30th Anniversary VOY Discussion Marathon

[Nate the Great]

Parallax


Janeway drafts Paris to begin training as Holodoc's assistant. He had two roughly applicable classes at the Academy, which for this ship was as close as anyone came to being qualified. Paris didn't seem at all pleased by the assignment--and, as subsequent episodes proved, he wasn't up to the task. Whether it's because he just wasn't qualified or because he effectively practiced passive resistance, I don't dare venture to guess.



When did Tom prove incompetent at medical tasks? He was never enthusiastic about them, but he did his best.


Carrey, of course, lords his apparent seniority over Torres, and condescends to her enough that half of Engineering seems to root for her to break his nose again. Torres, however, seems to be slightly unnerved from her previous encounter with the captain, and isn't in a mood to break anything at the moment. Torres isn't all spitfire and right hooks; she has some skeletons in her closet she hasn't shown anyone yet. Could it be that the Klingon Tsunami is actually...suffering from low self esteem?
Nah, couldn't be.



Good insight. That was always a problem with Voyager-character development didn't happened at the same rate as TNG. This is particularly odd because the higher-ups told the producers to knock it off with the Maquis conflict and try to be TNG Part Two as much as possible. And on TNG the cast was allowed to have character growth once Gene was kicked out.

Tom Paris asks what the heck they're talking about--"we got the signal before we got stuck...how's that possible? Am I making any sense here?" To which Janeway replies, "no. But that's okay." She pats him on the head like a good little Gump and gets back to chatting at warp 9 with Torres. (I'm not bothering to pass on the science, because it gave me a headache trying to follow it. I'll side with Paris on this one; just look cute, keep your mouth shut, and be ready to drive fast when given the word.)



Hehe.


We also get to meet Carrey, Torres' rival in Engineering; a Bajoran/Maquis engineer who is fitting into the Voyager crew even less well than Torres; and we see the first "date" between Kes and Holodoc.



Ew.


Time and Again


This was the second straight episode where effect preceded cause. Perhaps they didn't want us to forget this "valid literary technique" so soon after introducing it in the black hole episode. My personal feeling about such things is that it's crap, and when they try to cram too much Trek Science into an episode I lose interest. The more time they waste on science, pseudo science, and other technosputum, the less time they can devote to plot and character development.



He has a point, albeit a debatable one.


The progression from "we can't violate the prime directive" to "well, we already violated the prime directive, so we might as well spill it," was too abrupt and there was little in the way of body language or other cues to suggest that she had made the transition in a plausible way.



Another debatable point, but it must be pointed out that Kirk was even more cavalier about the PD at times.



These time-twist stories can be effective, but it still boils down to, how does the time-twist affect the characters? How do they react, how do they change? This is what's really interesting. In this Voyager episode, you really didn't see any of that, which is why I was so disappointed.



Cue comparisons to "Year of Hell" again.

[Nate the Great]

February 6th, 1995, "Phage"

Fiver by Kira

The Episode

JANEWAY: Assuming we do find dilithium on this planetoid, we're going to need a refining facility on the ship to process it.
CHAKOTAY: Lieutenant Torres has already asked permission to start modifications to the auxiliary impulse reactor. It could be converted into a crude dilithium refinery.

Yeah, this is complete nonsense.

JANEWAY: I'm sure it can. Tell her I want regular reports on her progress every step of the way. Are you sure you won't join me for breakfast? I was thinking of having eggs Benedict with asparagus, strawberries and cream.
CHAKOTAY: Ah.
JANEWAY: I said I was thinking about it. I'm actually having ration pack number five. Stewed tomatoes with dehydrated eggs.
CHAKOTAY: Mmm. Sounds delicious, but I've already had my vacuum-packed oatmeal this morning.

Cute moment, but completely antithetical to the modified premise. At least establish replicator rations before you start talking about MREs. Also, stewed tomatoes and eggs sounds disgusting.

JANEWAY: Well, you might have asked me first. This used to be my private dining room.
NEELIX: Your? Your dining room?
JANEWAY: If you had checked the ship's directory, you would have noticed that cabin one two five alpha deck two is designated as the Captain's private dining room.

