UNCUT - Warlord (VOY S3E10) | Star Trek Journey 438

This escapes being a F-tier episode for me only because they gave Kes something to do. D or Low C if I'm being generous

Where was the ADR in this episode I didn’t see it

Yeah it’s voyager but it’s still AAA compared to anything post 2017

Reading is Fundamental so is Shakespeare

You guys hit the nail on the head with Voyager. Especially at this point in the show, nobody knows what they're doing. They have no idea what they want to do with any of these characters; they had no idea what to do with the season 1 and 2 plots; and they have no idea what to replace those plots with. The show is more concerned with being safe than doing anything interesting, and it's very much producer ran. They don't care about quality, they care about ratings and being "accessable." Plus I heard that unlike TNG where working on it was a blast, for the cast of Voyager, everything was a tightly controlled miserable hell. But more depressingly, you could argue that some episodes this season are actually certain character's best character development episodes. For instance, some people think this is actually peak character development for Kes, and The Chute was peak character development for Paris and Kim. And depending on how you look at it, they're not wrong. There's a reason why this is a show where many people say seasons 1 and 2 were the best instead of the worst. And yeah, if you think The Chute and The Swarm are looking good right now, wait until you get to NuTrek. Episodes like Warlord are still part of the golden age of Star Trek. Eventually, episodes like this are going to look like the crown jewels.

First time I saw this episode. I actually thought it was pretty good.

It wasn't good... but it wasn't nearly as bad as how you represent it in your discussion. Not all episodes are going to land. They had an idea, they ran with it, and though it had some potential and delivered in a few ways, it mostly landed flat. But you guys are nothing but doom and gloom about Voyager as a whole. Relax! I just don't buy the whole, "They've shown they can do good episodes, so I can't give them a break when an episode is awful." Or even several episodes in a row. It just doesn't work that way. I think it's really very difficult to capture that magic over and over and over again. There is not a show out there where each episode is better than the previous one. It's more like a rollercoaster with ups and downs, some really great ones followed by some rather forgettable ones. TOS was like that. TNG was like that. DS9 was like that. And Voyager is no different. Stop looking at the other series with rose-colored glasses while bashing on Voyager. They all had their slumps.

On the bright side, this season does get better.

Congratulations, you’ve watched my least favorite episode of Voyager. E

Rewatching season 4, it gets better. I recall drifting off of Voyager in the 90s and watching it occasionally, missing many episodes, probably because DS9 was peaking and that was enough.

This is an episode i'd been dreading. I only saw it once over 20 years ago, since then i've skipped it. I was ready to give another E, but i actually thought it was better than i remembered. Low C!

Season 4 gets better I promise!

This is pure TNG season 1/2. How could they basically be on what's TNG season 10 and be turning out concepts/scripts that are so weak? Thank God Kes got another episode this season.

I do want to re-emphasize that S3 is the worst season. They make some changes behind the scenes and it get much better after this. S4 is only my 3rd favorite season, but S3 is dead last. That's quite the difference.

the viewer numbers of season 3 were bad ... rly bad ... the only reason it wasnt cancelled was because as you said it was their "flagship" show AND all other new shows did even worse ... not a good time for the channel so what you feel is what everyone felt ...

One rule I've heard is "if you have 1 bad actor, that's a bad actor, but if every actor is bad, that's usually a bad director." Think of Lucas and the prequels, there are some really good actors in those movies giving pretty bad performances. So I think the director was a big part of the problem here. At best I don't think this director knew what they were going for tonally when making this ep.

Is it just me or did everyone decide to play it kinky this episode?

If I could say one quasi positive thing about this trash-heap. It's a slightly smaller trash-heap than that abomination of a dumpster fire with Ira Graves on TNG. But for real...we had that trope of an antagonist taking over one of our crew so many times! Ira Graves, (I honestly forget the title), Turnabout Intruder, The Passanger, The Assignment (the only one of these that I enjoyed), and Warlord. Why did they keep coming back to the well over and over and over!? It's hardly ever interesting, and done to death. (I mention ones where its just one of our characters by the way, so I'm not gonna count episodes like Power Play)

Josh: "Surely Voyager can come back from this right?" Alex: "We can't risk it, time to fire up the time machine" Listen guys, you all need to start making some wild predictions and manifest reality because every single day things could go in two different directions and there's no way to know where this is all headed. But, this episode, at this point in this season, this is where we are.

Deadlock should have been a TNG movie I tell ya. Sub the Borg for the VIdians.

Despite a fine performance by Jennifer, it's a lackluster episode. I guess you don't like Jeri Taylor as showrunner.

Kenny Atkinson insists that analytically season 3 of Voyager has been better than season 5 of DS9

Compare this blandness to "Broken Link" over on DS9. Guys said both eps were "just fine." Yet the DS9 ep is clearly superior to this one in every way. Bring back "B" grades! You can say an ep is "good" but not "great" without always falling back on "just fine." ("Warlord" is NOT a "B" though. Yawn.)

kudos to you Guys, to save the rant for the discussion after the Episode. thanks :)

The DS9 lovers/Voyager haters are eating good right now.

