UNCUT - Parallax (VOY S1E3) | Star Trek Journey 342

I'm sorry I might be missing something, but I just became a member of this channel to watch the UNCUT version of Voyager. Why am I only seeing a the clock on the screen with you? I did pay for the right membership to unlock this feature, right?

I don't think this is ever reference or explained in the show so i don't think this is spoiling anything but the Nacelles going up is actually a call back to the TNG episode of warp damaging space, they found that the nacelles at an angle either lessens the damage or negates it, i don't remember 100%, so they can go at high warp without damaging space, its why you will see a lot of ships designed around the era of Voyager with nacelles at an angle, like the Akira class. the Intrepid is the only one with moving nacelles though, and i love it for that fact lol

I know this is two weeks old, but I don't understand why you guys were disappointed that there was no captain's log narration to start the episode. I don't know if you're watching some weird cut of the show, but my streaming version absolutely DOES have Janeway voiceover after the opening credits.

They mentioned in I think in Caretaker that Janeway was a former science officer. And Voyager itself is a more of a primary science vessel than Enterprise which presumably is why a former science officer was specifically assigned to command Voyager

I understand they need to do in this in the context of the show, the fact that B'Lana is a main character means she needs to have a main role. But in the context of the story itself I think Janeway promoting her to chief was kind of a command blunder in the context of what we know of B'lana so far. It's no doubt she's the best skilled engineer. But the Chief Engineer isn't really necessarily your most technically gifted person, that's part of it but it's mainly the one that can best manage and leverage their team to the best of their abilities. B'Lana didn't demonstrate that at all. She demonstrated the exact opposite. As an example, in TNG, in many ways Barkley, Wesley and Data are better skilled engineers than Geordi. Does that mean they should be chief over Geordi? Geordi knew he wasn't always the most gifted but was able to leverage Data, Wesley and even Barkley to make things happen.

I said this before, but there is a big theory that Chakotay is the Lt. Cmdr. that Ro refers to in “Preemptive Strike” that joined the Maquis.

YOU GUYS. I'm biting my tongue, so to speak. So if no one pointed out, the actor who plays Lt. Carey was Josh Clark who once appeared as a background actor in the TNG episode Justice. This has led to some fan-canon that Lt. Carey may have served on the Enterprise D. Martha Hackett who played the Bajoran also played T'Rul, the Romulan who was responsible for the cloaking device on the Defiant. Re: technobabble and scientific inaccuracy, as a long time reader of comic books, I have to have a high suspension of disbelief. People have long explained why characters like Giant-Man would not be able to exist. I don't care because in a visual medium giant characters add interest and power diversity and they are still being used by writers, regardless of the science. Fact is, the average media consumers are "smarter" now because in 30 years, we have discovered more about our universe. Also, we have resources online that can be accessed instantaneously versus going to a library for books and encyclopedia that can be 10 or more years old. This episode had to do a lot in setting up status quo and I think it was successful. They needed to follow up on the chief engineer dying in Caretaker and why B'Elanna was such an a spitfire and they tackled both of those in one story. They've done more to flesh out their female characters than we saw in 4 seasons of TNG. Also she and Janeway aren't in leotards, doing stretches, talking about boys. Janeway was a science officer so that explains why she was so involved in the analysis of the singularity. Mulgrew really delivers and her facial expressions are something to be enjoyed.

Can we also acknowledge that it wasn't until 1 year after Parallax was written and filmed, that humanity for the first time, confirmed that stars outside our solar system had planets? Additionally, when we did make that discovery, it was shocking to find-out that it was a gas giant, which was closer to it's sun than Mercury is.... which scientist concluded was impossible previously. Further, in 1994, we thought the universe was decelerating from the Big Bang, but in 1998, it was found that the universe was actually accelerating due to dark energy (we didn't know existed). Therefore, to the people critiquing Brannan Braga here for not getting the technicalities of an event horizon correct in 1994.... Give him a break. Perhaps a ship that can go Warp 9, which is equivalent to the energy of 1,500 suns, has a loophole we haven't discovered yet. It's about character friends.