Why would the captain need a private dining room? Picard didn't even have a private dining room! Couldn't they have at least designated this as an officer's private dining room?

TORRES: It also looks like there's a series of subterranean caves with an oxygen-nitrogen atmosphere.
CHAKOTAY: Class M. It'll make mining a lot easier if we can go in there without environmental suits.

And once again the writers think that the only requirement for Class M is a breathable atmosphere. They forget gravity, air pressure, temperature, etc. It's annoying every time.

NEELIX: Wait a minute. I'm getting unusual readings from this rock face. Traces of organic energy. Looks like a bio-electrical signature. I think there's something alive down here. It's about two metres into this rock face.
CHAKOTAY [OC]: Neelix, I said get back here! Neelix, did you hear what I said?
NEELIX: Just one minute, Commander.

I wish that they'd had a conversation between Neelix and Kes by now about how Neelix feels that he has to prove himself useful in as many ways as possible lest Janeway throw him off the ship. But no, Neelix just makes himself look like an idiot over and over again.

EMH: The infuser will keep his oxygen levels stable for the next hour or so, but after that he'll die. His lungs have been removed.

At no point does Doc even bring up doing surgery to more formally connect Neelix to an external life support system. There has to be a larger version of this infuser that you can connect to the biobed, turning it into a proverbial iron lung.

JANEWAY: Can't we fit him with a pair of artificial lungs?
EMH: His respiratory system is directly linked to multiple points along his spinal column. It's too complex to replicate.

This bit of Treknobabble seems to be obtuse for the sake of being obtuse. Just say that Talaxian lungs have more complex connections to the nervous system that Doc won't be able to account for before Neelix dies!

EMH: The man drives a seven hundred thousand ton starship so somebody thinks he'd make a good medic.

I had a whole screed planned about comparing the size/mass of Voyager with the Enterprise-D, but to summarize 700,000 metric tons seems a bit light for Voyager.

I understand the real world reason why Paris was made field medic, we don't want to hire another recurring character (although I wonder why Ayala or Seska couldn't have been the nurse, come to think of it). But his piloting skills are irrelevant to Janeway's decision, it was because he had taken a vaguely related course at the Academy.

But seriously, Doc should have a few nameless nurses in the background by now. Don't name them, don't pay the money to have them talk, but HAVE them.

EMH: Computer, is there an identification matrix on Mister Neelix from the last time he used the transporter?
COMPUTER: Affirmative.
EMH: Transfer it to console four.

Ugh. There's some information in the ship's computer that Doc can just access "telepathically". Then again, you could say the same thing about Data, but I'll skip that screed.

PARIS: I thought you just said we can't replicate his lungs.
EMH: We can't. But if I can reconfigure my emitter array I might be able to create a pair of holographic lungs for Mister Neelix.
PARIS: Holographic lungs?
EMH: If it's successful, we can precisely control his pulmonary functions to allow normal breathing.

This is of course nonsense, but if we allow for holographic lungs then we must also allow for the eventual creation of proper artificial lungs down the line because we'll have created the "blueprint" through the hologram.

EMH: The magnetic containment field that creates the illusion of my body can be modulated to allow matter to pass through it or be stopped. I might be able to modulate the holographic lungs in the same way, allowing oxygen and carbon dioxide to pass from the lungs to the blood stream.

This is overly simplistic, but I get the metaphor.

KES: How long will he have to stay like that?
EMH: For the rest of his life, unless the holo-lungs can be replaced by his original organs. And he will never be able to leave the holographic environment of this room. The holo-lungs would disappear the moment he went out the door.

Even if I'll buy that Doc can make holo-lungs within the restraint of the biobed, there's no way they could be used if Neelix is moving around. We're talking about holographic resolutions down to the size of molecules. No way could that be maintained if they have to be in motion as well.

TUVOK: This room is the source of the dilithium signature we detected earlier. The power systems here are running on an unusual dilithium matrix.
KIM: So there are actually no dilithium deposits on this planet.
TUVOK: It would appear not.

So Vidiian technology generates energy emissions that resemble that of dilithium? That introduces more questions, but I'll skip the screed.

