Star Trek Voyager Is Good, Actually | Renegade Cut

[Music] star trek voyager is the story of a starship flung across the galaxy two crews won the upstanding starfleet and the other the rebellious maquis joined together to find their way home voyager debuted in january 1995 in the midst of a golden era of the franchise star trek is often divided into eras never officially and more as shorthand for fans trek fans consider the original series and the animated series as the early era of trek the original cast movies as its own era and so forth if you ask a star trek fan what the best era of trek was they will probably say the time between the late 80s through the turn of the century when the next generation deep space nine and voyager were on the air they may or may not count enterprise among its era considering how different it was from the rest for a long time the next generation in deep space 9 were heralded as the best of this era and with good reason the next generation was iconic and deep space 9 was a kind of precursor to the peak television style of writing in which there were season long arcs completely unheard of in star trek prior to this voyager was often considered lesser trek by the nerdy faithful or even just flat out bad my observations about trek fandom comes from personal experiences everything from late 90s trek message boards through modern day facebook fan pages if your experiences with the fandom are different that's okay our experiences are not universal this general consensus of voyager being lesser trek has been challenged in recent years by new star trek fans according to netflix data star trek voyager episodes are re-watched more than any other trek imdb user ratings for star trek episodes from shows before voyager average at 7.466 for the original series 7.400 for the next generation 7.586 for deep space 9 and 7.4 for voyager that's approximately the same as tos and tng and just below ds9 bear in mind i don't think a bunch of numbers can determine some objective ranking of quality that's nonsense but these numbers do seem to indicate that a lot more people love star trek voyager than the uber nerds of the 90s believed or at least indicate that those feelings have broadly changed a lot of people are re-watching voyager or watching voyager for the first time on netflix hulu amazon and cbs all access and thinking is this good i would argue yes it is and before anyone jumps up and says in your opinion like yeah i know when i put actually in the title i'm being facetious this is just me kidding around about a thing that i like and voyager is just a show i like and it would be amazing if we could all just chill now with that out of the way why do i sing the praises of star trek voyager it's not my favorite trek that's steep space nine but what is it about this series that makes it worth watching to answer that we actually need to explore the characters eager young space cadet operations officer and verified snack harry kim in trek fan circles ensign kim is sometimes seen as a disappointing character who never lived up to his potential forever trapped in his rank aboard a starship with little room for upward mobility and at the same time forever settled with a rank that makes everyone look at him as if he's falling off a turnip truck a young man at the beginning of his career but one of the things you'll learn as you move up the ranks and get a little older oh captain don't toy with him kim works best when paired with someone because his personality is otherwise confined to being sincere officious and shy but it is in these relationships where kim shines brightest his closest friendship is with tom paris right from the beginning we're introduced to kim in cork's bar in deep space nine quirk is attempting to sell him some lovely stones that are not worth all that much and kim newly made an ensign says we were warned about the frankie at the academy racist quark is rightly offended but paris swoops in with his big dumb chin and convinces kim not to buy from quirk repeating kim's line about the dangers of ferengi didn't they warn you about ferengi at the academy racist from then on kim and paris are inseparable playing games on the holodeck according the delaney sisters the friendship is one of the highlights of the entire series season 3 episode 3 the shoot features paris and kim unjustly convicted a clamp that functions as a torture device is implanted in both of their heads the psychological and neurological damage causes them to turn on each other but kim eventually regains control and defends paris until they're able to escape leading to this touching scene you wanna know what i remember someone's saying this man is my friend nobody touches him in the early seasons kim has a strong friendship with bologna tourists stemming from their shared incarceration by the ocapa she calls him starfleet and he calls her maki kim is a by the book starfleet ensign and torres is the hot-tempered maquis who does things her own way the duo becomes more of a trio of friends which includes paris and then kim becomes more of a third wheel once paris and torres get together nevertheless the early interactions between kim and torres are great and their unlikely friendship is one of the strong parts of the first two seasons kim's relationship with 7 of 9 starts as a crush then forms naturally into a friendship based on mutual respect for what it's worth it won't be the same without you episodes that focus solely on kim are a mixed bag season 1 episode 9 emanations is arguably kim's first starring role but he is such a passive entity in it season 2 episode 5 non-sequitur is the next time kim gets his own episode and it's easily among his best kim wakes up in san francisco with no idea how he got there or what happened to voyager and his determination is the first time we get to see kim get tough it's also just a compelling story and a favorite among the early seasons kim does not get another starring episode until season 3 episode 20. favorite sun where he stranded on a