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Star Trek Voyager is kind of over-hated I think

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Markitron

Is currently staging a hunger strike outside Gearbox HQ while trying to hate them to death
Not to mention Voyager pretty much retcons how early humans and the Federation knew of The Borg. TNG established that the Enterprise-D's encounter with them was the first time they've ever met The Borg - yet apparently Seven of Nine's family was tracking them for a long time.

I really liked The Raven, but yea it was a bit much. What was their justification for the distance covered by them to end up in the Delta Quadrant again?
 

siddx

Magnificent Eager Mighty Brilliantly Erect Registereduser
Correct. Voyager has some great moments. Some terrible ones too, but far more decent to fantastic moments over all.
 

4Tran

Member
I really didn't mind them not taking the Maquis part very far at all. I think it would have dragged badly. What Voyager needed was to make the show about them actually surviving and exploring out there in a tangible way. The Photon Torpedo count is the perfect example, of something they could have dealt with throughout the seasons and all that.

But nope. Real shame that they couldn't see the true potential in the premise. It could have worked even if they didn't want to make it a true serial. Part serial/Part-episodic would have worked.
It's less not seeing the potential of the Voyager premise and more not wanting to deal with it at all. The showrunners literally wanted another TNG but wanted to get rid of the trappings of the existing shows so that everything would feel more fresh. They also wanted to stay away from a couple of the key elements that were in DS9; namely continuity, and ongoing conflict between the main characters. The latter was especially pointed because the showrunners felt it important to constantly portray Janeway as a strong woman captain, and ongoing conflict would erode her authority.
 

Fuchsdh

Member
Not to mention Voyager pretty much retcons how early humans and the Federation knew of The Borg. TNG established that the Enterprise-D's encounter with them was the first time they've ever met The Borg - yet apparently Seven of Nine's family was tracking them for a long time.

I honestly don't think that's much of a retcon. The Federation obviously knew the Borg existed for decades, albeit with very little known about them—they'd had El-Aurians running around for that long. The Hansens just went off without Starfleet supervision and their research was lost when they stumbled into the Delta Quadrant.
 

Sephzilla

Member
I honestly don't think that's much of a retcon. The Federation obviously knew the Borg existed for decades, albeit with very little known about them—they'd had El-Aurians running around for that long. The Hansens just went off without Starfleet supervision and their research was lost when they stumbled into the Delta Quadrant.

Eh it still feels retcon-ish to me. There's already a Borg tease at the end of season one of TNG and even then absolutely nobody seems to know what was going on (either Federation or Romulan).
 

Lothars

Member
Yup I agree with you OP, The Show is pretty good, Not as good as the DS9 or TNG but better than the Original series and Enterprise.
 

MC Safety

Member
It's a terrible show.

I suspect the writers were computers and only added humans to the cast begrudgingly. It explains so much about Voyager's worship of technobabble, its lack of relatable human characters, and why the captain doesn't seek advice from her human crew but rather a technological recreation of Leonardo da Vinci. Even the most interesting characters here are pieces of technology.

It's not over-hated. In truth, it doesn't receive enough scorn.
 

s_mirage

Member
Not to mention Voyager pretty much retcons how early humans and the Federation knew of The Borg. TNG established that the Enterprise-D's encounter with them was the first time they've ever met The Borg - yet apparently Seven of Nine's family was tracking them for a long time.

As uncharacteristic as it is for me to defend Voyager, Generations had possibly already thrown in a contradiction regarding the Borg. Surely Starfleet intelligence of the 23rd century would have investigated just what the El-Aurians were running from.
 

Schlorgan

Member
the alternative ending to First Contact is one of my fave Trek scenes.

Is that the one where Picard says something really cool before snapping the Queen's neck?

The Plinkett review for First Contact might actually be my favorite Plinkett review.
 

Fuchsdh

Member
It's a terrible show.

I suspect the writers were computers and only added humans to the cast begrudgingly. It explains so much about Voyager's worship of technobabble, its lack of relatable human characters, and why the captain doesn't seek advice from her human crew but rather a technological recreation of Leonardo da Vinci. Even the most interesting characters here are pieces of technology.

It's not over-hated. In truth, it doesn't receive enough scorn.

latest

In general, I'm going to say anyone who says "no, this media isn't hated enough!" needs to take a chill pill and calm the hell down.
 

Sephzilla

Member
In general, I'm going to say anyone who says "no, this media isn't hated enough!" needs to take a chill pill and calm the hell down.

This isn't really a valid comparison though. Geordi was tasked with something very specific regarding the engines and making that holodeck program was basically the equivalent of him reading the owners manual of the engines. Plus it was a one-off thing.

