What is your favorite female character from Voyager?

[tomalak301]

The character is great!
There were some flaws which could and should have been corrected but despite those, she is a great character and should have deserved better.

Given your post history, I'm assuming you were talking about Kes. I still like Kes, but the legal problems and finding out the real reason why Lien left (Mental Health) kind of soured me a little bit. I hope Lien is getting the help she needs, but that whole situation seems a lot dirtier than what was lead on and the writers didn't do the character any favors.

Every time I watch Voyager, I gain more appreciation for Torres, and the arc she went through trying to understand her identity as half Klingon half Human and embracing both. I find an episode like Faces to be an underrated episode of the series, but in a sense, that theme carried with her for the rest of the shows run, especially through Leniage where she has qualms about how her Baby will look like and that she didn't want her daughter to go through what she went through.

 

[fireproof78]

Chakotay was created on advice from a huckster and his actor wanted out. Harry was a character who was foundering, and the powers that be actively chose not to salvage. Either would have been a better candidate for elimination from the show, and Kes and Seven could have both stayed.

Agreed. Not every character works and Chakotay was just terrible. A deeply frustrating result when having a Native American character could have provided an interesting idea.

 

[suarezguy]

Chakotay was created on advice from a huckster and his actor wanted out. Harry was a character who was foundering, and the powers that be actively chose not to salvage. Either would have been a better candidate for elimination from the show, and Kes and Seven could have both stayed.

I think it would be pretty hard for any first officer to Janeway to make a particularly better impression, be better regarded, when the writers had Janeway (aside from Seven and occasionally the Doctor) so much making the decisions, driving the stories and the other characters either having to agree with her or Janeway otherwise being portrayed as being in the right. Tuvok could have been kind of more used/interesting as Janeway's new first officer but with there being little to no conflict and Janeway having to be right not a bit change/improvement for him or any new first officer.

 

[XCV330]

I think we should have had a season arc with Fury Kes causing mayhem across the quadrant. She could have killed Neelix for taking advantage of her as a youngster, and continually sought revenge from a Voyager now forced to flee her instead of trying to get back home.

 

[at Quark's]

The original Enterprise, with its slower speed and less firepower, would probably not have been able to handle the Borg, so it would have likely either avoided them and started a colony somewhere or been blown to bits and/or assimilated.

Then again, the Borg (and other species) would've been less advanced, too, if the original Enterprise had been lost in the 23rd century DQ. We don't know how much the Borg progressed over the 80 years between Kirk and Picard, but they probably already were quite advanced back then.

 

[Bad Thoughts]

Chakotay was created on advice from a huckster and his actor wanted out. Harry was a character who was foundering, and the powers that be actively chose not to salvage. Either would have been a better candidate for elimination from the show, and Kes and Seven could have both stayed.

Saying he wanted out gives Beltran too much credit. By his own admission, he stayed for money and the women. Like Gene.

 

[BohandiAnsoid]

I think we should have had a season arc with Fury Kes causing mayhem across the quadrant. She could have killed Neelix for taking advantage of her as a youngster, and continually sought revenge from a Voyager now forced to flee her instead of trying to get back home.

Let's not talk about this. It has an annyoing tendency of derailing threads.

 

[XCV330]

Let's not talk about this. It has an annyoing tendency of derailing threads.

admittedly there are some who don't really understand Kes and that Fury was really where her character came into her own narratively.

 

[Lynx]

You're essentially saying what I am. Harry's potential as a character was both vast and variable, because he was so early in his journey. He was like Bashir on DS9. When Bashir was foundering as a character, the writers went to work on making him more relevant and interesting. They established that he was genetically modified, and put him on a collision course with Section 31. When Harry was foundering, the powers that be made an active decision to do nothing other than try to play his inexperience for laughs. They were still trying to play this tired and stupid game even when Harry had seven years in Starfleet in the innocence-killing crucible of the Delta Quadrant, and the idea of him still being the green ensign who Quark almost plucked like a pigeon was just laughable. They even clung to the idea that he  had to be an ensign forever with the ferocity of a two-year-old (the human version that wears Oshkosh and drinks apple juice from a sippy cup) who's picked up someone else's teddy bear. Thirty-one years later, the joke persists... I'd say it stopped being funny years ago, but it never was.

Harry could have been the character he was in the books. He should have been that character. We as an audience deserved that character, and Garrett Wang deserved the opportunity to give it to us. In the hands of competent showrunners, he would have gotten it.