planet of women and it's not great harry working best as a companion to other characters might seem like a failing as if he's not engaging enough to hold an episode on his own but it could be argued that this aspect of his character actually reveals he's simply a very likable character and watching him play off other characters is kim being utilized well he does get major roles in some classic episodes like timeless and demon where he gets to say this need i remind you winston that there is no environment less hospitable to humanoid life than a class y actually tuvak no you needn't remind me in season 7 episode 8 nightingale we get to see kim take a leadership position which really should have happened earlier in the series but better late than never kim is perpetually embarrassed by his parents a hopeless romantic and a loyal friend all qualities that make him relatable also he toots he toots real good harry kim for captain of voyager in a revived series please [Music] jakote is the first officer of voyager former maki rebel and also just kind of a low-key hunk right sexy and an understated sort of way oh come now handsome man like you in the first two seasons of voyager chicote is the conscience of the ship always giving sound advice and guidance about respecting local cultures and traditions not disturbing burial sites and such his conscience is what made him want to join the maquis resigning from starfleet under moral objections djokote is an anthropologist at heart helps the crew through spiritual matters and in his spare time he likes the box he's a well-rounded character with a rich backstory and it's a real shame that after season 3 he takes such a back seat to a lot of the cast but early on chicote had a much larger role fans who seemed to think that the series did not really start until seven of nine is debuted tend to forget the chicote of seasons one two and three chicote was the main character in the best perhaps only really good caisson episode in which the commander befriends a case on child played by the late aaron eisenberg jakote's relationship with cesca is one of the most intriguing parts of the early seasons beginning as a friendship with a previous romantic backstory to cesca revealing herself as a secret cardassian to cesca stealing chicote's dna to impregnate herself okay that is admittedly some weird sci-fi soap opera stuff right there but it's also hilarious you're going to be a father hahaha i stole your junk takote has major parts to play in episodes like unity and a bizarre fan favorite slash goofy episode nemesis in which chicote is brainwashed into fighting in a conflict against aliens who are clearly just predators it's an emotional journey undercut by aliens who look exactly like humans but use synonyms for words we commonly use in the trunks did you glimpse any you've got the trembles if you don't wrestle your trembles to rage's ally the nemesis will nullify you like i get it we're seeing indoctrination as chicote begins to speak like them but it's also hard not to laugh chikote and tuvak have an antagonistic relationship stemming from the fact that tuvak was a spy posing as a maquis their differing views come to a head in the season 3 opener in which tuvak assumes the indigenous people of an alien world are dangerous and cannot be trusted whereas chikote tries successfully to work with them the best way to describe chikote is that he's just a good dude and maybe that's not compelling for some people but i find a character whose traits and actions are defined by his righteousness and decency to be very compelling it's the same argument that splits people on superman basically if you don't like superman you won't like jakote and if you like superman you just might like chicote one common complaint about the character is that he is an amalgamation of various native american tribes and that the consultant for the series was actually a fraud it's a genuine drawback to the character and whether or not djokote works as good representation is a matter of some debate among native american star trek fans and it's one i do not feel qualified to offer an opinion the problem with chicote is not chikote when chicote is on he's on the problem with chicote is that there was not enough dukote compared to other first officers like will riker and kira nuris chukote does not get a lot of focus the biggest missed opportunities for chikote to break out as a character are probably all the romantic possibilities that the series squandered the most notable being with captain janeway they had chemistry their friendship was one of the best relationships in the series it was teased in a season 2 episode in which chicote and janeway had to live together on a planet possibly forever but nothing came of it there was also a tease for milana and chicote one episode confirmed she had feelings for him but it was never addressed afterward poor chicote it will never be pon far night at the vulcan nightclub kes is an o'compen which means that like many aliens in star trek she looks exactly like a human except for one defining facial characteristic unfortunately kessa's role in the first season centers around her associations more than herself she is nelix's girlfriend she is the doctor's friend cass doesn't get to do much except be a supporting character at the best of times by season two kess featured in the episode illogium in which kess needed nelix to decide very quickly whether or not to be a father due to some sci-fi shenanigans that affected her body it's an okay episode but it only reinforced kessa's character as being nelix's girlfriend the only ongoing story cass had in the first two seasons is nelix being jealous that she was spending time with tom paris and she became more of a prop than a character someone for paris depined for someone for nelix to covet kess is not even involved in the resolution of the storyline in which she is the conflict she has a kind of mentor relationship with tuvak so there's that i guess in cold fire cass gets some character growth