There sure is a lot of earth-related crap floating around in the Delta Quadrant.

Possibly. It helps to roll with the premise. If one can do so for Space 1999, then anything is possible.

Good point...

Nice...

 

I am not sure Galileo ever looked directly at the Sun with his telescope not even for a few seconds or not only his eyse but his face would have been badly burned right away. Don't forget that you can start a fire that way (by pointing to the Sun and directing the other end to something dry and flammable...)

Galileo must have taken some precautions, unfortunately, these were not enough.

 

It's my head canon that they fell into one of the Vadwaar subspace corriders.

 

Best premise maybe, but best characters???? Nelix? A poorly researched Native American? Harry Kim? Neelix???? I'll stick with Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Picard, Data, Worf, Barclay, Sisko, Kira, Odo et al, thanks.

I prefer the simple "The Preservers saved a bunch of dinosaurs". It's happened once before in the novels, and can explain why they weren't far more advanced than they were.

 

I've never heard that mentioned in relation to the Voth before. But that would make the Preservers IMMENSELY old, considering they saved other Earth cultures like the Indians. That would stagnate the Preservers even more than the Voth.

I find that interesting, but I definitely do not prefer that theory.

 

Galileo did his observations in the early 17th century (1609 is one of the years mentioned). Back then they didn't have the kinds of solar filters to make it safe to observe the Sun.

I've read about his blindness and its cause in multiple biographies, and it's a fact that he studied sunspots.

 

And there's nothing saying you can't. Those are fine characters.

I'll give you Chakotay, given how his character was researched. And yes, Neelix could be annoying sometimes. However, Harry was potential character growth in its purest form. He could have easily gone from the earnest but wet behind the ears puppy we met in Caretaker to a seasoned and experienced spacefarer who would have his own command someday. See Bashir and Nog for how this could have happened. The writers of Voyager just chose not to do anything with him.

 

But that's probably true of all (underused) Voyager characters. Chakotay could have been researched better (as you say yourself) and his split background (beyond the vision quest stuff) and split loyalty between Maquis and Starfleet explored more, and he would have made for a fascinating character. Neelix had great potential too, with his tragic past, if only we had gotten more episodes like Jetrel, Fair Trade and Mortal Coil (I can understand people dislike the last one, but at least it is a look at Neelix in a bit more depth), but they chose to mainly stay with the 'comedic relief' role (and not a particularly strong one at that *). Kes probably could have given us much more than the 'elf with psychic powers' schtick. And so on.

(* I'm talking about how Neelix was written, the actor playing him was fine and did with the material what he could).

 

All true. Especially Neelix. Because he was so relentlessly cheerful (often irritatingly so, like you mom cheerily waking you up at 6:30 AM on the dark gray Monday morning after Christmas vacation), people often forgot about his serious side.

Chakotay would have required some alterations at the writing level, but I agree, there was potential in him. Unfortunately, having him and Janeway properly complement each other would require them to allow her a few weaknesses. Because she was the first female captain, they were hesitant to do so.

 

Vaudwaar...

Vaudwaar.

That is a name the seventh season’s writers had not heard in a long time...

A long time.

 

I find the idea that the ancestors of Chakotay had no language of their own a bit insulting, not to mention absurd.

 

According to Star Trek Online, they're INSANELY old.

Exactly. "Potential" and "could have" are important words here.

Yeah, the less said about the "Sky Spirits" the better.

 

Sorry but I have to disagree here. I still think that Voyager had the best characters even if I do hold the characters you mention in high esteem.

I can agree that Chakotay's background was poorly researched. But the character was great and imagine what could have been with good writers who had done a better research and wrote better stories.

The same for Harry Kim who had potential but was sadly wasted. Read some of the early Voyager books where Kim is actually doing something and you'll see the difference.

And Neelix is actually one of the best Star Trek characters when it comes to depth and realism.

Just consider his tragic background. He was living a happy life with his family on Rinax. All of a sudden all that changed when his family and friends were killed by the Haakonian Metreon Cascade. Now, that could have made anyone lose his or her mind and that happened to Neelix. In fact, he was actually a drug addict for a while but his friend Wixiban helped him out of this (Voyager book "Pathways by Jeri Taylor).