I agree with you. DS9 ran with 20+, surely VOY could run 10. But assuming they were GOING to scrap one, Kes was not the one I'd have chosen.

I can agree on what you write about Harry.

I don't know the reasons for those in charge to mneglect the character the way they did but if there was a personal feud between them and the actor, then they acted like spoiled children by punishing the character, making the character a total failure.

As i see it harry could have been written a lot better, I don't understand why they didn't.

I wouldn't have liked to see Harry being killed off but if it absolutely had to be a choice between him and Kes, then I would rather have seen Harry go.

As for Bashir, I didn't like that "genetically modified" thing but in other aspects, the character became more interesting in many ways, however I also think that he was good from the start.

Given your post history, I'm assuming you were talking about Kes. I still like Kes, but the legal problems and finding out the real reason why Lien left (Mental Health) kind of soured me a little bit. I hope Lien is getting the help she needs, but that whole situation seems a lot dirtier than what was lead on and the writers didn't do the character any favors.

Every time I watch Voyager, I gain more appreciation for Torres, and the arc she went through trying to understand her identity as half Klingon half Human and embracing both. I find an episode like Faces to be an underrated episode of the series, but in a sense, that theme carried with her for the rest of the shows run, especially through Leniage where she has qualms about how her Baby will look like and that she didn't want her daughter to go through what she went through.

Yes, it was Kes I was talking about!

When it comes to the legal problems you mentioned, I'm not sure how much truth there were in them. I distrusted those in charge and theit´r information back then and I still distrust them. They lied about those reasons twice and I see no reason to believe them now.

I wrote this comment below when I first read that new version from those in charge of the show, the comments about "fired for mental issues".

With the "Celebration book", we finally have the true story why Jennifer Lien was fired and the character Kes was dumped……………..or have we?

Let’s take it from the beginning. In the beginning of season 4, Kes is suddenly dumped from the show. After three years of good performances in the series, Kes have an important role in the cliffhanger “Scorpion” and then suddenly written out of the series in the following episode, a badly written one which seems to have been made in a rush, only to get rid of the character as soon as possible.

The official explanation was that “Jennifer Lien left of her own free will”. Nothing more, no comment from Jennifer herself, nothing.

Of course, such a lousy explanation didn’t go down among the fans. Almost immediately rumors started to spread that Jennifer Lien had been fired. So those in charge came up with a new version.
This time we were told that “the writers could no longer come up with good stories for the character” and that Jennifer had to go and that it was a “mutual agreement”. Now, everyone with the slightest knowledge of the entertainment business knows that “mutual agreement” means “fired” and that there is foul play involved.

To come up with something so silly that experienced writers after three years of coming up with many good stories for a character all of a sudden lose the ability to continue with that is downright insulting to the fans and, as expected weren’t accepted either. Instead there were more rumors spreading about what really happened.

What happened next was that those in charge of the show did all they could to erase all memories of the character. She was never mentioned in the series again and all focus was on her successor Seven Of Nine until those in charge decided to bring back the character with the one and only intention to ruin and destroy the character in an episode who is regarded as one of the worst ever in any TV series and honestly never should have been made.

And now, more than 20 years later we get this new and final statement that Jennifer Lien was fired and Kes written out because of Jennifer Lien’s increasing mental problems.

Can we really assume that this is the absolute truth or is it just an attempt to use Jennifer Lien’s recent problems as an excuse to justify that she was fired from Star trek Voyager back then?
Personally I do have some problems with this. They have lied about this twice so how do we know that they are not lying again and using recent sad events to make up another story which will make them look all innocent?

Note that Jennifer wasn’t put in some institution back then or inactive in any way. She had an important role in “American History X” and were also in a movie called “SLC Punk”, she got married, had a child, continued to participate at conventions, studied art and had what looks like a normal life. In an article at startrek.com called “catching up with Jennifer Lien” in 2010 she seems to have a normal, happy life. In the article she stated that: "I have kids, I study, and I'm active with a life that doesn't involve acting anymore." She added that she was taking college courses with the goal of becoming a nurse, dietician, or nutritionist — whatever would give her the most time with her family.

Then everything went quiet until she all of a sudden shows up in Harriman, Tennessee and having trouble with the law.

The only disturbing thing I noticed during those years were her sudden weight gain, which may have been a result of her earlier pregnancy and the following struggle with that but also may have been the result of mental problems. She lost weight then gained weight again and so on. But that can happen to anyone. However, I’m not a doctor and I don’t know Jennifer so I won’t speculate about what might have happened which caused that or triggered recent events.

