S7 E24: Renaissance Man

Janeway returns to Voyager after an away mission with the Doctor on the Flyer, and informs Chakotay of a threat from a nearby group called the R'Kaal. The only hope for Voyager's survival, she says, is to abandon ship and settle on a nearby planet. Janeway turns out to be the Doctor in disguise, and he continues impersonating crew members (and incapacitating them as necessary) for an unknown purpose. He eventually steals the Delta Flyer, along with Voyager's warp core, and rendezvous with a Hierarchy ship upon which Janeway is being held hostage. Soon the Doctor is also a hostage, but Paris and Tuvok arrive in a shuttle to save the day.

Well, this episode was fun and all, but I was hoping for something besides fluff for the second to last episode of Voyager. It's fun fluff. Everyone gets to take their turn playing the Doctor playing them, but...

I guess that after Homestead, my expectations were a bit high. When Janeway came back on board Voyager with this talk of the R'Kaal, I was interested. A truly massive civilization that we haven't met yet. They're big, powerful, something to whet our appetites for more Trek even though the show is ending. They could have played into the way home, given the extent of their empire; I wouldn't have been disappointed if Voyager'd gotten home now, since there's so much ground to cover when they do.

The thing is, the R'Kaal aren't real. The Hierarchy just made them up. Instead of an interesting, new antagonist, we get the frumpy potato guys. It was cool when they showed up as a footnote in The Void, but now they're just a killjoy.

The Doctor's over-dramatic death scene, with his confessions to the crew could have been interesting too. He did confess his love for Seven, after all. But I doubt we'll hear any more about that, given what's happening next time.

Watchability: 3/5

Bottom Line: I tried giving this episode a 2/5, but when I looked back at what other episodes have received that score I felt I just couldn't do it. This is good for a 3/5 easily in any other slot besides the second to last episode of the series. This isn't a The Dogs of War, nor a For All Our Yesterdays, nor even a Preemptive Strike. But I guess it isn't bad, so a 3/5 it is.

S7 E23: Homestead

A Talaxian colony is found hidden in an asteroid belt. The inhabitants seem to be pretty xenophobic, and it becomes clear why shortly - they have been forced to relocate many times, and are currently being forced out by a mining company. Neelix suggests negotiations, but those only buy the Talaxians more time to prepare for departure. At Tuvok's "hypothetical" suggestion, he returns to the colony and convinces them to stand their ground. They build a defensive shield with Neelix's help (and that of a last-minute Delta Flyer arrival), and Neelix remains on the colony as a long-term Federation ambassador to the delta quadrant.

Oh, Neelix. The memory alpha annotations have been very helpful for getting background information on the episodes as I've been reviewing them, but every now and then they'd let loose a spoiler. As a result, I've known for some time that Neelix would leave just before the end. To be honest, I expected to hate it. After all the times that he'd glowed about his life on Voyager, that he'd spoken about his desire to see Earth, that he'd spread the Federation gospel - and all the times that he could have stayed behind and didn't - I couldn't imagine effectively creating an episode that wouldn't make it seem like he was just being put on a bus

Well, I'm happy to say that I was wrong. I was worried at first when Neelix was still up to his old antics, harassing a disinterested Tuvok, but that quickly faded. Neelix contrasted very well with the characters at the Talaxian colony - Talaxians in Voyager tend to be pretty small-time, largely due to their whole "we're conquered and have lived under subjugation for a generation" thing, and Neelix started out that way too. At first, he thought on a small scale - trick the Voyager people into helping him rescue Kes, worry about the consequences later. Or you could also look at how he behaved with Kes - he was jealous of other men and acted possessively towards her, which eventually drove her away. But he's different now. Years of relative stability of Voyager has given him more perspective - now he can be the leader that the Talaxians need him to be.

The real selling point of this episode is the scene in which Tuvok convinces him of that fact. That's where this episode ties in with his other arc, the one started in Jetrel. Neelix was once a coward, the guy who hid from military duty, and watched his family die. If he were a pacifist ideologically, that would be one thing, but he knows he's not; he just didn't want to risk his life. But now he has his chance to atone for his past - and the person who shows him that isn't Janeway. She often gets to steal this sort of moment in the show - I'm thinking of The Gift and Kes in particular, but this time it's the right person. The only person who could really get to him, Tuvok.

It was also very refreshing to have a Voyager episode advocate a military solution to a problem. I'm all for peaceful solutions when they're available, nonviolence is cool. But know it isn't always practical, particularly in a universe where enemies can vaporize whole worlds at the push of a button. These Talaxians have been pushed and pushed and pushed, and even I agree it is time for them to push back. It surprised me that the Voyager writers agreed, but this is the seventh season after all. Plus, it opened the show up for the cathartic moment when the Delta Flyer shows up at the end.

Watchability: 5/5

Bottom Line: The Neelix character arcs are wrapped up with grace and style. This is an excellent example of what you can accomplish in a show with minimal continuity, and still reward the loyal viewers. Bravo.

S7 E22: Natural Law

A planetary shield surrounding a beautiful, practically untouched planet brings down a shuttle with Chakotay and Seven aboard it. They work with the indigenous inhabitants to find their shuttle wreckage, while Janeway discovers from a nearby civilization (the Ledosians) that the shield had been placed there in the distant past by a third culture, in order to protect the natives from the Ledosians' meddling. As soon as Seven brings down the shield, Ledosian away teams are surveying the surface for exploitable natural resources, and Voyager steps in to reestablish the field.

So, I'll defend the prime directive more than most people I know, but this episode is as strong an argument against it as I've heard. Most of the time, native peoples don't have magical force field protecting them. And for these guys, as soon as the field is down, you've got opportunists around to take advantage of the planet's resources. Sure, it's the nice thing to do to let people be, but in a universe as crowded as Trek's, that's practically a death sentence. As soon as the Federation moves on, hey, it's time for the Ferengi or the Klingons or somebody else. Isn't it the lesser evil for the noble people to interfere?

Even putting the shield there in the first place is interference - what happens when these people get to the technological level that they could engage in space flight, but can't breach the barrier? Enforced isolation is still interference - what happens when a natural disaster would wipe out the people there, and their opportunistic neighbors cannot save them? In that case, I'd bet they'd rather have the Ledosians as their neighbors than the Federation, given the results of Pen Pals - and that's the best of the bad prime directive episodes.

The natives are interesting; they're nonverbal, and my wife recognized some of their sign language as slightly altered parts of American Sign Language. That's cool, I like it when they throw some easter eggs like that in. At the same time, they are your basic "noble savage" guys, which is fine, but largely boring. They might've been more compelling if they weren't all model citizens, but I'm glad we didn't have to have long sequences wherein Chakotay earns their trust. Making them civil allowed for more of a chance for Chakotay to exercise his interest of the week, linguistics.

What really surprised me is that there was no hint even of Seven and Chakotay romancery. When they started the episode in a shuttle together, we groaned. Yeah, it's gonna crash and they're gonna have makeouts. Well, it crashed, but there were no makeouts. Props to the writers for taking it slow, though at this point they don't really have much time left.

There's also a subplot with Paris needing to take a pilot safety course after breaking one of the flight protocols, but it is best forgotten. It's inoffensive, but it only fills time. Not particularly funny, and without other substance.

Watchability: 3/5

Bottom Line: Well, even though this episode didn't exactly express the point that it meant to, it wasn't hard to watch, and gave an interesting starting point for a prime directive discussion without cramming a message down our throats.

S7 E21: Friendship One

Four years after the initial warp flight by Zefram Cochrane, Earth launched an unmanned warp ship; its mission was to initiate first contact and share technology. Starfleet contacts Voyager and informs Janeway that they're in the neighborhood of that probe, Friendship One, and asks them to please investigate. Turns out that the people of the planet it landed on learned from the technology, but suffered a global ecological disaster as a result and blame humans for it. They take the Delta Flyer's crew hostage, and kill Joe Carey when Janeway tries to negotiate. A Voyager commando force retrieves the captives, and once they are no longer acting under duress, they help restore the planet's atmosphere.

I like the idea here, but I feel like they could have made it a bit more interesting. It's just terribly... uncomplicated as it stands. I mean, it's pretty obvious from the teaser alone that Friendship One did something bad to the planet. The direction the episode takes it in honestly takes all the blame off of human hands. Sure, they gave them the technology, but it is entirely not the humans' fault what those people did with it. Maybe this episode is intended as a "prime directive is good after all" episode, but the people on this planet need to take a little responsibility for their own actions. Humans had the same technology that they did, and Earth is fine. Maybe if those guys didn't suck, they'd still have a planet.

What might've been more interesting is if some other unintended consequence of the probe's arrival had caused the disaster. My wife suggested maybe something like the introduction of small pox to the new world - since it is possible for microbes to survive on a vehicle like this, maybe those microbes could have been dangerous to introduce to this new planet's ecology. Or if they still want to go with the technology route, anti-matter technology could be damaging to the populace on its own, even without a containment failure. Then they'd have had the societal problem of a new, powerful fuel source that they must sacrifice population to in order to maintain the quality of life for the rest of the planet. Sure, that's an old trope, but I'm just throwing stuff out there. Combine that with the arrival of the people who gave them the technology generations ago, and they could have come up with a new and interesting story.