Janeway, on multiple occasions, asked advice from her stupid Da Vinci holodeck instead of her fellow senior officers.

As uncharacteristic as it is for me to defend Voyager, Generations had possibly already thrown in a contradiction regarding the Borg. Surely Starfleet intelligence of the 23rd century would have investigated just what the El-Aurians were running from.

They probably waited until Tuesday to ask
 

kingkaiser

Member
I really liked The Raven, but yea it was a bit much. What was their justification for the distance covered by them to end up in the Delta Quadrant again?

It was explained a little bit later in "The Dark Frontier". The ship was basically drawn into a transwarp conduit created by the Borg vessel the Hansens were studying.

Oh, and the first Trek which retconned the first contact with the Borg was "The first contact" the motion picture *lol*

I mean Zefram Cochrane was told about them and Lily Sloane even met them in person. Do you people think they never mentioned them after that? Hell, there was even an Enterprise episode which dealt with this (Regeneration).
 

Sephzilla

Member
I still maintain my fan theory that First Contact created a slightly parallel timeline where Cochrane knew about The Borg and the Enterprise. In this timeline, since Cochrane knew about the future, he pushed to get the NX ship named "The Enterprise". Which is why we never heard about the NX Enterprise until after First Contact.

This would also explain some of the Borg retcons
 
I still maintain my fan theory that First Contact created a slightly parallel timeline where Cochrane knew about The Borg and the Enterprise. In this timeline, since Cochrane knew about the future, he pushed to get the NX ship named "The Enterprise". Which is why we never heard about the NX Enterprise until after First Contact.

This would also explain some of the Borg retcons

There's a great star trek book which theorises that the mirror universe is created by cochrane warning the vulcans about the borg, leading to the creation of the empire.
 

Schlorgan

Member
I still maintain my fan theory that First Contact created a slightly parallel timeline where Cochrane knew about The Borg and the Enterprise. In this timeline, since Cochrane knew about the future, he pushed to get the NX ship named "The Enterprise". Which is why we never heard about the NX Enterprise until after First Contact.

This would also explain some of the Borg retcons

That's a great theory, I'm just not confident that they thought that far ahead when they wrote First Contact.
 

MC Safety

Member
In general, I'm going to say anyone who says "no, this media isn't hated enough!" needs to take a chill pill and calm the hell down.

Chill pill taken.

Voyager is still awful and my criticisms are absolutely valid.

How many chill pills do I need to take before Voyager magically becomes good? I don't want to overdose.
 
It's mainly middle ground and everything gets judged by the highs. TNG and DS9 both have a lot more trash, but also a lot more good stuff.

Voyager is for the most part inbetween. Not that it didn't have any greats or stinkers.
 

Currygan

at last, for christ's sake
look I don't hate Voyager, I just happen to think it's the ST serie with the blandest crew, totally uninteresting storylines and a penchant for ruining some of the most intriguing characters in the franchise

TNG pummels it, TOS stomps it and DS9 takes a gigantic shit on it from Terok Nor
 
The minute they decided to make the premise episodic it had no chance. If there was ever a Trek show that needed a wall to wall, pilot to finale serialized run, it was Voyager. Having a gag episode or light hearted moments is all well and good, but having 4 of them a season and having all these laughable moments when just the episode before you doomed an entire species of people or 1/12th of your crew died is some internal tonal dissonance I've never been able to get over.

The show needed to focus on the interpersonal way more than it did. The fight between the human factions, the way these people would interact, the social and societal groups that would emerge overtime knowing that you were no longer a part of a cohesive nation but a ship adrift in a foreign land. There should have always been an overbearing feeling of desperation and fear, when you see the ship it should look after a season or so like a ramshackle mishmash of various alien tech slapped together and gerried to work as best it can.

Instead we get TNG except the weekly moralizing and hand wringing involves genocide far too often and the characters are all underdeveloped and ignored other than the Doctor.
 

Tobor

Member
What really pisses me off about Voyager is that they shit all over an excellent concept.

Someone else, nearly anyone else, could have made a truly brilliant show out of that premise.

They took a slow fast pitch that should have been a home run and turned it into a double play. It pisses me off every time I think about it.
 

twobear

sputum-flecked apoplexy
What really pisses me off about Voyager is that they shit all over an excellent concept.

Someone else, nearly anyone else, could have made a truly brilliant show out of that premise.

ronald d moore, who worked on voyager, in fact did take a very similar concept and made a truly brilliant show out of it. in fact in the 'here's the stuff we got wrong about voyager' article basically everything he points out as how voyager should have been made its way into battlestar galactica.
 