But let us now be kind to those in charge of the show and assume that their latest statements actually are the truth and nothing but the truth. If that’s so, then I still have to ask: Why didn’t they tell the truth from the beginning?

OK, I can truly understand that they couldn’t or wouldn't come up with a statement like “Jennifer is having mental problems and we can’t keep her in the show”. But they could at least have come up with something like “Jennifer Lien is finding the filming schedule and the long days of work too stressful and will therefore leave to focus on other projects”. That, added with some comment from Jennifer herself or her management would have settled the whole thing.

Instead, they came up with all those ridiculous lies about writers not being able to do their job, mutual agreements and on top of all the constant BS about how good it was to get rid of Kes so that the show could have Seven Of Nine instead and how Seven saved the show.

What all that did was to create more rumors, more distrust and more controversy. I must admit that if they had bothered to come up with a decent explanation from the beginning, I would have accepted that instead of becoming so involved in this thing ant acting the way I did.

However, I wasn’t the only one to react that way. There were letter campaigns to have Kes back and a lot of questions from more people than me. However I may have been the worst one which I have realized in recent years and isn’t too proud about.

But I must also state that a glimpse of the old, angry Lynx actually did show up when I read the statement from Jeri Taylor about “We knew that there was something going on,” Taylor admitted. “But she wouldn’t talk or let us offer to help.”

Well, I can understand that it can be impossible to have a very troubled person in the cast. I know about rock musicians who have been kicked out of their bands for less serious things. So I understand that there might have been necessary to do what they did, if the recent story tells the truth. But what they did after that was to more and less to try to erase the character from everyone’s minds and by doing so disregard and neglect Jennifer‘s work on the show, then bring her back to make a fool of herself in the worst episode ever made for a TV show and then more and less pretend that she never existed. With “friends” and “help” like that, she probably doesn’t need any enemies.

Anyway, what has happened to Jennifer Lien is a sad and tragic story. I’ve experienced a similar thing happen to a person who was very close to me once and this whole Kes/Jennifer thing has for me been to experience the nightmare once again.

It’s so tragic that an obviously nice and shy person and a talented actress should end up the way she has done. We can only hope and pray that she can get her life back in order. The support from family and friends are important but she also need inner strength and determination to overcome this. Let us hope and pray for the best.

Let us also hope that Jennifer will have more credit for her contributions to the series than she has had in the recent years after her dismissal from Voyager and that the character Kes will be restored in future books and stories. That would be a nice tribute to Jennifer as well.

Agreed. Not every character works and Chakotay was just terrible. A deeply frustrating result when having a Native American character could have provided an interesting idea.

I don't find Chakotay terrible.
He's a great character and I think that he was good iin the first three seasons.
I also think Beltran did a good job in the first three seasons and i can understan why he lost interest later on.
But I agree that the Native Amreican thing could have been handled better.
Why make a fantasy tribe when they could have come up with a real one?

 

[Michael]

She was never mentioned in the series again …

I understand this doesn’t fit your favored narrative, but it’s just blatantly untrue, because Kes was actually mentioned by name a number of times after the character exited the show. Namely in “Random Thoughts”, “Mortal Coil”, “Prey”, “The Voyager Conspiracy” and of course “Fury”. Note, also, that in almost all instances where she’s mentioned it’s a character lovingly reminiscing about her. Hardly them trying to “erase the character from everyone’s minds” or “pretend that she never existed” as you like to believe.

But what they did after that was to more and less to try to erase the character from everyone’s minds and by doing so disregard and neglect Jennifer‘s work on the show, then bring her back to make a fool of herself in the worst episode ever made for a TV show and then more and less pretend that she never existed. With “friends” and “help” like that, she probably doesn’t need any enemies.

I believe the problem is that you are confusing Kes the character with Jennifer Lien the actress. Bringing her back to guest star on a dedicated episode (regardless of whether you like the episode or not; and trust me, we all know you don’t) is precisely what friends in their positions would do to help. If you don’t know what it means for an actor to get hired to do an episode of television, get paid for your work and get exposure, you don’t understand anything about Hollywood and how it works.

But let us now be kind to those in charge of the show and assume that their latest statements actually are the truth and nothing but the truth. If that’s so, then I still have to ask: Why didn’t they tell the truth from the beginning?