Most of the population of the planet are painted in pretty broad strokes, but I guess there's nothing outright offensive going on at least. Any time the crackpot scientist is cast as the good guy and the new, responsible leader of his world, I can walk away happy. Neelix gets to bring up the destruction of his homeworld's moon again, and though it doesn't work, it seemed like a decent way to try to build common ground.

This is also Joe Carey's first real-timeline appearance since State of Flux, and I had been pretty content to just assume he'd died at some point. Not really sure why they brought him back just to kill him. *shrug*

Watchability: 3/5

Bottom Line: I would have been happy to see a lot more layers here. Or, really, even one more layer would have been nice. I suppose though that if my biggest complaint about a Voyager episode is that it is only uncomplicated, then that's pretty big progress.

S7 E20: Author, Author

The Doctor has written a new holonovel, and is going to get it published on earth. Paris talks him into letting him proofreadplay it, and discovers that it is essentially a manifesto on holographic rights... the only problem is it casts thinly disguised alter-egos of the crew as the maniacal bigots. Paris shows it to the rest of the crew, and Janeway confronts the Doctor about it. He is defensive, saying it wasn't meant to be the Voyager crew, and is further outraged when Paris tries to convince him by pranking him with a holonovel about an ego-crazed doctor. Neelix eventually talks him down, but it is too late; though he asks his publisher not to distribute his program before he can make his edits, the guy cites the fact that the Doctor, as a hologram, does not have any rights and publishes it anyways. Tuvok is tasked with running the Doctor's defense across the quadrants, and a Federation judge, while he won't make the ruling that the Doctor is necessarily sentient, will rule that he has possession over his own creation.

Every time the issue of hologram rights and treatment comes up, I write here a reaction along the lines of "didn't we already do this?" Well, it has been done, but the issue of how the Federation will deal with it was only briefly touched upon in Life Line, and it wasn't a pretty picture. Since I doubt we'll get much in the way of post-return fallout in the series, I suppose it is reasonable to front-load it here.

Still, for someone who has become so obsessed with social protocol, it is really strange that the Doctor would be so self-centered that he would portray his friends the way he does in his program. He's smarter than that. He's more insightful than the counter-arguments he's been given in this episode's dialogue. My wife pointed out that he's doing the thing that he complained about so stirringly in Living Witness by revising his history aboard Voyager. Sure, it's in the service of a noble cause (the one about hologram's rights, not the one about proving to everyone how awesome he is), but it was uncomfortable seeing the Doctor behave the way he did here.

The novel itself, and Paris' parody, are highly entertaining though. The caricatures are a delight - Chakotay is a Bajoran, with a huge, colorful facial tattoo, Paris is a womanizer with a mustache, Kim is a hypochondriac Trill, Tuvok is a goateed thug, Seven is some kind of techno-wiccan and his only ally, and Janeway is a cold-blooded, pistol-collecting captain who executes a patient that the Doctor wanted to treat. Only Neelix escapes parody, because he kind of already is a hamster. The verbal duel between the Doctor and Paris, once Paris has shown him his parody, is effectively emotionally charged and interesting to watch. Neelix once again gets to be the level-headed one too, I'm always happy to see that.

Where this episode really hits its stride though is with the Doctor's unscrupulous publisher. You know, the guy who will spread a call to arms about hologram's rights by citing a hologram's lack of rights? Maybe he thinks he is behaving morally, and this little stunt of his will draw more attention to the Doctor's situation. This part added a very much needed level of complexity to the proceedings, forcing the crew into supporting the rights of a guy who everyone in the alpha quadrant knows has written a piece that defames their character. Taking that stance not only shows their support for him, but mitigates claims that his program is an accurate representation of his life on Voyager. So, in a way, it is both complex and tidy.

The courtroom scenes in the last third of the episode seem somewhat perfunctory; this is presumably where the big issue of the episode will be hashed out, but it turns into something smaller. I can't really blame the Federation judge for not ruling with broad strokes in the Doctor's case. He's still a coward, but the ramifications of holographic rights in a society where holodecks are so prolific are huuuuge. Sure, they could limit the language to only include self-aware holograms, but where does that line get drawn? That issue is going to take a lot of time to hammer out, and I can only imagine that the Federation will take the same tactic that they did with genetic engineering. Since the Federation doesn't like playing God ever (see: the prime directive as well), I'd bet they'll outlaw the creation of new sentient holograms, at least temporarily. Just some interesting stuff we'll probably never get into in this show.

Then there are the calls to home. The crew is now able to have real-time conversations with people in the alpha quadrant, three minutes at a time. Kim's is the most needless: his overbearing parents complain about his lack of promotion and tell him they plan to send a letter to Janeway. Bleh. Seven talks to her aunt; that one's a bit awkward, which I suppose is understandable, but kind of crowded the episode. Torres' conversation is with her estranged dad, and is a nice follow up to Lineage. And, for some reason, Paris never talks to his dad.

Watchability: 5/5

Bottom Line: Overall this episode is thoughtful and interesting, but I ended it still feeling frustrated by the Doctor's behavior. The coda to it is perfect though: the action moves to a Federation mining station, where old EMH mark ones are being used as slave labor - exactly the situation described by Guinan in The Measure of a Man. While this episode may not compete on the same level as that one, it still has its moments.

S7 E19: Q2

Q is back, and he's brought his insufferable son with him, hoping that the Voyager crew can be the parents that he isn't. He first leaves his some behind with his powers intact, but rectifies that mistake on the second try. Now at the mercy of the crew, and under the threat of being turned into an amoeba if he doesn't behave, he begins to fit in. A third visit from his father, who is not happy with the humanization of his son, sends him into despair again, and he steals the Delta Flyer and Icheb on a mission to find babes. Icheb is mortally wounded on this excursion, and even the Doctor cannot repair the damage, so he has to ask forgiveness from the aliens he offended in order to save Icheb's life. The aliens are actually his father in disgueise, and with this new evidence of his son's maturity, he gets the continuum to agree to not turn him into an amoeba.

This episode adheres to the Deja Q formula very closely, only with Q's son instead of Q and Icheb instead of Data. That's not necessarily a bad thing; I didn't automatically dislike Nemesis just because it followed the Wrath of Khan formula. I disliked Nemesis because it didn't have much to add to that formula, and what it did change wasn't good.

The major change here is the addition of the parenting elements, which are all kind of awkward exchanges between Q and Janeway the non-parent. Well, awkward in parenting advice content - as always, I love the way those two interact. Q's complete disregard for what Janeway wants, the way he calls her Kathy, the way he throws all of her negative character attributes back at her and she reacts with disgust, those are things I've loved about every Voyager Q episode.

Q's son is played by John De Lancie's actual real-life son, and that was a good choice as far as I'm concerned. He has inherited many of his father's delightful mannerisms, even if he also reminded me of the earlier, terrible Q episodes for the first third of the episode. See, here's the thing: I've heard people complaining about what a bad actor the guy who played Anakin (I can't be bothered to look up his name) in Star Wars episodes II and II was. I've always maintained that he probably isn't a bad actor, he's just really good at portraying exactly what the producers of those films wanted out of him: an insufferable, angst-ridden, cripplingly dour waste of screen time. The problem is that whether what I think or what they think is true is irrelevant because, either way, it was a burden to have to make my eyes follow him for hours.

And when you compare this episode to Star Wars episodes II and III, this is Oscar material. Sure, it was derivative and the boy was obnoxious most of the time, but at least he worked well with Icheb. The banter those two had going here was fun and natural, and not painful to watch.

Watchability: 3/5

Bottom Line: Well, as always they needed to contrive a way for Q to be happy with them at the end and yet still not send them home, but this episode wasn't as bad as I'd feared.

S7 E18: Human Error

Seven is covertly working on her social skills by engaging in some Holodeck Reality AvoidanceTM. This involves seducing a holographic Chakotay and neglecting her astrometrics lab work. Janeway is distressed when Seven's sudden unreliability puts the ship in danger, but the Doctor gets to the bottom of the situation when Seven's cortical node misfires and she winds up in sickbay. It turns out that the node has a failsafe that will incapacitate any drone that is exhibiting too much emotion, and Seven has reached that point. She turns down the Doctor's offer to deactivate that function (which would take several surgical procedures) on the grounds that she is embarrassed by the things her emotions have caused her to do.

I sure hope there is someone out there who isn't uncomfortable with the Voyager writers' idea of romantic and flirtatious dialogue, because I can hardly stand it. When it shows up in a scene between one character and a hologram of another, and I'm spending half the episode waiting for the real Chakotay to walk in, it becomes very difficult to watch. After season five's Someone to Watch Over Me, another Seven and romance episode, I had no reason to believe the writers wouldn't go for the trite resolution, so all I could do was grip the couch in dread.

Of course, that moment never came. This is season seven, the one where my expectations are routinely subverted, and it has happened again here. That doesn't mean those scenes weren't awful, but since there were several other interesting things going on in this episode, it was spared the fate of Someone to Watch Over Me.