Let me explain why sometimes this tech stuff matters and why the patreon take were so unexpected for some. For instance: We know Warps 2 &3 are kinda slow, Warp 6 is cursing, and Warp 9 in flooring it, right? In The Wounded we have the Enterprise chasing after Maxwell who is suspected of mass murder. When Maxwell attacks, everyone is watching the latest massacre helplessly on the view screen. A disturbed Picard asks Data how long until they can intercept Maxwell, Data says words to the effect we're traveling at warp 4, so 17 hours. Why the hell Warp 4? That is so slow by Galaxy Class standards! To someone with an incurable bout of Trek brain like myself that makes it look like Picard isn't even trying. If he had gone even like Warp 7 he could have caught up to them and probably saved hundred of lives. I realize this is was probably and oversight that just fell through the cracks and that it was not the intention to make it seem like Picard and crew we're leisurely plodding along with zero urgency, but sometimes when you fuck that stuff up it completely changes how I see the story.

i dont get the patron takes at all lmao, the plot of this was one of the most memorable to me in the first seasons and this is one of my fav episodes tbh

I think there's a quote from Roddenberry: "space is not our backyard." It's supposed to take some time to go from planet to planet. Your not supposed to be able to, say, jump from Romulus to Earth in a few hours. Stars are supposed to be days apart. I think, canonically, it's supposed to be a 3-4 week journey round trip from DS9 to Earth and back. That's why the last episode we saw an idiot Admirals order Sisko and the entire senior staff to dinner at the OG Olive Garden on Earth: it's so the senior staff and the Defiant could be away from DS9 for the better part of a month.

The Milkyway is about 100,000 light-years across irl so the 70,000 light-year distance makes a lot of sense. The section of the galaxy that the rest of star Trek happens in is really a tiny section of the Milkyway. It's still a huge area of territories but compared to the whole galaxy Starfleet really hasn't explored much

The warp scale is logarithmic. Warp 1 is light speed. But the higher the numbers the greater the gap in speed. Someone can probably send you a chart that shows it but basically Warp 9.5 to 9.6 is like a WAY bigger jump than warp 1 to warp 2

The Doctor was only programed to be around long enough to help out with a medical emergency until more real doctors can arrive. The emergency medical hologram is only meant for bad emergencies where either the medical staff is gone or there's such a severe medical problem that they just need another doctor to help. His usage would be very rare. Staying left on so long is simply unnatural for him, it's not what he's programmed for, so he doesn't like it

Ah yes, the Magic Meeting Room™ makes its appearance

This was another fun reaction! There are a lot of great moments in this episode that I hoped you guys would appreciate and I was very happy to see you react favorably to all of those things. I honestly don’t understand the complaints people have about this episode. I think this one is rock solid and hits all the right notes. It covers a lot in those 45 minutes and it all works for me. Great character moments all around made even better by the excellent acting. The plot was well used and tied into the overall story for the character development. I think the people complaining are primarily the fans who don’t care for Voyager as a whole, so they are just negative and looking for things to complain about rather than keeping an open mind about what the episode actually is. I was glad that you guys seemed to warm up to Lt. Carey by the end of the episode. Usually when you decide you like or don't like someone, that doesn't change by the end of the episode, so it was kind of neat to see you develop a little understanding and respect for him by the end. His reactions throughout the episode always made sense and seemed believable to me.

Funny enough, I did miss the pilot, so this actually was the first episode of Voyager I ever saw. Really glad they mentioned the “75 year trip” in the episode or who knows how long it would have been before I figured out the premise of the show. I don’t think I saw Caretaker until I caught a batch of reruns sometime after Season 1. But as for this episode, outside of it being special to me since this was my premiere of Voyager, I think it’s a pretty dang good episode too. B/B+ range.

holy technobable batman!

Yes! Yes! What you were talking about at 1:28:30 forward, as a more dominant woman I cannot agree more!!! Thank you, I love how you communicated that! Exactly!

Regarding “S” and “N” types… in Doctor Who circles, I often hear the words (borrowed from Sherlock Holmes fandom) that you are either watching a show from a “Holmsian” or “Doyle-ist” perspective. If you’re watching from a Holmsian lens, it’s all the in-universe world building, plot-driven, how the characters are affected by events, etc. Whereas the “Doyleist” perspective (based on the author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle) is from a real world production perspective (writers, directors, production budgets, cast shake-ups, etc)

God, I love Kate Mulgrew.