PARIS: Okay. The isotropic restraint is activated. He won't be able to move more than two microns in any direction.

Oxygen molecules are 300 picometers. 2 microns is seven thousand times larger. In other words, moving 2 microns is way too big if you want to avoid killing Neelix.

NEELIX: Well, if I'm going to be in here a while, now's as good a time as any to tell you. Your ceiling is hideous.
EMH: I didn't design the room, I just work here.
NEELIX: Something with a bit of colour would help. Maybe a nice tapestry or a painting. Could you dim the lights a little?

Yeah, now is not the time for comic relief. Neelix should be gibbering at this point. For a social creature like him the idea of being trapped in a bed for the rest of his life would be horrifying.

NEELIX: Oh, fine. I have a little accident, I lose a pair of lungs, and the next thing I know Paris is swooping in like a Rectillian vulture.
KES: What are you talking about?
NEELIX: Didn't you hear the way that he said that? I'll be on the bridge if you need me. If you need me.
KES: Neelix
NEELIX: Why doesn't he just pull the plug on the holographic emitter and get it over with. Get me out of the way so he can have you all to himself.
KES: Neelix, you're over-reacting. Tom's been very supportive.
NEELIX: Ah, so it's Tom now, is it?
KES: You really have nothing to worry about. We're friends, that's all.
NEELIX: It's not you I'm worried about. It's him. He's just one big hormone walking around the ship. Don't you see the way that he looks at you?

Let's move past Neelix's jealousy or Kes' obliviousness, I've ranted about them enough in the past and will continue to do so. The important part is that Kes has made it clear that as long as she's with Neelix she will be loyal to him.

I'm reminded of that time on Friends when Ross and Rachel were going through a rough patch and Ross was jealous of Mark. It took Monica yelling at Ross to get it through his head that just because Mark was hitting on Rachel that doesn't mean that Mark will get Rachel, Ross should trust her. The same thing applies here. It doesn't matter how much Tom hits on Kes, he won't get anywhere as long as Kes is devoted to Neelix.

[Nate the Great]

TUVOK: I could describe to you in detail the psychological observations I have made about you over the past four years which lead me to conclude you are about to take this ship inside the asteroid. But suffice it to say, I know you quite well.

Four years? Tuvok has known Janeway since 2356, that's fifteen years! Yeah, yeah, new show, growing pains, etc. but still!

NEELIX: Doctor, wait, don't leave.
EMH: I'm not leaving, Mister Neelix, I'm simply going back to work.
NEELIX: I can't see you over there. I feel like I'm all alone.

Ugh. Put a set of VR glasses and headphones on Neelix and free up a hand to operate some variant of a mouse and let him entertain himself.

TUVOK: No, Captain. The walls are emanating severe electro-magnetic interference. I cannot scan them directly.
JANEWAY: It's like trying to move through a hall of mirrors. You never know when you're going to walk into the glass.
PARIS: I'm still picking up the alien's ion trail. Maybe we should follow that.
CHAKOTAY: He might have left a fake ion trail to lure us in here. It could lead us right into one of those walls.

So use the tractor beam in short bursts to map the walls. Duh. You can have it be a slow process to build up a 3D model of this chamber before you can move freely.

JANEWAY: That's a chance we're going to have to take. Tuvok, extend the deflectors to maximum range. If we do run into something, it'll give us an extra margin of error.

Oh sure, turn the ship into a bumper car! Great idea!

MOTURA: Yes, it attacked our people over two millennia ago. It consumes our bodies, destroys our genetic codes and cellular structures.
JANEWAY: So you harvest the bodies of other beings to replace your own tissues as they're consumed by this phage?
MOTURA: Our immuno-technology cannot keep up. The phage adapts. It resists all attempts to destroy it. Our society has been ravaged. Thousands die each day. There is no other way for us to survive.

It occurs to me that this would be a great way to tie into the Borg. Suppose the Vidiians had found a way to resist assimilation, so the Borg created the Phage to weaken them so that either they died out or got weak enough to be assimilated down the road.