Good thing number one is the bizarre scene about halfway through when Seven begins to have a massive breakdown. The surreality of her reality and fantasies blending together, evocative imagery of her looking into the mirror and seeing herself as a Borg, and the haunting piano melody in the background all work together to give this montage an honestly angstful feel. Now, I have ranted about angsty show elements in the past, and I'd do it again, but for the most part I do it when those elements are draped on overused plots. When it is angst for angst's sake, when it is accomplished in a way that is no different from any generic teen romance story, I'll rally the troops to march on Starfleet headquarters. But Seven's breakdown is presented in a relatively unique and interesting way, which I applaud.

Also, hologram-Chakotay isn't just an object for Seven's lust. His piano lesson with Seven, while it is kind of a WTF moment because Chakotay has never shown any interest in music or in Seven's quest to be human, gives a nice, subtle subtheme to the episode (and its title). He argues with her - showing himself to not just be the sock puppet I expected him to be - it is human error that makes a human endeavor emotionally significant. He ties his argument into her playing when he stops the metronome, saying that her errors in tempo are part of what makes the performance her own. I think that's an interesting take on the more trite "emotions make humans special" argument that usually gets thrown into Seven, Data, and Vulcan episodes. I'll applaud this part too; if you can take something I didn't like in other episodes, and repackage it in a way that it takes a while to recognize, and presents the argument in a new light, I'm happy.

That whole bit contrasts starkly with the dumb holo-Neelix scene where he suggests that Seven should decorate her new quarters in a way that suits her individuality. He goes on to tear down her suggestions that would match her own personality, instead making suggestions that would make her quarters look like everyone else's. I'd mostly like to pretend that this scene didn't exist, but it was holo-Neelix, so maybe it's just a manifestation of Seven's own insecurity about being different. I'm feeling charitable, so I'll go with option B.

Furthermore, the Doctor's part in this episode is perfect. Once he comes in and realizes what it going on, returning her to sickbay, that's when it is pretty clear we're not going to have the "Chakotay walks in" scene. Sure, that point is three quarters of the way into the episode, but I was grateful for the reprieve. The way in which he shows his disappointment that Seven is interested in Chakotay isn't in the script, it is all in Picardo's delivery. His reaction gives his next offer, that of helping defuse Seven's implant, more poignancy. He's too mature, too good a friend, to be bitter. Another show might've dragged on with a plot about the Doctor's unrequited love; this is where I'm glad I'm watching Star Trek.

I suppose it is also worth remarking that this, the eighteenth episode of the last season, is the very first indication of any sort of romance between Seven and Chakotay. They've scarcely had any time together so far, and in the scenes that they have had, they haven't gotten along. Even if we ignore for the moment episodes like One Small Step, they don't seem like a terribly natural pair. Chakotay has been so poorly developed in the episodes since Seven joined the cast that it is hard to have any idea of what she sees in him: "Oh, Chakotay, you're so... neutral, so beige!" That's not really this particular episode's fault though, and it does what it can to cast him as the embodiment of the natural humanity she wants to possess.

Watchability: 4/5

Bottom Line: I know, I did say that 75% of the episode was unbearably difficult to watch. But I do try to be fair, and the other 25% was awesome. That, and the main reason why I hated the other parts so much is that I'm so scarred from the first six seasons of this show.

I have to say, though, that I am incredibly disappointed that she didn't wind up with a uniform outside of her fantasy. I've been waiting so long.

S7 E17: Workforce, Part II

Chakotay seeks help from Janeway and her lover, but she turns him in out of fear once he reveals that she's his captain. An investigator on Quarra becomes suspicious when Chakotay is taken away to the medical facility there, and he gets in touch with Seven; she has been having flashbacks since her meld, and the two work together to uncover the truth with Paris and Janeway. Chakotay is captured and the shadowy medical guy uses him to lure Voyager to their planet, but Kim repels an ambush and the crew on the surface helps deactivate the planetary shields. The planet's officials were unaware of this personnel smuggling ring, and thank Voyager for exposing it.

The Janeway and Chakotay scenes are a little awkward, because I think they are actively trying to set up their viewer for not pairing the two at the end of the show. Chakotay very carefully has no reaction to Janeway's new romance, which is fine, but feels a little hollow given their relationship for the entire rest of the series. The conflict between the Doctor and Kim is resolved predictably, with Kim proving he can do a tactical thing too - nothing special there, but it took up plenty of screen time. My last disappointment* is that after being impoartant in part I, Tuvok spent this entire episode incapacitated. All I want is for Tuvok to be cool. Is that so much to ask?

One of the things I've been enjoying in the Doctor Who episodes that my wife and I have been watching (we're about halfway through the second season, and have watched no other Whos) is that the Doctor rarely takes all the heroics for himself. Often times, someone from the time period he's visiting gets to not only be involved, but be a critical part of solving the dilemma. There's some of that here; even though Tuvok's down for the count, Seven doesn't get all the credit. The Quarren investigator, Yerid, gets a share of the credit for being Odo-like in his pursuit of order. Something doesn't sit right with him about Chakotay's story and transfer from his facility, so he does his thing: he investigates. There's also the junior doctor at the medical facility who uncovers the plot, but after he reveals his knowledge nothing much happens with him.

Neelix is assigned to helping Torres rediscover her life, and those scenes are touching. Her realization that the nice bartender who looked after her is her husband, the father of her child, is good. Also good is her lament that she now knows all this and he's still trapped on the planet. This part does bring up the troubling element of what's going to happen off-camera, on a ship full of people who are adjusting to being back on Voyager. The Quarra abducted over a hundred people, that's going to be a blast for the Doctor to handle.

Watchability: 4/5

Bottom Line: The first episode in this pair did a lot of the heavy-lifting in terms of setting up the story. That being the case, it felt like there was simply a lot less going on in part two. It's not a bad episode, and it is required viewing for anyone who watches the first part, it's just not quite as excellent.

*I think of this lyric every single time I say or type the word disappointment.

S7 E16: Workforce, Part I

Many of Voyager's crew are happily working at a power plant, seemingly unaware of their previous lives. Meanwhile, returning from a Delta Flyer Survey MissionTM, Chakotay, Kim, and Neelix find the Doctor alone aboard Voyager in Emergency Command Hologram mode. He tells them about the evacuation of the ship that occured after it struck a mine, and the subsequent capture of the crew. Once the crew is located, the planet's officials are uncooperative, so Chakotay and Neelix go undercover and abduct Torres. Tuvok begins having a breakdown, and is taken away by security - but not before mind-melding with Seven. Voyager's rescue attempt is cut short, and Chakotay remains stranded on the planet. To Be Continued...

There's a fun game to play when you're watching this type of episode, the kind where everyone's affected by some alien mind stuff. As the characters show up, one by one, you get to guess what the people you haven't seen yet are up to. Usually Seven's one of the last to show up (The Killing Game notwithstanding) because she's the key to solving the puzzle, so seeing her early on was a pleasant surprise. Tuvok is the first character to show up behaving in a manner that doesn't typically suit him - he's laughing and joking, though he does over-explain his jokes in a Vulcanly manner. Especially since Seven's kept her icy demeanor and Tom kept his misfitness, that meant Tuvok was going to be important, so cheers to that.

I was looking forward to Kim being stuck in a Quarren cubicle, moping at his desk that his excellence never gets noticed, but when the episode cut to the Delta Flyer that meant that the second most likely thing had happened. It was not a surprise that the Doctor was the last to be shown, but it was great to see him in the command uniform again. Unfortunately, the weakest link of this episode so far has to be the quarreling between the Doctor and Kim over command duties, and I'm not particularly looking forward to more of it in the next episode.

Torres and Paris are cute together here, though it helps that they don't remember who they are. Tom is a womanizer again, but he takes a liking to Torres - she's feeling down being a future single working mother and all. He's protective of her, and a friendship between the two develops naturally. I'm surprised that the writers didn't play up the single working mother element more, especially given the bravery and social consciousness of the more recent episodes, but since she's been abducted I suspect we won't be getting any in part two.

Speaking of getting any, Janeway gets some here. Her romance with another guy at the plant moves fast, but since she's not as condescending when she doesn't have her rank to back it up it isn't completely unbelievable. I'm quite pleased with the direction of the "characters out of character" in this episode across the board. I keep waiting for her new boyfriend to turn out to be a secret agent, someone in the underground, that would be a fun twist (though it would undermine her romance with him a bit, which I'm not sure she needs right now).

While Torres' abduction scene is well done - it manages to get you to see it from her perspective, that of someone lonely being surrounded by a couple weirdos in a dark alley, only to be assaulted by the hamster and beamed away - but the best one has to be the scene with Tuvok and Seven. He's gripping his console, barely holding it together, sweating bullets, when she approaches him (she's been made the new Quarren efficiency expert). He turns to her, and I'm chanting at the screen "Meld with her, meld with her!", and then he flips out and does just that. He's hauled away screaming "We don't belong here!" and it is all chilling and exciting. A shaken Seven looks back at him, still reeling from the memories he just dredged up. Part two's got some big shoes to fill.

