LizstarTrek - Voyager Season 3 episodes 14 - 19

Every Sunday my Twitch subs and I watch Star Trek in my Discord. Here are my reviews and thoughts on each of the episodes as I see it. If you’re curious about a nerd’s views on Star Trek episodes, please read on, I go quite in depth with some of these episodes! I’ve watched some Star Trek before but not all of it!

Alter Ego - VOY 2/10

This episode is directed by the Doctor. Gee, it’s like they’re running a directing school here.

Voyager is looking at an “inversion nebula”, whatever that is, and Harry Kim goes to Tuvok like “Hey, can you help me remove my emotions” and Tuvok is like “it’s kind of not that easy, why?” and Kim is like “cause I’m in love with a Holodeck program” and Tuvok is like “lol you’re in love with A PROGRAM SUBROUTINE??? YOU NERD” and Kim is like “aww”

I wonder if Kim’s girlfriend just doesn’t matter anymore. I wonder if we’re even gonna bring it up.

Tuvok: “Vulcans don’t have friends. We have fellowships and the like.” Tuvok. My man. I know that’s wrong, because they made THREE MOVIES ABOUT THE TOPIC

This holodeck character, Malayna, is very very lifelike. Like, all holodeck characters are lifelike. But she’s very perceptive, going beyond her coding as a beachside instructor. She’s very logical, calcualting, but also friendly and inviting. This comes to a head as Tuvok also becomes interested in the woman, who is putting the moves on, something fierce

I don’t like this. Stop. This man is married. He has several kids and has been married for like 80 years. You can ship anyone else on this ship, have them all be in one big fuck pile if you want, but leave Tuvok out of this. Like, cheating and things don’t sit well with me, and Harry is TECHNICALLY dating someone, but like, after two years, I’ll accept that. It feels weirder for Tuvok, who is long lived, and WILL be alive and fine in 80 years when they get back home, everything can return as normal.

Anyways Kim and Tuvok get in a bit of a jealousy spat, and Tuvok deletes her from the Holodeck, but she just puts herself in Tuvok’s room instead, and is like “Hey, you’re move~” putting the hots back on him. THANKFULLY, Tuvok is immediately like “nope, all my hots are gone, this is clearly bad and this woman is a threat to Voyager” and calls security. Okay good. I was checking out SO HARD from this, but this helps. Anyways, Malayna has control over the ship’s functions, and she stops the alarms and zoops out of there.

Ten minutes earlier “I would NEVER be a threat to you or your ship!” Ten minutes later, she’s strangling B’elanna, and going “GIVE ME VULCAN DICK OR I WILL LITERALLY DESTROY VOYAGER”. Lady. He’s just not that into you, and you are going WAY too far for this.

Anyways she’s actual an alien on a nearby station that looks over the nebula, and she’s alone. And very lonely. She hacks nearby ships that pass by to look into them and see what they’re about. Have you every considered like… saying hi??? I mean she technically did here, but then it went too far, she fell in love with Tuvok, and now she wants him so much she’ll do murder. I cannot relate to her in any way lol. She literally says “I chose a life of isolation here and I want to be here, alone”. So why would I feel bad about this?? Anyways he destroys her with Facts and Logic, and she sadly lets him go. He tells her to go back to her own kind, if this assignment is fucking with her THIS badly and she’s like “woah I didn’t think of that, huh”. THIS LADY THOUGHT SHE WAS LOGICAL ENOUGH FOR A VULCAN?? The episode ends with Tuvok apologizing to Kim, which fair, he did treat him kinda like shit, and teaches him a Vulcan board game.

Neli gave a good analogy. A ranger is alone in the forest and sees a group of hikers. He talks to one of them, likes them, and then kidnaps them and says “I will kill the others if you don’t fuck me”, and then when suggested to just… not be a ranger, cause clearly it’s damaging their psyche, they go “huh I hadn’t thought of that”.

This episode blows.

Koda - VOY 6/10

Janeway and Chakotay go on a shuttle, and it goes down and crashes onto a planet. Why the fuck would they put the two highest ranking officers on the same shuttle? Aren’t there rules for this? Anyways, Janeway dies in the crash. Pretty bold of the show to kill off the main character. Chakotay manages to revive her. They’re REALLY trying to make the thing between them a thing. I don’t want it. I hate it. Please.

Anyways turns out they were shot down by Vidiians, who come in and kill Chakotay and strangle Janeway to death. Then they wake back up on their shuttle. They appear to be in some kind of time loop. The Vidiians kill them AGAIN, but the third time they manage to disrupt the loop and escape the ships, making it back to Voyager. When they get back, suddenly Chakotay doesn’t remember the timeloop. And when the doctor examines her, apparently she’s infected by the phage. No idea HOW, but one of the phage’s side effects is that it can cause hallucinations, apparently, so that explains that.