There’s nothing wrong with the science-plot/techno stuff in this episode. It’s a solid episode. I think when people write Patreon takes, they write them as someone who has seen the episode many times. Would the “science plot” get boring after 10 rewatches? Certainly it can. That doesn’t mean it’s bad or not good the first time watching.

I'm sure it's been stated somewhere along the way already but the "variable geometry" warp nacelles were supposedly an upgraded system to reduce/eliminate the damage that necessitated the warp speed limit....and they wanted something on the ship to articulate. Solutions for both! Even though DS9 and TNG fight for top spot for me I've always thought Voyager had a stronger and more enjoyable start/season.

I've never quite understood the "technobabble problem" with Trek. I didn't even think about it in the pre-internet days, it was just 'part of the plot'. After all, this is a science fiction series, so I expect some fictional science! Trek even goes as far to use some consistency so that sometimes I can hear a term and do some analysis myself. I know if I hear tachyons or chronotons, there's probably some time travel shit going on. Or a cloaking device. There's probably some neutrino flux around a wormhole. And so on. Sometimes they lean a little to hard on it, but not in this episode, and not in many. I think people get too hung up on the term.

"How do we get unstuck from the radius of area in which our car will run out of gas?!" "I know! Break through the edge of that area!" "Brilliant! Genius!" "But, won't we just run out of gas?" "FULL SPEED AHEAD!" -This episode, basically.

I liked this introduction to the “normal” season episodes. I appreciated that they didn’t push the conflict between the Maquis and Starfleet in the mutiny/active conflict direction here because I think they can come back from a broken nose to work together but they couldn’t come back and trust IMO if the Maquis immediately try to take over the ship. I like that Chakotay had the backstory to support his choices to do step into that first officer role and expect the others to fall in line too because I’ve always appreciated the positive Captain/Number One relationships from other shows and there’s lots of scope for exploring it more in depth here where they are all essentially in a quadrant-sized locked room. Can’t really get away from each other and everyone else is a subordinate.

So other than a few episodes here and there I never really watched Voyager. But so far I'm enjoying it watching it along with the hosts and everyone here.

Back to the S and N thing I mentioned before. The reason why you feel like your brain is wired differently is because it actually is! Your guys' brains actually ARE wired different from most fans. That's what the S/N thing is meant to describe. It's an opposite set of perception and values. You guys watch these episodes through a very stereotypical S type lens, with high emphasis on stuff like how the show was made, and everything being filtered through the lens of the characters. Nothing wrong with that. S types are even the norm. They are far more common than N types. But most Star Trek fans are N types. Their primary focus when watching the show isn't the characters. To oversimplify how they watch, they are plot first, not character first. Or at least plot/idea/story/science/world building first. Character stuff is secondary to that, and is seen as necessary to support those things. Just as you see the plot as necessary to supporting the characters. Ss and Ns literally value opposite things. So take your own priority of things when you watch the show. The things that you value the least about the show are usually the main reasons why N types watch. The things you value most about the show are usually an afterthought to Ns, or are viewed more as a supporting thing. So yes, we might like the character stuff a lot, but if the plot/story makes no sense, or the science is really bad, we have no reason to be invested in it. It would be the same for you if the episode had a pretty interesting plot or idea, but the character stuff was either non-existent or done in a way that was laughably bad. Take the Jem'Hadar for example. For most fans, the entire point of that episode was the plot. The character stuff at the beginning was just a way to get us there as a nice little bonus. Then people got terrified that you wouldn't like the Dominion going forward, or like ANY DS9 plot the way that they did because they are plot first. So yes, people didn't like the plot here. Yes, the plot supported our characters. That's a good thing. But that's not what we're primarily looking for. We want a good plot/story first, and the plot on its own was bad. And THAT'S our primary thing, not the characters. Although the characters are also important.

There was a prior Chief in TNG who was a woman - but she's only in one or two episodes of season one - and it was Naked Now from what I remember.