Watchability: 5/5

Bottom Line: There's a lot of action in this episode without being over the top, a lot of character set up without much tedious exposition, and a carefully metered pace of information about just exactly what is going on. This episode was a lot of fun.

S7 E15: The Void

Voyager gets sucked into an area of space that is void of all matter, and is immediately attacked by enemy ships. Another ship, captained by a man named Valen, arrives and he welcomes them to this area of space that has no way out and is filled with people who will do anything to survive. He offers to trade for some supplies, but Janeway is unwilling to trade him any photon torpedoes. Low on resources after the attack, she is faced with asking her crew to die for her their principles. One by one, she manages to recruit a number of other ships into an alliance of good will, and by working together they make their way out of the void.

This is generally a feel-good, "aren't the good guys just swell" episode. I'm okay with that; I see enough examples of the waste that humanity has to offer on a daily basis that I don't really need my televised entertainment to constantly remind me that humanity is kind of filled with scumbags. This episode does kind of remind me of a "chinese proverb" (a quick google search has it attributed to Korean, Vietnamese, and Papal sources as well) that I've heard a number of times from different sources. See, in hell, people are sitting around a round table/pot of noodles/whatever but cannot feed themselves because they have meter-long chopsticks, so they are miserable and starving all the time. But in heaven, no one goes hungry because everyone feeds each other out of kindness and goodwill.

That story has bothered me since the day I heard it. So what's the moral, that only smart people go to heaven? That dilemma's not being solved with goodness of the soul, it is being solved with cunning. I've known plenty of unscrupulous smart people who are good at solving riddles. Anyone who works together for mutual gain can be more effective, and people who don't have prime directives to follow are significantly more dangerous in groups. And don't even get me started on the one where a guy goes to a job interview over breakfast/lunch/dinner and doesn't get hired because he salts/peppers/mayonnaises his food before tasting it. That doesn't tell the interviewer anything about the guy's competence - heck, you could just as easily twist it the other way and say that he's a man who happens to know what he likes!

Okay, I guess I did get started on it. Why didn't you stop me? Anyways, this episode actually does a decent job of avoiding the trite pitfalls of those parables; the bad guys do learn from the alliance's successes and start teaming up. And Janeway, she even admits that she made a mistake! That's the third time in seven years! And the writers don't just use it as an opportunity to show that she was right all along. Sure, the alliance gets out of the void, but for all we know the bad guy alliance is soon to follow. We even know that they have the tools at their disposal because that one guy Janeway kicked out of the alliance had access to a critical component. I also really appreciated that the two good guys with screen time were both from one-off quasi-villain factions - and the potato guys from Tinker, Tenor, Doctor, Spy were even still good at that espionage stuff that they were good at in their one episode. Good attention to detail.

There's kind of a C-plot with aliens who are "native" to the void. Native to an area of space with absolutely no matter in it? Reminds me of the guys from the previous "area of space with no stars in it" episode, Night. These two episodes actually start from a pretty similar place: a completely silly void space zone with aliens that are somehow native to it. But while Night filled itself with boring villains and bizarre Janeway behavior, this one has an interesting plot about cooperation and maintaining one's principles. And the aliens, they're pretty cool. They don't respond to spoken language, but the Doctor discovers that they can hear when they respond positively to his opera music. Since I guess they don't respond to the nuances of consonants and vowel variations on sounds, he finds a way to communicate with them through the tone frequencies of music. They end up huddled in groups with chirping padds, conversing in eerie-sounding electronic music. Just a fun idea. I don't know that it could have carried a whole episode, but it was perfect as a flavor element here.

Watchability: 4/5

Bottom Line: The message is somewhat sappy, but avoids being overly saccharine when it counts. Interesting players and cool ideas keep this episode running.

S7 E14: Prophecy

An old Klingon ship arrives, carrying pilgrims on a decades-long journey across the galaxy. Their captain is distrustful of Voyager at first, due to the whole "leaving the alpha quadrant back when the Klingons were at war with the Federation" thing. But when he discovers that Torres' child may be the answer to their ancient prophecies, he sabotages his own ship so that Voyager is forced to evacuate the Klingons or allow them to die. He is pragmatic about the prophecies; he knows that her child may not be the answer, but enough facts match, and boy would it be nice to stop traveling, so he sets about convincing his crew. His first officer is more skeptical, and even challenges Paris to a duel. When the Doctor cures a disease that has infected all the members of the Klingon crew using the baby's stem cells, that relieves their worries, and they happily settle on a nearby planet. Also, Neelix and a Klingon woman sexile Tuvok. True story.

While I'm sure there are plenty of stories left to tell about interesting new delta quadrant factions that we've never heard of before, I'm not one to turn down a fun Klingon story. Sure, the Klingons have never been big on prophecies, that's more of a Bajoran thing, but they are still one of the more religious species in Trek. They must've had some prophecies. I like the idea of meeting other travelers along Voyager's route, other people who aren't natives, and that's as reasonable a time as any to bring back an old favorite.

The Klingon captain, Kohlar, is quite an interesting character. The mix of pragmatism and faith gives him some interesting motivations and decisions, and gives his interactions with Torres a healthy twist. Plenty of other sci-fi shows have explored the vagueness of prophecy, and how easy it is to make otherwise benign events fit with them, but Kohlar's approach gives the agnostic Federation an actual incentive to match events to the prophecies. They make it clear they'd be uncomfortable lying to the Klingon crew, but if they can see a way that the prophecies match, what's the harm?

Also exciting is that Torres, though she makes no apology about not following Klingon practices, does not go out of her way to show how disgusted she is with them. Like maybe, just maybe, she's learned something in seven years. Or at least in the last few episodes.

Of course, the lion's share of the entertainment in this episode goes to Neelix, Kim, and Tuvok. Kim breaks up a fight in the mess hall, and immediately attracts the attention of Ch'Rega. She announces her intention to mate with him, and chaste Kim falls back on his usual response to sex: complete and overwhelming terror. The Doctor even writes him a permission slip to go do the deed. But he's still running from her when Neelix makes his move. He knows a good deal when he sees one. He makes a big show about of terrifying Kim (easy for Kim to play along with that) in front of Ch'Rega - thereby shifting her attention onto him. Of course, Tuvok has been forced to double up with Neelix, since Neelix had given up his quarters to a Klingon family, so that night Tuvok returns to find he's been locked out of his quarters.

Just think, in seasons one and two, I would have given anything to not hear about Neelix's sex life. As much trouble as I've given the Voyager writers about stagnant characters and no character growth, they've done right by Neelix.

Watchability: 4/5

Bottom Line: Not a terribly substantial episode, but it was fun nonetheless.

S7 E13: Repentance

Voyager responds to a distress call, and arrives just in time to save the people on the ship before it blows up. The ship was a prison ship, and the captain asks Janeway to help him bring his captives (all of them murderers) home to have their sentences carried out: death. We follow the story of two inmates; the first is Iko, a sociopathic fellow who tried taking Seven hostage when he first arrived, terrorizes the other prisoners, and would taunt the guards until they beat him brutally. When patching him up after the beating, the doctor inadvertently cures his sociopathy, and he is overcome with guilt. The other one, Joleg, befriends Neelix, and tells him of the racial injustices in his world's justice system. He convinces Neelix to send a message to his brother - a plan that ends with an enemy ship arriving and attacking Voyager. In the mayhem, the prisoners escape and take the guards hostage. Joleg drops his pleasant demeanor and becomes the ringleader, but Iko helps the guards and the prisoners are recaptured. Seven, who has gotten to know Iko (his treatment came from her nanoprobes), makes a plea that his sentence should be changed, as he is now quite literally a different person. In their justice system, however, sentences are decided upon by the victim's families, and the plea falls on deaf ears. Iko is repentant though, and accepts his fate with grace.

I've got to admit, when it became clear that this was going to be a death penalty episode, I rolled my eyes. After this season's health care episode, Critical Care, I was sure that this was going to be another heavy-handed, unsubtle, and poorly researched episode.

I am pleased to say that I was wrong on all counts. Both sides of the issue get to make their arguments, with Seven on one side, and the Doctor and Neelix on the other. There are no strawman arguments, and no one's mind is magically changed. There's a subversion of expectations in both directions from the two prisoners, which affects characters on both sides strongly, but their opinions aren't completely flipped like the proverbial light switch. Through the Neelix/Joleg plot line, the episode raises the important points about the racial inequality in sentencing that exists today, while also contrasting that against the manipulator, the one who preys on the compassion of others in order to achieve his goals. Joleg is a sly user of the system, earning Neelix's trust through a defense of the system that would ultimately kill him. Incidentally, I found that look into the Nygean justice system very interesting; while I don't agree with the sentencing by the victim's family model, Joleg makes interesting arguments both for and against it.