When she awakes 40 hours later, Doctor goes “Nope, can’t find a cure. Guess I’ll have to kill you :(“ and poisons her with a neurotoxin, and we see her painfully dying. What the fuck??

Back to the anomaly. They can see it physically, and then Janeway sees Chakotay trying to revive her body, from that first time. She’s suddenly in a It’s A Wonderful Life situation, watching everyone react to her death.

Kes seems to feel that she’s there, cause psychic, y’know. The rest of them take any chance to save Janeway, and Janeway stands there watching, as her dad shows up like “Hey honey, you’re dead, like me! Come join me in the afterlife :D” Janeway keeps holding on, until she sees everyone give up on her, and hold a eulogy.

…But even after, no, she has to stand by them. She’ll just watch, it’s fine. She’ll be with them in spirit, and a captain never abandons ship (Incorrect, you’ve abandoned ship a few times already, but thats okay)

She starts seeing flashes of the Doctor trying to resuscitate her, and determines THIS isn’t real, and her dad is trying really, REALLY hard to convince her to just give up and die, which is not at all what her father would do. She asks him if he’s an alien, and yes, okay, he is, but he’s here to make people crossing over into the next life easier. Uh, no, clearly not. He’s basically a vulture, feasting on dying people. But she makes it back, and everythings okay.

I found this episode pretty interesting… at least, the second half. The first half was uh… what does that have to do with anything???? It feels like they wrote an episode, didn’t know how to end it, and just wrote a completely different episode.

Blood Fever - VOY 3/10

Y’all remember PON FAR?! One of the Vulcans on board is undergoing it, and asks Torres to be his mate. It’s a very “I assure you, I am quite fertile” moment. Anyways when he gets… handsy, Torres fucking decks him. Go Torres. The Doctor tries helping him, but the pon far isn’t a thing people talk about. It’s a private matter. The Doctor is annoyed by how Victorian Vulcans are about the whole sex thing. I agree. The only thing they CAN do here is just let him meditate, which doesn’t seem to be helping.

Torres, Neelix, and Paris go into a cave and do some climbing to find some minerals they need. Torres is very… harsh, fast paced, high energy. When their climbing equipment fails, Neelix is injured, she’d lightly hurt, and gets VERY angry at him. When Paris tries to stop her, she bites him, and is like “what the fuck?!”

Turns out Vorik, the Vulcan, mind melded with Torres briefly and now SHE’S experiencing Pon Far. They go after her, and some aliens come out of the rocks, and consider her hostile… because she is. An earthquake happens, and her and Paris are seperated. She refuses to accept something is wrong with her, and no one wnats to explain Pon Far to her. Just say its Vulcan Mind Meld Fuckery, seriously.

The Doctor develops an alternative for Vorik. He makes a Vulcan blow-up doll on the holodeck. No joke. It’s VERY funny. He’s basically teaching Vulcans how to masturbate.

Anyways, because it’s a Love Pollen episode and Torres and Paris are alone, Torres wants to fuck Paris. At least, benefits to Paris, he’s not IMMEDIATELY getting it on. Even HE realizes the ethical fuckery of this, but it is indeed, fucky, and VERY uncomfortable to watch.

She tells him she’s ALWAYS been interested in him like he has in her, but like, no, you’re clearly saying that for sex,. and even after a kiss, he’s not comfortable with fucking her. God bless, thank you Paris. Thank GOD. But after Chakotay and Tuvok rescue them, they determine that they MUST fuck, or she’ll die. Vorik sneaks down to the surface, the masturbation not helping, and declares ritual combat. Y’know, the thing that Spock did to Kirk. Torres tells him to go fuck himself and declares herself as her OWN defender, and beats the shit out of him. The Blood Fever is over.

Torres tries to avoid the subject later on with Paris, who tells her she’s being ridiculous and he didn’t mind it THAT much. What a TERRIBLE start to their relationship. And then they find Borg corpses on the surface, which means this episode is kind of important. Oh no.

This episode made me feel gross.

Unity - VOY 7.5/10

Chakotay and an Ensign who’s prolly gonna die later are lost in space, and Will Robinson is nowhere to be found. They get the lead of a Federation beacon and head to it, but it’s a planet, not Voyager, and the people on the planet recognize them as Federation. They’re still pretty far out, so that’s intriguing. When they land, there are people there to meet them, who just start blasting for some reason. The Ensign is killed, of course, but Chakotay is saved after being injured. He’s saved by a Human who explains that she, and the others on this planet, were kidnapped by aliens and stranded here. There are some Klingons, Cardassians, and all kinds of other things on this planet. She demands he rest for a bit.