OK, I can truly understand that they couldn’t or wouldn't come up with a statement like “Jennifer is having mental problems and we can’t keep her in the show”. But they could at least have come up with something like “Jennifer Lien is finding the filming schedule and the long days of work too stressful and will therefore leave to focus on other projects”.

This again is you seemingly not understanding how anything works in Hollywood. If they had said anything like you are suggesting here, it would have been the immediate end of her career. “She’s finding the filming schedule and the long days of work too stressful” — you seriously believe anyone would have hired her after that kind of statement from a former employer?

No, them not openly talking about her issues back then and just giving her the dignity of seemingly leaving the show in a sort of mutual agreement is a million times better than what you are suggesting. In an ideal world they would have been able to find a way of giving her the opportunity to seek help, get better and keep the job. But unfortunately that’s not how it always works in the real world. They very obviously cared about her as a human being, or else they wouldn’t have brought her back to the show to work with her again.

 

[Bad Thoughts]

Where the narrative concerning Lien's mental health falls apart is the popularity of the actress among the cast. In Fifty Year Mission, much of the antagonism toward Ryan was due to it coming at the expense of Lien. The actors wanted to work with Lien. It should not have been an issue for Taylor and Berman.

 

[Sim]

The main problem of VOY imo was constantly and reliably missing opportunities when writing character development ... for *all* characters. This is especially painfully obvious when you contrast VOY with DS9, which was the main reason for my disappointment with VOY back in the 90s.

The only characters who got a slightly better treatment were Seven and the Doctor, no idea why.

Was is really that the showrunners and/or the authors were clueless, or because the studio powers forced a "110% NOT serialized, totally certified 110% reset button" policy on the authors? I have no idea.

 

[tomalak301]

Yes, it was Kes I was talking about!

When it comes to the legal problems you mentioned, I'm not sure how much truth there were in them. I distrusted those in charge and theit´r information back then and I still distrust them. They lied about those reasons twice and I see no reason to believe them now.

I wrote this comment below when I first read that new version from those in charge of the show, the comments about "fired for mental issues".

With the "Celebration book", we finally have the true story why Jennifer Lien was fired and the character Kes was dumped……………..or have we?

Let’s take it from the beginning. In the beginning of season 4, Kes is suddenly dumped from the show. After three years of good performances in the series, Kes have an important role in the cliffhanger “Scorpion” and then suddenly written out of the series in the following episode, a badly written one which seems to have been made in a rush, only to get rid of the character as soon as possible.

The official explanation was that “Jennifer Lien left of her own free will”. Nothing more, no comment from Jennifer herself, nothing.

Of course, such a lousy explanation didn’t go down among the fans. Almost immediately rumors started to spread that Jennifer Lien had been fired. So those in charge came up with a new version.
This time we were told that “the writers could no longer come up with good stories for the character” and that Jennifer had to go and that it was a “mutual agreement”. Now, everyone with the slightest knowledge of the entertainment business knows that “mutual agreement” means “fired” and that there is foul play involved.

To come up with something so silly that experienced writers after three years of coming up with many good stories for a character all of a sudden lose the ability to continue with that is downright insulting to the fans and, as expected weren’t accepted either. Instead there were more rumors spreading about what really happened.

What happened next was that those in charge of the show did all they could to erase all memories of the character. She was never mentioned in the series again and all focus was on her successor Seven Of Nine until those in charge decided to bring back the character with the one and only intention to ruin and destroy the character in an episode who is regarded as one of the worst ever in any TV series and honestly never should have been made.

And now, more than 20 years later we get this new and final statement that Jennifer Lien was fired and Kes written out because of Jennifer Lien’s increasing mental problems.

Can we really assume that this is the absolute truth or is it just an attempt to use Jennifer Lien’s recent problems as an excuse to justify that she was fired from Star trek Voyager back then?
Personally I do have some problems with this. They have lied about this twice so how do we know that they are not lying again and using recent sad events to make up another story which will make them look all innocent?

Note that Jennifer wasn’t put in some institution back then or inactive in any way. She had an important role in “American History X” and were also in a movie called “SLC Punk”, she got married, had a child, continued to participate at conventions, studied art and had what looks like a normal life. In an article at startrek.com called “catching up with Jennifer Lien” in 2010 she seems to have a normal, happy life. In the article she stated that: "I have kids, I study, and I'm active with a life that doesn't involve acting anymore." She added that she was taking college courses with the goal of becoming a nurse, dietician, or nutritionist — whatever would give her the most time with her family.