The Seven/Iko plot is even more fascinating, and like the last episode, it is also the kind of story you can only tell in a science fiction piece. There's no modern cure for sociopathy - no meds, no therapy. But in the world of Trek, the Doctor finds one by accident; he turns a heartless killer, a guy who would threaten the lives of the guards' children just to get a rise out of him, into a repentant man. While Seven's mind is changed on Iko's case in particular, it seems to me that the main reason for that is the change in Iko's mind. He is genuinely a different person. If he remained the man he was before, I doubt that the Doctor's ineloquent arguments would have swayed her. To me, what is even better about this part of the story is Iko's complete acceptance of his punishment now that he can feel guilt for his actions.

The themes from Neelix, Seven, Iko, and Joleg all weave together to turn what I expected to be a "death penalty is bad" kumbaya session into a complex and subtle story. I mean, I'm against the death penalty myself, but I'd always rather get an insightful story like this over one that just congratulates me for agreeing with its message. Seven manages to discuss the economics of long term imprisonment without making the proceedings sound cold and heartless, while Neelix and his moral outrage over racial injustice isn't played as a trump card the way it would have been in some other shows.

Watchability: 5/5

Bottom Line: This is one of the best episodes of Voyager. It takes a controversial topic and gives it a bold and honest discussion without picking one side or the other. It hits important facts in the debate, belying some good research on the part of the writers.

S7 E12: Lineage

Torres is pregnant, and she and Paris start adjusting to the idea of being parents. They aren't helped by every crew member harassing them non-stop, but the really aren't helped when the Doctor makes a holographic representation of what their child will look like based on her DNA. Torres is troubled to learn that the forehead ridges will be passed on and works out a way to remove those genes, but Paris and the Doctor are troubled by her efforts. The Doctor abruptly changes his tune, but Paris discovers that Torres has altered his program just in time to stop her from undergoing the procedure. She breaks down and tells him about the events in her childhood that caused her to believe that her klingonness is what made her parents divorce, and he reassures her that if he hasn't left yet he isn't going to.

Here's the bad news: once again, since it is a Torres and Paris story, they both fight all the time in the exact same "they don't tell each other their problems so they stew until they explode" way, even though they made up last time. And once again, because it is a Torres story, she is uncomfortable with her Klingon side, even though she learns to embrace it all those other times. I genuinely think that this is an interesting story, but boy I wish some of that prior character growth would stick. Even just a little bit. Torres' insecurity is dialed up to eleven here, when I think maybe they could have done with a seven. The number, not the character. Up until the final sickbay scene, because her actions seem like a huge step backwards for her, they feel like a gross overreaction to her child's appearance.

However, that last scene does a lot to fix those problems. Her scene camping with her father, the overheard conversation, and her outburst, asking why he doesn't just leave them (only to have him leave them less than two weeks later), add a realistic emotional motive for her behavior. It casts her choices in a light that shows her to be carrying baggage from her childhood; baggage from a time when she didn't have the emotional maturity that she has developed throughout the series. Her insecurities sound more like things I've heard from actual parents and parents to be in my career as a nurse.

I do like that the question of genetic alteration is approached honestly here, rather than the "it is bad because it is illegal" way that it is in other Trek episodes. The congenital spine curvature is the perfect lead-in, since the way to cure that is genetic resequencing; I think it would be hard for anyone to argue that that treatment is something that should be outlawed. It helps blur the line, which I really appreciate. The other characters are uncomfortable with Torres' plan, but no one goes so far as to say it is criminal. The Doctor certainly makes it clear that he thinks she's being short sighted, but even Janeway doesn't outright rule against the procedure.

Watchability: 4/5

Bottom Line: The last ten minutes are fantastic, but I can't really ignore that the first thirty-five were annoying. Still, this is the kind of story I want from Trek, the kind of story that can only happen in a sci-fi setting, but still incorporates elements common to humanity as a whole.

S7 E11: Shattered

Chakoty is injured in an accident in engineering that shatters the ship into 37 distinct timelines. He wakes up in sickbay, where the Doctor is complaining that no one appreciates him. That's nothing new, but what is strange is that the Doctor has never heard of the mobile emitter. Chakotay goes to the bridge, but passes through a field and emerges into a time before the Caretaker incident. After escaping from a Janeway that distrusts him, he discovers that he has been made immune to the fields by a treatment that the Doctor had given him, and innoculates her as well. The two explore the ship in an attempt to reverse the damage. They get help from adult versions of Naomi and Icheb in astrometrics, maquis Torres in the transporter room, and watch Tuvok die with Neelix and Paris in a mess hall in the normal timeline. The episode ends with a rousing finale of everyone coming together to overcome Seska and the Kazons (band name!) in engineering.

At first glance, this episode feels pretty similar to Relativity, another episode that looks back at different parts of Voyager's past. Once again, the central character must gain the trust of a Janeway who is not inclined to help and work together to restore the timeline. This particular story is unburdened by the bizzare time-travel inconsistencies of Relativity; in fact, the show is pretty consistent about the arbitrary time-travel rules it sets forth. Other than being able to see back through a field only if you're innoculated, it plays by its own rules, and that counts for a lot.

But what really makes this one a winner is that it is exactly the kind of fun episode I'd like to see in the last season of a show. Up until now, the seventh season has really felt like business as usual; like it is senior year, and the writers all have senioritis and can't be bothered to come up with anything new. This episode is different - it feels like senior year, but for the crew instead. It is a fond remembrance of the past seven years, both the good (Seska) and the bad (the Macrovirus), but it doesn't pull any punches either. Past Janeway looks at the future she has wrought with horror, and while Chakotay reassures her, that gives this episode less of the smug self-congratulatory dialogue that other reminiscences in this show have had. This is absolutely what I want more of; Voyager, you've got a little more than half a season left, make the most of it. Your characters should be comfortable with each other - allow them to be the way you did here.

Watching this show with the knowledge that Seven will end up with Chakotay has been weird. I know I've been saying that for several seasons now, but here we are in the eleventh episode of the last season, and we're still getting Janeway/Chakotay teasing. With the knowledge that I have of how things turn out, I can see that the writers were actually trying here to make it clear that a romance won't happen; but their interactions here (particularly the one where season one Janeway explicitly asks Chakotay if they ever got together) show more chemistry between them than there has ever been yet between Seven and Chakotay.

Watchability: 5/5

Bottom Line: This is definitely the best of the Voyager fun episodes. I usually stick those at 4/5, but this one had it all; a balanced look back, good character interaction, and an exciting ending.

S7 E09/10: Flesh and Blood

Voyager responds to a Hirogen distress call, only to discover that the holographic technology that they'd given them is killing them. The holograms, which the Hirogen altered to be sentient in order to be sufficiently formidable prey, have begun rebelling against their creators. They have stolen a ship filled with holoemitters, and after capturing the Doctor, explain to him that they are on a mission to find a new homeworld. He is suspicious of them at first, but they win him over with shared memories of the brutality they faced in captivity. When Janeway arrives with a plan to deactivate all the holograms, and the Doctor can't convince her it isn't necessary to do, he defects to the hologram's ship and helps them escape. However, he is troubled when they also abduct Torres for their nefarious purposes. While Torres gets to know and trust Dejar, a hologram of a Cardassian, the Doctor becomes more and more disillusioned with his new crew. The leader, Iden, is a holographic re-creation of a Bajoran, and had Bajoran spirituality built in to his programming. However, megalomania has begun to set in, and Iden is twisting his faith to have himself at the center as the messiah of the holographic peoples. When he takes a detour to rescue some more holograms, and they kill the biological crew before discovering that the holograms are non-sentient, the Doctor's support for Iden evaporates completely. When they reach the new Class-Y (classy!) planet they were seeking, and beam down a Hirogen crew into an atmosphere they cannot breathe in order to hunt them down, the Doctor, Torres, and Dejar manage to subdue Iden and stop him.

This is Voyager's second feature-length episode (the first being Dark Frontier), and as such this episode will again count twice in the end of season average. Back in Dark Frontier, the writers seemed more visibly drunk on the idea of an Event Episode, but this time the story felt like it evolved more naturally from an episode that simply couldn't fit in one hour, and yet had no obvious mid-episode breaking point that would make it a two-parter.

While Dark Frontier went to Seven, this one goes to the Doctor; kind of the obvious move for this show. As usual, we take some steps backward for the character in order to give them growth in the episode. The Doctor starts out once again disappointed in his lack of growth opportunities, and for some reason Iden is able to successfully convince him that he is... well, while not exactly a second class citizen, but that he isn't a first class citizen. The theme of rights for holograms once again arises, and to be honest it is getting a bit stale. Latent Image was fantastic (if a few seasons late) and Warhead successfully expanded the theme to other sentient AIs, but this episode did tread dangerously close to the beating a dead horse line.

What saved it for me is that neither the Hirogen, nor the holograms, nor the Doctor were presented as being "right." The Hirogen's use of the hologram technology did free up some of their populace to pursue non-hunting professions, and it most certainly saved the lives of many non-holographic potential prey. To make it more than a passing fad, I'm convinced that they had to make their prey capable of learning. And the holograms, well I certainly do not begrudge them the right to freedom from incessant, daily, agonizing deaths, or even the chance to help free others. It is when their quest became more of a crusade, when it became clear that they had not exactly overcome their ruthless programming, that was when the episode got more interesting for me. That is when getting involved become more of a messy decision; not one to discard without a care because of the prime directive, but one to weigh your options carefully before making a choice (something the Doctor didn't do).

