I'd say "Warlord" is probably my favorite Kes episode. She just didn't get a lot to do on the show. I don't think there was a Tom Paris solo episode that I really liked.
Edited to add: I don't dislike the character of Tom Paris, but he just never "clicked" for me. He's a lot like Harry Kim in that respect.
Defining characteristics:
1) Sarcastic one liners. That's cool, BUT you have to be able to write the kind of dialog that makes that character work. Think of the dialog from Marlon Brando's "The Wild One"
Chick: Hey, Johnny - what are you rebelling against?
Brando: What have ya got?
2) Young. He looked a little too old with his receding hairline to be playing the part of the angry young man.
3) Love of 20th century pop culture. It just seemed forced, like most of the time when Trek writers insert this stuff into 24th century stories.
4) Hotshot pilot. Trek really doesn't give the character many opportunities to really show it off outside of one or two episodes. Starfleet ships are luxury sedans, not hot rods.
5) Relationship with B'Lanna. I like the fact that they took their time developing the relationship. Probably the best part of the character for me. But I don't think Trek writers are very good at romantic relationships in general. A lot of their bickering and stuff just comes across as stale rehashes of lines you would hear on a sitcom or bad 80s drama.
having said all of that, none of those criticisms actually made me dislike the character. It's just that none of those things made me find him interesting. Just like Harry's love of his parents, girlfriend, and playing the clarinet made me interested in his character.
Robert Duncan McNeill does have an inherent likeability, though. many of the Voyager cast did, imo.
As for your comments on Paris:
1) I really love his sarcastic one-liners.
2) He looked young to me. As a matter of fact I once worked at the same place as a guy who was almost bald at 22.
3) OK, they went a bit over the top there. If there had been just some interest for 20th century popular music, I mean we still love Beethoven and those guys. But here it was almost everything. I find it hard that anyone would have such an interest for everything in a certain century.
4) I liked his role as a hotshot pilot. Worked fine for me.
5) I got the impression that the Paris-Torres relationship was created just to show that both characters still were main characters. They were both sadly neglected when Seven took over the show. However, it worked OK for me.
The Trek writers were incapable of writing about relationships. They couldn't do it neither on TNG nor on Voyager. Everytime they tried, it became stale and strained.
As for Paris, he's actually one of my favorite characters. I really like his humor and funny remarks.
Best Paris episode? There are a lot of great Paris episodes, I find it hard to pick a specific one. "Caretaker", "Ex Post Facto", "Basics", "Future's End" are great. Not to mention "Parturition" where his funny humor is great to watch.
As for Kes: "Cold Fire" is my favorite.