but after that it became clear that the writers simply did not know how to write kes as a character who could be the center of the episode unlike the other characters she is not the head of a department and she has no major role on the ship an episode of the next generation starring commander riker could simply have him on assignment when he encounters danger but kes never goes on away missions an episode of deep space 9 starring dr bashir could start with an unusual medical problem that only he can solve but kess is the doctor's assistant not the doctor now the writers could have written her a role that would have made her part of the action everything that she does is changeable by the writers but someone made the decision that kes is a nurse and that was that kes is sweet kind compassionate various other synonyms for the same thing and star trek fans just hate her kes hate comes in many flavors the first is that trek fans hate the actor's performance but they never seem to have as many qualms about wooden performances from other trick actors the second is that she didn't do anything but that should be cause for disappointment about lost potential more than hate the third is that they associate kess with the pre-7f9 version of voyager if seven f9 needs a counterpart to always compare them to it's kess ocampa aged quickly which meant that if kess were to last to season 5 or season 6 she would have had to wear old woman makeup in every episode we never got that far though as season 3 turned to season 4 the producers decided either for creative reasons or financial reasons or both kess needed to go she went super saiyan in season 4 and disappeared forever until the end of season 6 when she returned as a villain to destroy voyager but then she remembers that she was not filled with hate and learns the true meaning of christmas and then she's gone forever again kess could have been a lot more than she was but i will always remember her fondly as a child woman who ate bugs that one time [Music] voyager went through a variety of changes as the series progressed at the end of season two michael piller one of the series creators left his role and rick berman and brandon braga became more involved character relationships character emphasis and even the focus of the series itself changed starting with season 3 and reached voyageur's normalcy by the beginning of season 4 with the introduction of 7 of nine when people think about voyager they are more likely to think about this not this voyager in the first two seasons had season long arcs something that rick berman famously despised so these arcs were gone by season 3. the arc in season 1 is the integration of the maquis and starfleet crews into one various episodes show the characters initially not getting along then being given senior staff positions then being instructed by tuvak the ark in season 2 was about cesca and the quezon and chicote's donation to that storyline episodes referenced previous episodes and foreshadowed future episodes it's the basics of television in the 21st century but was still new to star trek in the 90s these arcs these developing relationships made voyager feel like a home the crew like a family their quarters lived in their disagreements serious because they could go over to the next episode trek fans today remark on how much better the series became starting with scorpion part 1 but when the premise and focus of the series changed that meant that we would never see what could have been kim and torres stopped being besties paris and torres suddenly had feelings for each other that the series kept insisting began in season 1 but there was no real evidence of that or even the idea that the writers were setting that up cesca died in the season 3 premiere ending the series primary antagonist before voyager was even halfway home imagine if q only had encounter at farpoint and then maybe two more episodes before pulling the character altogether not allowing the audience to see his relationship with picard develop in classic episodes like tapestry imagine if gul dukat perished in an explosion in that early episode of deep space nine when thomas riker takes off his sideburns we would have never seen him in the dominion or with zeal or anything else trek fans might scoff at this because cesco was no ducat but they didn't really give her a chance to be voyager switched her out for the board queen as the primary antagonist a character that might have had a more striking aesthetic but without much potential for depth motivation and an arc the kaizon were not much of a threat but they always seemed more powerful and more cunning with cesca leading them season 3 also largely saw the end of the vedians a complex antagonist species that performs unspeakable acts out of desperation to save their culture and their population from a plague the other notable change in focus after the end of season 2 is that the maquis were an afterthought not the characters torres gets a lot of screen time but the fact that they were maki is rarely brought up they are simply starfleet officers now in the crowd-pleasing season 3 two-parter future's end chakote even seems to renounce his former membership in the maki contrast that with kira at her days in the majorin resistance in the season 3 episode worst case scenario tuvak confirms that there are no more major disagreements between the starfleet and maki crew members the premise of the series no longer exists they are still working toward finding their home but all of their struggles are external rarely internal the first three seasons are often dismissed but there are simply too many good episodes in them and it's a shame that they are seen with such derision caretaker is a better pilot than most of what trek normally gets looking at you encounter at farpoint eye of the needle is this quiet desperate story about voyager trying to convince a romulan on the other side of the wormhole to help them and the twist ending is heartbreaking state of flux with cesca is a fine mystery