That's also what makes this a better episode than Nightingale. Both belong to the season seven school of episodes that conveniently forget about the first six seasons' dogmatic adherence to the prime directive, but Nightingale wanted us to forget about the prime directive for the wrong reasons. This episode fixes those problems by making directive-related decisions something to discuss and analyze, and showing the Doctor's practice of jumping into the fray headlong as being the ill-advised course of action.

I do have a few more problems though: the crew acts here as if they didn't give up the holodeck technology under duress initially. I place no blame on the crew of Voyager for the deaths of the Hirogen at the hands of the holograms. Taking responsibility for their irresponsible actions is incredibly arrogant, and adds to the perception of the Federation as a condescending nanny-state that looks upon others as mere children. That evaluation extends to the Doctor's reprive too; Janeway lets him off for his treason by taking some of the blame for his actions for herself because she was the one who allowed him to have freedom in the first place. Really? You gave him his freedom because he was entitled to it as a sentient being. What he does with his freedom is his responsibility, that's what it means to make decisions for yourself. Of course, if I were the Doctor, I'd probably do exactly what he did at the end of the episode: swallow my pride, not say anything about the passive insult, and just be happy that she's not making me scrub plasma conduits.

The theme of a created species rebelling against its creators is not a new one, but the parallels between this episode and the central themes of Battlestar Galactica are interesting. Particularly in the reboot, the Cylons and the Humans are portrayed to both be flawed antagonists in their conflict, just like the Hirogen and the Holograms. Taking it further, this time the created ones are seeking a new home, but they are still retaliating in kind against their former oppressors. And even more interesting, the theme of religion in an artificially intelligent species comes up, with the holograms taking the religion of a biological species and turning it into something they can call their own.

Watchability: 4/5

Bottom Line: Of all the Voyager feature-length episodes and two-parters, this is the best since Basics , which probably got a little score inflation by being at the end of the second season. This was a solid story, one which paints a nicely complicated picture.

S7 E08: Nightingale

Kim is the ranking officer on a Delta Flyer Survey MissionTM with Neelix and Seven, and he chooses to help a vessel that claims to be on a humanitarian mission and is under attack. Most of the ship's officers have been killed, leaving only the doctors, so he assumes command and pilots the ship back to Voyager. Voyager has set down for repairs, and some of the refugee's enemies are in orbit, bartering with Janeway. Once they leave, he tells Janeway what's up, and she allows him to continue his mission on his new ship, to which he has given the name Nightingale. Once the ship is underway, it is revealed that they aren't really doctors, they've designed a new cloaking device and are bringing it to their homeworld so that they can break the blockade that their enemies have set up. He is relieved of command when he orders them to turn around, but Seven gives him a pep talk and he resumes command. He helps them get their new technology to their homeworld, but decides he may not quite be command material yet.

This is a new kind of prime directive episode, and it feels like the writers are furiously trying to back-pedal away from the rabid prime directive thumping of the early seasons. Here's the problem though: at its heart, the prime directive isn't necessarily a bad thing. It forces characters to think long and hard about the ramifications of interfering in another faction's business, since that is something that is worth thinking through thoroughly. Look back at, say, Prototype. Janeway gets a meaningless prime directive speech, where the real problem is that you probably shouldn't get involved if you don't have all the facts, or at least enough to make an informed decision. Her take on it is that you just shouldn't get involved ever, and the plot goes on to back her up.

Here, Kim makes the call to help the guys because their enemies are behaving like jerks, and I'm pretty okay with that. But once he's out of the heat of the moment, he really needed to take some time and analyze the situation. He doesn't, and bizarrely Janeway doesn't, and even when the deception is revealed he still trusts them enough to go back to helping them. Maybe there's a good reason why they are being blockaded in the first place? Their new story doesn't quite add up either - why are they developing their technology off-world if they can't even get off world? Maybe that's just a plot hole, or maybe it is evidence of further deception. I can't shake the feeling that the writers decided that, because the fans don't like how they've used the prime directive in this show, the fans don't like the prime directive itself. And, as such, they're now offering plots that just ignore the directive mindlessly instead.

This whole thing about Kim's lack of promotion is weird. I mean, other people have gotten promotions. People like Tuvok, people who aren't driven by ambition. But for Kim, the one guy on the entire ship to whom a promotion would matter the most, nothing. There's really no reason not to. I guess the writers are worried that, if they promote him, they won't have the fuel for tired plots about how inexperienced he is? Like I said, absolutely no reason not to promote him.

Then there is the awful B-plot with Icheb and Torres. You see, Icheb, champion of the best episode in over two whole seasons worth of episodes, he has a crush on Torres, and thinks she's attracted to him too. These scenes came far too frequently, and made me long for another scene where Kim is showing how bad he is at command by micromanaging his crew. Really, he did that. And, even better, Seven implied that Janeway doesn't micromanage. There is no captain in all of Starfleet who is more likely to show off to her crew that she knows more about whatever they do by stepping in and telling them how to do their job or do it for them. She is micromanagement incarnate, a physical manifestation of all the arrogant meddling in every universe. And just like that, I got out of talking about Icheb's plot.

Watchability: 2/5

Bottom Line: Kim will never get to be the belle of the ball as long as he is on this show. Even when he finally gets an episode to himself, it is doomed to failure.

Side Note: This is probably the first time that, when Seven has been on an away mission with other characters, she is the one to become incapacitated. Usually everyone else is knocked out and she does her thing.

S7 E07: Body and Soul

The Doctor, Kim, and Seven are on a Delta Flyer Survey MissionTM, when they are assaulted by a species who is waging war on "photonics." The Doctor is downloaded into Seven's body, and wacky hijinks ensue. See, he tries to befriend the captain of the ship, but because he's in a woman's body, he takes it as a romantic advance; fortunately, the Doctor is a man, so he is disgusted when the captain kisses him. And the engineer/medic of the ship, he develops romantic feelings for her, but she just tries to hook him up with her brother, because he's male. Then, when they are rescued by Voyager and betray their new friends, the engineer/medic is all like oh no, I don't think my brother would want to sleep with you now because you're a guy, and he only likes to have sex with women.

So, yeah. The thing is, I already covered this episode's biggest problem in my Warlord review. I don't really have much to add to it. I can do a decent job of ignoring the writers' outright cowardice when it comes to including homosexual characters as long as they don't rub it in my face. After all, not every show needs to have a full spectrum of affirmative action technicolor crew members. But this is Star Trek. This is the successor to the show that put a black woman on the bridge of a starship. A show whose original pilot had a female first officer. Sure, they put a woman in the captain's chair, but that was overdue already. It's like your grandpa saying that something's "groovy" in an attempt to be "hip." He's late to the wrong party. You know what, skip the gay crew member (or, rather, don't stop there). Go straight for polygamy/polyamory.

So, in addition to doing another "lulz we put a man in a woman's body" story, they also made it awkward and uncomfortable to watch. Sure, there were little bits that were good, like the Doctor eating cheesecake for the first time, but that scene was before we saw Seven's reaction to his behavior in her body. The first time they extract him, she is incensed that he ate junk food and got drunk and was working on a way for them to escape quite effectively. As uncomfortable as her reaction was, it made all the other scenes with him in her body worse, because you know now that he not only has to fool his captors, but he also has to behave in a way that won't enrage Seven. With so many ways to fail, it wasn't very enjoyable to watch.

Meanwhile, Janeway engages in cowboy diplomacy that would've made Kirk proud. That's right, I said another nice thing about her. This time her performance was still grating, but she did bully other people with lesser technology a bit more, something that would have been interesting to see in the first couple of seasons. That would have been something interesting to do with her; play up the Federation-hubris angle with her, and give her chances to learn and show humility. Well, none of that happens here, she just gets her way all the time because she's Janeway, but it would've been nice.

Watchability: 1/5

Bottom Line: You get the feeling one of the writers said: "Hey, you know how we only know how to write for the Doctor and Seven? What if we put them in the same body!" Ryan and Picardo tried to make this work, and I was quite impressed with Ryan's acting range again, but you can have an operatic tenor sing Kid Rock and it will still suck.

Addendum: Well, I forgot about this B-plot on the first run through this review, which is weird because it was by far the best part of the episode. Anyways, Tuvok is finally going through Pon Farr, and without the Doctor around, Paris has to be his physician and confidant. Tom prescribes a hologram of Tuvok's wife, which didn't work last time (Blood Fever), but Tuvok is more mature, and they didn't try a hologram of Torres either, so I could buy it working. I like the Voyager approach to the morality of having sex with holograms (which is to say - it's fine, who cares?), but this plot kind of vanishes halfway through, only to be solved with exposition at the end. Still a 1/5.

