LizstarTrek - Voyager Season 5 episodes 11-15

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!

Fair Haven - VOY 6/10

This episode is totally a “We had this set on lot” episode, and they just ran with it.

In this episode, Paris has invented a new holoprogram called Fair Haven, which is an idealized version of a 19th century Irish village. Paris makes it clear, he wants this to be just what it is. No aliens, no leprachauns, no magic. Just… a place to escape and relax. A lot of people get into it. The Doctor sets himself as a priest, for example. And according to him, Janeway is very into Irish history. Oh… she is? I mean, yeah, of course! We all remember…. that aspect about her! She also gives eyes at a bartender, which Worries me because Star Trek NEVER does one episode romance well.

Suddenly the episode becomes a completely different episode as they’re all studying an anomaly. It’s gonna make them sit there for a few days. To keep spirits up, they have the holodecks running at all times.

At the very least, this episode isn’t like…. okay, do you remember that episode of TNG where they’re evacuating a colony that’s literally just Ireland? This is better than that, but I’m always worried when an episode is like the “THIS CULTURE” episode. Like, even if it’s something where I’m like “you can’t be racist to it, they’re white people” if this was a French episode and everyone was holding baguettes and goin’ HON HON HON you’d be like “okay I dunno about this”. This is treading very, very carefully on that. And when I say it’s the Irish episode, like, it’s VERY Irish. It’s all anyone is talking about, basically.

Janeway goes into the program’s data and makes some edits (probably without Paris’ knowledge of wanting of her doing that) to the bartender. I have never seen a woman more downbad than this one image. Look at her fuckin’ DRAPED. She makes some edits to his background, makes him more into arts and literature. Makes him more “complicated”, more confrontational (Janeway is a bottom, okay, that’s not what I expected). And then…. one of the best lines I’ve ever seen in a Star Trek episode.

DELETE. THE. WIFE.

Okay so Kate Mulgrew is very hot and if she was being horny at me, I’d become a puddle on the floor, but there’s something massively uncomfortable about watching Star Trek characters be horny, in that same way I don’t like romance plots in these episodes. I mean, thinking about it in the most abject way, bringing it down to its most base concepts, Captain Janeway is currently making a holofuck doll. To her EXACT specifications. It’s weird now when horny 28 year olds who never aged past 14 do it, and it’s weird when she does it. It’s just weird, and uncomfortable. At the very least, AT THE VERY LEAST, this time it’s not a fucking nazi.

Good scene with Seven and some random guy in the bartender

“I possess superior hand-eye coordination.” “That’s not all that’s superior. The lily and the rose are staging a competition on your face.” “Clarify.” “The fullness of your lips and the paleness of your cheeks – it’s enough to make a man faint.” “Then, in that case, perhaps we should sit down.”

Dude’s got game. That’d work on me.

Things go further with the bartender, Michael Sullivan, and he and Janeway kiss. She then ghosts him when she kinda freaks out about it. He then starts a fucking bar fight with Paris over “WHERE IS SHE”. When Janeway finds out, the Doctor takes her on a walk around the deck. Like, literally, they circle the set like 2 times. She admits to him what made her freak out. It wasn’t a “oh no I’m falling for him, a hologram” thing like I thought it might be. Cause like, she had a LONG time to stop that. No, she was there, cuddling with him… and then he began to snore. She was like “Oh, don’t like that. Oh well, I can just change it” and then realized that’s kinda fucked up, and it made her freak out.

The idea of falling in love with someone who you can meld and control all of their feelings and thoughts and very being, that IS uncomfortable, and is it really love? The Doctor makes the argument that it doesn’t matter what he is or how his molecules are aligned, what matters is the kind of person he and she are. Though maybe don’t edit his program in the future.

They make it clear of the anomaly, though it destabalizes the program that’s currently running, Fair Haven. They can maybe save like, 10% of it. Paris asks Janeway if there’s anything she wants him to try and save specifically.

She brings him up and lets him know she’s not gonna be around as much. But she might be around in the future, cause she can’t quit him. And then she makes one last change to his behavioral subroutines. “Deny Janeway any future access to editing his behavioral subroutines”. That’s nice. Though I notice she DIDN’T deny access to physical subroutines.

“Computer. 12 inches.” And then he becomes 12 inches and she’s like “wait wait wait”

It’s fine. I kinda like where it took things by the end but it was a bit wishy washy about that, too.

Blink of an Eye - VOY 10/10

Voyager finds a torus planet in space. Oh shit, it’s a Final Fantasy world. They go to look at it but get dragged into orbit.

