Star Trek - Space: The Final Frontier

[L50LasPak]

For contrast, look at a good admiral like Nechayev. In Journey's End, she was the middleman between Picard and the Council and tried to lobby the Council to not resettle the Navajo and she does more or less the same thing in The Maquis with Sisko. The audience calls her Bitchayev for her trouble even though she didn't actually do anything wrong or illegal.

The Bitchayev perception pretty much only comes from her matter of speaking forcefully to Picard and cutting him off whenever he tries to make it into an arguement. It think its another case of TNG fans being too sensitive. Its brusque, but there's nothing technically wrong with it as far as a command style. Her actress said she had been approached over the years by a few people who used her character as a role model when they had to accept leadership positions, so apparently not everyone felt this way.

I will give TNG fans a bone here and say Kirk always seemed to have a pretty friendly relationship with senior officers in TOS. He knew Decker and Commodore Wesley by name, for instance. Nechayev's harsh tone does contrast that quite a bit; maybe it really was just too much of a change of pace for some people, I dunno.

 

[WhatIsThePunchline]

So I've finally started watching Voyager.

I love the premise and the set up and the story ideas feel like classic Star Trek.

The biggest issue so far...all of the characters are either bland or they feel like some repeat of characters we've seen before.

Tuvok is Spock but with Worf's job.
Torres is Worf but as a lady and with Geordi's job
Janeway is Picard, but as a lady
Neelix is Quark, but nicer.
The Hologram Doctor is Data with Bones' personality and job

Right now, the show feels like its made up of left over scripts from Next Gen and DS9 that never got made and they just switched out the characters. The ideas are cool, but I'm not feeling it with the characters. Hopefully that changes as I continue to watch.

Try not to binge on it. It's an episodic format. Works really well when you watch one episode a week for a couple of years. When you watch a bunch of episodes in a row it works less well.

But yeah, even the most vocal of Voyager haters still tends to give it the credit that it had some real potential. And hell the fans of it still tend to acknowledge its flaws.

 

[Flexo]

Why wasn't "Phaser the fucker in his stupid Kelpian face" plan A?

HOW DOES IT HAPPEN IN THE FIRST PLACE??

I feel like I'm reading some idiotic fan fiction where Greta whats-her-name cried so hard it caused all of the oil on earth to blow up and then everybody had to sit and think about their impact on mother earth.

That's twilight zone/black mirror shit - not Star Trek! (and it's super dumb regardless)

 

[RomanesEuntDomus]

HOW DOES IT HAPPEN IN THE FIRST PLACE??

I feel like I'm reading some idiotic fan fiction where Greta whats-her-name cried so hard it caused all of the oil on earth to blow up and then everybody had to sit and think about their impact on mother earth.

That's twilight zone/black mirror shit - not Star Trek! (and it's super dumb regardless)

I think I'd have an easier time accepting this nonsense if it was Q fucking with civilisations for some stupid reason. Or even no reason at all. Just show John DeLancie mugging at the camera going "Well, without Jean Luc it was getting kinda dull, so I thought it would be funny to watch you lesser lifeforms scramble around without warp power" and that's it.

Try not to binge on it. It's an episodic format. Works really well when you watch one episode a week for a couple of years. When you watch a bunch of episodes in a row it works less well.

But yeah, even the most vocal of Voyager haters still tends to give it the credit that it had some real potential. And hell the fans of it still tend to acknowledge its flaws.

Stretching out watching it like this also has the added benefit of not showing off the inconsistent writing as much as watching some of the worst offenders back to back.

Come to think about it, I guess this also kind of shows off the differences between old and new fandoms.
Voyager fans will gladly admit that the writing is inconsistent as fuck and I doubt many people would try to defend it with claims of it being "character progression" or anything if Janeway reacts differently to the same situation in two episodes.
New fans of stuff like SW and ST will spit fire and fury to defend every little inconsistency as some kind of bold statement and meticulously planned example of thought-out things that are all super mega interconnected, pinkyswear. Just look at all the shit that doesn't make sense in the SW sequels and how fans come up with retarded explanations based on absolutely nothing within the movies, rather than admitting that shit's busted yo.

 

[BScCollateral]

I had to bring this up.

SPACE.COM is a reasonably good-for-normies site about real-life space news and history. Unfortunately, they will occasionally do a basic-bitch article crowing about genre fiction. It looks like zero effort puffery but I have to admit I've never bothered to read one.

And then this popped up a few days ago. This is the first time I can recall their adopting a negative stance in one of their fiction articles instead of tongue-bath or, at their most harsh, neutral fact-dropping. I am genuinely gobsmacked.