S7 E06: Inside Man

Voyager didn't receive last month's message from Starfleet, but this month the entire message contains the code for a hologram of Barclay. He informs the crew of a way home that Starfleet has been working on, one which would be very dangerous if it weren't for the new shielding and radiation inoculation technology that he has brought to them. Meanwhile, at Starfleet command, Barclay can't figure out why Voyager hasn't received the last two signals he's sent, until he interrupts Troi's vacation (at least he brought a chocolate beverage!). She helps him realize that his last girlfriend, who left him suddenly, was just using him to get information on Voyager. Turns out she was hired by a group of Ferengi who want Voyager to try out their "way home" and die trying, allowing them to capture the mobile emitter and Seven's nanoprobes. Barclay, unable to send a signal to Voyager, manages to fool the Ferengi into closing the rift before Voyager can enter.

I rewatched DS9 after watching Battlestar Galactica 2.0, and I came to an important realization: DS9 needed the Ferengi. I loved BSG, but in the later seasons, once Baltar no longer had the same comical edge, there just wasn't much to distract from the grim reality of the show. It was still good, but maybe a bit too dour for my taste. The Ferengi, and other Vic or wedding or baseball related themes, kept the later DS9 seasons from becoming quite as dreary (though I could have done without the sexism of Profit and Lace).

Voyager does not need the Ferengi. It's already a brighter, less depressing (on the surface anyways) show, and it does not need stupid, goofy villains. They aren't even used the same way. In the two Voyager Ferengi episodes, they've been the failed villains that they were in TNG, the mustache-twirling incompetents that sound like Skeletor. In DS9 they were a counterpoint to the more serious-minded Federation, unburdened by duty or honor or morality or shame. And just when you think you can write them off as comic relief in DS9, Quark will deliver one of his speeches like the ones from The Jem'Hadar or from The Seige of AR-558. Instead they're just doofuses, the only villains who can be outwitted by Barclay.

As for Barclay, I did appreciate that his hologram wasn't him, not exactly. He was an idealized Barclay, but still a bit different from his demeanor on the holodeck in Pathfinder. He's more confident, but has a little bit more of that awkward side that his "real life" persona maintains. If you're making a hologram of yourself, you'd probably leave at your flaws as best you could, but your creation would still be a product of the person that you are. Hologram Barclay is just that, an idealized but sill slightly awkward version of himself. Dwight Schultz deserves credit here for his performance, since he did quite a good job of distinguishing between his different personas.

Still, I just feel sad seeing the same two out-of-work TNG actors time and again on Voyager. They've built a reasonable back-story in for Barclay I suppose, but the excuses for wedging Troi into the show are beyond flimsy at this point. She has no real place in this story, she's just there because no one else has hired her. And the chocolate thing... I guess I already ranted about it for my Life Line review. Just go back and read that again.

Watchability: 1/5

Bottom Line: The whole Voyager crew comes off looking incompetent here, because even by the end they haven't figured out the Ferengi's plan. Honestly, this is their show, it's time to retire Troi and Barclay.

S7 E05: Critical Care

The Doctor's mobile emitter has been stolen, and delivered by a shady merchant to an overcrowded alien medical facility. Once activated, he is outraged that he has been stolen, but is compelled to help care for his new patients out of compassion. He quickly finds that his new colleagues are not as compassionate, and health care is strictly rationed by how valuable any particular patient is to society. He begins by stealing medicine from the wealthy clients, but once he is caught he has to up the ante. The Doctor hacks into the social value computing system, and down-ranks the facility administrator's position, before deliberately infecting him with a treatable but deadly illness - one for which the computer system will no longer dispense medications, since he's no longer considered important. Once the administrator gives in, Voyager finally finds him and takes him home.

So, in 1986, congress passed, as part of another act, EMTALA - the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act. The wikipedia article does a great job of describing the act, but I'll summarize here as well. EMTALA is an effort to prevent hospitals from turning away patients or denying medical treatments to patients based on their ability to pay. I consider that to be a laudable goal, and obviously so does this episode, based on its incredibly thinly-veiled commentary. But the issues surrounding EMTALA are so much more complicated than this episode suggests that it makes my brain ache. Since there's no funding that goes with the act, congress is basically saying: "we feel like you should do this, but we don't think it is important enough to help pay for it." Because of the act, emergency rooms have become a source of free primary care for those who can't pay, but ER visits are not cheap, so this is an incredible drain on the health care system. It is essentially a band-aid solution to a bigger problem; it would be much more cost-effective to find a way to fund primary care visits for people without insurance, but that's a tougher pill for taxpayers to swallow.

I don't mean to push an agenda here - I just want to illustrate that the reality of the problem is significantly more complicated than this episode gives it credit for. I've certainly never met a health care provider who could look at someone with an emergent, treatable medical condition and want to see some cash first - which is what the aliens in the show are essentially doing. I know the writers are going for intelligent commentary here, but when they draw the characters and situations with all the subtlety of a political cartoon, it makes their arguments seem empty. It is hard to imagine that anyone would argue that the doctors of that world are right in their actions, but that's not doing anything to educate people about important health care issues. Instead, it gets people riled up without giving them important facts. EMTALA was born out of justified moral outrage, but given its unforeseen consequences, I'd like to see more education about the system, not less.

While the big picture of this episode fell flat for me, it did play host for the more interesting choice that the Doctor made. The aliens are undeniable jerks, so does that make it okay to intentionally infect them with a deadly disease in order to affect social change? While I'd say this definitely counts as prime directive territory, Trek doctors have a history of being the crew members who are most outraged when it restricts their actions. Without anyone else around, I find it unsurprising that the prime directive wasn't the Doctor's primary concern. Anyways, was it right? I don't know. I do know that it says something about the Doctor that he was willing to do it - and it relates to my concerns about his ethical subroutines from Equinox, Part II. I wasn't comfortable with the idea that a hologram that has matured as much as the Doctor has could be turned evil at the flip of a switch. But this situation has got to go outside of the scope of his subroutines, I like to think that he made this choice on his own. It is somewhat confirmed when he has Seven check the subroutines at the end of the episode, and I think he must have outgrown them at this point.

Another real life health care issue that seeped into this episode is that of ordering unnecessary tests and treatments. That's another extraordinarily complicated issue - people with better insurance, on average, receive more tests and treatments. Unfortunate, but true. Whether that is due to a provider wanting to pad their income or because they know that a certain treatment is better and can be used because the patient's insurance can pay for it is a subject of intense debate. Then there is the issue of the fear of lawsuits driving doctors towards ordering more diagnostics, which adds yet another angle to it. It is just used as a more minor plot point here - the Doctor orders unnecessary treatments and steals them for the indigent, but talks his way out of trouble with the second in command by justifying the extra medicines as a means to keep the facility's budget up. Since this issue only plays a minor role, I'll give some leeway here in the simplification department. In addition, I find it perversely pleasing that something that is often cited as a major cause of health care's current dire situation is twisted into being an instrument of good.

What else? Oh, yes, there's the whole part where Neelix tortures the swindler for information about the Doctor's whereabouts. It is played off as being cutesy, but Neelix feeds him something that will give him stomach cramps, and then offers a cure only if they get the Doctor back. Tuvok voices concern about this tactic, but Neelix just brushes him off. Tuvok's plan had been to threaten him with a mindmeld, which genuinely sounds like a great idea. But even better would be not to threaten, but to just go ahead and do it! You have a known criminal here, and you have a telepath who can find out what you need to know. Just read his mind. It's that easy. Then you won't have to torture him with Neelix's cooking.

One last thing - it was just one brief scene, where Voyager was looking for information about the thief's location, but the unthinkable happened. I liked Janeway's performance. There, I said it. For the last part of a sequence of different aliens-on-the-viewscreen, we come to Janeway, bored out of her skull, rolling her eyes through the last interview. It was hilarious. She went on to pretend for the sake of the interviewee that she and Tuvok were a couple, and he was appropriately disturbed. Well done.

Watchability: 3/5

Bottom Line: This is a hard episode to give a score to. On the one hand, I was disgusted with how ham-fistedly the alien metaphor culture was presented. On the other, that's kind of a Trek thing, and it did make way for the Doctor's mania. Though I was generally disappointed, I think I'd still rather have more allegory, even clunky, shortsighted allegory, in my Voyager episodes, not less. While much of what I had to say about this episode wasn't entirely complimentary, I'd always rather have episodes that I have a lot to say about.

S7 E04: Repression

Maquis crew members start dropping like flies - not dead, just unconscious. Tuvok's investigation reveals that he is the guilty party - and his strange acticities are traced back to a subliminal message he received in the last data transfer from Starfleet. A renegade Bajoran vedek, Teero Anaydis, had been a member of the Maquis who experimented with mind control, appears to have orchestrated this event. Tuvok had been planting subliminal signals in the Maquis members of the crew, which he now activates, and they seize control of the ship. However, Tuvok regains control and turns the tables on them again.

On the face of it, this is a mystery that is not very mysterious. Tuvok's acting weird from the beginning, and they just got a transmission from home; putting two and two together wasn't that hard. And, of course, since it is a Tuvok episode, he has to be emotional for reasons outside of his control. When it is a Seven episode, you know she's got to learn about being human, when it's a Kim episode he's got to be in love, and when it's Tuvok's turn, he's got to wig-out. It wasn't always this way for Voyager, but in the later seasons the writers seem to be even less willing to take chances with a story.