in which the crew tries to discover who is the spy the 37s is just fun voyager finds amelia earhart on the other side of the galaxy and it's played up so sincerely despite the cornball premise projections really has the doctor come into his own as he struggles with his own identity meld introduces lon suitor the best supporting character crew member voyager gets he's a murderer with a redemption arc and it's actually very satisfying it also gives us emotional creepy tuvak the early seasons also get two of the best q episodes in all of trek the later season q episode is the worst real life with the doctor's holographic family and koda with janeway preparing for the afterlife both pack an emotional wallop i also have strong feelings about tuvix and the ethical conundrum in that episode my feelings are as follows that information is not available and that's what i have to say about tuvix the first three seasons particularly seasons one and two really are worth re-watching in an era when season-long arcs are more appreciated tom paris joins voyager straight out of prison to hunt down the maquis before that he was with the maki before that he was in a flying accident at starfleet before covering it up and before that he was nick licarno paris eventually earns the respect of the maquis and the respect of captain janeway opinions on all star trek characters vary but opinions on tom paris specifically vary so wildly i have seen trek fans think of him as a goofy cringy space chandler i have seen star trek fans think of him as a lovable geek doofus i have seen people call him the worst and best voyager character in fairly equal measure it also seems to change with the times he was a very popular character back then and now there's a kind of backlash i don't know i i side with liking tom paris shock horror he's a space pirate of privilege who develops as a character throughout the series until he's a dad and a hollow novelist all that and he gets the best line in all of star trek that was us so where's the child we ate him paris's biggest weakness is that so few great episodes are those centered solely around him his starring roles are in alice wherein paris falls in love with a shuttlecraft and threshold wherein paris breaks warp 10 becomes a salamander and mates with salamander janeway paris best central character episode is 30 days in which he breaks the prime directive to save a planet and gets sentenced to the brig and demoted in rank hashtag tom paris did nothing wrong hashtag free tom paris paris works best when he's paired with his eventual wife like in the famous i love you scene from day of honor if paris gave us one unassailable good it's the inclusion of captain proton paris and kim's hollow adventures are funny and adorable and they feature satan's robot the best of captain proton comes from bride of chaotica with holodecks gone wrong like they always do and captain janeway dressing up like this to save everyone paris does have a lot of memorable moments like walking down the street in world war ii era france using 20th century lingo traveling back in time and pretending to be a secret agent to fool sarah silverman it's funny that tom paris became the best comic relief character in a series that already came with a pre-packaged designated comic relief character it's also funny that the pre-packaged comic relief character gets some of the most serious episodes but i will get to that when i get to that paris has father issues in the episode hunters the crew is preparing to get letters from home for the first time in years it's an ensemble episode but paris is a big part of it he tries not to get his hopes up about hearing from his father and it's just a very quiet warm episode that also features the heroine so what about tom paris's wife [Music] half human half klingon and the series will constantly remind you about that bolana torres is a former maquis and chief engineer on voyager she is characterized by her fiery temper that again she blames on being half klingon season one episode faces splits torres into two women one human one klingon all the way to season 7 episode lineage in which torres is concerned that her daughter might look like a klingon she does get to star in some memorable episodes like prototype in which she befriends an android and dreadnought in which she tries to disarm her weapon that she programmed there is an episode of voyager in which anton vorak is so haunt that he almost dies blood fever has forec accidentally transmit the ponfar to torres for anyone who hasn't watched star trek the ponfar is a chemical imbalance that vulcans get every seven years that can only be resolved by mating or by ritual combat for some reason those two things are nothing alike usually how can that happen anyway torah's gotta have it and paris is like not gonna happen because your judgment is impaired but then tuvak is like no do it and then both vorak and torres resolve their respective pon fars by just wailing on each other it nearly taints the whole paris torres thing fortunately their actual relationship once it gets started is mostly sweet they argue but they're a good pair and they get married twice due to some sci-fi hijinx malana has asked me to forego the rigors of klingon pain sticks in favor of a more traditional ceremony they're saving the pain sticks for the honeymoon torres gets some good development over the series resolving her feelings about her mother and learning to let her walls down so that she can fall in love with chandler bing [Music] seven of nine did not replace kess in the way that dr pulaski replaced dr crusher seven of nine did not become an assistant to a holographic doctor and minor character she became head of astrometrics and arguably the series star from season four through seven it was more like she was added very suddenly to boost failing ratings she became extremely popular and was given a lot of credit for keeping the show afloat criticism of seven of nine is mostly criticism about how much intention she was given at the expense