Tobor

Member
ronald d moore, who worked on voyager, in fact did take a very similar concept and made a truly brilliant show out of it. in fact in the 'here's the stuff we got wrong about voyager' article basically everything he points out as how voyager should have been made its way into battlestar galactica.

I have issues with BSG as well. Also, a good part of what makes the Voyager premise so compelling is the Star Trek IP. Take that away and it's less interesting to me.

What I'd really like to see one day is a Voyager done right, in that universe.

In the meantime, I believe there is a Lost in Space reboot happening at Netflix. That could be interesting.
 

TyrantII

Member
It's mainly middle ground and everything gets judged by the highs. TNG and DS9 both have a lot more trash, but also a lot more good stuff.

Voyager is for the most part inbetween. Not that it didn't have any greats or stinkers.

Having just rewatched both, disagree. I'd agree with you if you said Enterprise.

I guess maybe if you count season 1 of TNG, but that seems unfair seeing as they had to find their new footing.
 

ExVicis

Member
I think my problem with Voyager isn't so much that it's really bad. But my problems is that when compared to DS9 it's problems and quality are really magnified.

In DS9 you have a ton of memorable characters. Have your opinions on Jadzia Dax or Bashir but Odo, Quark, Nog, Garak, Dukat, Jake (in some episodes), Martok, Sisko and even O'Brien all had really good moments and episodes. Kira was underused a lot as well but she also had some good episodes too. Compare that with Voyager that had maybe...three characters that were consistently good (Seven of Nine, the Doctor and Janeway) and very little development for other characters, it really showed how under-utilized everything was. A lot of Voyager's friendships or relationships in comparison to just the O'Brien-Bashir friendship felt rushed and forced. Beyond the Doctor there was no sense of a playful back and forth conversation like Odo and Quark or Garak and... well anyone else.

So I think you're right, over-hated it might be. But I think it's fair to be very disappointed in how it came out when compared to everything else.
 

firehawk12

Subete no aware
Having watched pretty much the whole series a couple of weeks ago, I'll say that Voyager is an okay "Star Trek" show but a terrible waste of its premise with a completely inconsistently written Janeway and blank slates for every other character.
 
Oh, I think it's both. The bright spots are nice to remember and the show as a whole was a train wreck. I'll totally agree on the lack of character quality.

Captain: Ok. Memorable.
Doctor: Definitely memorable.
First Officer: Irrelevant. Romance out of nowhere. Backstory blah. Replaceable.
Security Officer: Generally well done. Spock with a gun, but a bit tired since he gets all of the typical Vulcan plotpoints.
Science Officer: Searching the delta quadrant for ratings.
Pilot: Backstory and character just very boring. They tried, but just no traction.
Kim: Quickly turned into a joke character.
Engineer: You could tell the writers are tired of klingons.
Alien: The local. Not very interesting, hence replaced by Doctor in most fish-out-of-water plotlines. (Much better execution in Enterprise, obviously)
Alien 2: tossed with good reason

Realistically, killing off Chakotay, Kim, Neelix, Paris and Seven in one episode would not have crippled the show. Hell even Neelix could have been replaced easily.
 
Garbage. It could have easily been one of the best things that's happened to Trek, but instead it was TNG too. Marooned in an unexplored part of the galaxy and forced to share a ship with your enemies. This very idea was not explored to its ends and everyone started getting along way too quick.
 

Timbuktu

Member
So I think you're right, over-hated it might be. But I think it's fair to be very disappointed in how it came out when compared to everything else.

For me it's more compared with what it could have been. You just know that the concept could have been made into a good show if it was done today when every genre make season long arcs. I still appreciate the good episodes though, because well crafted self-contained 40 minutes episodes can also be a beautiful thing and Voyager did have some of those, and we don't get as much of that nowadays.
 

ExVicis

Member
For me it's more compared with what it could have been. You just know that the concept could have been made into a good show if it was done today when every genre make season long arcs. I still appreciate the good episodes though, because well crafted self-contained 40 minutes episodes can also be a beautiful thing and Voyager did have some of those, and we don't get as much of that nowadays.

But even if you take away the premise, if it was just an excuse to have crazy stories about whatever, I would have totally been fine with that...if the characters were good. But they weren't. Their were some good characters but not enough to carry the entire show. Episodes, sure maybe, but not the show.

With good characters you can make any premise enjoyable, even mundane things like a business transaction. Maybe with better characters the show might have been acceptable. But we don't really get that. beyond the Captain, The Doctor and Seven of Nine everyone kind of just has nothing really interesting or defining about them after a while. Up until Netflix acquired Voyager I had trouble even remembering half the crew beyond the 3 people I mentioned.
 