Meanwhile, on the planet, a new light appears in the sky as the planet starts shaking. The inhabitants of the planet begin to worship the new star, calling it “Earthshaker”, the new greatest god in the sky.

Back on Voyager, we find ourselves stuck in orbit, unable to escape due to engineering problems. They’re working on that. They also register that due to some Plotium core in the planet, the planet is in a different timeline than us, basically. For every second above, a full year happens down there.

We then jump ahead, a few minutes for them, centuries for the people on the surface. It’s like an early medieval age now. We’ve got a “Protector” and his sage advisor. He sends a message up to the Earthshaker asking it to stop shaking their planet, as it keeps knocking down their walls and, worst of all, made him trip during an important meeting.

Jump ahead even further, to a like…. early 1900s almost. They’re studying Voyager now through telescopes, and know it’s a ship. They call it the Sky Ship. They have comics and stories about it. THey send radio waves up with prime numbers, and a message like “Hey, please stop shaking our planet. I hope you’re a friend.”

This is VERY interesting. Prime Directive is kind of out the window considering what’s been going on, but they DO want to try and minimize damage as much as they can. They decide to send down a spy, but any person they send down there would prolly die from the temporal shock, at least. So they send down the Doctor. They try to bring him back quickly but lose him due to problems, and then finally manage to bring him back… three years later, for him. He explains that they people on the surface are perfectly pleasant and technologically advancing, in part due to Voyager. But there’s also a space race. Who can get to the spaceship first. And for some, it’s for science and exploration. For others…. it’s for war and power. As with any multi cultural planet, right?

Some astronauts blast up. Luckily, they’re an exploration type. They go up, and then all their messages suddenly get weird and garbled. Huh, that’s strange. Well, their job is to try and learn all they can from the Sky Ship. They dock, go in, and everyone is frozen. And then the time collapses on them VERY suddenly, killing one, but the other can be saved. He’s an anxious guy, but very smart. He’s excited to be here. Scared. Everyone he knew is now dead down there. But he wants to help them, and this was always his dream. He’s also worried because knowing how life is in the rest of the universe, he’s afraid his people may not be able to explore space, which was always his dream.

While he’s up there, technology keeps growing. Aaaand they developed warp technology. And then they send fucking torpedos up. While I’m like “what the fuck” I DO kinda get it. The astronaut goes back down to try and tell them to stop. His people have become a bit more militaristic, and when he tries to communicate, they’re like “Who the hell are you? You’re dead. Good thing you left, we’re about to blow it out of the sky.”

Voyager’s shields go down to zero JUST as something else comes up… it’s the astronaut! He beams on with a temporal compensator, and explains he can’t stay for long, the technology isn’t QUITE there yet. But he wishes them luck, helps them escape, and then we end with him, old now, watching the light fade out in the sky.

This is peak Star Trek. In the following episodes,

Virtuoso - VOY 7.5/10

Voyager has run into some aliens who are like, the fucking worst. The Qomar, they are rude, egotistical, and awful all around. They treat the Doctor like he’s nothing (one of them over ennunciates as if he can’t understand her, so I guess they’re from the American Planet), call them all inferior, and complain that their inferior technology damaged their systems. Voyager is trying to help them repair it, and while the doctor prepares their medicine, he absently hums. Well at least this time they didn’t just invent a hobby for him. Last episode Chakotay was like “You know I love anthropology”, and the one before that “Janeway has ALWAYS been into the Irish”. This time he at least has an established enjoyment of singing.

Anyways, these aliens never actually invented music, so they are STUNNED. “It’s a unique mathematical variation, how did they invent it???” And he’s like “what”.

Did you ever want an episode that was just Robert Picardo singing? I didn’t know I wanted that, but that’s what this is! The Qomar ask to get a concert (well, they want full access to the doctor), and Janeway suggests a concert. They put on a concert, with the Doctor as a star attraction. They’re REALLY into it, but when they try and get anyone else on like Kim playing clarinet, they ONLY want the Doctor. Poor Kim. It DOES stroke the Doctor’s ego, though.

Doctor gets more and more popular among the Qomar. THey’re very, VERY excited and interested in learning more. He puts on some concerts on the planet, and they LOVE it. Seven then calls Janeway over and suggests the Qomar are trying to sabatoge Voyager by sending so much useless data to their comms systems by literally DDOSing Voyager. And with what? Fan mail. So much fan mail asking stupid irrelevent questions like, how much can he calculate pi?