of other characters and that's certainly fair the more the series was about seven of nine the less the series could be about djokote torres and even captain janeway this might be a little reductive but there are two kinds of star trek episodes episodes that center around a main character and ensemble episodes in which the entire main cast is working towards solving some problem in the latter seven of nine began getting more and more screen time compared to the others in the ensemble and in the former episodes centered solely around seven of nine were a lot more common than an episode centered solely around say harry kim this grew as the series continued season four had about four episodes that are mostly about seven of nine season five had about seven episodes that were mostly about seven of nine so this is a valid complaint but with all of that being said seven of nine still is a great character played very well by jerry ryan she was the star of so many great episodes and was clearly the breakout character of the series the scorpion part 2 obviously but also the raven when she learns about her parents drone when jerry ryan says you are hurting me and we all cried i did and you did too seven had great relationships captain janeway her parental figure perry kim lost in his perpetual crush that eventually just develops into a friendship tuvak her ally against the emotionals the doctor her mentor remember that time seven of nine got rock bottomed by dwayne the rock johnson on a martial arts planet run by the reanimator so good one common complaint among trek fans who don't like voyager is that the series ruined the borg by ruined they usually mean that the borg were no longer threatening as an antagonist or no longer interesting as a mystery what once was a species so completely beyond the power of the federation became a threat on the level of say the romulans you know steady stock antagonists there's q who that acts as a cue episode as much as a borg episode the classic best of both worlds two-parter then iborg one of the best trek episodes of all time and then the descent to parter i do not argue that voyager ruined the borg i would argue that the borg peaked too soon after the best of both worlds where do you go you do a more philosophical episode to humanize them and then you just completely botch it in descent the borg were basically a hired goon squad for lore data's evil twin star trek first contact better answered the where do you go from here question following the whole low cutest thing time travel it's ludicrous and it's great but after that it seemed like the borg really were just another antagonist the borg was this top shelf threat right up until the closing credits of first contact voyager didn't have the scorpion episode until after first contact voyager did not play out the borg as an antagonist the tng series and movie did they did the only thing left with the antagonist species that can ever be done in trek they joined the main cast it happened with the klingons an antagonist in the original series and then in the main cast of the next generation it also happened with the ferengi in the next generation getting new life in the main cast of deep space nine and then the same thing happened with the borg in voyager they explored the borg through seven of nine and through unimatrix zero yes exploring their culture demystified them but again after first contact they didn't really have anywhere else to go some of the complaints trick fans have with voyager tell you a lot about trick fans why is the number of photon torpedoes so inconsistent is an actual constant wine that has lasted for over 20 years why didn't voyager take the wormhole in the gamma quadrant well allow me to answer these questions with the question who cares they bought or made new torpedoes and they went with the direct space route instead of the wormhole route because wormholes are unstable and if they traveled for decades to something that might not exist when they got there they would have wasted half of their lives minutia and lore are not plot holes and series breaking errors the only star trek canon i care about is the photonic canon i do have actual complaints you know genuine complaints with star trek voyager based on what is actually in the series and not how well it adheres to canon or roddenberry's vision voyager did a poor job with its supporting characters the main cast is very likable and has great chemistry but the series spent little time on developing supporting recurring characters supporting characters in trek flesh out the world of each series and offer new opportunities for the same characters to emerge and present new challenges deep space nine had garrick nag dukat wynn and so many more the next generation introduced q gainen gauran barkley lore and more voyager by contrast reused q and barkley and got rid of cesca color and suitor in the same episode the season 3 premiere they didn't really do much with vorik except the aforementioned extremely gross episode afterward he became a background character like so many nameless ensigns in star trek as the series progressed various children were introduced naomi wildman and icheb eachab is a deeply boring character i'm sorry i'm glad as i got pulled out i don't care the other complaint is that there were some disastrous episodes this is true of any star trek but voyager had some whoppers 1159 is often hailed as its worst janeway learns that her ancestor was not as important as she once thought and it plays out in a modern day romantic drama the funny thing is that the scenes on the ship with the crew chatting together about their families are actually really good and have that unmistakable voyager chemistry if the whole episode had been this quiet story on the ship instead of the story of someone's car breaking down in front of a bookstore it might have been salvaged retrospect feels like the writers were arguing against the me too movement 20 years early avoid at all costs false prophets is your standard ferengi episode