Alex goes full vulcan at 1:07:12 (check his right hand)

I’m by no means a Voyager hater. I like the good episodes and I dislike the bad ones. Some of them I actually love. In this case I’m in the “like” category. I thought it did a good job telling a story about where the new crew was at this point and it emphasized the difficulties of assimilating the two groups. Great stuff with Janeway, Chakotay and Torres. And as far as technobabble goes this one is super tame. While the science isn’t very accurate it’s still believable and I think it’s presented in an easily understandable manner that doesn’t bog down the narrative.

Man i don't remember how much Quality there was in the Beginning! (20 Years since i watched it) I begin to fall in Love with Voyager, help! Janeway is such a good written Character and i like even Torres, which i almost hated in my first watch. Glad that i have another View on things, and see the Quality in the quieter Moments.

I absolutely hate this episode. The conflict between the Starfleet crew and the Maquis should not be this easy to resolve. We shouldn't be getting to this level of cooperation until the end of the season, at the very least. Things were already going in the wrong direction at the end of the pilot when Chakotay agreed to don the uniform of the military force that was looking to arrest him, but now he's engaging in mild passive-aggressive spats instead of taking a stronger no-compromise position. Compared to Kira, another former anti-Cardassian terrorist turned second-in-command, Chakotay looks like a doormat.

Voyager learned from the faults of DS9 and TNG. They give us what we both want. Good characters, backstory, a bit of interpersonal drama and conflict (that all makes logical sense), AND some solid techno sci-fi shenanigans, all woven together masterfully, even in a "normal" episode you could say. So excited to continue it!

You guys probably aren't going to have a problem with Voyager's technobabble. People's problem with it isn't that it doesn't serve the characters, like it does here. People's problem with it is it's incredibly scientifically inaccurate. This also ends up leading to nonsense plots like this one. Again, people's problem with the plot in this episode isn't that it's a random sci-fi plot of the week. It's that the SCI-fi plot isn't based in real science. If you're someone who cares about that, Voyager is very aggravating. Plus Brannon Braga isn't known for being scientifically accurate either if you remember the comments from Genesis. There's some episodes by him that some people consider to be epically bad for the same reason. But since you guys don't care about the scientific accuracy of the plot or technobabble, you're not going to have the same problems with it that the fans do, unless as you said, it also ends up doing nothing for the characters.

I just assume since the doctor mentions he would eventually have trouble reaching the patients, that someone else turned him on after Kess left. Probably due to an injury from the various shaking of the ship from the PLOT.

The complaint that the event horizon isn't a physical thing, and therefore the plot makes no sense, is a fair complaint. But I give it some slack because A) we don't actually know for sure what the inside of a black hole is like, and some theories do involve dramatic high-energy physics right around the event horizon, and B) we're in a universe with faster-than-light warp travel, where the traditional event horizon itself isn't necessarily much of an obstacle, but dramatic high energy physics near the horizon would be.

Imagine Kim Friedman going over the script and getting to the warp particles and considering her life choices. I watched an episode of The Love Boat recently (yes I'm publicly admitting this) and noticed some nice flourishes in the style. Went back and checked the credits: directed by Kim Friedman!

Voyager was basically a promotion for Brannon Braga - instead of sending him to DS9 where he'd have been joining an established team and just been another name in room (DS9 is basically Moore and Behr's show) - they rewarded him by making him a producer and one of the primary writers. Voyager is basically Brannon Braga unleashed. If you like Braga's work, you'll like Voyager.

So glad you're liking it. Can't wait for you to get to some of my favorite episodes!

I was hesitant to start Voyager because for the longest time I have heard it's TNG-Lite, as if you can get lighter than what is already near weightless, but this isn't like TNG for the most part, it's more like TOS-Lite. I can see people saying this is their favorite of the three, and it's a pleasant surprise to see a ST where you just sit down and, shock of shocks, you get a decent little adventure where there is some semblance of stakes. Thank god there are no flutes, no violin lessons, no kids in daycare, it's a ship trapped in a time loop. And how refreshing it doesn't open with "while escorting XYZ to a proctologist convention....". I don't know if the quality lasts, probably doesn't, but so far this is a good partner for DS9.

The Doctor being used as comic relief in this episode also has another purpose. It's continuing the thread of what we already saw in the pilot. That except for maybe Kes, the Voyager crew does not care about the Doctor's needs at all. They view him as expendable because he's a hologram. They don't care that his display is malfunctioning even if it interferes with his job, and they don't even bother to turn his program off even when asked. They don't treat him like the Enterprise crew treats Data, like he's a real person.