JANEWAY: Take a message to your people. If I ever encounter your kind again, I will do whatever is necessary to protect my people from this harvesting of yours. Any aggressive actions against this ship or it's crew will be met by the deadliest force. Is that clear?
DERETH: Quite.

Well that's cold blooded, and I can't help but feel that this is part of Jeri Taylor's machinations to make her seem strong at the expense of common sense.

DERETH: Which of you will donate a lung?
KES: Me.
NEELIX: No, absolutely not. It's too dangerous. Let someone else do it.
KES: No, I want to do it, Neelix. I'm willing to take the risk.

I get Kes' devotion, but her lung is much smaller than Neelix's. This transplant would leave both of them unable to exert themselves at all. They could've at least thrown in a line about Kes's lungs are easier for Doc to replicate and implant and have Kes donate BOTH of her lungs to Neelix.

The Fiver

Chakotay: Neelix, what happened?
Neelix: GAK!
Chakotay: Someone stole your lungs?
Neelix: GAK!
Chakotay: Then how are you saying "Gak"?
Neelix: Shut up.

Timmy fell down a well? Hehe.

Doc: I'm sorry, but Neelix will never be able to leave this restraint.
Kes: NOOOOOOOO!
Doc: And he'll have to spend the rest of his life in Sickbay with me.
Neelix: NOOOOOOOO!

It's amusing to ponder whether or not Doc or Neelix would be more tortured by this arrangement.

Neelix: I'm bored. Will you sing for me, Doc?
Doc: Pfft. Me? Sing? That'll be the day.

Hehe. I was able to get a lot of examples for our TVTropes page from this fiver.

Kes: I'll give Neelix one of my lungs. That way he'll remember me even after I'm gone.
All: BWAHAHAHAHAHA!
Janeway: Good one, Kes, but go ahead anyways.

This one seems a but tasteless. Neelix mentioned Kes plenty of times in the later seasons.

Memory Alpha

* Originally it was supposed to be Paris' heart stolen. To me a problem with this is that I jolly well expect Doc to be able to replicate and implant a human heart. It would have to be either Kes or Neelix to justify inadequate medical knowledge.
* Originally the Vidiians were called "Vaphorans", but the actors couldn't pronounce the word the same.

Nitcentral

* The terms "planetoid", "planet", and "moon" are used for the Vidiian base, these aren't remotely synonymous.
* Even if the Vidiians could transplant Neelix's lungs back, wouldn't they be tainted by the Phage by now?
* Much discussion about whether this episode is a ripoff of "Spock's Brain." I feel that the similarities are weak enough to not really play a factor (although I wonder if Doc has the Fabrini medical database in him).
* Why didn't Janeway immediately impose isolation when the Phage was brought up?
* Someone wondered why Doc couldn't clone new lungs using Neelix's DNA. I would immediately retort that Doc doesn't know enough about Talaxians yet. Were the Delta Quadrant races seeded by the Progenitors? I'm not sure.
* How come they only took Neelix's lungs as opposed to all of them?
* Someone else brought up my idea of a transplant from someone that Doc COULD make new lungs for.

Delta Blues

* Jim wonders if Doc is more capable of emotion because of the bioneural gelpacks. I am extremely dubious of this idea.

[Nate the Great]

February 13th, 1995, "The Cloud"

Fiver by Jade

Yet another example of good character work but a horrible premise. And this episode should've happened earlier.

The Episode

JANEWAY [OC]: Personal log, Stardate 48546.2. Our journey home is several weeks old now...

Try almost three months, Captain. We should've had a full-blown Maquis mutiny by now.

JANEWAY [OC]: At the Academy, we are taught that a captain is expected to maintain a certain distance. Until now, I've always been comfortable with that distance.

Ugh. I'll skip the screed, but I could pontificate for a LONG TIME about this one.

KIM: There's an ancient Chinese curse, Captain. May you live in interesting times. Mealtime is always interesting now that Neelix is in the kitchen.

This isn't actually a Chinese curse, the thing comes from the writings of a 19th century politician. Terry Pratchett proposed two more curses to form a trinity with this one, "may you come to the attention of those in authority" and "may the gods give you everything you ask for."

JANEWAY: We shouldn't judge him too harshly. He is helping us conserve replicator energy.