meaning obnoxious and painful to watch proving that only deep space nine seemed capable of writing good for angie stories these episodes along with a few others make for some indefensible stories and moments in voyager tuvak is the sassiest vulcan vulcans are always written to be humorless but tuvak has such contempt for some characters that he can't help but be sarcastic an uncommon trait among his people well straighten them out shall i flog them as well i love to [ __ ] this is how he dances look at him go two box stars on a lot of voyager's best episodes the aforementioned episode meld with lon suitor is intense and powerful flashback with tuvak remembering his time serving under captain sulu is not only fan service but actually a compelling story with some funny moments gravity has tuvok paris and the doctor stranded on a planet and lori petty falls in love with tuvak and it's beautiful tuvak has two major relationships throughout the series janeway and nelix tuvak and janeway are old friends their relationship is one of mutual respect but also almost familial comfort the scene and end game between them is so touching and so sad trek fans often cite kirk and spock or o'brien and bashir as the best written friendships in trek but janeway and tuvak is up there and then there's nelix nelix is the comic foil to the sirius tuvak the relationship actually gets more development than that though in the season 3 episode rise tuvak and nelix must work together and tuvok's contempt for nelix is called out nelix's last episode is also the resolution of tuvak's relationship with him as the wise vulcan encourages nelix to save his people the talaxians and admits to nelix's great variety of skills and leadership qualities unlike most of the crew tuvak is not given many relationships but the two that last throughout the series are among voyagers most memorable felix is introduced in the pilot episode as a kind of junk merchant who persuades the voyager crew to help rescue kes unbeknownst to them nelix starts off as a kind of con artist with the heart of gold and becomes arguably the most valuable member of the crew he's the cook ambassador morale officer at time security officer nelix was designed to be a comic relief character but it doesn't take long before the audience realizes that his nervous talking is a side effect of a traumatic life nelix's home planet was conquered his home on the moon annihilated his sister lost nelix has been practically homeless for a long time prior to boarding voyager nelix gets some dark and serious episodes that really allow actor ethan phillips to shine in the episode phage the elix's organs are harvested by the vedians and he asks the doctor to pull the plug on him jatrel is not a good episode and has a really problematic resolution nevertheless it does contain a great performance by phillips as nelix mortal coil has nelix recognized that his religion is false and that there is no afterlife and that without his faith his life has no meaning i was dead for 18 hours i should have experienced something i should remember something the episode once upon a time is mocked because it's the one with flutter but the story is actually extremely serious as nelix godfather to naomi wildman struggles with whether or not to tell the young girl that her mother may have been lost on an away mission when you were her age you were safe and sound on earth with two healthy parents to take care of you you never had to worry about the possibility of being alone i feel like star trek fans have referred to nelix as a jar jar binks character so many times that it has created a kind of mandela effect misremembering nelix as a goofy character when he was just as often portrayed as sincere in the first two seasons nelix is portrayed as having a character flaw jealousy this manifested most in his relationship with kess however the series never portrays this character flaw positively always negatively and nelix successfully overcomes it nelix and kess breaking up is handled rather poorly kess breaks up with him while she is under the control of an alien but the breakup somehow stuck and was never properly explained i can't defend that and i won't try in the end nelix leaves the ship to defend his people from space miners and gets a good send-off it's a little disappointing that he only gets a cameo in the series finale but writing him out as the hero of his people made more sense for him he is the only character who lasts the whole series who had no personal interest in going to earth [Music] the doctor is an emergency medical hologram that due to the passing of the chief medical officer takes over responsibilities in sickbay he begins his life with a terrible bedside manner but as he becomes more accepted as a real person that starts to change particularly in season 2 episode life science in which he shows a romantic interest in a patient the doctor's character growth throughout the series is arguably the best out of the cast that was there from the pilot the doctor spends a lot of his time arguing for his own rights sometimes against the otherwise enlightened captain janeway who sometimes is not ready to see the doctor as anything more than a tricorder this contrasts greatly to the relationship between data and captain picard the latter defending the rights of the former from others in starfleet such as in the measure of a man and the offspring janeway by comparison plays both supporter of and opposition 2 the doctors rights depending on the situation it makes the dynamics between them really engaging even tense as janeway holds the keys to his freedom but sometimes stands in his way for reasons of pragmatism the doctor stars in some of the best episodes of voyager message in a bottle is behind only bride of chaonica as voyageur's best comedy episode the doctor is sent across the galaxy to deliver a message to starfleet where he encounters the mark ii version of his holographic program stop breathing down my neck my breathing is merely a simulation so is my neck stop it