 

[ZMOT]

And then this popped up a few days ago. This is the first time I can recall their adopting a negative stance in one of their fiction articles instead of tongue-bath or, at their most harsh, neutral fact-dropping. I am genuinely gobsmacked.

well, if you're into the real thing, which star trek usually was a pretty good version off (as far as tv dramas go, ofc), ending up with infantile science fantasy with not even college-tier fanfiction writing it can leave a bad taste in your mouth.

The Bitchayev perception pretty much only comes from her matter of speaking forcefully to Picard and cutting him off whenever he tries to make it into an arguement. It think its another case of TNG fans being too sensitive. Its brusque, but there's nothing technically wrong with it as far as a command style. Her actress said she had been approached over the years by a few people who used her character as a role model when they had to accept leadership positions, so apparently not everyone felt this way.

I will give TNG fans a bone here and say Kirk always seemed to have a pretty friendly relationship with senior officers in TOS. He knew Decker and Commodore Wesley by name, for instance. Nechayev's harsh tone does contrast that quite a bit; maybe it really was just too much of a change of pace for some people, I dunno.

picard was the talker tho, I'd say talking things out that was one of the points of TNG (and probably in part why nechayev was written as an antagonist that way). sure, starfleet is still military with ranks and everything, but "you do as as I say because rank" even when it's outright stupid just to drive the point home someone's gonna get his comeuppance as the "villain" is the type of shit tier writing you see constantly. following that logic even that one notorious star trek short is suddenly good and makes sense.

I might be mistaken, but I don't think there is a single subplot featuring the Doctor that isn't really enjoyable. Some are goofy, some are serious, but they all offer something to be entertaining. His "daydream subroutine" epsiode has to be one of the funniest bits in ST history.

that episode where he becomes an opera singer, because I could see the "twist" coming from a mile a away and it didn't really add anything imo, at least nothing that would warrant a whole episode for it. living witness was kinda eh too, but it had the mirror janeway camp to make up for it.

 

[RomanesEuntDomus]

that episode where he becomes an opera singer, because I could see the "twist" coming from a mile a away and it didn't really add anything imo, at least nothing that would warrant a whole episode for it

The twist was so obvious, it wasn't even really a twist, but to me, it was kind of interesting to see the Doc suddenly becoming "famous" (even though for the wrong reasons) and him being a bit full of himself. It gave him some character growth and it had its moments, I guess, though it would have been fine as a b plot, making it the focus of the episode was a bit too much, I agree. It was a bit of a weak episode, but not unwatchable, which is still ahead of some of the more asinine episodes of Voyager, I'd say.

living witness was kinda eh too, but it had the mirror janeway camp to make up for it.

Have to disagree, I really liked Living Witness. The camp with all the crazy shit going on was really fun and watching the Doctor trying to figure out how to clear Voyager's reputation was neat, too. The biggest flaw was how much the very basic idea of this episode violated past aspects. The Doc was supposed to be irreplaceable and impossible to copy or making a backup... so suddenly there's an episode where a backup copy of him plays a major role... That's a massive flaw. But I can overlook that huge error, cause it gave us some absolutely amazing stuff like black-glove SS Janeway and a healthy dose of warcrimes.

 

[ZMOT]

living witness was definitely an enjoyable episode to watch, but for me it fails at kinda the same thing as the opera episode, it doesn't really go anywhere, or is just boring in it's formulaic writing. the doctor getting full of himself wasn't anything new at this point, that aspect of him was used quite often, like the whole emergency command hologram, but it ends with the doctor getting "insight" only to be dunked on again when they need the same type of plot, which also makes it feel like it doesn't change anything in the long run. so the doctor wanted to be "more" (since he's basically voyager's data), but the way it's shown in some episodes is just eh for me with zero long-term outcome. like all chakotay had to say is "remember when you wanted to be an opera singer" and the whole episode implodes.
still fun to watch because of picardo and him ending up with the better scripts, but still...

what annoyed me with living witness was that of course not everyone will have a positive memory of voyager and the repercussions of it traveling through the delta quadrant (every action has consequences), but all they do with it is a single self-contained episode that basically tells me what I already know with a clunky premise (the backup, like you mentioned) just to make it work. I'd say without not!mirror janeway people wouldn't even remember it that much, and it's not like it was completely out of character for janeway to begin with (in part to her inconsistent writing).

 

[Quantum Diabetes]

Spoiler

I heard in the next series Tilly gets so fat her self generated gravity causes a quantum Fat-ularity in the Fupa Cluster and they dispatch Admiral Richard Simmons with the Uss DealaMeal

and then

Spoiler

the audience gets fed up and watches the Orville instead

 

[Quintex96]

living witness was definitely an enjoyable episode to watch, but for me it fails at kinda the same thing as the opera episode, it doesn't really go anywhere, or is just boring in it's formulaic writing. the doctor getting full of himself wasn't anything new at this point, that aspect of him was used quite often, like the whole emergency command hologram, but it ends with the doctor getting "insight" only to be dunked on again when they need the same type of plot, which also makes it feel like it doesn't change anything in the long run. so the doctor wanted to be "more" (since he's basically voyager's data), but the way it's shown in some episodes is just eh for me with zero long-term outcome. like all chakotay had to say is "remember when you wanted to be an opera singer" and the whole episode implodes.
still fun to watch because of picardo and him ending up with the better scripts.