WolfeTone

Member
Loved Voyager as a kid, but looking back it was a wasted opportunity. 3 good characters in Janeway, Doctor and Seven, maybe through in Tuvok, but everyone else was pretty much pointless. The rest of the cast had less development than many one off guest stars on DS9. Did Harry Kim even have more than 2 episodes? I can only remember the one where he wakes up back on earth for some reason and the one where future Kim comes back in time to prevent his past fuck up.
 

IISANDERII

Member
I really liked Voyager, yeah early on it was rough like all Treks but it ended up having some of the greatest pure Trek episodes and I found it to be the most organic Star Trek as well.
 

Fox318

Member
All these threads made me finally check out the series.

I've seen next gen at least 3 times but I've never watched DS9 or Voyager so 1 season done I can say this.


1. How the Fuck is there not another Star Trek series since enterprise?

2. Janeway deciding to not use the travel device in the first episode? She already violated the prime directive by just being 9n the planet in the first place? One could argue that the possibility of a war or the guardian falling into other hands was bound to happen anyway and would have forced society below to adapt from the underground life as they had already started to do.

3. The Doctor is the most interesting character by far.

4. Man why don't the Maki actually wear their own uniforms? It would add so much to the dynamic that they are not Starfleet.
 
1. How the Fuck is there not another Star Trek series since enterprise?

Years of ratings atrophy from Trek being on all the time eithout adapting to a changing audience. Back then The networks wanted ratings for general success and syndication for long term profit. The whole idea of Netflix prestige shows didn't even exist and they never really understood how TNG managed to make prestige TV. Hell, part of green lighting Voyager was written off to make it a key show for that new channel UPN because there was a big gold rush for new channels back in the day.

A new series is starting soonish on CBS...'s online streaming service. :-/. Hoping it's good.
 

SL128

Member
I think my problem with Voyager isn't so much that it's really bad. But my problems is that when compared to DS9 it's problems and quality are really magnified.

In DS9 you have a ton of memorable characters. Have your opinions on Jadzia Dax or Bashir but Odo, Quark, Nog, Garak, Dukat, Jake (in some episodes), Martok, Sisko and even O'Brien all had really good moments and episodes. Kira was underused a lot as well but she also had some good episodes too. Compare that with Voyager that had maybe...three characters that were consistently good (Seven of Nine, the Doctor and Janeway) and very little development for other characters, it really showed how under-utilized everything was. A lot of Voyager's friendships or relationships in comparison to just the O'Brien-Bashir friendship felt rushed and forced. Beyond the Doctor there was no sense of a playful back and forth conversation like Odo and Quark or Garak and... well anyone else.

So I think you're right, over-hated it might be. But I think it's fair to be very disappointed in how it came out when compared to everything else.
Yeah, Garak (33 episodes), Dukat (35), Damar (23), Ziyal (9), Nog (46), Rom (36), Ishka/Moogie (5), Brunt (8), Zek (7), Weyoun (24), Martok (24), Vic Fontaine (8) and even Smiley O'Brien (4) had more development than Chakotay, Kim, Paris, Neelix and B'elanna in most cases, or were on par at worst.
 

Fox318

Member
Man Voyager really is a baby TNG.

They really don't seem to feature many episodes about them being lost or the scarcity of supplies or energy.

I just got up to an episode where they started talking about pregnancy and that's what the should should be about more instead of the flavor of the month alien culture.

Also is kinda funny how each of the TNG elements are represented in the crew.
 

Fox318

Member
2 episodes left in season 2.

Man this show feels all over the place.

Its like halfway through they decided it wanted to be TNG.

Plus Janeway doesn't really make any decisions that imply she's blurring the line so much as she's sticking to the book when it's inconvenient and breaking rules .

The Tuvix episode comes to mind. She willing killed off a life form so 2 could be split up yet is keeping a sociopath locked up and wasting limited resources feeding him.

Its also like the show completely forgets about the list in space nature of their return home and is just doing general star trek shit.

Only thing missing is then negotiating on behalf of an alien race and transporting passengers.

Shouldn't Janeway be more focused on getting her crew home than scientific research when they appear to be the only starship post warp period with limited power and replicators that they can't rely on for unlimited food and parts?

Plus it hasn't really felt like the show has dived into the characters as much as other Star Trek shows. Outside of The Doctor none of The charcters feel like they have depth.
 

ckohler

Member
Shouldn't Janeway be more focused on getting her crew home than scientific research when they appear to be the only starship post warp period with limited power and replicators that they can't rely on for unlimited food and parts?