Given the size of the airponics bay I have doubts that the crew could really survive on crops grown on board.

PARIS: And I'm sure the gastrointestinal problems will go away as soon as our systems get used to his, er, gourmet touch.

Ugh. Surely Doc could come up with futuristic equivalents of Beano to make the Delta Quadrant crops more compatible with Alpha Quadrant biology.

KIM: We should've asked her to join us.
PARIS: Ensigns don't invite captains to sit down.
KIM: Why not?
PARIS: Because they don't.
KIM: Well, what's wrong with showing a little courtesy?
PARIS: Captains don't want courtesy, they want respect. That's why they don't get chummy with the lower ranks.
KIM: Well, who else is she supposed to get chummy with out here? There aren't many other captains and admirals for her to talk to.
PARIS: If she wants to sit with us, she'll ask us to join her. That's the way it's done.

An interesting topic, especially combined with the knowledge that the senior officers had their own mess hall before Neelix took it over. Everyone used the same mess hall on TOS, but the 1701 is a lot smaller than Voyager.

Even so, I have to agree with Tom that the senior officer should approach the junior officer.

JANEWAY: Neelix. Do we have any coffee left?
NEELIX: No, but we have something even better.
JANEWAY: I don't want something even better. I want coffee.
NEELIX: It's made from a proteinaceous seed I discovered on an expedition
JANEWAY: Never mind.

Given that other Alpha Quadrant races have their own coffee equivalents (although I'll pass on the fish juice, thank you), wouldn't Neelix have some Talaxian equivalent already? Even with the Kazon around there should be some basic trade routes that Voyager will have enountered by now.

JANEWAY: I'll use one of my replicator rations for coffee.
NEELIX: That would not be appropriate, Captain.
JANEWAY: I beg your pardon?
NEELIX: You need to set an example for the crew.
JANEWAY: Well, thank you for reminding me.
NEELIX: You're welcome. After all, if you want the crew to begin to accept natural food alternatives instead of further depleting our energy reserves, you need to encourage them by your own choices, don't you?

A good point. Even the captain shouldn't be exempt from emergency conditions.

Then again, I'm reminded of a story from the very good book "Now Hear This" about life in the Navy in the Fifties. Even when the ship is in an area suffering from a drought and there's an onboard water shortage, the pipe going to the flag officer's mess isn't turned off like the others who only get access to water twice a day. So the local goldbrickers tap into the pipe and start selling water to the sailors.

JANEWAY: There's coffee in that nebula.

This line is iconic and enjoyably put to music in the John Worsley classic "Tuvok, the Vessel's Vulcan."

JANEWAY: I'm worried about them. I wish we had a counsellor on board, but the nature of our mission didn't require one.

Ha ha ha. I didn't remember this one. It occurs to me that any mission involving Maquis would require a counsellor to help avoid possible conflicts of interests or stress when confronting the Cardassians.

CHAKOTAY: We're taught that an animal guide accompanies us through life. Basically, it's what Carl Jung thought he invented when he came up with his active imagination technique in 1932, but we've been doing pretty much the same thing for centuries.

I didn't remember this one either. There's another screed to be had here, but I won't write it.

JANEWAY: Is there a different animal guide for everyone?
CHAKOTAY: Actually, yes.
JANEWAY: Let me guess. Yours is a bear.
CHAKOTAY: Why do you say that?
JANEWAY: You strike me as the bear type.
CHAKOTAY: Thank you. The bear is a very powerful animal. It has great pokattah. But he's not my animal guide. The creature that guides us doesn't define who we are. It merely chooses to be with us.
JANEWAY: Okay. If not a bear, then what?
CHAKOTAY: I can't tell you that. It would offend my animal guide if I spoke its name.

This is an interesting conversation, but my problem is this notion that animal's only sense of identity is it's species. Or maybe I'm being influenced by reading Bambi recently (FYI, don't bother, there's even less plot than the movie, very much one of those "stuff happens, the end" stories). Chakotay should be able to say "Mickey" or "a mouse" without giving the other name and he wouldn't be revealing the full identity.

