personally, if the books were my only exposure to the Janeway character then I wouldn't care much for her either.
Janeway (mostly later-season Janeway) and Archer both rubbed me the wrong way. It was more about the crappy plots of convenience than anything else. They had their moments, but I found them both to be really empty plot-movers rather than people. In that way, I never formed any real bond with them.
It's true the Janeway of the later seasons was mainly there to say "Fire phasers" or "I'll be in my ready room." Most of the character development went to Seven and the Doctor.
And it underlined how dangerous was the role of security chief. Before Tasha's death, almost every security guard we saw die in ST was a one-off guest star or a nameless extra.
First of all: Thanks for your support.
But kimc and I have settled the "sexist" issue via PM as far as I'm concerned, so we hopefully can drop this off-topic part of the discussion.
Interesting interpretation and most likely a valid one. Like I said above I was more of a casual viewer of Voyager and quite frankly the crew never really worked as well for me as those of the other series, so it's certainly possible that I "overlooked" the psychological parts of the equitation and only saw her unilateral decisions and misinterpreted them as over-confidence.
But does that change the fact that this would still mean that in the end she became a victim of her own weakness? (other than that it's an different weakness than I assumed
) I'm not sure if her cameo in Nemesis was significant enough to judge her feelings, so ignoring that for the moment: maybe she had a problem with letting go of her "I have to do everything alone" attitude after living with it for a decade. And her being an Admiral and basically having to work even more by herself and having the responsibility for even more people might not have been helpful in changing it.
I want to add a little to this interesting discussion:
Each Star Trek series has at least one or two episodes in which the captain does something that feels out of character and you wish it had never been written. In DS9, one of them is indeed “For the Uniform”. It was a very long time ago but I still remember that I even had passionate discussions with the author on Usenet who disagreed with me and defended Sisko`s actions. I was amazed that he did so. At the end we had to agree to disagree but it was a discussion I nevertheless enjoyed. The other one I hated was “The Sons of Mogh”. I consider these two episodes as bad exceptions of the rule. I refused to let these two exceptions taint my positive view of Sisko especially because although I passionately disagree with his actions or decisions, he wanted to do the right thing. Oh, yes, there are some TNG episodes in which I was unhappy with Picard but in that regard he wasn`t different from Sisko.
Archer was worse. In season three, we don`t see one or two odd episodes but an ongoing trend I very much disliked when the authors introduced ruthless Archer. I found many of the excuses and explanations very annoying and not appropriate for a Star Trek captain who is supposedly a positive role model for the viewers. It was gone with season four and I am very grateful that the books mentioned that Archer was determined to do better in future. Good – I hope he doesn`t relapse.
There were strong confrontations about Archer`s decisions sometimes. With Janeway, it was very different. I am also one of the viewers who only watched most episodes once but I never got the feeling that Janeway had anyone on board who really challenged her and stood up to her, certainly not after the big change with the departure of Jeri Taylor. Sometimes I wondered if these male authors thought, Janeway has to look strong, therefore she has to be surrounded by weak male characters, especially a weak first officer. Her security chief was no better either and had a record of unauthorized departures and other security breaches that was embarrassing. I also think, “Equinox” went much further than any other “captain is going bad” episode. Janeway would have murdered a prisoner in cold blood. That alone is not something I can forgive, not even excuse. It also doesn`t help that before Janeway`s death (well, how dead she is we will probably find out soon) she annoyed me immensely with her attitude towards Picard and threatening him with a court martial in spite he was very right indeed by not following certain orders. I am sure, would Janeway be able to, she would defend the mutiny on the Enterprise ( and although I love the book, the mutiny is something I have a lot of problems with). Janeway wasn`t out of character in the Borg arch so far. I certainly disagree with what some people said, that her death was an insult and not heroic. As I keep saying, I don`t think it was a good idea to kill her off and I want to repeat here that doing so was not Peter David`s decision. He himself said, if not him, another author would have written her death. Janeway was given a negative build up and she was in character but certainly not at her best in “Before Dishonor”. I can imagine that especially Voyager fans have to wonder about this – a cynical person could say by showing Janeway in a bad light before her death, it could make that decision more acceptable to many readers.
Each Star Trek series has at least one or two episodes in which the captain does something that feels out of character and you wish it had never been written. In DS9, one of them is indeed “For the Uniform”. It was a very long time ago but I still remember that I even had passionate discussions with the author on Usenet who disagreed with me and defended Sisko`s actions. I was amazed that he did so. At the end we had to agree to disagree but it was a discussion I nevertheless enjoyed. The other one I hated was “The Sons of Mogh”. I consider these two episodes as bad exceptions of the rule. I refused to let these two exceptions taint my positive view of Sisko especially because although I passionately disagree with his actions or decisions, he wanted to do the right thing. Oh, yes, there are some TNG episodes in which I was unhappy with Picard but in that regard he wasn`t different from Sisko.