anyway living witness is easily one of voyager's best episodes carried by the doctor we are actually seeing a backup file of the doctor a duplicate trying to set the record straight on a planet that trafficks in historical misinformation about voyager latent image is a great mystery episode mixed with a character development episode for the doctor as he must resolve the fact that he made a decision based on his personal feelings and not his ethical subroutines it's also the episode that best resolves how janeway sees the doctor there are more and more doctor-centric episodes as the series progresses partly because the writers must have found him a great character to write for but also because he was a very popular character among star trek fans the doctor sometimes gets the same criticism as seven of nine too much focus on this character means less focus for other characters but the audience decided they loved the doctor the audience got what they wanted captain catherine janeway of the federation starship voyager a scientist an explorer and arguably the most controversial character in the series there are those who love janeway for her sometimes measured and sometimes forceful approaches to problems and some who have noted that men trying to write women as tough sometimes mistake tough for mean and janeway is sometimes portrayed that way and probably for that reason janeway's sometimes erratic behavior is mostly the result of different writers having different takes on her but the in-universe explanation was delivered by tuvak in the episode night i've been observing her behavior for the past four years guilt has been her constant companion janeway feels guilty about stranding her crew in the delta quadrant she saved the ocompa but her actions not only kept her crew far from home but also indirectly resulted in the demise of many of her crew along the way including harry kim except they had a spare it's complicated anyway with all that being said janeway under incredible stress always delivers in the episode's scientific method her crew was subjected to dangerous medical experiments by aliens and when one of her crew tragically passed because of this janeway was like this ends now and flew voyager into the sun the aliens bailed out but not before one of their ships exploded presumably vaporizing everyone inside counterpoint is this wild episode in which janeway trafficks telepathic refugees across an alien empire and submits to inspections like border patrol in outer space she gets seduced by the head alien fooled into thinking he was on her side but uh oh she tricked him and it's actually just a very fun episode janeway is the star of endgame the series finale this finale is fine the bad aspects of the episode are chakote and seven having no chemistry and the series ending only seconds after voyager makes it home some fans were bothered by that last part but considering much of the first half of end game shows what will or at least what could happen to the crew following their return anyway this seems like a minor complaint to me future janeway versus present janeway is cool because of their different philosophies the aforementioned scene with tuvak is one of the best in the series and the battle with the borg mostly works whether or not the borg being the final boss of voyager works for you probably depends on whether or not you liked the borg in voyager at all anyway fought a macro virus got assimilated still got her crew home so why have i been referencing every possible good episode of voyager and spending so much time on individual characters well because it's related to why i think voyager is good actually in the end star trek voyager just has more decent to good episodes than bad episodes the good episodes stand out and the decent episodes though unremarkable are populated by likeable characters someone to watch over me may only be a decent episode but because we care about the doctor in seven seeing him fall in love with her makes the episode engaging it's a very low stakes episode but the doctor is so likable that we want him to be happy and it's hard watching him fail in the end the decent episodes become more than that as for the outright good and even great episodes i have mentioned a lot of them already but who can forget year of hell a two-parter with a compelling complicated antagonist and a kind of micro version of what some people wanted voyager to be constantly under threat and barely making it through the quadrant prey with the heroine and species 8472 was a good one relativity is a fun time travel episode equinox is star trek doing what it does best pondering morality renaissance man is the doctor at his height as he evades tuvak and tries to save the captain the voyager conspiracy is just bonkers but a real crowd pleaser basically seven absorbs too much data and starts to think voyager being in the delta quadrant is either a starfleet plot or a maquis plot my argument that voyager is good actually is simply that there are too many good episodes of course this is all subjective but if you want to argue against this you're gonna have to explain why you think living witness and timeless and so many other classic episodes are bad actually so good luck with that i freely admit that saying it's good because it has good episodes is not going to convince anyone because it's kind of circular so instead of trying to convince you i am instead trying to challenge you go back and watch it or if you've never seen it before and have just heard it's bad judge for yourself and go see it it's on so many platforms that you must be subscribed to one of them or if you're not most of them have like free trials or whatever that's it it's actually not that complicated i just felt like inundating you with classic episodes and moments to make my point i hope we all learned something to [ __ ] i understand you are a vulcan man you have just gone without for seven years about paris please find a way to load a hypo spray i will give you the sign just aim for his behind