Is this episode a commentary on how people who watched Voyager only cared about the Doctor? Is this episode a commentary on me? Prolly more just fandom in general, which is a little much. The Doctor lets more and more things get to his head. Some Qomar try to seduce the Doctor, which makes him so uncomfortable he turns himself off. One of them, Tincoo, seems to be falling fo him. And then of course, there’s THIS.

This is the funniest shit I’ve ever seen.

The Doctor gets SO into this that he requests to leave Voyager and stay with the Qomar. Again, a lot of this is because of ego, and because he thinks one of the Qomar is falling for him (they’re obviously not). This is OBVIOUSLY a very bad idea, and is not how this is going to actually go. And most people are not taking it well. His closest friends are kind of offended he’s leaving just for his ego, like Seven. It’s nice that she’s like, very VERY hurt about all this.

So, this is a program the girl he THOUGHT was into him made to replace him. He can sing in ways the Doctor can’t, superior in every way. They’re making a Hatsune Miku. The Doctor almost realizes how fucking stupid he’s being about all of this. Almost. He has a bit of a breakdown, like, “BELANNA, I NEED YOU TO ERASE MY MEDICAL SUBROUTINES AND MAKE ME BETTER AT MUSIC”. He’s ALMOST burned too many bridges to do this, but she eventually hits him with a “You know, I CAN do this and turn you into just a music bot, but you won’t be you anymore”. He’d sacrifice everything he is, and has, to keep famous. And is that really worth it?

He gives one last Opera performance, this being the only one NOT performed by Robert Picardo, as Tincoo watches. Tincoo then introduces her new Doctor Clone. The Qomar are super, SUPER into it, and immediately forget that stinky old Doctor they used to have singing for him. How fickle is fame? There’s a hard fucking cut with him singing a weird song that’s like, just noise. Which IS a valid kind of music, but you know. Not when it’s made by kind of a dickhead.

The Doctor had ended up offending a lot of the crew, but he’s reinstated. He’s willing to erase his singing subroutines, but is told “nah you don’t need to go that far”. He’s kind of disgusted by the whole thing, and when Seven delivers more fanmail, he’s like “fuck that shit”, but she reads it anyway. It’s fanmail from her, to him, about how much she respects him.

It’s genuinely a really heartwarming ending. Not a bad episode over all.

Memorial - VOY 10/10

Paris, Neelix, Chakotay, and Harry return home to Voyager after a two week away mission. Harry is just glad to be back home with working sonic showers and not near three other smelly men. Paris returns to Torres, who built him an authentic 50s TV, which is VERY cute and adorable. He stays up late watching old cartoons, and then the TV swaps to a war movie, which bothers him for some reason, but he can’t change the channel. And then he sees himself in the TV. Huh! Interesting setup.

It’s not just him. Kim hallucinates in the Jeffries Tubes. Neelix freaks out at a kettle whistle and people sneaking up on him. He becomes VERY protective of Naomi, telling her to “Get down” behind the counter as people come in. Chakotay is having nightmares of a battle, but is woken up by Tuvok telling him that Neelix has barricaded himself in the messhall and is basically holding Naomi hostage (he thinks he’s protecting her).

Obviously something is wrong. They appear to have been in a war, and they don’t even remember it. And it doesn’t help that everyone appears to be suffering from terrible PTSD. Well, everyone except Chakotay, who still cannot act. THey remember volunteering, though the fact that they can’t even remember what happened implies they were kind of coerced.

Their memories slowly come back. They were working to try and evacuate some aliens, the Nakan. Something happened, no one knows what, no one saw. Either their people fired first, or some colonists. Some of the soldiers tried to protect the colonists. Some didn’t, just shooting them out of fear.

How each of them handles this is different. Harry is scared, and shoots some of the colonists. Neelix tries to protect them, and thinks they shouldn’t have even been there in the first place. Either way, 82 civilians were killed in a massacre. All of them. No survivors.

Neelix and Harry have nervous breakdowns over what they did. Paris is next, screaming at Belanna to leave him alone so he can just stare at a wall. I mean I do get that, tbh. Chakotay is there.

They go over the logs, go to the system where it happened, and then JANEWAY remembers being there, killing civilians. But she was very, VERY clearly on Voyager for two weeks. The scene we get with her is GRAPHIC. Her commander shoots the corpses, and is like “we will cover up the evidence”, and she’s DISGUSTED, demanding that they need to band together and make sure no one forgets. But most of the rest of them refuse, getting belligerent. Whatever IS happening here is also starting to spread. The entire ship is being pulled into this alien conflict, in their memories.