Archer was worse. In season three, we don`t see one or two odd episodes but an ongoing trend I very much disliked when the authors introduced ruthless Archer. I found many of the excuses and explanations very annoying and not appropriate for a Star Trek captain who is supposedly a positive role model for the viewers. It was gone with season four and I am very grateful that the books mentioned that Archer was determined to do better in future. Good – I hope he doesn`t relapse.
There were strong confrontations about Archer`s decisions sometimes. With Janeway, it was very different. I am also one of the viewers who only watched most episodes once but I never got the feeling that Janeway had anyone on board who really challenged her and stood up to her, certainly not after the big change with the departure of Jeri Taylor. Sometimes I wondered if these male authors thought, Janeway has to look strong, therefore she has to be surrounded by weak male characters, especially a weak first officer. Her security chief was no better either and had a record of unauthorized departures and other security breaches that was embarrassing. I also think, “Equinox” went much further than any other “captain is going bad” episode. Janeway would have murdered a prisoner in cold blood. That alone is not something I can forgive, not even excuse. It also doesn`t help that before Janeway`s death (well, how dead she is we will probably find out soon) she annoyed me immensely with her attitude towards Picard and threatening him with a court martial in spite he was very right indeed by not following certain orders. I am sure, would Janeway be able to, she would defend the mutiny on the Enterprise ( and although I love the book, the mutiny is something I have a lot of problems with). Janeway wasn`t out of character in the Borg arch so far. I certainly disagree with what some people said, that her death was an insult and not heroic. As I keep saying, I don`t think it was a good idea to kill her off and I want to repeat here that doing so was not Peter David`s decision. He himself said, if not him, another author would have written her death. Janeway was given a negative build up and she was in character but certainly not at her best in “Before Dishonor”. I can imagine that especially Voyager fans have to wonder about this – a cynical person could say by showing Janeway in a bad light before her death, it could make that decision more acceptable to many readers.
Last edited:
Very well. And I apologize to kimc if I was too harsh earlier. It's just that I don't like to see accusations of prejudice bandied about liberally; I feel it diminishes the real thing.
Well, that's just my interpretation; certainly a case could be made for yours as well. But I've always been that way towards Janeway; where others see inconsistent characterization, I choose to see psychological complexity. Doesn't make me more right, but I do think it's more interesting than the outside-the-box explanations of lazy writers.
I suppose not. But then, all characters are flawed; otherwise they wouldn't be particularly interesting characters. Does it mean Janeway deserved to die for exhibiting this weakness?
Quite possibly, and like you said it was only a brief cameo. But I think it makes a more representative sample of post-series Janeway than extreme circumstances on the show. And, of course, post-series Janeway has an option Captain Janeway never had: if she's unhappy with her job, she's perfectly free to quit and try something in civilian life. In the Delta Quadrant, there was no escaping her responsibilities.
Fictitiously yours, Trent Roman
Does she really had that choice? She was a character very much into Starfleet from the get go, and after being stranded in the Delta Quadrant for a decade basically all she has in life anymore is Starfleet, since all her non-Starfleet contacts, like her fiance, have moved on to live their lifes. So I'm not really so sure she would be a woman who would just let Starfleet be Starfleet, even if she isn't 100% happy there anymore.
I'm not sure if deserving is the right word, but I think it's something she has to accept for her way of conducting things. So I wouldn't go as far as to say she deserved it, but I stand by my comments above that it's something that fits her character in my opinion.
Regarding Sisko... It astounds me that everyone overlooks the single most egregious act that is "unbecoming a Starfleet Captain." That took place in In the Pale Moonlight. I think this episode gets overlooked so much in these types of discussions because it was so well written, engaging and a generally great episode and tends to top a lot of peoples' favorites list (mine included BTW). But this was considerably worse than Equinox and any other Captain-gone-bad episodes I've seen in Trek.
Sisko was an accessory to MURDER, he knew about it and didn't report it to anybody. He in a manner of speaking set it up himself. Even had the outcome not been the death of the Praetor (or was it a senator? I don't recall) he actively involved himself in a VERY massive and detrimental act of War with the Romulan Star Empire in order to lure them into a war that they had no (from their perspective) reason to enter. He framed an entire government, effectively putting them at war with another government for the sole purpose of relieving his own government from the effects of war with the government that he framed. He then went on to say in that episode that he'd do it all again! This is a thing that is so bad that even given the "good" outcome of the actions, and the nobility behind the reasoning of them even hindsight can not justify completely those actions. If/when that comes out I fully expect (if Sisko is alive) him to be thrown in jail -- to which I'd expect him to go with his head held high for the good that ultimately resulted from the evil he did. I'd also expect the Romulan Star Empire to either fully wage war on the Federation, or at least demand ludicrous amounts of reparations from them.
