Should Voyager have been more like Stargate: Universe?

[Enterprise1981]

In Stargate: Universe, literally every day on a ship exiled billions of light years from Earth was a struggle for survival and entire episodes were devoted to those struggles. Most of the machinery on the ship didn't work and people took out their frustrations on crewmates. There was a lack of consensus as to who was in charge--the ranking military officer, the lead civilian scientist, the politician--and lack of consensus over whether to find a nice habitable planet to settle on in that particular corner of the universe or to keep trying to get back home.

Would Voyager have been too depressing if it had followed that format or would it have been more believable? It's hard to say considering Voyager lasted seven seasons while SGU got cancelled after just two.

 

[F. King Daniel]

Voyager was enjoyable light entertainment, as were Stargate SG-1 and Atlantis. SGU's change in direction over it's predecessors was a franchise killer. People liked the light fun, they didn't want nuBSG's tone in Stargate - and it wouldn't have been a good fit for Star Trek either, IMO.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

The show runners wanted it to be that way, but the network execs overruled them.

The people who actually wrote and created Voyager didn't want it to be the "TNG Lite" it became. They were forced against their will to make it that way. (Remember, they wanted "Year of Hell" to last an entire season.)

 

[Lucky]

It didn't have to go that dark, but I would have definitely liked to see the crew struggling more.

 

[Relayer1]

It didn't have to go that dark, but I would have definitely liked to see the crew struggling more.

This.

Showing occasional shortages, rationing, recycling, manufacturing and crew dissatisfaction would have made it all more convincing.

 

[Enterprise1981]

(Remember, they wanted "Year of Hell" to last an entire season.)

Wow, I didn't know that. I do remember watching "Before and After" for the first time and thinking that version of the "year of hell" was foreshadowing of Season 4.

It didn't have to go that dark, but I would have definitely liked to see the crew struggling more.

I suppose so. But what I always had trouble making sense of was how the ship could be in shambles one scene and the very next scene: POOF, all the lights are back on and there's no evidence of any battle damage anywhere.

 

[Anwar]

I suppose so. But what I always had trouble making sense of was how the ship could be in shambles one scene and the very next scene: POOF, all the lights are back on and there's no evidence of any battle damage anywhere.

To be fair, the other Trek shows did this too without giving any explanations between episodes.

Anyways, I do think that VOY might've been better if they were on some Alien Starship they got from the Caretaker and if it'd been some huge Battleship instead of a tiny Scout Ship. And for there to be thousands of people in the "crew" who were also lots of aliens from other parts of the Galaxy that the Caretaker was holding on his Array when he died.

 

[JarodRussell]

I generally hate the types of characters they had in SGU. All miserable, stupid, unprofessional, and scheming against each other. Can't draw any sort of entertainment out of that.

The only entertaining thing was when they had to get the older SG1 and SGA characters in to help them out, because they sucked both in-universe and in reality. It was like an admission of failure. "We can't handle this, get Rodney McKay." "We can't handle this, get General O'Neill."

 

[Enterprise1981]

To be fair, the other Trek shows did this too without giving any explanations between episodes.

At least with TNG, it made more sense with quick and easy access to starbase repair facilities. And with one of the few times as a stationwide power failure was a plot device--when they crashed the computers at the end of Season 5 and the start of Season 6 took place three months later--that took roughly a month to fix.

 

[Anwar]

To be fair, the other Trek shows did this too without giving any explanations between episodes.

At least with TNG, it made more sense with quick and easy access to starbase repair facilities. And with one of the few times as a stationwide power failure was a plot device--when they crashed the computers at the end of Season 5 and the start of Season 6 took place three months later--that took roughly a month to fix.

What about "To The Death"? Where renegade Jem'Hadar blew off one of those big pylons? By the next episode, the station was A-Okay.

 

[Lynx]

First I thought this was a joke!

Honestly, "Stargate Universe" is the worst piece of crap I've ever watched. Voyager did have its flaws and there were some things who could have been done better but Voyager never came close to Stargate Universe when it comes to lousy characters and bad storytelling.

Voyager had a mixed crew of Starfleet crewmembers and Maquis rebels who realised that they had to work together and overcome all difficulties to find their way back to Federation space.

Stargate Univerese had a mixed crew of military and civilians who constantly bickered and argued about everything and didn't achieve anything in order to find a way back home, not even when they had those ridiculous stones with which they could transfer themselves back to Earth in someone elses body.

Not to mention the main characters. While Voyager had likeable characters, Stargate Universe's characters were the direct opposite: An acoholic captain who would never had achieved status as a crewmember on Voyager, a crazy scientist who deliberately obstructed every attempt to get home, a whining civilian female character who started conflict after conflict between the military and the civilians, the silly computer kid, the lame "action Lieutenant", the soldier with the lousy temper, the Ambassador's daughter whose only interest was sexual activities with the "hero character" and the female doctor who spent the first three episodes complaining "I shouldn't have been on this ship".

The only interesting thing with Stargate Universe was those blue aliens who did show up in some episode. Otherwise the stories were lameand uninteresting, full of meaningless bickering.

In fact, Stargate Universe became a joke between me and an old friend of mine who claim that he managed to fell asleep on two occasions two occasions while watching the show.

Not to mention that Voyager did arrive home, Destiny didn't!

 

[Guy Gardener]

Universe told a long winding story that led to several massive payoffs for keeping up with the series.

Voyager gave you 40 minutes of entertainment that barely impacted the future or the past of the franchise, which would you could practically watch in any order.

 

[TEACAKE'S PLEATHER DOME]

I got mixed up and thought this was about who you would ship Janeway with if she was on SG:U and then I freaked out thinking about how someone somewhere would ship her with Rush which would be awful.

 

[MacLeod]

I'm going to have to go with yes, however that doesn't mean it had to get as bad at shows like SG:U and nBSG. VOY barely played lip service to being tens of thousands of light years from year home.

 

[TEACAKE'S PLEATHER DOME]

Throw a dollop, a Year of Hell sized dollop, of SGU into it. That would be lovely.

 

[Anwar]

I'm going to have to go with yes, however that doesn't mean it had to get as bad at shows like SG:U and nBSG. VOY barely played lip service to being tens of thousands of light years from year home.

TBH, it wasn't really a new or exciting plot. TOS and TNG did the same thing, more than once.

 

[TEACAKE'S PLEATHER DOME]

What was great about SG:U is

Spoiler: SG:U spoiler

they never got back. And/or we never knew if they got back. Or even lived.

 

[Guy Gardener]

Don't be such a scamp Teacake!

Of course Eli came through!

That kid has moxy!

 

[TEACAKE'S PLEATHER DOME]

I do agree he was hot, or would have been hot had I been 20 years younger which means after sitting in that tomb full of frozen folk for 20 years he would have been hot. Or mad. Probably the latter, heck he would have turned into a fat Rush basket case. Knowing me this would probably have been appealing.

Yeah I guess he died very much alone

 

[Guy Gardener]

You are not remembering the end right.

Spoiler

They were one cryopod short to make the jump to the next galaxy. Some one could volunteer suicide and they would be safe. No one did. Rush had a month while the rest were in stasis to get his pod working until they crossed their margins where they would no longer have enough fuel/power to make it to the next galaxy. On greater reflection, it was decided that Rush was such a massive tool that they could not trust him to self whack in a month like a good boy. Vain bastard would think if he just had one more week, that he could lick this problem, but he probably couldn't. Thus Young left Eli was left free reign with the ship for 30 days to save himself or top himself.

The actor who played Eli is currently 32 years young and very thin.

You're allowed to whatever the hell you want to him in effigy.