"Somehow... Tieran has returned"

The point of having the warlord jump to the other guy at the end was so Kes could be the one to defeat him in the end. But it was executed anticlimactically

I used to think S2 was the low point of the show, and sure enough it does contain several of the very worst eps IMO. However while both S2 and 3 follow a similar pattern of having a weak first half, looking at the 2 seasons side by side, there are 2 or 3 S2 eps that I think are worse than anything in S3(Warlord comes close though), a lot of the rest of early S2 was just mediocre(37s, Cold Fire, Persistence of Vision), and eps like Sacred Ground, False Profits, and of course this episode are worse than those. On the flip side, there's genuinely good stuff in S3, but it probably falls slightly short of Deadlock, or Tuvix, or Lifesigns. Higher highs and lower lows basically. Now those 2 things might balance out, but what makes S2 better than I remember and S3 worse than I remember is the middle of the road episodes. I don't think Threshold is a good episode or makes a lot of sense, but it sure is entertaining. Dreadnought, Projections, Non Sequitur, & Prototype are all pretty solid eps that keep you engaged. In short, S3 is just more boring. I liked The Chute and Remember, and Future's End was decent. That's about it. As for comparisons to The Passenger, I think Jennifer at least puts in more effort in a couple scenes, compared to Siddig really only making 2 acting choices; talking real low and real slow with zero emotion, and having a seizure/jizzing his pants. Then again I couldn't help but laugh at that goofy run across the room and the cartoonish villain act, so this is definitely harder to take seriously. Not a good sign when you have to start talking about the TOS eps you enjoyed in the middle of the reaction. At least Caitlin Brown was a decent guest performance in The Passenger, and I'd definitely say that was a better overall episode. It just focused so heavily on Siddig and he wasn't up to the task(back then anyway). D tier

"I don't need to see that" No one ever needs to see that opening.

How could they prevent people from getting addicted to being in the holodeck? Who would want to ever leave?

In regards to single word titles: "Writers have noted that Berman had strong, immediate reactions to anything that sounded overly theatrical, flowery, or literary. If a pitch arrived titled like a classic sci-fi short story or an old TOS episode ("The City on the Edge of Forever", "For the World Is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky"), the leadership reflexively pushed it toward punchy, modern high concepts. If an executive producer routinely crosses out multi-word poetic titles in favor of the core premise word, writers quickly adapt. The room rule becomes: don't waste time pitching ornate titles; just give it a punchy single word." Again, this just solidifies the corporate meddling that went on. From the characters being told to be less interesting to Berman not signing off on intelligent titles. The reason Voyager rubs people the wrong way is obvious. I don't blame anyone but the corporate brass and possibly UPN had their own edicts about not making the show too intelligent (this part is just my theory)

Fair enough. I only wish Josh would be able to see the same bad things in „Smallville“.

"Uncut - Warlord" i didn't need to know him that intimately

DS9 writers: "The passenger". Voyager writers: "Hold my beer".

Always remember - Voyager was the show where the main cast were explicitly told to tone down their performances so that the aliens of the week would stand out more.

Apparently, the fact it mostly focused on the villians was something Klink was proud of due to it being unusual

I disagree that this is that bad, but it's definitely a problem that we've had quite the run of mediocre episodes. There's not 7 seasons of this, and there's one of my favorites before the season ends to come.

The way Neelix's feet kept being focused on was so weird. Makes Tarantino seem normal by comparison.

Gonna be an awkward nostril Thanksgiving

Somehow Tieran returned!

I had no memory of this episode and I can see why.

Great discussion. I was wondering if Voyager’s lack of direction would be obvious to the guys by this point, especially after the goodwill that came with a solid season 1. I listened to a recent interview with Bryan Fuller, and he very plainly was able to outline the dynamics- Ira over at DS9 was more than willing to go toe to toe with Berman- “this is the show and if you don’t like it you can fire me”. No one on Voyager had the balls/vision to do that. Which led to the compounding issue of Berman/the studio/the network exerting even more control as a reaction to not being able to reign in Ira.

I totally forgot this one, and deservedly so. But you know what? I had fun. It's a garbage story, but Jennifer Lien chewing the scenery is a blast even if this was all she had to work with. The bar for Voyager has gotten so low that just the fact that they *tried* to be exciting and create some tension makes me give this one a little grace. As long as I don't include anything from the hook, because Neelix's feet are unforgivable.

Would it be a spoiler to say "guys, it DOES get better?" Because, guys, it DOES get better.

So Tuvix was murdered by Janeway just to return Neelix to Kes so she could friend zone him

Where's Prof Moff at? Warlord Kes definitely added a few notches to the scoreboard.

Voyager sex scoreboard “we can always replicate a dildo “ Truer words have never been spoken. SCOREBOARD Paris 3 Jayneway 3 Torres 3 new +1 Chakotay 2 Harry 2 Neelix 1 Kes 1 The Doctor 1 DETAILS Well in this turd salad episode we do get a score. The one and only interesting scene is when Torres goes to boytoytown to funkaround. I am interested in the snorkling equipment though. I think maybe Torres is even freakier than we thought and we are DOWN WI DIT.

