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"Twisted", not twisted but an alien illusion

Lynx

Vice Admiral
Admiral
I recently watched "Twisted" again and it struck me that all that happened must have been the result of an alien-created illusion, not that the ship was actually twisted.

When Voyager approaches the distortion ring, odd things starts to happen. The senior officers can't get to the bridge, the corridors are turned into a maze and everything on the ship seems scrambled, like some crewmembers quarters located on the wrong deck and so on.

Later on in the episode, we see an image on a computer screen where the ship seems to be twisted. But that doesn't make sence since everything seems to be scrambled beyond what we see on that computer screen and if the ship would have been that twisted, we would see rifts, broken walls, teared up metal, damaged quarters and such.

My impression is that the aliens who controlled the distortion ring used some power to create an illusion of the ship where everything was scrambled in order to test the people on the ship, how intelligent they were and so.

Then, when they saw how the Voyager crew responded to that and realized that those alien creatures were actually developed after all, they decided to make an exchange of knowledge by downloading Voyager's database and give Voyager similar information back (however, I wonder if they actually used that information, no hint of that in upcoming episodes).

One thing that also strikes me is that Baxter must have annoyed someone high in the hierarcy, most possible Janeway when she found out about Baxter's rude behavior to The Doctor. When we first see Baxter in "The Cloud", he's rude to The Doctor. Then he is dressed in Command black and red. But next time we see him, in "Twisted", he's in Engineering black and gold, like if he has been transferred to the Engineering's Security Team.

Maybe Janeway trasferred him to Security because she couldn't stand him after his rudeness to The Doctor and thought that Tuvok could handle him better. Or maybe they just needed more Security personal and Baxter was the right guy for it.
 
Good catch about Baxter, I'll look out for it next time I watch these. I think some times when security detail needs to be increased Tuvok is allowed to 'enlist' more.

I liked the special effects in this episode and illusion could well account for a sense of twisted reality as much as twisted metal. Interesting interpersonal relationships here too. Chakotay wanting to cut Tuvok down in front of the others. Tuvok apologizing to him was very mature. My initial viewing of that was indignant. It seemed to me that Tuvok was trying to share his interpretation of what Janeway would do and Chakotay was trying to counter it both as a being a friend of Janeway too and as being her next in command. It did annoy me that Chakotay automatically huddled together with Torres in the decision making. Sure he trusted and knew her best, but it seemed disrespectful and hypocritical. If Chakotay wanted Tuvok to respect the chain of command regards him and Janeway he needed to given it back to Tuvok by placing Tuvok as his next in line and not bypassing him to favor Torres. She was clearly erratic and wrong in this episode.

Still they came to terms and I liked how when they weren't sure how it was all going to end, you see instincts take over rules. Chakotay gravitated back to B'Ellana to calm her and Tuvok placed his hand close to Janeway.
 
The entity in Twisted is further explained in one of the post Voyager novels. Great story and it introduces a great story arc.
 
If Chakotay wanted Tuvok to respect the chain of command regards him and Janeway he needed to given it back to Tuvok by placing Tuvok as his next in line and not bypassing him to favor Torres. She was clearly erratic and wrong in this episode.
When people complain about Voyager not living up to it's premise about tension between the two groups, you can see in episodes like this that there was still tension months after they were forced to make the journey together.

The entity in Twisted is further explained in one of the post Voyager novels. Great story and it introduces a great story arc.
Do you recall which novel?
 
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