Craggus’ Trek Trek:
Now, Voyager! Vol 11
Craggus’ Trek Trek Now Voyager Vol 11 sees the series introduce yet another new race in an attempt to avoid leaning on the Borg too much…
Star Trek Voyager S4E14: Message In A Bottle
The discovery of a seemingly abandoned alien subspace relay network offers an opportunity for contact to be made with the Alpha Quadrant, especially when Seven of Nine detects a Starfleet vessel within range. What begins as a Seven of Nine story quickly turns into a Doctor story as he’s digitally compressed and sent through the network on his very first away mission. The ship detected turns out to be the USS Prometheus, an experimental prototype ship that has been seized by the Romulans. It’s down to The Doctor and his Mark II counterpart to defeat the Romulans and retake the ship. It’s a superb action-comedy episode with Robert Picardo on sparkling form and guest star Andy Dick mercifully restrained to deliver a fun romp that also sets in motion some ongoing season and series arcs as it low-key introduces the Hirogen and, finally, lets Starfleet know that Voyager is alive and well and in the Delta Quadrant.
Star Trek Voyager S4E15: Hunters
Voyager does “Predator” as the owners of the supposedly abandoned subspace relay network from Message In A Bottle turn up wanting to know who’s been using up all the free minutes on their data plan. The Hirogen are a fantastic addition to the series’ rogue’s gallery and here in their first full appearance, they’re at their most intimidating thanks to clever casting and camera angles allowing the Hirogen captors to tower over Seven and Tuvok. The episode struggles a little bit to balance its main hostage storyline with the ongoing drip-feed of character moments as the crew start to receive news from loved ones at home and, as the middle chapter of the introductory Hirogen trilogy, it lacks the clear sense of narrative identity that its predecessor and successor have.
Star Trek Voyager S4E16: Prey
If the last episode of Star Trek Voyager was the franchise’s take on “Predator”, this one follows it up with a spin on “Alien vs Predator” as the crew encounter a Hirogen hunt gone terribly wrong after they’ve targeted a stranded member of Species-8472 as their quarry. Caught between these two deadly enemies, Janeway attempts to impose some Starfleet-style diplomacy, first to make peace with and avoid a confrontation with the Hirogen who are still understandably aggrieved at the destruction of their subspace network and secondly to try and communicate with the wounded member of Species-8472 to understand why it remains in this dimension or whether it’s an advance scout for another invasion. Taking a more, shall we say, pragmatic approach to the situation, Seven of Nine channels her inner Ken Watanabe, taking a “Let them fight” attitude to the pair and suggesting it’s none of Voyager’s business. It’s chock full of great performances and nice character moments, especially from Kate Mulgrew, Jeri Ryan and guest star Tony Todd and it’s enormously satisfying to see Janeway’s ‘perfect’ Starfleet family have to adapt to the presence of its own Emo black sheep.
Star Trek Voyager S4E17: Retrospect
While it probably went unremarked on at the time, this story of false memories and accusations feels very uncomfortable today, deliberately flouting the “Me Too” mantra to believe victims and instead unambiguously throwing its lot in with the accusations can destroy lives lot. From every angle, the episode makes unpleasant choices and leaves none of the characters better or wiser for what they’ve experienced, especially Seven who’s initially persuaded into thinking she was a victim and then finally becomes one thanks to the Doctor’s inadvertent manipulation, leaving her emotionally traumatised by both an incident which didn’t happen and the lack of closure. Faring even worse is the scuzzy arms dealer who ends up killing himself rather than placing his trust in justice being done. A new low in Detective Tuvok’s career and a profoundly misjudged foray into psychology from The Doctor which Janeway indulgently handwaves away.
Star Trek Voyager S4E18: The Killing Game
Allo ‘Allo – what do we have here? Star Trek does The Secret Army as we find our heroes in multimedia res with Voyager under Hirogen control and running like a brutalist theme park for their sport. The main focus sees the Hirogen taking on the role of the Nazis in occupied France towards the end of the Second World War with allied forces advancing and Janeway cast in the role of nightclub owner and secret resistance leader along with the fallen borg with the big boobies as a nightclub chanteuse. There are a lot of good elements, but it never quite gels together into a cohesive whole and its tone oscillates from cosplay romp to wartime thriller and back again without any real sense of timing or rhythm, creating some pacing issues as well. Still, it builds up nicely to a catastrophic cliffhanger as the holodeck – and the situation – is blown wide open.
Star Trek Voyager S4E19: The Killing Game, Part II
An altogether flatter episode, with it becoming abundantly clear the resolution of the story was being written on the hoof while moving the various flailing plot threads forward. As a result, it suffers from a few false endings before it finally reaches its denouement and the philosophical and political divide at the heart of Hirogen society is articulated too little and too late for it to lift this second part to the level of the first. Still, there’s never a bad time to reinforce the idea that Nazis are bad. Especially nowadays, apparently.
Star Trek Voyager S4E20: Vis À Vis
Ironically, Tom Paris – Voyager’s very own 1950s B-movie aficionado – finds himself suffering his very own invasion of the body snatcher as an alien pilot testing an experimental warp drive turns out to be an imposter who has been body-swapping his way through the Delta quadrant for some time. The episode opens with Tom having lapsed (out of nowhere) into his bad-boy slacker persona which he seemed to have put to rest back in season two but it’s brought back here to make the story work a little better, even if it is a disservice to the character. While the story follows the body-swapping shenanigans, it’s curiously convenient that everyone just seems to discard the experimental coaxial warp drive which could enable Voyager to get home much quicker, especially after Tom figures out a way to resolve the instability problem.
Star Trek Voyager S4E21: The Omega Directive
When Voyager detects an extremely powerful particle that has the ability to destroy warp travel the crew have no idea they’ve stumbled on a MacGuffin that would have made much more sense as a basis for Star Trek Discovery’s third season than an orphaned Kelpien having a tantrum. An episode that gives free rein to Janeway’s tendency to ride roughshod over principles if they get in the way of her goal, it’s a fascinating glimpse into the highest echelons of Starfleet Command and the Borg’s overall objectives as we learn how each view the Omega Particle.