KIM: I've never seen anything like it.
(Tuvok uses his comm. badge.)
TUVOK: Tuvok to Kim. Mister Kim, that is a comment we'd prefer not to hear from a senior officer on the Bridge. It makes the junior officers nervous.
KIM: Yes, sir.

Why? Is the Enterprise the only ship that's meant to boldly go where no one has gone before?

JANEWAY: What do you make of it, Mister Tuvok?
TUVOK: I am unable to offer identification, Captain.
(Kim uses his comm. badge.)
KIM: Kim to Tuvok. In other words, you've never seen anything like it. Oh, I promise not to tell the junior officers.

This is a rather weak joke. Furthermore, Tuvok is a security officer, why is he expected to know everything about spatial phenomena? That's Harry's job!

NEELIX: Kes! Now look what she's gotten us into!
KES: Do all nebulas look like that?
NEELIX: I wouldn't know. I'm smart enough to go around nebulas when I encounter them.

This seems overly cautious on Neelix's part. He's not supposed to be this much of a coward. And they're overdoing Kes' excitement for exploration here.

CHAKOTAY: Whatever they are, they're passing right through our shields.
JANEWAY: Try reversing the shield polarity.

They really do rely on "reverse the polarity" too much, don't they? At least say "remodulate the shields!"

CHAKOTAY: We have a complement of thirty eight photon torpedoes at our disposal, Captain.
JANEWAY: And no way to replace them after they're gone.

This is completely ludicrous. Torpedo casings would be energy intensive to replicate, but it should be possible to do at a slow rate. Then you just bleed off matter and antimatter from the ship's stores.

Ex Astris Scientia counts 93 torpedoes used during the series.

[Nate the Great]

PARIS: I'm having trouble navigating through the energy currents. It's as thick as a Toarian ice storm out there.

Only mention of Toarians. I would think you could just say "Breen" instead.

KIM: I remember being in my mother's womb.

Well, that's just creepy, but you have to admit it's one of Voyager's immortal lines.

PARIS: Gaunt Gary, Ames Pool Hall, New York City, 1953. They say that he hustled the great Willie Mosconi himself.

Gaunt Gary is played by Larry Hankin, who I remember best as Mr. Heckles in Friends.

Willie Mosconi was a real pool player, back in the '40s and '50s he won the World Straight Pool Championships nineteen times. Straight pool is a variant where a player tries to pocket as many balls in a row as possible ignoring solids and stripes.

GAUNT GARY: The game is pool, kid. Pool. I don't suppose you'd care to wager a fin on a game or two?
...
KIM: What's a fin?
PARIS: I'm not sure. Some old kind of Scandinavian currency.

Actually a fin is just a five dollar bet.

EMH: Now there's an interesting concept. A hologram that programs himself. What would I do with that ability? Create a family? Raise an army?

I remember this line. He will of course create a family, but as for raising an army that'll have to wait until "The Killing Game".

EMH: A nebula? What were we doing in a nebula? No, wait, don't tell me. We were investigating. That's all we do around here. Why pretend we're going home at all? All we're going to do is investigate every cubic millimetre of this quadrant, aren't we?

Even early on Doc got the best lines.

CHAKOTAY: My medicine bundle. I've never showed it to anyone before. After what you said this morning, I thought it was important to let you see.

He never showed Seska? It's an interesting idea, what Bajorans and Cardassians would think of the idea of spirit guides. I refer you to Garak's pet regnar (a kind of Cardassian lizard) in the novel "A Stitch in Time".

CHAKOTAY: My ancestors used psychoactive herbs to assist their vision quests. Now they're no longer necessary. Our scientists have found more modern ways to facilitate the search for animal guides.

As SF Debris said, this lets Chakotay do Native American stuff without drugs that the viewer would disapprove of.

JANEWAY: The Commander was introducing me to my animal guide.
TORRES: I hope that you have better luck with yours than I had with mine.
CHAKOTAY: B'Elanna's the only one I know who tried to kill her animal guide.

So Chakotay showed B'Elanna the akoonah but not his medicine bundle? So why did he bother showing the rest of the stuff to Janeway?

