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.