Now, I'm sure the justification I'm bound to receive here is that "it wasn't Sisko who did all of this, it was Garak and the alien." Sisko, knew full well what he was doing when he went to Garak and there was a reason he didn't want to know all the gory details of what Garak was going to do, because he knew Garak would arrange something quite atrocious to make the end goal happen. It's been a while since I've seen this episode, I think I'll go home and watch it tonight, but wasn't that alien murdered too? In order to tie up the loose end he would have been so that now ONLY Garak and Sisko know what really happened?
Sisko was an accessory to MURDER, he knew about it and didn't report it to anybody. He in a manner of speaking set it up himself. Even had the outcome not been the death of the Praetor (or was it a senator? I don't recall) he actively involved himself in a VERY massive and detrimental act of War with the Romulan Star Empire in order to lure them into a war that they had no (from their perspective) reason to enter. He framed an entire government, effectively putting them at war with another government for the sole purpose of relieving his own government from the effects of war with the government that he framed. He then went on to say in that episode that he'd do it all again! This is a thing that is so bad that even given the "good" outcome of the actions, and the nobility behind the reasoning of them even hindsight can not justify completely those actions. If/when that comes out I fully expect (if Sisko is alive) him to be thrown in jail -- to which I'd expect him to go with his head held high for the good that ultimately resulted from the evil he did. I'd also expect the Romulan Star Empire to either fully wage war on the Federation, or at least demand ludicrous amounts of reparations from them.
Now, I'm sure the justification I'm bound to receive here is that "it wasn't Sisko who did all of this, it was Garak and the alien." Sisko, knew full well what he was doing when he went to Garak and there was a reason he didn't want to know all the gory details of what Garak was going to do, because he knew Garak would arrange something quite atrocious to make the end goal happen. It's been a while since I've seen this episode, I think I'll go home and watch it tonight, but wasn't that alien murdered too? In order to tie up the loose end he would have been so that now ONLY Garak and Sisko know what really happened?
Last edited:
And in Hollow Men, his role in the event *is* revealed, to senior members of Starfleet Command. And they don't do anything.
Inter Arma Enim Silent Leges
Inter Arma Enim Silent Leges
She does. She has a mother and a sister in civilian life who she's apparently close to (which makes sense, given that she's the attachment-forming type). Janeway was in sciences before she went into command, so it's not like captaining starships is all she knows how to do or enjoy; after an arguably traumatic experience like captaining a lost ship, it wouldn't surprise me if she'd taken some time off to do something else like Picard did. So I'm inclined to take her Nemesis cameo at face value, that Janeway wants to be in Starfleet and still enjoys what she does.
Well, I don't agree, but you know that by now. I don't think she was overconfident to board a Borg ship everybody thought was dead (and she did set up a number of precautions, since Janeway has a healthy respect for the Borg's potency). I don't think she was arrogant to dismiss Lady Q's cryptic warning, because of the Q's recorded fondness for making humans run their rat-mazes, and generally to far less fatal results. And I don't think she deserved the psychological torture and death that befell her, while her ersatz oracle watched on and mocked her.
I didn't overlook it, actually, I deliberately decided not to bring it up. Partly because I still haven't been able to come to a decision about that episode (not a comfortable state of affairs for a person of my, er, 'critical' temperament), but partly because I think ItPM was a different breed of situation to that we've been discussing her. Sisko in "For the Uniform", Janeway in "Equinox" and 'Airlock' Archer all exhibited a kind of righteous, vengeful outrage that blinded them to the ethical considerations of their own actions. This time, in contrast, Sisko was perfectly aware of what he was doing, continously questioning himself and his motives; his anger was mostly directed at Garak and himself, the perpetrators rather than the victims. I've always thought that episode spoke less to Sisko as a character in the way that "For the Uniform" and "Equinox" speaks to the character's motives, then it did about war as a state of being, and the effect that has on even good people. The incidents we've been dealing with are deeply personal, whereas ItPM could have happened to most any character (it isn't difficult to see Kira or Bashir making those same choices, for instance, while one couldn't imagine Chakotay doing what Janeway did in "Equinox", or the rest of the Defiant crew [perhaps excluding Worf] in "For the Uniform").
Fictitiously yours, Trent Roman
Which would make them the biggest hypocrites ever, in my book. Clearly the Federation stands for exactly nothing... and that's a problem given the alleged high ideals they purport to stand for.
I can accept that as a difference. Though, while different, it's still got some similarities in morality. In a way this makes Sisko worse actually, because he thought it out and made an aware and conscious decision to do the unthinkable. Where as at least the others were under some sort of stress. A sort of "Temporary Insanity" plea vs "Murder in the First degree" type of thing.