Then everything went quiet until she all of a sudden shows up in Harriman, Tennessee and having trouble with the law.

The only disturbing thing I noticed during those years were her sudden weight gain, which may have been a result of her earlier pregnancy and the following struggle with that but also may have been the result of mental problems. She lost weight then gained weight again and so on. But that can happen to anyone. However, I’m not a doctor and I don’t know Jennifer so I won’t speculate about what might have happened which caused that or triggered recent events.

But let us now be kind to those in charge of the show and assume that their latest statements actually are the truth and nothing but the truth. If that’s so, then I still have to ask: Why didn’t they tell the truth from the beginning?

OK, I can truly understand that they couldn’t or wouldn't come up with a statement like “Jennifer is having mental problems and we can’t keep her in the show”. But they could at least have come up with something like “Jennifer Lien is finding the filming schedule and the long days of work too stressful and will therefore leave to focus on other projects”. That, added with some comment from Jennifer herself or her management would have settled the whole thing.

Instead, they came up with all those ridiculous lies about writers not being able to do their job, mutual agreements and on top of all the constant BS about how good it was to get rid of Kes so that the show could have Seven Of Nine instead and how Seven saved the show.

What all that did was to create more rumors, more distrust and more controversy. I must admit that if they had bothered to come up with a decent explanation from the beginning, I would have accepted that instead of becoming so involved in this thing ant acting the way I did.

However, I wasn’t the only one to react that way. There were letter campaigns to have Kes back and a lot of questions from more people than me. However I may have been the worst one which I have realized in recent years and isn’t too proud about.

But I must also state that a glimpse of the old, angry Lynx actually did show up when I read the statement from Jeri Taylor about “We knew that there was something going on,” Taylor admitted. “But she wouldn’t talk or let us offer to help.”

Well, I can understand that it can be impossible to have a very troubled person in the cast. I know about rock musicians who have been kicked out of their bands for less serious things. So I understand that there might have been necessary to do what they did, if the recent story tells the truth. But what they did after that was to more and less to try to erase the character from everyone’s minds and by doing so disregard and neglect Jennifer‘s work on the show, then bring her back to make a fool of herself in the worst episode ever made for a TV show and then more and less pretend that she never existed. With “friends” and “help” like that, she probably doesn’t need any enemies.

Anyway, what has happened to Jennifer Lien is a sad and tragic story. I’ve experienced a similar thing happen to a person who was very close to me once and this whole Kes/Jennifer thing has for me been to experience the nightmare once again.

It’s so tragic that an obviously nice and shy person and a talented actress should end up the way she has done. We can only hope and pray that she can get her life back in order. The support from family and friends are important but she also need inner strength and determination to overcome this. Let us hope and pray for the best.

Let us also hope that Jennifer will have more credit for her contributions to the series than she has had in the recent years after her dismissal from Voyager and that the character Kes will be restored in future books and stories. That would be a nice tribute to Jennifer as well.

I understand this doesn’t fit your favored narrative, but it’s just blatantly untrue, because Kes was actually mentioned by name a number of times after the character exited the show. Namely in “Random Thoughts”, “Mortal Coil”, “Prey”, “The Voyager Conspiracy” and of course “Fury”. Note, also, that in almost all instances where she’s mentioned it’s a character lovingly reminiscing about her. Hardly them trying to “erase the character from everyone’s minds” or “pretend that she never existed” as you like to believe.


I believe the problem is that you are confusing Kes the character with Jennifer Lien the actress. Bringing her back to guest star on a dedicated episode (regardless of whether you like the episode or not; and trust me, we all know you don’t) is precisely what friends in their positions would do to help. If you don’t know what it means for an actor to get hired to do an episode of television, get paid for your work and get exposure, you don’t understand anything about Hollywood and how it works.


This again is you seemingly not understanding how anything works in Hollywood. If they had said anything like you are suggesting here, it would have been the immediate end of her career. “She’s finding the filming schedule and the long days of work too stressful” — you seriously believe anyone would have hired her after that kind of statement from a former employer?

No, them not openly talking about her issues back then and just giving her the dignity of seemingly leaving the show in a sort of mutual agreement is a million times better than what you are suggesting. In an ideal world they would have been able to find a way of giving her the opportunity to seek help, get better and keep the job. But unfortunately that’s not how it always works in the real world. They very obviously cared about her as a human being, or else they wouldn’t have brought her back to the show to work with her again.