I gotta say if I got punched in the face and then that person gets promoted over me, I’d be pissed off! Haha. This is a good 2nd episode that sets the foundation for the show and the issues of being 70,000 light years from home. I think Voyager does the best of character arcs and morality conflicts. Janeway is the best captain!

When it comes to Rick Berman, while he's the top guy and still has say in both DS9 and Voyager, because Voyager was heading UPN, his focus was on Voyager and he tended to have less of a role in DS9. He did butt in time to time with DS9 on things but was much more hands on when it came to Voyager.

Juicy character stuff! I have no problems with a relatively quick integration of the Maquis as long as it's brought up occasionally for at least a couple years. A number of them were Starfleet previously, and the situation is what it is. It reminds me of a thing Gallifrey Pals said when reacting to Caretaker, at the scene where Chakotay does his 'she's the captain' bit: "This is her house. We're under her roof. She pays the bills, she makes the rules." and like...I LIKE when Star Trek tries to show that their humans are more evolved than us. You can have resentment and still be a professional, and I'm sure the Maquis know that plenty of captains/ships WOULD have found a way to put them in the brig the whole way home.

I do remember the fuss about voyager wasn’t the casting of a female captain, but a black Vulcan. Some fans were upset. Some of us did point out that humans come in a number of colors so why not Vulcans? Tuvok is, to me, the best Vulcan since Spock. He shows you can have mastery of your emotions and still have humor (as Spock did). He is fantastic

In terms of Voyager following the "it doesn't get good until season 3" formula, Voyager is a little different here. On the one hand, it DOES follow that formula because, like the other shows, it's iconic seasons are seasons 4-6/7. By that I mean that a lot of stuff that this show is known for doesn't even get introduced or fully fleshed out until then. However, depending on your taste, a lot of people say that seasons 1-3 are actually the best. I guess we'll see what camp you guys fall into.

Really like Roxanne Dawson's portrayal. Her behind the scenes work is good too. Lol @ "Chakotay great moment" - not a lot of those. C+ ep

Congrats on getting through the most infamous technobabble scene in the entire franchise. Everyone together now: WARP PARTICLES!

Josh your agreeing with Janeway’s assessment was great, and funny

This show set the standard! For technobabble.

The interpersonal stuff is great but good god the science and technobabble is absurd even for someone like me with no science background. The event horizon as a physical barrier they need to punch through like ice on a frozen lake what on earth 😭 😭 FYI Janeway so would throw you in the brig for saying she's not perfect.

I've always found the Maqui criticism of them wearing Starfleet uniforms too early, kinda laughable. Imagine you take a Democrat and a Republican, toss them on a life raft together in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. Are they still going to be arguing about tax policy and immigration the entire time? Or are they going to be focused on a unified goal of getting home. The primary disagreement Chakotay has with Starfleet, has no bearing 70,000 light years away. So... Why would he start causing a ruckus now? Janeway didn't make the decision to not get involved with Cardassia. He spent like 20 years in Starfleet, it's not like he doesn't think there is something of redeemable value here. He didn't leave Starfleet because he hated the uniform; he left because he hated a specific policy. Once that policy is irrelevant, his default setting should be the officer he was for two decades.

The reason the Doctor was on was simply people were coming in reporting dizziness and symptoms of the event horizon, obviously they just never turned him off again before they left. But yes, there's a lot of character stuff going on here. With Janeway's science background and seeing her and Torres basically science the shit out things that went over everyone else's head was fantastic.

Grates on me that they set off on a 3 light year journey to that nearby race at impulse. Full impulse is something about 1/3-2/3 the speed of light so it would take years to get there. They later say they’ve travelled 1.6 light years before ending up back in the anomaly. I guess the “writer’s bible” for Voyager wasn’t as detailed as the one they gave TNG writers.

The doctor didn’t switch himself on - he said he had lots of crew going in with headaches. There will have been medical reports / records plus the doctor’s medical logs to write up afterwards if we assume those TNG protocols continued.