Then he found a new home on Voyager and did all he could to fit in. OK, he definitely had his issues. His annoying jealousy when it came to Kes (which lead to him losing her in the long run), his whims about being Morale Officer, journalist and whatsoever but that was obviously a result of the trauma he had went through. In that way, he was actually more realistic than some of the casual Starfleet cut-out characters who go through life without a scratch.

Not to mention that despite his inner demons, sometimes annoying behavior and despite his exaggerated ways of trying to please, he actually did everything he could to be friendly, helpful and supporing to everyone and as I see it, that makes him admirable in many ways.

"And little Sir Neelix in his colorful clothes
and the Anthraxic Citrus Peel Orange Juice in his glass
And Little Sir Neelix with his Leola Root plate
proved the strongest man at last
Without him, the crew would never have got so much food
without having to steal and loot
And Janeway would never have got the strength to lead the crew
without the little Leola Root"

Last verse from the old English song "John Barleycorn"
Song recorded by Traffic in 1970
and lyrics slightly altered by Lynx 2021

 

Well, when they say they had no language on their first visit, at least they're not talking about his great-grandparents or any of his ancestors that lived in America, but about his far distant ancestors before they even crossed the Bering strait, still living in Siberia, deep in prehistory 45,000 years ago. Even so, language probably is significantly older than that. Had they simply mentioned a figure 'only' ten times larger (i.e. in the several hundreds of thousands of years range there), it might have been somewhat plausible.

 

One of the better YouTube analyses I've seen on the subject juxtaposes Harry with other young characters, namely Jake, Nog, and Bashir. All three of these characters went on very real character journeys: Jake found his own path, Nog found discipline and purpose in Starfleet, and Bashir went from brash pup to a seasoned officer and doctor. Why was Deep Space 9 so effective at doing that, while Voyager couldn't handle it? The Doctor evolved just fine, and Seven changed a lot in her four seasons.

 

Isn't the problem just that Voyager decided to concentrate on 'the big three' (Janeway, EMH, Seven), and didn't give the other characters too much character development? (Well, Tom and B' elanna still got a moderate amount of it, but Tuvok, Harry, Kes, Neelix, and Chakotay didn't get that much, especially not in the later years).

TNG didn't do better in that department by the way, there the character development stories were focused mostly on Picard, Data and Worf.

 

Tuvok was 110 years old, and his actions and decisions were solidly rooted in logic. So it almost made sense for him to be mostly static (his concession at Neelix's departure was perfect Tuvok).

But yes, there was potential in Neelix: his race's tragic story, his unique religious beliefs, his own backstory. And Ethan Phillip's was a very capable actor.

Kes was a classic example of an intriguing concept that they had no idea what to do with. They finally just decided to stick everything that might have been in one episode: "Before and After".

 

Those characters still had their feature episodes, just not as many as Janeway, EMH, and Seven of Nine. Even so, the "minor" characters could have still been developed without having it take a lot of time from other stories. Chakotay could have been more reflective when Janeway consulted him, showing intellectual growth. Kim's promotion could have come with new responsibilities, wherein he was shown giving commands to some of the (Maquis) crewmen. Tuvok could have decided to embrace a friendship with Neelix, becoming something more akin to O'Brien and Bashir. Of course, none of that happened.

 

The water thing at the beginning was really stupid. I wonder who came up with that idiotic idea. I mean how can people with starships suffer from a dearth of water? That doesn't make any sense.

 

True. I actually enjoyed the conflict between Tuvok and Neelix, though I do think that their Tuvix experience should have helped them understand each other better.

But Kim was just infuriating. Shifting a character to the back burner is acceptable. Insulting your audience is not. And, the notion that after seven years under great adversity, and with the tutelage of officers like Janeway and Tuvok, Harry was still the clueless muffinhead ensign Tom needed to save from Quark... that's just a @#*%$-ing load of crap. Never promoting him just made it worse. And rubbing the audience's nose in it ("I didn't see a box on my chair") was worse still.