I think there is probably at least one similar thread like this, so if this feels to redundant, feel free to ignore me. But I was thinking about Voyager and how it could have been really great. I feel like these were the main problems it failed to overcome (in no particular order):
I agree, VOY has had great episodes and often had potential to be great
er.
1.) Excessive use of techno-babble. Now, I'm one of those people who would get pissed at season 7 of DS9 when they would throw in a whole song by Vic Fontaine - made me feel like the writers couldn't be arsed to write another scene so they threw a song in. What's even worse than that, IMO, is throwing in technobabble exposition to pad the episode or for whatever other unfathomable reason. I'm not even one of those people who cares if the technobabble explanation is remotely scientifically plausible or not - I don't watch Trek for scientific accuracy, I watch it for the same reason I watch any other show - to be entertained by a good story. I have no interest in seeing the characters technobabble their way out of a situation every damn week. I'm not saying that this was the only Trek show guilty of this, but it seems to be most prominent on Voyager, and it just smacks of lazy writing.
Agreed. It's ironic, as I adore the episode "Timeless", but the TB (technobabble, not tuberculosis) used felt so convenient, contrived, and artificial. "A Borg temporal transmitter". Artificial not because of the alliteration, but because it's as if the Borg use these as commonplace as we use bars of soap. What are the Borg doing with all these convenient timey-wimey things? (Yes, "timey-wimey" should always and only be used as a pejorative. Or something Elmo on Sesame Street might say.)
2.) Wasted opportunities: Mainly the ST crew and the Maquis. The tension between these two groups pretty much disappeared in like, two episodes, and they were pretty much one big happy crew after that. I wanted more of a struggle to integrate. Heck, we saw more tension between the Bajorans and the Feds on DS9, and the Feds were INVITED their to HELP them. I'm not saying the two crews had to be at each other's throats every episode, but a more bumpy integration, a gradual dissolving of tensions and slow progress to mutual trust and respect would have been more compelling to watch than the insta-integration that happened. Why bother making half the crew Maquis if you're not going to use it as a plot point for more than five seconds?
Big-time. Season 3's "Worst Case Scenario" took advantage of increased tensions, but subverting what could have been as a lame simulation - as lame booby trap set up by Seska as I recall. At least the show addressed the issue but the episode rocked until the big reveal.
3.) Poor character development. This is not to say all the characters were poorly developed - I'd say it was mostly Chakotay and Harry who got the bum rush when it came to character development. Chakotay never got much to besides his "Spritual Indian" shtick, and Harry ... wow, what can I say? About the only Harry-centric episode I can say where we ever saw any potential for character growth was when he was in that prison with Tom - and even then, the focus wasn't so much on Harry, but on the Harry/Tom dynamic, a friendship in the vein of Bashir/O'Brien - which was about the only part of Harry's underdeveloped character that I find interesting.
TNG didn't have very much of it as well, but with VOY it was worse. Neither is like other shows where so little is said about anybody where the characters are shown to do all sorts of things in later episodes that would be rightly deemed apocryphal had characters been thought out and set up before the writing of a single script took place. Now there's lazy development...
"Timeless" is Harry's best episode. In part because he gets to be a human reacting to a bad mistake and showing character attributes of wanting to do what he thinks is the right thing. He's an incredibly underused character and one with guts and gusto when given the opportunity. TOS, TNG, et al, almost never showed mistakes or decisions not working out for anyone. Garrett also proves beyond the shadow of any doubt that the scripts were VOY's problem, not the actors, as he really sells the episode as the situation he's in continues to get worse. Even with the blasted TB.
4.) Little to no character growth. Strongly related to above. Even those character on VOY who were given character development remained rather static through the course of the series. I can't help once again comparing it to my favorite Trek series, DS9, where even a recurring character like Nog went through more growth than a supposed "main" character like Harry Kim. I'm not saying there was no character growth at all - Seven was good example of successful character evolution - but there should have been a lot more.
Agreed, a lot more should have been given.
The best we got, in a perverse sort of way, are from episodes like "Living Witness" where we see the crew as a form of perception. This is why VOY needed a mirror episode because the actors are all clearly relishing their parts when getting to play other than "evolved 24th century Vulcan prototypes'. Yet without their main sensibilities would these one-time episodes where they get to play evil be as compelling?
Seven definitely got the most character development...
But, as with most Trek, there was no major development. Picard got turned into a Borg and there's a very special episode afterward that otherwise couldn't be made. But even after "Chain of Command", Picard's his reset-button self by the next week. Which is okay. It's a TV show, we love the characters, in real life most would have lifelong PTSD recurring and some to the point where they wouldn't be able to continue doing their starship duties. Could a show where many cast changes all the time due to such issues really last?