Where the narrative concerning Lien's mental health falls apart is the popularity of the actress among the cast. In Fifty Year Mission, much of the antagonism toward Ryan was due to it coming at the expense of Lien. The actors wanted to work with Lien. It should not have been an issue for Taylor and Berman.

I've tried to read and take in pretty much all of this, and I think the simple conclusion I can come up with is what I originally said, the writers did the actress and the character no favors, despite having a few glimpses of great episodes to her name (Warlord, Before and After, Scorpion, basically all her scenes with the Doctor to progress his story forward, etc.). With all that being said, B'Elanna is still my favorite female character on the show as I liked her story better. Nothing to diminish Lein or Kes at all.

 

[Oddish]

Saying he wanted out gives Beltran too much credit. By his own admission, he stayed for money and the women. Like Gene.

He was trying to get them to sack him by increasing his salary demand, but they kept meeting it. Considering that they did little meaningful with his character, seems like a waste of money.

Was is really that the showrunners and/or the authors were clueless, or because the studio powers forced a "110% NOT serialized, totally certified 110% reset button" policy on the authors? I have no idea.

Could have been a bit of both, sonce both statements are essentially correct.

 

[Bad Thoughts]

I've tried to read and take in pretty much all of this, and I think the simple conclusion I can come up with is what I originally said, the writers did the actress and the character no favors, despite having a few glimpses of great episodes to her name (Warlord, Before and After, Scorpion, basically all her scenes with the Doctor to progress his story forward, etc.). With all that being said, B'Elanna is still my favorite female character on the show as I liked her story better. Nothing to diminish Lein or Kes at all.

This is about how I feel as well. We keep getting pretext and rationalizations, not reasons and explanations. Many in Hollywood are willing to work through the personal problems of their co-workers. The mental health aspect seems out of left field: I've seen no evidence that Lien could not work or could not work with others. The opposite seems to been the with the rest of the Voyager cast. The issue of not being able to write stories seems equally spurious, IMO. Kes was not the first, nor the last, attempt at a young, wise, and sexy character. Indeed, Seven of Nine was another iteration thereof. And Kes made a more natural fit in that mold than Dax: each year she comes at relationships in a new stage of life. It seems like they were setting up Season 4 to be the biological clock story. Season 5 is the 40 year old dealing with a teenager. Season 6 is middle age. Season 7 is the twilight years. Every season is a new challenge for Kes, and those challenges could evolve organically.

 

[Bad Thoughts]

He was trying to get them to sack him by increasing his salary demand, but they kept meeting it. Considering that they did little meaningful with his character, seems like a waste of money.

Verily, he did the work and he took the money. He didn't quit. He said the words they asked him to say.

And yes, it was a waste.

 

[Oddish]

In addition to other reasons, killing off one or two regulars would have heightened the tension. If Harry went down for good in maybe Season 3, and Chakotay followed in Season 5, we wouldn't just assume that all the main characters would get through safe and sound.

 

[rocketscientist]

I think we should have had a season arc with Fury Kes causing mayhem across the quadrant. She could have killed Neelix for taking advantage of her as a youngster, and continually sought revenge from a Voyager now forced to flee her instead of trying to get back home.

Yeah, I wonder how that would have gone over.

Though, I have to say, imo, Neelix did have it coming for what he did to Kes.

 

[thribs]

Probably B’elanna. The one actress I can’t seem to meet since she keeps cancelling.

 

[rocketscientist]

Speaking for myself, in order, I'd rank the Voyager women as

1. Seven
2. Janeway (close to Seven)
3. B'lanna
4. Kes.

I thought Seven was fantastic. They really lucked out with Jeri Ryan, who was given a fascinating, traumatized character who was slowly regaining her humanity. I really give Ryan and her character a lot of credit for greatly improving Voyager. Yes, Chakotay and Kim in particular got left along with wayside, but they weren't especially interesting characters to begin with.

I also thought the creators really scored with Kate Mulgrew as Janeway. Mulgrew carried the required authority extremely well. She was an inspiring character and a great role model for girls.

Initially I didn't care much for B'lanna, but as they did more with the character and developed the relationship with Paris, I liked her more and more.

I never cared for Kes. Not only was the 2 year lifespan an extremely bad idea, but the whole relationship with Neelix was just gross. Plus, I found the character somewhat cloying.