Channel: Renegade Cut

Views: 247,604

Rating: 4.8378916 out of 5

Keywords: renegade cut, star trek, star trek voyager, star trek the next generation, star trek tng, star trek deep space nine, star trek ds9, star trek enterprise, star trek tos, voyager, captain janeway, seven of nine, the doctor, chakotay, tom paris, neelix, tuvok, harry kim, star trek voyager review, star trek explained, star trek voyager analysis, star trek voyager scenes, star trek first contact, trek review, star trek universe, star trek discovery, star trek lower decks, trek

Id: E4Sh0NAsHfU

Length: 46min 28sec (2788 seconds)

Published: Sun Aug 02 2020

Reddit Comments

[u/[deleted]]

Voyager has some of the best and the worst episodes.

[u/Darzanak]

Voyager is the only series my wife has sat through and watched in its entirety, and she loved it. We are now working our way through TOS, but I think the strong female lead was what really resonated with her.

[u/connerjameswilson]

I really enjoyed Voyager. It’s probably not my favorite of the shows but certainly comparable with DS9 and TNG. Definitely a worthwhile show with memorable characters and some fantastic episodes.

[u/hippiechan]

Voyager was the Star Trek I grew up on, so I have a nostalgic connection to it for sure. There are also a lot of great episodes in Voyager (The Thaw, Blink of an Eye, Counterpoint, etc.) even if a lot of them are crummy and corny.

[u/[deleted]]

Voyager is great

i am so glad Seven is in Picard may make people who never saw the show go back and watch it.

[u/jimmyray01]

Re watching Voyager right now. I made it through TOS, Its cheep and cheesy, but I still loved it, TAS too, then TNG, just once its a big show, I Watched DS9 4 times through, Picard, Discovery, all the movies.

There was nothing else, so I figured OK, fine, I got through back in the 90's I can do it again. You know what, Voyager is good, really good, like wow. I'm realizing, ho much of a judgmental teenage boy i use to be comparing it to the recently ended TNG and watching it after the best episodes of DS9, but now watching it on its own, and being able to skip the occasional bad episode, dam it is really great, I had no idea.

I am really surprised, really, I'm not sure yet, but I think after this I might, might maybe, I don't want to, but I might try Enterprise again too.

[u/the_c0nstable]

Oh I’ve been so excited for this! Leon’s Renegade Cut Videos are excellent, but he also has done great informative videos about the Berman era, a positive review of Generations, and a political analysis of the UFP and Starfleet, pointing out that a lot of its politics appeal to the left, but a lot of the set-up and hierarchy of Starfleet appeal to the right.

I can’t wait to see him analyze Voyager; I know he has a section on each character.

[u/PauI_MuadDib]

I wish I had watched VOY sooner. It's my go-to Trek to rewatch now. DS9 and VOY have my favorite episodes and characters as well.

And I always find it funny that at one time VOY was Netflix's most rewatched Trek. I would've guessed it was TNG. So that stat was surprising. I mostly meet TNG & Kelvin timeline fans out in the wild. I've met ENT, VOY and a few Picard fans, but never DS9 or Discovery.

[u/colmatrix33]

This comes as no surprise to Trek fans. Voyager is awesome.