The difference is circumstance. Up until season 5 The Doctor is given autonomy but is still regarded as little more than a hologram to the majority of the crew. Janeway in particular claims to be rooting for him but you can tell she just throws him a bone every now and then to keep him quiet. The turning point is 'Latent Image' (also my favourite episode) that is where the Doctor truly becomes a sentient being. In 'Virtuoso' (the Opera episode) the conflict comes from the Doctor wanting to voluntarily leave the ship, which is poingant is his ongoing character development as he has the free will to do so. Had this episode occurred earlier on, the response would be 'You are starfleet property, get the fuck back to sickbay or we will reprogram you to do so'.

The plot's are recycled in a sense but the characters reactions tends to differ. Since the show is episodic in nature it is difficult for them address characer development in a direct manner. Someone further up mentioned not binging the show and only watching an episode or two a week and I agree with them. When binging you tend to zone out and miss a ton of nuance that goes into these shows.

 

[Uranus Pink]

HOW DOES IT HAPPEN IN THE FIRST PLACE??

I feel like I'm reading some idiotic fan fiction where Greta whats-her-name cried so hard it caused all of the oil on earth to blow up and then everybody had to sit and think about their impact on mother earth.

That's twilight zone/black mirror shit - not Star Trek! (and it's super dumb regardless)

Or someone at Secret Hideout was a fan of this PoS tv series. Which had already done same thing while ripping out an older better sci-fi novel.

 

[RomanesEuntDomus]

The difference is circumstance. Up until season 5 The Doctor is given autonomy but is still regarded as little more than a hologram to the majority of the crew. Janeway in particular claims to be rooting for him but you can tell she just throws him a bone every now and then to keep him quiet. The turning point is 'Latent Image' (also my favourite episode) that is where the Doctor truly becomes a sentient being. In 'Virtuoso' (the Opera episode) the conflict comes from the Doctor wanting to voluntarily leave the ship, which is poingant is his ongoing character development as he has the free will to do so. Had this episode occurred earlier on, the response would be 'You are starfleet property, get the fuck back to sickbay or we will reprogram you to do so'.

The plot's are recycled in a sense but the characters reactions tends to differ. Since the show is episodic in nature it is difficult for them address characer development in a direct manner. Someone further up mentioned not binging the show and only watching an episode or two a week and I agree with them. When binging you tend to zone out and miss a ton of nuance that goes into these shows.

I totally forgot about Latent Image. That episode is one of the best pieces of the show. The mystery and the pay off are really good and easily en par with the family episode. It's actually a bit of a shame that it also highlights one of the weaknesses of Voyager in an indirect way.

Imagine if the woman that "went missing" in that episode was a recurring side character that we'd have seen here and there in smaller parts throughout the show before that point. Stuff like that would have severely improved the show. Unfortunately, they never gave us a well-defined crew, it was always just randoms in the background that barely did anything. Had the rest of the crew been a bit more fleshed out, to make us really feel this isn't a bridge crew of like 7 or 8 people that do all the work and a bunch of faceless no-names running in circles in the corridors, that would have been rad.

 

[Flexo]

I totally forgot about Latent Image. That episode is one of the best pieces of the show. The mystery and the pay off are really good and easily en par with the family episode. It's actually a bit of a shame that it also highlights one of the weaknesses of Voyager in an indirect way.

Imagine if the woman that "went missing" in that episode was a recurring side character that we'd have seen here and there in smaller parts throughout the show before that point. Stuff like that would have severely improved the show. Unfortunately, they never gave us a well-defined crew, it was always just randoms in the background that barely did anything. Had the rest of the crew been a bit more fleshed out, to make us really feel this isn't a bridge crew of like 7 or 8 people that do all the work and a bunch of faceless no-names running in circles in the corridors, that would have been rad.

Exactly. Voyager was uniquely set up in that it could do episodic stories while STILL having ongoing arcs by utilizing the ship and crew.

It wouldn't have even cost extra in the budget. It would have only required the F word.

eFFort.

 

[ditto]

The Bitchayev perception pretty much only comes from her matter of speaking forcefully to Picard and cutting him off whenever he tries to make it into an arguement.

Didn't she negotiate the Cardassian-Federation Treaty - the worst treaty in the history of treaties?

 

[L50LasPak]

Didn't she negotiate the Cardassian-Federation Treaty - the worst treaty in the history of treaties?

I may not be up on my lore but the impression I got was that she was just one of several higher ups involved in the treaty rather than solely responsible for it.