I love this one, i give it a B. Great moments for both my favourites, B'lanna and the Doctor. I'm glad you both liked it, i knew you'd love the character scenes, but weren't sure if the technobabble would bore you, i'm glad it didn't. One thing i saw you both smile at during the reaction, but didn't mention in the discussion was when the holodecks were mentioned, during the pilot you wondered if Voyager had them, now you know.

I'm surprised how much you liked it! Just proves I still can't predict you guys

Funny that you mentioned seeing this before Caretaker, as this episode was the first episode of Voyager I watched.

I am not claiming Voyager is not worth watching. Overall, I think it is enjoyable, BUT from the pilot on I always felt that TV ST had already peaked. Voyager is not as successful on its own terms as TNG or DS9. It was burdened with being a network's flagship show, which limited the risks it could take. It (ironically) was also limited by the decision to send the ship to another quadrant. That required the kind of writing that wouldn't be commercially viable until Moore's BSG reboot. Additionally, I always thought the show's overall visual aesthetic wasn't quite right. The lighting especially which lacked variation and led to a kind of highly competent 'soup' visually.

Braga and Moore split. And so did the fandom. Maybe not in an absolute toxic way, but it was substantual.

This episode is such a weird choice so early in the series. The Torrez stuff is decent but the plot and technobabble are terrible. C at best.

The true speed of warp is the speed of plot

FYI - Before moving to command, Janeway was a science officer.

"neelix, this meeting is ONLY for senior officers... thats why ensign kim is here."

I enjoyed this episode on rewatch. Granted, I enjoyed it the first time i watched it years ago. I am having a really hard time not running ahead on episodes from what you guys publish. Same reason I dont post in the "takes" because its been so long i dont really remember these episodes in detail. I think I am going to enjoy this journey with you. even if it is a frustrating pace. hehe :)

I do agree the character stuff is all great, and it does a solid job kicking off B'Elanna's character, but I can't give it more than a low B/high C because the rest just felt phoned in. You can certainly use an engineering/space disaster scenario as a vehicle to make her chief engineer, but this one didn't work for me. Still, this and the next one are the weakest of the season for me, so if you liked this one as much as you did, it's a good sign for the rest of the season. Might we get an entire season of Banger and above? If any season can pull it off, this one only being 16 eps and packed with solid episodes has a pretty good chance.

Sex Scoreboard Outrageous Okana mention which means he had sex again..... BUT no one has entered the event horizon yet. Now it seems likely Kes and StarTrek Jar Jar (Neelix) is bangin' but we just can't score it. Maybe it does not happen, I can say I can't remember for sure. They imply it in the first two eps but maybe not (I am not joking about this, I truly do not know for sure). Board notta nuttin' goin' on yet.

Voyager is so underrated. Character work in this series is great too.

I think Janeway has earned Chakotay’s respect. She could have tried to throw him in the brig on day one, but she let him work with them to recover their people. And as a former Starfleet officer he is used to working in a command structure. They are stuck together morally speaking what’s he gonna do steal their ship and strand the voyager crew?

I don't mind it if it's believable. But I have read a lot of quantum physics and when the techo babble is flat out nonsense..well, that's BEYOND cringe. I mean, sometimes there is a severe lack of physics where they don't even use the correct terminology. I can't just un-hear mistakes and idiocy lol

So glad you enjoyed this one! Great reaction. I'm genuinely so excited to watch each episode again with you. Kinda dreading the bad ones though! Honestly, I never got the impression Voyager had too much technobabble. That always went way over my head. I loved Voyager more for the characters. I remember when I first watched Voyager all the way through. I was about 14 and studying for my exams, including for science, and I used to reward myself for studying with Voyager. Back then you could watch it on YouTube split into five parts. 1 hour of study meant a new 10 minute part of an episode. I always credit the fact I passed my science exams to Janeway!

Warp particles!

Kes remembered to turn the Doctor off because she's kind, polite and considerate. Most of the crew (at this point) aren't giving the Doctor a second thought once they leave sickbay, so he's stuck on his own until someone else shows up

Warp formulas are based on geometric progression. Ex. Warp 1 = Speed of light. Warp 2 = 8x SoL, Warp 3 = 27x SoL, Warp 4 = 84x SoL and so on. Top Speed in TOS was Warp 8 (512x SoL) and once in an emergency they hit Warp 9 (729x SoL).