On the plus side, we're reminded here that there are all these people in the crew who aren't really part of Starfleet. You know, the Maquis. This episode belongs to the group of season five episodes that would have made more sense if it were aired in the first couple of seasons. It is clear that the writers didn't want to use the crew's division, why would they go back to it now? But I'm definitely looking at this in a way that I am not expected to by the writers; this show was not written as a sequential story. The intent was to be able to pick it up at any point, in any order in reruns, and have it make sense. Kind of like a Fingertips for TV instead of music. For the end-of-series review, this is something I'm definitely going to come back to.

So does it make sense? Well, it gives voice to a genuine concern, even if it happened to be raised by a mind-controlled character: will the Federation be as accepting of the Maquis crew as the Starfleet members of Voyager's crew have been? The two groups have been bound together by necessity, but other than a couple of hiccups they have been a good fit. It's natural though; it is harder to be enemies with good people that you know personally and work with closely. But their superiors at Starfleet don't know them personally and haven't worked with them closely, so will they simply take Janeway's word for it that they're good people? I would love to see this emerge as a theme this season, the way the theme of Seven being afraid of returning surfaced for a while there, but I don't have my hopes up. After all, all of this is just based on an off-hand comment from a mind-controlled person.

And the solution? Well, one of two things happened: either Tuvok just flipped a switch and overcame his programming for no reason, or he was so attached to Janeway that the mere thought of shooting her broke the mental control. I'm not happy with either choice.

Watchability: 2/5

Bottom Line: I mean, I'm happy to see them remember that there are Maquis around, but it does just remind me of how unused they are. It's not taking any real dramatic chances to have their independence emerge only when they're mind controlled. The plot didn't leave much to hold my interest because it was so predictable, and I got nothing really new for Tuvok either.

S7 E03: Drive

Paris and Kim are out testing the Delta Flyer II when they are challenged to a race by another ship. They win, but need to take the other ship to Voyager to help repair it. Its pilot, Irina, informs them of a nearby interstellar race, in which Paris immediately seeks Janeway's permission to compete. She consents, but Torres is frustrated that he had forgotten about their romantic holodeck getaway, so on Neelix's counsel, she takes Kim's place aboard the Flyer for the race. The race's organizers embrace Voyager as a neutral party for hosting the event, since it is the first since the cessation of hostilities in the area. Irina's ship shows signs of sabotage, and when her co-pilot is injured, Kim takes his place. When he is almost incapacitated too, he realizes that Irina is herself the saboteur, and plans to not be anywhere near the finish line when the Flyer, which she also sabotaged, crosses the finish line - an act that would set off a bomb and kill all the spectators. The communications system is down, but Kim manages to send an encoded message to the Flyer, which has already stopped short of winning because Paris and Torres were arguing. They get the message and transport the bomb to a nebula, and then Paris and Torres get married for some reason.

So, you know how I'm annoyed because every time Paris and Torres get screen time together it is so that they can fight with each other? This episode is the same thing. The time when they were happiest together remains Thirty Days, two seasons ago, when they couldn't see each other because Paris was in solitary confinement. Every time they're around, they're miserable. Worse, out of a need for drama, they are constantly dismissive of the other's desires to the point that it is really hard to imagine that they care for each other.

When Torres is dejected over Paris' latest slight, she visits the mess hall. Neelix is once again the thoughtful, caring, mature ship's counselor, and offers useful advice, but my wife and I were adding dialogue to the scene because we were so annoyed by Torres/Paris. Some examples:

NEELIX: What about your weekend with Tom?
TORRES: He just cancelled it.
MY WIFE AND ME (US): And you're going to break up with him!!
NEELIX: Does he have any idea how much planning it took?
TORRES: No, and you’re not going to tell him either. He just entered this big race and he’s really excited and, I don’t want to spoil it for him.
US: Plus, it gives you more time to break up with him!
NEELIX: I'm sure if you tell him how important this weekend was to you, he’ll reconsider.
TORRES: Probably, but he should be able to do what makes him happy.
US: Like not be with you?
NEELIX: What about what makes you happy?
TORRES; It’s time I faced facts, Neelix. Tom and I just don’t belong together.
US: FINALLY!
NEELIX: Then you’re not in love with him anymore?
TORRES: I didn’t say that.
US: It's just that you never were in love in the first place!
NEELIX: B’Elanna, if you still love each other.
TORRES: Maybe that isn’t enough.
NEELIX: Call me a hopeless romantic, but I still think it is.
TORRES: There’s a Klingon phrase my grandmother used to use. Mok'tah. It means bad match. That’s what Tom and I are. I just hate that it's taken me three years to realize it.
US: We hate it too!

But, of course, Paris had to pull out all the stops and lose the race just to get her back, so she had to marry him. I guess that's how that works. The thing is, they always patch things up when they fight (which, as I've mentioned, is all the time), so I have zero faith that things will improve between them.

On the other hand, this episode also has the space rally race, which is a bit silly but also awesome. I'm surprised that there hasn't been anything else like it in Trek, but if there's only one show to have a race, it should be the show with Tom Paris in it. The idea of the race as a kind of public relations stunt designed to bring formerly warring factions together is also great, and gives Voyager a good excuse to participate. If only it weren't marred by being another tedious Torres/Paris episode, this premise could have made for a fantastic fun episode.

Watchability: 3/5

Bottom Line: Okay, so the Paris/Torres stuff is actually a bit more palatable than it usually is, and the writers do a decent job of not really siding with one or the other here, which helps.

S7 E02: Imperfection

Three of the Borg kids are dropped off with a foster species, but Icheb remains behind since his parents wanted to turn him into a bomb. Once of Seven's implants is malfunctioning, and it cannot be replicated, and when Janeway salvages one from a dead drone it turns out that only one from a live drone will do. Icheb hatches a plan to use his own implant for Seven, and use his youth to help his body adapt to its abscence. Seven doesn't like the risk inherent in his plan, so he takes matters into his own hands and deactivates his implant himself. Janeway and the Doctor are now faced with two patients who are refusing treatment, but Seven relents and accepts Icheb's help. Fortunately, the transfer is a success, and Icheb recovers as well.

When the three youngest Borg kids left in the beginning of this episode, I started wondering how they'd get rid of Icheb by the end. It felt like the writers were trying to unload last season's baggage, and when it became clear that a live drone's implant was needed AND we'd spent all that time talking about Icheb's future plans to join Starfleet, it seemed pretty obvious that he'd have to make a heroic sacrifice, thereby cleaning out the rest of the season six luggage. I was completely floored when he lived through the episode.

It was interesting tracking my feelings about the episode as it progressed. Every episode starts out at a three out of five, and goes up and down from there based on a number of largely subjective elements; as the plot continued getting less and less tidy, I felt better and better about it. Early on, it seemed like a fairly generic Seven story, and even annoyed me by lampshading the ease of replacing the Delta Flyer. It went on to overuse the "oh, by the way, the last five dramatic minutes were all a holodeck simulation" trope. Of course, the first half of the episode was also home to some fun dialogue; the Doctor goading Seven into playing a game with Neelix was delightful, so I was content to call it a wash.

Things really started to turn around when Seven escapes from sickbay and takes refuge in engineering with Torres. Those two have had more time together than they've deserved, but their interaction here is one of the most touching parts of the whole episode. Despite their previous differences, they carry on a geniunely moving dialogue, punctuated with appropriate humor and existential angst. Icheb's discovery that he could help Seven initially worried me (based on my initial assumptions about the direction of this episode), but his confrontation of the Doctor with his plan is well delivered and paced. I was still certain he was going to die, but they'd given him his meatiest part of the series, so I figured it was worth it.

In a Trek where the most compelling character is the Doctor, you're going to get a lot of patient's rights themes shooting around. Here, it is particularly related to Seven's refusal to undergo a procedure that could save her, but might kill Icheb. You might remember from Nothing Human that Janeway's previous stance on the matter was that she could override the patient's wishes as the captain, since she must take into account the welfare of the whole crew where a critical crew member is concerned. While this episode may seem like a bit of a departure from that stance, since she does not force Seven to undergo the procedure, I do think that there is are several significant differences between the two instances. Overriding Torres (in Nothing Human) would result in no physical harm to her. While emotional harm is something worth considering, I'm okay with it taking second place to physical harm. But here, overriding Seven could result in physical harm to Icheb, and isn't even 100% guaranteed to help Seven, which makes it a significantly more complex dilemma, and one I would not be eager to make a choice on for someone else.

But the icing on the cake for me is Icheb's solution, which is to make the dilemma even more complex. He sabotages himself, then refuses treatment that would restore his implant, so that they now outright have to choose between two conflicting desires. SO AWESOME. This is entirely what I came here for. And, since we've already got the icing on this cake, I'm really not sure what to call the writers' bravery that allowed Icheb to live until the end. Candles? Another cake on top of the first cake?

Watchability: 5/5

Bottom Line: I love complicated stories, I love problems that don't have simple solutions, and I love this episode. This is hands-down the best use of any of the Borg kids.