 

[XYZpdq]

also the core joke of "Bitchayev" is really fucking funny

 

[Drag-on Knight 91873]

Didn't she negotiate the Cardassian-Federation Treaty - the worst treaty in the history of treaties?

I would say the Treaty of Algeron was the worst treaty. A treaty that effectively forbids submarine use for one side is asinine as fuck. Which many higher-ups in Starfleet recognized since Pressman's experiment was covered up and it took all of Picard's favors to find out about the court martial.

I got the impression Nechayev was acting under orders from the Federation council since Sisko wasn't complaining about her, but about Earth. I went to Memory Alpha to read that she was the one that assigned Jellico to deal with the Cardassians, so she herself wasn't adverse to realpolitick on principle. Which is why I say that the politicians like Jaresh-Inyo were the ones that drew those arbitrary lines while the admiral had to go out and actually sign it. Trying to evict the Navajo was long-standing Federation policy to avoid a border war that the Feds could win if they really wanted to.

 

[ditto]

I may not be up on my lore but the impression I got was that she was just one of several higher ups involved in the treaty rather than solely responsible for it.

Memory Alpha lists her as lead negotiator, but there might have been a line in the TNG navajo episode about nobody being very happy about it.

I would say the Treaty of Algeron was the worst treaty. A treaty that effectively forbids submarine use for one side is asinine as fuck.

That episode made the Federation look sketchy as fuck, with coverups and seal court-martials all to hide a program to deliberately violate a treaty. Especially dumb considering the effort that Kirk went to in stealing one in the first place.

politicians like Jaresh-Inyo

Federation politicians are depicted as being incredibly weak and puppets of their Starfleet advisors. Don't get me started on Federation ambassadors...

 

[RomanesEuntDomus]

Exactly. Voyager was uniquely set up in that it could do episodic stories while STILL having ongoing arcs by utilizing the ship and crew.

It wouldn't have even cost extra in the budget. It would have only required the F word.

eFFort.

It would have been a great way to make the most of their setting, by reinforcing that every single person on the ship is irreplaceable and that they are a tightly knit group of people, in this together. And it would not have taken much, just re-use some background characters here and there, they don't even have to do much. Like sit at a table with Tom Paris in one scene and Kim going "Hi Tom, hi Jack..." before going into whatever dialogue the episode needs for the plot to happen as usual.

Never watched much of the new BSG, but there's a scene I saw where someone commits suicide and someone who knew them on the "Airforce One"-type presidential cruiser gets drunk and staggers to the big whiteboard with the numbers of survivors on the fleet and wipes away the last digit (which conveniently was a 1) and strolls out of the room. It was a very effective scene to highlight that every single person in that fleet mattered. Sure, the people involved in that scene were main characters, but even just having a fixed number of survivors gives the audience the feeling of continuity. Something big happens, a ship gets blown up, and the number is lowered drastically. It's still a huge number and we'll never even see 10% of these guys, even just for a short glimpse, so for all intents and purposes, the number is meaningless, but it symbolizes that the fleet is limited in size and resources - even human resources.

There's also a good scene where someone enters the cabin and goes something to the effect of "The number of survivors changed", people are a bit saddened by this until that other person says "such-and-such gave birth" and it's a small glimmer of hope in that situation that the number goes up for once...

Carrying over damage from one episode to the next would have also been a decent thing. Maybe show Voyager staying at some space station to overhaul their ship every once in a while and stay there for a few episodes. They wanted to cling to the episodic nature of Star Trek and I can see why (being able to just watch an episode on its own is a good thing after all), but I feel that particular show and setting wasn't fit for that kind of approach. A shame, really.

 

[Flexo]

Carrying over damage from one episode to the next would have also been a decent thing. Maybe show Voyager staying at some space station to overhaul their ship every once in a while and stay there for a few episodes. They wanted to cling to the episodic nature of Star Trek and I can see why (being able to just watch an episode on its own is a good thing after all), but I feel that particular show and setting wasn't fit for that kind of approach. A shame, really.

You could have still kept it somewhat episodic and had continuity.

If you haven't seen it before, go find the show Burn Notice and literally grab an episode in the middle of any random season. The A plot of the episode will be completely stand-alone and the B plot of it will be the show's ongoing arc - and half the time you're able to follow that anyway because they also make it a bit episodic much of the time. (i.e. "Ok to get the next step closer to my goal I need to get this thing so here's how I'll get the thing.")

Voyager would have even more flexibility to it. So for example you could have the A plot of an episode being random anomaly of the week. But then the B plot is that there's a random alien ship stuck in it and Janeway and Chakoty discuss whether if they rescue the other ship they might get some much needed crew or at least some random parts/supplies from the ship.

Just imagine how much of the show would have changed with one line: "We've lost 3 shuttlecraft, captain. Maybe they have a spare to give us."