Janeway NEEDS to know that it wasn’t ACTUALLY athing they did that just became erased somehow. They set a course.

Neelix asks Seven how she handles the memories of what she did was a Borg. Is it because guilt is irrelevant? No, of course not. It is VERY important. She remembers what she did frequently, and moves on, lets it guide her, so she never hurts anyone ever again. It’s a VERY good scene.

They land on the planet, and go hunting. Harry find the victims he personally killed, and finds… corpses, yes. But they died 300 years ago. More exploration, and they find a giant memorial that occasionally pulses. The soldiers here (or SOMEONE) built this memorial, sending out a memory pulse to anyone passing by, so that it wouldn’t be forgotten. No one will forget. Most of Voyager is like “okay good, let’s turn it off now”. But Neelix is like “we can’t turn this off and destroy the evidence”. I think this an interesting moral dilemma, and for the record, some of my chat disagree on this a lot. Janeway eventually decides not to turn it off, and instead puts a warning bouy near the system. Prolly the best of both worlds.

They leave, but they will NEVER forget.

Very interesting episode.

Tsunkatse - VOY 9/10

This episode is very interesting for one reason, and it’s this:

SPECIAL GUEST: THE ROCK. YEP. This was The Rock’s first acting gig that wasn’t wrestling.

We start with a blood match, some kind of fighting MMA match. Something called “Tsunkatse”. Chakotay and Torres are REAL into it, which… I dunno if Federation officers SHOULD be, but okay. While here on shore leave, they’re excited to catch more Tsunkatse matches. Most of the crew is into shore leave either for that, or for other things. Neelix gets sunburnt. But Seven and Tuvok go to study a micronebula instead. We’ve always had “logic” characters in this series, but we’ve never had two at once. It’s really fun, they bounce off each other well.

While studying the micronebula, a ship comes, disables their shuttle, and plants a bomb on it, blowing it the fuck up. Seven then wakes up right in front of fucking Weyoun. No, it’s some other alien, but it’s played by Jeffrey Combs, who is using the EXACT same voice he uses for Weyoun. One of the other aliens with him is also Martok. Damn, all star cast. This new guy, this ringleader of the blood fights, is like “I will treat Tuvok, who’s injuries are severe, if you fight for us”. So Seven complies, unhappily.

The rest of the crew goes to see the combat. Exciting, I wonder who’s gonna fight! :D Aaaaand there he is. Of course he can’t act, all he can do is that fuckin’ eyebrow thing he does.

Oh they’re so excited to see this guy throw people into the stands, ha ha, what a fun blood sport! Oh no, now that someone you KNOW is being forced to fight in the bloodsport now it’s not so enjoyable.

She and The Rock fight, and it’s pretty hot to see Seven kick ass. She keeps hesitating, because y’know, she doesn’t want to be there and doesn’t wanna hurt anyone. The Rock doesn’t feel the same way, and beats the hell of her after her hesitation. She loses, though this makes Not-Weyoun very happy, because so many people were REALLY excited to see a Borg get injured. Imagine how many would tune in to see a Borg die! Ooohoo, how exciting. There’s a Hirojan, the one played by Martok, who basically adopts her and tries to help her survive.

He has a tragic past, being captured with his son, who he never saw again. He might be imprinting him on her, though that doesn’t mean he goes easy on her.

The crew is now all “I can’t BELIEVE that this society is so into this gross bloodsport” which is very funny considering how into it they all were. Which y’know, is the point.

It’s time for the fight. The “Red Match”. Seven is NOT happy about having to kill someone to survive, but whatever it takes to survive. But who is her opponent? I think we know.

He wants a death his son would be proud of. If she won’t fight, then he’ll be forced to kill her.

What proceeds is a fight. The Hirojen ends up basically coercing her to fight by calling her imperfect. Meanwhile, Voyager comes and fires on the fighter ship, and beam over Tuvok. Buuut it looks like they might not be enough, until the Delta Flyer comes over to Big Damn Heroes the day. And just as Seven is going to kill the Hirojen (he begs for it, saying to not let her prey suffer), they’re teleported over. Both of them, safe and sound. The Hirogen goes to hunt for his son, but not before sharing one more moment with Seven. They’re lucky there was a way out. This time. And then she has one with Tuvok. They both like silence, but here they have a reason to speak.

She spent the past three years trying to regain her humanity, and almost killed someone. Tuvok explains that that feeling she feels, shame, remorse? That shows she has not lost it, and never will. It’s good.

Really good episode. It’s stupid that this is “THE ROCK EPISODE” when he was in two and a half minutes, said three lines, and could not act.