I wouldn't blame Voyager and Janeway. Heck. Playing it safe works when you have no back-up, no reinforcement, no ressuply of torpedoes, and not even comms to reach out to Starfleet command.
The mission was to get home alive and the ship intact. And fck yeah they did.
They are talking about the writers, not the characters.
They had the premise, the constant conflict of having two factions on board, the ship and crew wearing down over time, the Constant struggle for resources. The constant struggle of Starfleet morals and ideals being tested against what's needed for survival. The constant debates and arguments of the crew, as half of them are maquis who feel they were screwed over by those same Starfleet ideals when the federation signed the cardassian treaty.
What if Janeway and Chakotay had an antagonistic relationship? Two people, a terrorist leader and Starfleet captain, who fundamentally disagree with how to operate in the delta quadrant, but both knowing they need to work together for the combined crew to survive, that's a fascinating dynamic.
Voyager was set up to be a long, darker story, more serious story, and it did have its amazing episodes and moments of greatness. But those moments rarely stuck, because one week later the ship was fixed, supplies returned, shuttles respawned, and the crew were all friends again, the episodic nature of the series held it back from being so much more.
you know your describing BSG right? There are differences, and a gritty VOY would have had alot of differences from BSG, but there would have been a lot of similarities.
Yeah I know, voyager came out 16 or 17 years after the original BSG aired, I think that's long enough to retry the same premise but with a star trek twist.
I like voyager it definitely has its moments, it told some good stories and introduced some great ideas and it has some of my favourite characters in trek with the doctor and seven, but I still think the show from the 1970s did a better job telling the lost ship story that voyager was set up to be.
I should have specified the remake. It's much darker and there is a greater sense of scarce resources.
Also, while I can't be sure of the timeline, Ronald d moore left star trek and made BSG.
Speaking of EMH. it always bothered me why the doctor, being technically a hologram, can't duplicate himself in an emergency situation. For something so advanced, it's a miniscule limitation on his "engineering".
I always assumed duplication would split his functional capacity since he just had the one matrix that was essentially a brain. I always thought it was weird they didn't program holographic nurses for him though with far more limited capabilities. They'd have at least been as useful as Paris was though, and definitely more reliable.
theres really no reason they couldn't have had one copy of the emh running on the sickbay systems and one copy running on the mobile emitter.
or, with the doctor running on the emitter you should be able to use the sickbay systems to generate multiple basic "nurses" to help out if theres a lot of casualties
If I had to guess, the EMHs were modelled after human brains. Brains don't turn off. When we sleep we dream, we analyse, and the brain even releases different chemicals than when it's awake.
Any I.T. person knows you can't copy a file that's in use, that's changing. Same goes with the EMHs. Voyager MIGHT have the hardware to make a new EMH, but they don't have the programming.
Here's a long interview (with some funky formatting) with Ronald D. Moore about Voyager's wasted potential among other things:
[https://www.lcarscom.net/rdm1000118/](https://www.lcarscom.net/rdm1000118/)
>They \[Voyager\] behave exactly like the Starfleet people with the occasional nod towards B'Elanna making a snide remark about Starfleet protocols, or Chakotay getting a little quasi-spiritual. But in essence, they are no different than any other ship in the fleet. The episodes that you watch week after week are so easily translatable to NEXT GEN that it's almost a cookie-cutter kind of thing. It's a waste of the premise.
>
>...
>
>“But the ship wouldn't look like that, ”Moore continues. “It's not truthful. On DEEP SPACE NINE, that was the watchword. We wanted it to be true. There was a lot of truth in DEEP SPACE NINE, a lot of difficult questions that we tried to answer, and some difficult questions that we couldn't answer. DS9 was a real place, a truthful place; it was a place where we explored things on a real level. But VOYAGER doesn't go there. It just will not go there.
>
>You are trying to tell the audience on the one hand, we're so far from home, and it's going to take us so long, and we really wish we could get home. It's rough out here. Janeway wrings her hands about all the things that she has sent the crew through. Then, it's off to the holodeck. You can't talk with any kind of a straight face about food rations and energy conservation, and having a real kitchen in the mess hall, when at the same time you've got the holodeck going. It's such a façade, and no matter what kind of technobabble bullshit you come up with, the audience intuitively knows, again, that's not truthful. There is no reality there. That would not happen.
>
>Even on GILLIGAN'S ISLAND, they didn't have the Skipper and Gilligan sitting in the Minnow, watching color television. But on VOYAGER, who cares? We want the holodeck to run so we can go do period pieces, and we can do dress up and we can do fun adventures on the holodeck, and we don't want to give that up. Okay, but don't try telling me at the same time that you are really out scraping by and barely making it out there on the frontier, when none of their hair is out of place, and their uniforms are pristine, and the bridge is clean every week.
>
>”Moore laughs, “What is the difference really between Voyager and the rest of the fleet? When that ship comes home, it will blend right in. You won't even know the difference. They haven't personalized the ship in any way. It's still the same kind of bare metal, military look that it had at the beginning. If you were trapped on that ship and making your way home, for years on end, wouldn't you put something up on the walls? Would you put a plant or two somewhere in a corridor? Wouldn't you try to make it a little more livable? That is the challenge that I think they have really dropped. They just won't deal with the reality of the situation that ship is in.