"D" for straight into the dumpster

Welp I thought it would be an E but it was more like a C-. This story reminds me loosely on a story about like the Romans. I don’t remember the story, of course, but this one is not done well. It seemed like there was going to be a lot of political family drama, but then they didn’t follow through. Why did the younger brother do that but it doesn’t matter because you’re happy it’s over.

I'll rewatch full bad seasons of TNG and DS9 (S1/S2). Then there's Voyager. I do not rewatch the bad seasons of Voyager because I know I'll have regrets on my deathbed that I wasted hours of my life watching bad Voyager instead of doing literally anything else. It does get better. I won't say which season because that might be a spoiler, but I'll start watching Voyager with you when that comes. Until then, we've got DS9 to get us through it.

Pretty much how I felt about Voyager around that time. Voyager has tons of awesome episodes, but unfortunately, way more bad ones than it deserved.

After watching voyager with you guys I have to say season two was better than I remember and season three was a step down. They had some growing pain this season until they turned the show around.

Re: your questions about Voyager's season 3 slump, this is all covered in great detail in books, but very broadly: Piller in season 2 wanted a slow arc and very quiet introspective character stories. The Kazon didn't work very well and the writing room was tense and he left after Basics. Season 3 is mostly Taylor with an assist from Berman (Braga was stretched thin by working on the movie) and they went deliberately more standalone episodes. But one key thing is they mostly liked their work. Memory Alpha's page has Klink and Ryan both saying they liked how Warlord turned out.

Just imagining Avery Brooks trying to ADR his lines for some of his more… unique line deliveries. (Avery in the recording booth watching his performance): ”.... Fuck me.”

Saw this one now for the first time, but I heard already back in the 90s that they gave J.Lien something todo here. Well the idea is quite interesting, but I was distracted by the missing effort on the sets. I don't know... could the most important room where the government sits not have some windows with a mattpainting of some city outside... I was still entertained though, but maybe your reaction on the right side of the screen helped here ;9

Lastly.... you know.... if you WERE to drop First Contact today instead of Sunday..... to help wash this Warlord taste out of everyone's mouth..... I...... wouldn't say no......

Now you're starting to sound like many of us who have issues with Voyager. Welcome to the club, Gentlemen ;)

Star Trek was full of situations that could complicate production audio: alien prosthetics, elaborate sets, atmospheric effects, action sequences, and location filming. They also shot an episode a week and just couldn't take the time to reshoot every scene with questionable production audio. ADR was a necessity.

Interesting that no one calls the 2009 and later movies 11, 12, and 13.

If you thought this was a parody of Star Trek, just wait for NuTrek.....

Oh, we’re doing X-Rated thumbnails now? For clicks?

The voyager writing room was, according to one writer, "a bad place to work, and it was an unhappy experience. I was surrounded by people that were unhappy working there, and didn’t like their own show, and weren’t pleased with the people they were working with." And sometimes it really shows.

Alex used the word 'bland'. Far too often, I think that's Voyager's biggest issue.

Well.. that happened.. This was the low point of Voyager for me. It's certainly not the last meh episode but I think this is the only E episode of the series for me.

To your credit, I feel like I didn't notice ADR in shows as much until I started watching you guys all these years now, ... which I'm not sure is a good thing or bad thing, so thank you? Lol. ... But I didn't notice any ADR in this episode.

Oh.... a main character's body is taken over by a hostile alien ..... again

I actually thought you guys might like this episode. This always fell into a Darmok territory for me in that I recognize it's a good episode (to me) but I thought it was boring and bland and don't rewatch it.

Now that I've finished the episode, I can see why I forgot everything but Kes in this. I like Jennifer Lien's performance, but it gets repetitive instead of giving her more to do, with the exception of I like the scene where she and the bad guy are speaking inside of his mind.

Well that’s a thumbnail right there

Never made sense to call the TNG movies VII/VIII/IX/X to me, but I do see people do it.

I guess this is the latest time I've watched one of these where I had no issues with the guest actors, then suddenly they're shitting on them lol

I agree with you on all of the guest stars being not good. It was so bad, I was actually laughing out loud at some of them.

I love how they have no pop for the three volleyball ladies in swimsuits, but then pop as soon as the dude shows up later lol

Well, that was a decent, typical episode of Star Trek TOS season 2 or 3. For Voyager: more meh. I'm starting to feel glad I stopped watching this series early 30 years ago - I couldn't been wasting so much time. As it is now, I will keep going for awhile, but I maybe just skip the episode rewatches and skip to the TA discussions - definitely more entertaining.

Thought you might just never release this reaction and assume no one would notice.

Hot garbage of an episode. E. Don't worry, it DOES get better than this.

Part of me still hasn’t forgiven David Livingston for that opening. You can try to forget what you saw there but it will probably continue to haunt you for the rest of your lives..