Okay, let’s start with the good news. Um... oh yes, it’s the last story to feature Janeway’s holonovel. So now the bad news or as I like to call it, the rest of the episode.
We see at the beginning Janeway being crabby to everyone instead of her normal touchy feely approach to captaining which they could’ve done a bit more with before the Doctor ordered her to take time off. If only it were that easy in real life, most businesses would run on skeleton staff.
So she goes to her holonovel but then things from it start appearing in the ship and before we can say "epidemic" the entire crew is affected by these mind visions and it's up to Kes "call me Jean Grey" to save the day.
One thing, the part where each of the crew sees someone they love to bring them into a trance, so the alien could take over the ship... or something? Why did Paris see his father, if there's one person you can ignore it's someone saying how rubbish you are. Well presumably Kim must've managed it.
This episode, like so many, wasn’t tragically poor but again wasn’t good and didn’t seem to be about anything. The episode felt like a decidedly empty experience.
Lastly they apparently had an ending for the holonovel for another episode but never used it because nobody liked it. Why ever not? There's nothing I like better than turning on Star Trek to see how the Captain gets on in the latest video game and not their adventures in space (and time, but that's Voyager for you).
Remember last time and Neelix’ boring and repetitive jealousy? Well, it’s back and this time in an episode all to itself. Woo.
There’s a point in this episode where for about five or ten minutes I actually think it’s going to be really good. Of course that doesn’t last, in the same way that the feeling you get that this might be a good episode each time doesn’t last. Neelix actually becomes furious at Paris, Paris with Neelix and they end up in a fight, Kes is angry with the both of them and you can feel the emotions. Soon enough though it’s back to passive aggressiveness and the usual suppressed emotions. It almost turns into Vulcan ship, except that’d be good.
They’re both sent down to a planet on an entirely coincidental mission, crash and have to survive together while looking after a baby lizard. Yes, really. Shockingly they all have a newfound respect for each other at the end so everyone on the ship is friends with each other and there’s no conflict anywhere! But who needs conflict when you’re writing drama.
Looking at the positives at least Neelix’ jealousy won’t be mentioned again. Also the Doctor has a couple of good scenes in this. I still have nightmares about that episode he wasn’t in.
In today’s Voyager the crew come across a spatial anomaly, this being the first spatial anomaly that they’ve ever seen of course. I’m just shocked there was no mention of time travel this...um... time.
This anomaly seems to like moving round rooms, corridors and decks of the ship so people end up walking round lost. How no-one died during this I’ve no idea. Anyway it turns out the anomaly is doing all this so it can be space friends or something and after passing through the ship nothing is changed. Kind of like this show every week.
Also featured is more of Neelix getting jealous over other men’s attention to Kes. Yeagh, because that never gets boring and repetitive, kind of like seeing a spatial anomaly every other week. Maybe the anomaly caused his jealousy... wait that’s probably a season three story.
The thing that really makes this episode dreadful are the bizarre emotional outpourings and apologies from Voyager’s crew seemingly out of nowhere. So we have Tuvok and Chakotay sparring (because apparently Vulcan’s are arrogant then expressing their true respect for each other, Janeway telling Kim that he’s the bright spot of the voyage and Neelix and Kes with their jealousy shtick. It almost turns it from sci-fi into a poor soap opera.
As a side note Paris uses a weeks worth of his replicator rations to get Kes a locket as a present. Good to know that while there isn’t any money in StarFleet, commerce is alive and well. And they say Ferenginar is dead.
Welcome to a Harry Kim episode in all it's magnificence. Not only that it doesn't have any of the actual crew until the last minute and the Doctor isn't in it at all. Brace yourselves in everyone!
Harry wakes up in an alternate present due to time lines being affected by a shuttle accident or something. In this timeline Harry is successful at his gainful employ and is due to get married to an actual woman too.
So this Brannon Braga written story involves time travel? I'll let you come round from the shock before I continue. Ready?
The fact no-one believes him intrigues me. It seems in a lot of recent Trek people can just say they've been whisked away by a temporal anomaly without any evidence and their crews are falling over themselves to help them.
Then there's why he'd be fighting so hard to get back to a ship 70,000 light years from home. Apparently it's because of Paris and the person who ended up on Voyager instead of him. This despite the fact time was altered so these people will have known nothing else. In short Harry, this is why you’re still an ensign.
All in all though, while it has nothing going for it, it's not a terrible episode just a pointless one.
Told you Voyager would be back to normal this episode. The main story in this one is about Kes and Neelix’ relationship. Just in case anyone out there had forgotten about it.
The episode itself is pretty much about sex, so naturally it’s pretty dull. Kes is going through puberty and space sperm are attacking the ship. You wouldn’t have thought any of this was going to happen in this one after Chakotay and Janeway were talking about crew fraternisation at the start. Yes, they did use the word fraternisation.
Regarding Kes’ puberty and possible pregnancy I wasn’t sure if it was being played for laughs or not. Possibly because Kes seemed to lurch from scene to scene from farce to melodrama, which was funny in itself I suppose.
Tuvok seemed very irritable this story which I didn’t like, though I’ll give him a break since it was Neelix he was talking to and even being served “food” by. Also I should have “It’s a good thing the Doctor was in this episode” on autotext.
And another thing, what is it about Voyager that they keep coming across space aliens that try to attack or destroy the ship and Janeway doesn’t want to disturb them, spending the episode trying to be “space friends”. You just know if Kirk had got trapped in the Delta Quadrant it would’ve been one vast wasteland within two seasons. Space aliens? Shmace shmaliens.