In the pilot, Janeway mentioned serving as a science officer. Makes for an interesting captain I would say ;)

It's been heartwarming so far to revisit Voyager again with you two and realize that, even though I think TNG and DS9 are clearly better, I do love Voyager too, and I'm glad I'm back to see it all again.

I love that people love Voyager. For me, it does hit the highs, but not as often as DS9 and TNG. We are still in the golden era of Trek here. Will be interesting to see what the boys think as the series progresses. A strong start but, there are a lot of growing pains to come. Bring on Season 4! 😂

I have to admit when I'm wrong. I had somehow forgotten that I had enjoyed the first few episodes. I had forgotten how good the pilot was. We shall see how I feel moving forward. I know there is a reason I remember some of the great stories in Voyager. But I also know there is a reason it is my least favorite show in the franchise. There are a couple of changes of lore in the future that I most defiantly am not okay with. But voicing them would definitely be spoilers, so... I love how you guys pay attention to and acknowledge the directors, the music and production staff. These notations are often a revelation to me.

Pretty sure that when Janeway introduced herself to Paris on Earth, she mentioned she was the Science Officer on Admiral Paris's former ship.

I didn’t see Voyager until I was an adult, technically I don’t think there were many tv characters I had as heroes, Gem might be close, I know I liked Keiko when I saw a few TNG episodes when I was a kid. But books and music were more my thing than tv as a kid.

there is a content creator on Tiktok that has said that Janeway is what encouraged her to study science while in college, that she looks to Janeway as a role model for young women like her. and honestly thats pretty cool that young women have a role model like Janeway to look up to to get them interested in the sciences.

With regards to Voyager's nacelles moving around, this is described as "variable geometry pylons", which alter the angle of the warp nacelles when power is applied to the warp systems. Voyager's drive is a "green drive", designed to not cause the problems as seen in TNG's Force of Nature, where they implemented a warp speed limit on all ships. Naturally Starfleet develops engines that don't cause this problem at scale, and the design features implemented on all classes of starship. (Defiant, for example, also has green drives)

SPOILER FREE ANSWERS: 1. In "Caretaker," Janeway is talking to Tom Paris and says she served as Science Officer under Paris's father. This is why she knows the science/engineering stuff. She was like the Spock or Dax for that ship. 2. Rob Bowman "moved on" from Star Trek as a way to further his career. He became heavily involved in another show as both director and producer which I'm sure kept him busy. I'm not mentioning the show because I don't know if you'd consider that a spoiler. So, no drama there.

For the Record, Voyager is my second favorite just behind DS9. I’d explain more but that would contain too many spoilers. My prediction is when DS9 and Voyager are finished you’ll like them more than TNG. Mark this comment down.

Somebody asked DS9 writer Robert Hewitt Wolfe recently about Trek and technobabble, and I thought his answer was informative: “Horrible. I hated it. But Rick Berman thought it was essential for the show. He loved the speculative scifi stuff, even though it often ended up requiring a lot of 'blah-blah-blah science blah-blah' dialogue, which I (and Ira and pretty much all the other writers) thought was no fun to write, no fun to perform, and mostly just noise for the audience. We tried to do as little of it as possible as the show progressed.”

Yeah I like this one - The character stuff is great, there’s some strong scenes with the crew. For me tho it’s the technobabble stuff that kinda weighs the episode down a little.

STRONG 2ND EP💥 Technobabble balanced out by crew interactions and meaningul character-building. Loved the tension between Janeway and Chakotay. Knew J&A would appreciate the dynamics of this one. PS 👁 - In the pilot, Janeway tells Paris that she had been the Science Officer on the USS Al-Batani serving under Captain Owen Paris, Tom's dad. Credits were still roling on that scene, so it was easy to miss. But that speaks to your observation about Janeway's scientific knowledge. FUN FACT: 🤡😹 At the time Genevieve Bujold left the role of Janeway, it was said that she based her interpretation of the character on that one line of dialogue, and played Janeway as a scientist first. They were right to let her go based on her low-key perfomance/mis-read of the character. But she probably would have been fine in this particular ep.