It's theoretically going to take them 80 years to get back to Earth. Life would be pretty meaningless if all they did was try and do that. The series makes it pretty clear from the beginning that they intend to document the Delta Quadrant as they go because that's at the core of what Starfleet is about and it's in their nature to be explorers.
 

ckohler

Member
I mean Zefram Cochrane was told about them and Lily Sloane even met them in person. Do you people think they never mentioned them after that? Hell, there was even an Enterprise episode which dealt with this (Regeneration).

Actually, Zefram Cochrane DID tell people about "cybernetic creatures from the future" being repelled by people from the same time but everyone just thought it was one of his crazy drunken stories. He recanted his statements a few years later, though.
 

The Real Abed

Perma-Junior
It had some of my favorite weird Trek episodes. Like
the one where the ship gets twisted and changed. Or the Year of Hell, sans the reset button. Or the episodes where they are put into a holodeck Nazi program so the aliens can hunt them. Or the two-parter with Sarah Silverman. Or when the Doctor had dreams of being in command and some aliens picked up his dreams as fact and he had to convince Janeway to let him pretend to play captain in order to convince the aliens not to attack. Or the one with the replacement ship, or the other one with the neat ship and Andy Dick. Or was Dick in the other one? I don't remember. But the ship was fucking cool. Shame it was a trick. Or was that the other one? Or the one where Leonardo DaVinci is stolen along with a bunch of other stuff. Well, the mobile emitter is stolen, DaVinci just happens to somehow come along.. or something. Or when they find the ship has crashed and buried under ice so they have to fix the past and LaForge is there and says "no, you can't do that." Or the one where they find a colony of former disconnected Borg.. I think... I'm pretty sure it was an episode and not just a fever dream? Or the one where they find Amelia Earhart and a redneck and some other people who were abducted all because Paris is infatuated with 20th century technology and pickup trucks. Or the ones where Paris is infatuated with black and white Sci-Fi movies and makes his own on the holodeck and Seven ain't having none of that. Or that one where Janeway and Paris become iguanas and have children.

Just kidding about that last one. Fuck.

(Spoiler tagging for Fox. Not that I was explicit.)
 

Fox318

Member
It's theoretically going to take them 80 years to get back to Earth. Life would be pretty meaningless if all they did was try and do that. The series makes it pretty clear from the beginning that they intend to document the Delta Quadrant as they go because that's at the core of what Starfleet is about and it's in their nature to be explorers.
I get that but the ship is limited on power and it has a crew that won't live 80 years. She needs to make plans for replacing them or try to speed up travel. Plus they are in a quadrant that hasn't been charted yet they keep on finding humanoid lifeforms with advanced warp technology that somehow haven't even been able to reach the beta quadrant?

Also Just watched the Tuvix episode of Voyager for the first time.

Janeway is a monster.

That decision went against everything the federation stood for and she didn't bend the rules for things that made way more logical sense before that.

I have no problem with a captain making a decision as hard as that of they back it up better but in the same season she agreeded to let a Q commit suicide when she could have brought back her entire ship home.

But now when this new life is asking not to die she decides it's best to have her chief of security and cook back so the girl with 9 years can have somebody to bang?
 
I would generally agree that Voyager gets too much hate. More so than other Trek series, it seems to get judged exclusively by its worst episodes, and every Trek series has had some terrible episodes.

At the end of the day it was a decent show that squandered its own premise, but that doesn't mean it was bad.
 

Currygan

at last, for christ's sake
I think my problem with Voyager isn't so much that it's really bad. But my problems is that when compared to DS9 it's problems and quality are really magnified.

In DS9 you have a ton of memorable characters. Have your opinions on Jadzia Dax or Bashir but Odo, Quark, Nog, Garak, Dukat, Jake (in some episodes), Martok, Sisko and even O'Brien all had really good moments and episodes. Kira was underused a lot as well but she also had some good episodes too. Compare that with Voyager that had maybe...three characters that were consistently good (Seven of Nine, the Doctor and Janeway) and very little development for other characters, it really showed how under-utilized everything was. A lot of Voyager's friendships or relationships in comparison to just the O'Brien-Bashir friendship felt rushed and forced. Beyond the Doctor there was no sense of a playful back and forth conversation like Odo and Quark or Garak and... well anyone else.

So I think you're right, over-hated it might be. But I think it's fair to be very disappointed in how it came out when compared to everything else.

agreed

disagreed with "even O'Brien"
like, Chief O'Brien was aces man, aces. When he single handedly updates the space station to fire some mega cannons at enemy ships, man

O'Brien4lyfe
 
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