Meanwhile, Voyager is floating through a large expanse of nothing, bored, and then find… A BORG CUBE! It’s powered down and seems dead, so they send an away team to scavenge it and see if they can find anything that could help against future Borg attacks that will TOTALLY happen if we’ve seen hints of the Borg two episodes in a row.

Chakotay thinks the human he met, Riley, is kinda sussy, so he follows her outside and finds… BORG! They’re all Borg! She explains that yes, they WERE Borg. She was from Wolf 359. But after their Cube broke down, they escaped and regained their personal selves. They just want to make a society on here, and live happy lives. Chakotay is weirded out but hey, they can’t help having originally been Borg. Anyways Chakotay is dying and some Borg technology can help him, and the post-Borg can help him basically, temporarily putting him into the collective. Chakotay is a Borg Racist though and is like “NO FUCK THAT SHIT”, but eventually y’know, he’s about to die, so they welcome him into the collective briefly with a simple thing placed on his head, and easily removed after. It shows an interesting representation of what the Borg is, what it’s like being Borg, in a way that’s less threatening. Borg that wants to help and protect each other… but even then, the violence they’ve committed still bleeds through. They can’t escape it. I like that, it’s interesting.

Voyager shows up and saves Chakotay. Riley goes up to explain a plan they have. They’ll reactivate the Borg cube, for a minute, which will allow them to start a new collective, reconnecting their minds for good, and allowing them to peacefully assimilate all the raiders who are attacking them. While that isn’t bad, and she doesn’t think these people are bad, that forceful assimilation is still…. forceful, which is fucked, and also it might attract other Borg to the area, which is VERY bad, so Janeway says no. They accept her decision, and they go about their way.

Ha ha, no, they use the link they had established with Chakotay to force him to go into the Borg Cube and activate it. Like, they’re under attack by Raiders and about to die. They feel threatened and they have no other choice, I get it, but it’s still… unfortunate it had to come to this.

Chakotay reactivates the Cube, which allows them to assimilate the violent raiders, but also activates the Borg, who immediately get ready to fire on Voyager, but the New Cooperative, as they call themselves, blow up the Cube, sever the link, and say goodbye. Chakotay and Janeway wonder if they WILL be better than the actual Borg, because they DID force their will as soon as it suited their needs… and hoped that it would go better this time.

Pretty interesting episode, especially for a Chakotay episode!

Unity - VOY 9/10

We’ve got a Kes episode! Voyager meets some aliens, the Travelers, who explore space willy nilly. They look like Bajorans but their nose ridge is white, they CLEARLY are re-using makeup lol. They’re friendly enough, but often just go by their own whims. They’re willing to trade medical stuff and information to Voyager, to help them out, and Kes is working with one in particular, one named Zahir. He’s a bit different, very friendly and helpful. The Doctor, meanwhile, doesn’t like them and tells Kes to keep away.

At the same time, the Doctor is researching ancient people, and trying to implement their personalities into his own. This is… obviously a bad idea, and Torres calls it out as such, especially after the Doctor flirts with her and places his fucking hand on her thigh and she is like “I WILL find a way to break you, Doctor”. Changing your personality is DRASTIC, and dangerous. He just wants to improve his bedside manner and be more friendly, which makes sense. But this is noooot the way.

Kes and Zahir start a relationship, of course, and Kes is thinking of leaving Voyager to join him in his journeys.

Late at night, Zahir is attacked and thrown in a ravine, and his friend is attacked and burned… by the Doctor! Who’s acting all evil and fucked up. They get the Doctor to help him, and he’s… perfectly pleasant, but Torres notices a problem in his personality subroutines. Something fucked up with it and he’s degrading, so she tries to work on him… and is attacked by his Evil Version. It’s a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde situation. He’s unhinged, they do something with his eyes, and it’s PERFECT at making him seem unstable and evil as shit. His actor is FLEXING, and is SO good.

He kidnaps Kes and tries to escape to the planet, booking a ship to flee, with Kes as his… slave? I dunno. She eventually surmises that actually it’s the good parts inside of him trying to protect her. They chase them to the planet, and he threatens to throw them off a fucking cliff. But they catch them with the teleporter, and fix the Doctor, and all is well.

This episode is very entertaining, I didn’t wanna really type to distract myself. Good damn episode, let the Doctor flex more please. It ends with him reciting the Hippocratic oath… good episode.

…And thank God we ended on this episode, or this would be a very rough night.