The Bajorin woman is played by Martha Hacket. She also appeared on DS9 as the Romulan who gets "shot" in the back by the Jem'hadar.

VOY is not my favorite but I always liked it. But i worried you guys wouldn't care for it. Because of the Braga type SciFi. Because of the Tekknobabble. Because of some characters. Maybe because of Janeway. Seems like I am wrong. At least for now.

Mixed bag for me. I love all the spicy character interactions and the idea that these two crews aren't all going to be thrilled about being jammed together into one. That's why it's a letdown that Torres goes from pariah to chief engineer in one episode. I would have liked to see that arc stretch over part of the season while she gains Janeway's trust. And the congratulations from the other engineer at the end was a super-'90s "everyone goes to bed happy" kind of trope. It was jarring how fast everything fell into place. Then again, I loved the BSG reboot, so what do I know. I will say that Voyager is remarkably self-assured right out of the gate, more than I even remembered. Clearly they took some serious lessons from the eight years of Star Trek that had just come before.

Now imagining a scenario where Geneviève Bujold is cast, they realize she’s not working out and kill her off after one season, and then beg Michelle Forbes to join the show and take over as the lead, and she says: "For the love of God, stop asking."

The effect preceeding the cause reminds me of Christopher Nolan's Tenet. 'Don't try to understand it, feel it."

So, the other engineer gets called a dick after he says something snotty, but earlier when we learn Torres has a temper tantrum and breaks his nose in three places, where she made it physical first in the shoving match, nothing bad to say? *Spock eyebrow raise*

The cast are instantly like able and Voyager have the stronger first season in the Berman era.

The warp speed scale is weird. The writer's guide for the show had a formula to work out what a given warp factor was supposed to equate to; but it wasn't always strictly adhered to. They also changed the formula completely between TOS and TNG, so Warp numbers mentioned in TNG onwards aren't comparable to TOS. Under the TNG scale warp 1 is the speed of light, warp 2 is 10x the speed of light, warp 3 is 39x the speed of light... etc. for reference warp 9 is 1560x the speed of light. Warp 5 is 213x the speed of light so you can see why Starfleet must have been really pissed off with the events of Force of Nature.

That would be ChatGPt’s reaction to creating photos

Why Rob Bowman left Paramount: they used to have 8 days to shoot episodes and they reduced it to 7 to reduce costs. He found it to be extremely unpleasant.

As far as this episode, I think we're just supposed to assume that someone activated The Doctor off-screen after Kes turned him off and didn't deactivate him when they left. Probably Paris since he's supposed to be learning to be a field medic. That's my head canon anyway!

Boy, I love the interpersonal conflict, but this technobabble is like over 9000!

There's a pretty strongly held opinion in the fandom that aside from maybe Nimoy himself, Nobody in the entirety of Star Trek has portrayed a Vulcan as well as Tim Russ did on voyager.

I have countless criticisms of this show (still love it though), but I can't deny it starts off stronger than the others of the time.

This episode actually has a lot of rewatch value, I think they did an extremely good job with all the character stuff, especially in showing how Chakotay is in a really difficult position. I personally think it's a great episode for his character - he has to manage more competing interests than anyone else and ends up being correct, despite Janeway's doubts. I love the scene where he and Janeway are arguing, they both have completely valid points and it's difficult to choose a side. The acting is superb.

The Doctor complained in this episode that people don't turn him off. I think we can just assume that people are coming into sickbay for whatever reason, turning him on, then just leaving him like that.

Being one of those Star Trek fans who hasn't held Voyager in that high a regard, watching this back of the first time in years, I have to say that the show gets underway with a solid first episode after the opening feature length. There's some new faces, good interpersonal dynamics, tension and conflict set up with a good sci-fi element to serve the drama, finishing, as you say, with Torres becoming Chief Engineer. Glad you guys enjoyed it, too.

Damn, I didn't remember this episode being good, all I remembered was arguing and weird anomaly/time travel shit. I'll take it.

Janeway was a science officer - she mentions serving as science officer under Tom's father in the pilot. Sisko was an engineer and Picard was a pilot (and all round nerd)

Such a good episode

New design. The nacelles go up for warp so the ship won't hurt the fabric of space. No need to worry about speed limits that way. I know it's been on your mind a lot. lol