5.) Imbalance of characters (seeing a theme here? A lot of my complaints have to do with character stuff, heh). Example: When Jeri Ryan came on, VOY became the Seven of Nine show. Now, this is not to say I dislike the character. I know she was pretty much brought on because the powers that be believe the stereotype that the typical trek fan is a droolin hormone-fueled adolescent fanboy, and she provided the T and A. And heck, maybe that's true. But aside from her obvious ... assets ... Seven was an intriguing, complex character and I actually think she was one of the best-written, best-developed characters on the show. I just wish her character development did not have to come at the expense of other characters. Again comparing to DS9, we see a show that managed to develop main and recurring characters and maintain a balance between them (though arguably Jake sort of fell by the wayside towards the end). And they even managed to screw Seven up, by putting in her an out-of-nowhere romance with Chakotay. These two character had nothing in common and, despite the fact that they were both portrayed by attractive actors, have zero chemistry IMO. Yawn.
Agreed on all counts. Jeri Ryan could act and she quickly makes 7 her own. VOY dug the Borg into the ground but the "reclaiming humanity" subplot was a touching one for me and it's easy to see why it became the "The Seven and Janeway Mystery Magical Tour".
But, yep, the show got so hyper-focused on the new character that everyone else was still on the sidelines.
But are all relationships based on how much the individuals in it have in common or is there something larger than a handful of shared interests?
6.) Overabundance of supplies/happiness for a ship stuck however many billion light years from home. I didn't want VOY to be all doom and gloom, with them barely surviving, but it seems they could've been more of show of struggle, some scarcity aboard the ship, the ship itself showing more wear and tear than looking all magically shiny and new every episode. Look writers, if you want to do another TNG, just does do another TNG damn it! The premise was certainly successful enough. But no, you deliberately stranded them decades away from home, and half the time it's like they forgot they were trying to get back to the Delta Quandrant and were just exploring the galaxy, TNG-style. And they have all that time (and power!) to waste on the holodeck! Which leads us too ...
I can't deny the crew is a bit too smurfy at times, I agree. And the only one who should have been that was is, yes, Neelix.
The holodeck was a bit extraneous, especially if they have to ration power from things like replicators. This harks back to the Marquis-vs-Starfleet missed opportunity as well.
7.) Excessive and cringe-worthy use of the holodeck. I say "excessive" because unlike other Trek series, Voyager was supposed to have limited resources. I don't care if they gave a technobabble solution about Voyager's holodeck having a different power source than the rest of the ship (which - WTF? Who designs a ship that way?!). Holodeck episodes tend to be hit or miss when it comes to Trek, and Voyager is no exception. The only time I enjoyed holodeck eps on this show is when the did the Captain Proton episodes, because it was such cheesy, scene-chewery good fun (in black and white!) and a homage to the sci-fi days of yore. As for the rest ... well, Fairhaven.
Enough said.
I forgot the holodeck had a different power source, which may have been introduced in later starships due to the events of TNG's "Booby Trap" where the thing was used for constructive problem-solving.
Fairhaven, ugh...
8.) Character inconsistency. Yes, another character complaint. Even when characters got significant development, it was hard to tell, because it often felt like they were written differently from one episode to the next. Janeway is the most egregrious example of this. One week, the writers have her cleaving the Prime Directive like it's the most sacred, sacrosanct rule in her universe, the next week, she's throwing it out the window. Come on, people. Even if you didn't it write it, would it at least kill you to glance over last week's script! Yeesh.
Television never changes, I suppose. Script order and production order are not always the same and there was no group of writers in the same room poking through all the scripts to ensure a consistent theme. Even TOS broke its own PD rules, but over the span of fifty years - never mind thirty - we'd surely see more consistency and cohesiveness in the plot scripting department thanks to improved script writing/editing software to keep track of issues, collaboration, and other things compared to a typewriter from way back when. "Final Draft" didn't exist in the 1990s either... Also, 90s Trek was at its peak for casual audiences and slowly entering burnout around 1995, so some of the discontinuity could be expected. (DS9 held its own but VOY definitely felt less focused at times. DS9 definitely got the extra care. VOY is good but could have been more frequently exceptional too.)
So, those are my main gripes with Voyager. Feel free to add, critique, ignore, agree, or tell me I'm utterly and completely off the mark! It's all good.
If they went the lines of "Year of Hell" for seven years, that would have been fairly impressive... and depressive. Maybe for a season or two and then recover bits and pieces over time... As with Maquis-vs-Feds, seven
years of the same theme would not have worked. But two episodes and a big bright shiny red reset button was the opposite extreme.
On the other hands, Chaotica was greatly and funny. 