NEELIX: I just reached my limit. So if you don't mind, Kes and I will wait on board my little vessel for you to return.
JANEWAY: All our crews are busy preparing for this mission. I'm not pulling them off their duties to prepare your ship for launch. And I'm not going drop you off on the side of the road every time we hit a bump.

A good exchange, although it should've happened earlier.

JANEWAY: For the moment, find yourself a seat with a good view, because just like Jonah and the whale, you're going in.
...
NEELIX: Jonah? Whale?

Why would Neelix have any idea what Jonah and the Whale is? What was Janeway thinking?

TORRES: The only way we can shut down all thrusters is to vent their deuterium into space. We can't afford to lose all that fuel.

Well, that's stupid.

The Fiver

Janeway: Hi boys! If I say something funny, will you laugh?
Kim: No, ma'am, we're too nervous.

Poor Harry.

Paris: See, isn't Sandrine's a loevly place?

Typo alert!

Kim: I'm saving myself for Seven.
Paris: Good luck with that....

Whatever happened there anyway? Did Harry formally give up or was the plotline just dropped?

Chakotay: Here's your animal guide.
Janeway: Ooh, a lizard! I think I'll call him...Tom.
Torres: Hey, Tom's mine!
Janeway: Not for another two seasons, he's not! J/P is such a marvelous thing....
Chakotay: Hey!
Janeway: J/C is too, of course.
Torres: Ahem.
Janeway: Fine, and P/T! Why are you here, anyway?

This is odd for a Season One joke. I thought that Janeway and Tom had more of a mother/son relationship at the start of the show. As a friend of his father she would be very intimidating to him.

Paris: Yay, we can surf out of the nebula!
All: Yay! "Eeeeeeeeverybody's gone suuuuuuuuuurfing, surfing nebulaaaaaaaaaaaas...."

Have I mentioned lately how much I like the Beach Boys?

Neelix: I hereby appoint myself morale officer.
Tuvok: No, have mercy, HAVE MERCY!

Been dipping into the Trellium D have we?

Memory Alpha

* Memory Alpha calls this a bottle show but I disagree, what with the new pool hall and spirit animal forest sets and the living nebula.
* Much conflict behind the scenes about showing a pool hall without showing alcohol or tobacco. This confuses me, as both were shown in the Dixon Hill program and it was made clear that it's not real alcohol or tobacco. They could've dropped a line about that.
* In the first season the creators were scared to show too much of Chakotay's culture lest they offend someone. I'd argue that such things should've been sorted out in the series creation stage.
* The idea of the akoonah was controversial, which Taylor liked. I think that she should've worried more, especially when this is the flagship show of a new network.

Nitcentral

* Isn't the spirit animal talk a little too personal to be having on the bridge?
* One member wonders why Janeway is so excited about having a spirit guide when elsewhere she seems uber-atheist. A good point.

Delta Blues

Jim liked the character work, but thought that the nebula plot was too unoriginal and done better in prior shows.

[Nate the Great]

As you may have noticed, I haven't updated this thread or the DS9 one recently. Well, it's going to be even longer since Real Life has reared its ugly head again. I'm about to enter a period where I'll be very busy and I'll be without my desktop computer for awhile. I'll still be around and I can make short replies with my cell phone, but don't expect any long entries or ones with links in the coming weeks and months.

[Nate the Great]

And I'm back. I hope to do another retrospective entry in the next few days. In the meantime I hope to get some replies, especially from Zeke. This is how the site started, after all.

[NAHTMMM]

Originally Posted by Nate the Great

February 13th, 1995, "The Cloud"


NEELIX: Kes! Now look what she's gotten us into!
KES: Do all nebulas look like that?
NEELIX: I wouldn't know. I'm smart enough to go around nebulas when I encounter them.

This seems overly cautious on Neelix's part. He's not supposed to be this much of a coward. And they're overdoing Kes' excitement for exploration here.

Well it didn't work out for Khan, the Enterprise-E just plowing into a nebula ambush was one of the dumbest things among many candidates in Nemesis, then there was that loop-the-loop the NX-01 pulled on whoever was following them that one time although I'm not sure that was a nebula . . . nebulas are bad news in Trek.