Neelix scurries about this ship, attempting to make himself useful, but mostly annoying people in the process. Voyager arrives at the edge of a vast, unknown, dangerous part of space, stopping off at an outpost to pick up supplies before venturing in. On the station, Neelix meets an old friend (Wixiban, a fellow Talaxian), to whom he reveals that he's worried that he has outlived his usefulness to the Voyager crew. He doesn't know anything about the area beyond this station, and is gripped with an urgency to procure a map of the space ahead.
Wixiban suggests that he could help, but he would need some help from Neelix in exchange. Neelix doesn't ask many questions, which is unfortunate because the "help" involves assisting with the completion of a drug deal and killing someone (in self defense). Neelix is appropriately appalled, but agrees to keep silent out of a sense of camaraderie for his old friend. Wracked with guilt as the situation begins to spiral out of control, Neelix hatches a plan to come clean to the station supervisor and capture the drug dealers... and it works! However, Neelix is heavily injured, and the truth is revealed to Janeway; she lectures him on his responsibility to the truth, and Neelix learns important lessons about lying and self-worth.
A lot of the elements of this episode are actually pretty compelling, and I'm sure they looked great on paper: the wild-west-esque station on the edge of uncharted space, its authoritarian commander who tries to organize the chaos of the station, Neelix's reasonably rational fears that he won't be useful anymore. I'm always happy to see a different actor's take on Talaxians too, it gives me a little insight into what parts of Neelix's character are cultural and what parts are personal. Even the drugs are a unique twist; there is very little mention of drug use in the Trek universe, even by non-Federation people. Even though it isn't really a theme here, more of an incidental part of the plot, I'm glad to have that issue get some screen time.
Despite all those elements, I found myself very disappointed in the execution of this episode. What could have been an exploration of the station's culture becomes a rather plain backdrop to a very simple story about lying being wrong. There is a close parallel to this episode in The First Duty (TNG, season 5), where Wesley also faces the choice between honesty and fellowship. What, in my opinion, made that episode work so well was there was actually a dispute between the writers as to what path Wesley really would choose. Because the writing staff had people championing both options, the final episode came out much more even-handed, with genuine arguments from both sides making it on screen. In Fair Trade, it is pretty clear from step one that Neelix was making bad choices, and the capstone patronizing lecture from Janeway seals the deal.
Neelix's motivations, though, those were good. Not only does it give Neelix some more depth, but it adds to the sense of progress for the ship. It had to happen eventually that they'd move outside Neelix's sphere of knowledge; that it has finally occurred makes me feel like they're getting somewhere.
Watchability: 3/5
Bottom Line: It actually happens pretty frequently that I come up with a watchability number immediately after watching the episode, only to write the post and find I've made an argument for a different score. This one went from a 2 to a 3. Large parts of the Neelix-being-caught-in-a-lie plot were very difficult to watch, but on reflection there's more good than I initially gave it credit for.
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