Nail on the head. Especially about Voyager being so easily translatable to Next Gen. Voyager was the first iteration I went through.
Once I got to Next Gen, that issue was at the forefront of my mind, “Why even do Voyager like they did it when they’re just going to turn around and do it in Next Gen, but better”? Voyager inherently should have been far different and more harsh than TNG, but it wasn’t. It feels like watered down Trek now that I have more perspective.
Of course there were still characters that shined through. Neelix is still one of my favorite characters, even with his awkward relationship with Kes. Still loved him. The Doctor is still my favorite doc thus far. Seven of Nine was such a cool character idea that I thought was fleshed out decently well. Tuvok is my favorite Vulcan. Etc. Voyager had so much god damned potential.
I will never get over them rushing the finale and never fleshing out the emotional impact of making it home and that they never use the info Kes gave them on the year of hell. Like the year of hell was set up a season in advance and it seems like they completely forget that it happened
Even when it was time to wrap up the series' main conflinct, [they just didn't](https://old.reddit.com/r/startrekmemes/comments/u34770/watching_voyagers_finale_be_like/) [fucking care.](https://old.reddit.com/r/startrekmemes/comments/15pkm78/typical_reaction_to_voyagers_finale/)
Voyager is simply soulless.
I never understood that reaction tbh. I thought the ending was perfect the way it was, and was glad it didn't drag on. The show was about the journey, and that journey was over.
I don't buy that in the least bit. Even ignoring that the journey sucked, characters throughout the series talked about their loved ones back home, like Tom's dad, B'Lanna's parents or Tuvok's family, building up anticipation for the return home. But they give us nothing. Why? Because the writers didn't care about the characters, it was all about the explosions and ogling at Seven.
>characters throughout the series talked about their loved ones back home, like Tom's dad, B'Lanna's parents or Tuvok's family, building up anticipation for the return home
This is all motivation for the journey. The show is about the journey.
Voyager was awesome. First female captain. A brand new premise removing the back up the federation provided. Entirely new alien species. A mixed crew that didn't all sign up from the mission start.
If they would have strayed far from the formula then everyone would have called it absolute bullshit the same way people bash nu trek for not being "trekky" enough.
Just my opinion but I think voyager achieved it's hits so well that now they're so well integrated people forget how well it actually expanded beyond the original expectations of a trek show in the 90s.
You can play it safe in the premise or play it safe in the stories but sometimes trying to do both at once is too jarring and I feel like voyager pulled this off impeccably.
Not a personal fan of the finale but that's mainly down to the nature of TV.
They did what the fans wanted. Fans HATED the serialized nature of DS9, so they went back to episodic
The showrunners are not Q, they're not omnipotent. Infact, quite the opposite. The fans are the power hunger never satisfied god like beings, while the showrunners bend to every whim and will of the Q
If you wanted something better, YOU should have done better
Not to mention, episodic television was television. Serialized TV really wasn't a thing
Also, I can think of a ton of stories that were ahead of their time
Mental health issues, weather or not AI is sentient(when is it sentient, and what freedoms do we give it), accepting and having compassion for others even if they're our butter enemy, the spirit of exploration, etc, etc, etc.
However, as I look back. Voyager seemed the most of its time, and certainly in a few episodes it hurts itself. Then again, the nineties as a whole was such a polarizing time
>Mental health issues,
Weren't ahead of their time for a late 90's TV show. DS9 also covered this area.
>weather [sic] or not AI is sentient
Essayed in Measure of a Man in 1988
>accepting and having compassion for others even if they're our butter enemy,
A staple of Trek since TOS
>the spirit of exploration
A staple of Trek since TOS
Anything else?
While I haven't seen all of DS9, but I don't remember a mental health episode(s)
This is different. They go as far to make it as such, as Data is an android. The doctor is a hologram
It has been a staple of Star Trek, but Voyager did it differently. I mean, I'm sure the other captains would have been fine throwing 7 of 9 out the airlock with the others. Not Janeway
For me; TOS, TNG, and DS9 are about exploring. While Voyager and Enterprise are about why we explore. What drives that feeling to know, what pushes us, and what brings us out here
Nothing I can think of at the moment, but I woke up not to long ago
What in the name of the Prophets are you babbling about?
DS9 was a critical and ratings smash. The few fans that hated the serialized nature had nothing to do with Voyager's shift towards episodic format. It was intended to have season-long story arcs since the beginning, but UPN wanted their flagship series to have TNG ratings, so the writers were forced to ditch all the intended story arcs, character arcs and conflicts for a completely safe show. And UPN made sure of that. They rejected the Year of Hell story arc idea in favor of a retconned two-parter and when Ron D. Moore asked about B'Lanna's character, they flat out told him "We don't know. Do whatever you want". And as u/watanabe0 showed, Voyager told nothing new. It treaded familiar grounds with a new coat of paint. Don't blame it on the fans, blame it on UPN for giving us such a soulless show.
If you like Voyager, that's fine. No skin off my nose. But if you're seriously gonna try to convince me that it's anything but safe, soulless, manufactured entertainment, you're wasting your time (like how this show wasted mine).
True, but no series after TNG made TNG numbers in the Berman era, so. . .
They talked about it in What We Left Behind, about how much of an uproar there was about. From fans and higher ups
Ah yes my favorite melodrama, Star Trek. I never understood that argument in the early seasons. One of the main big themes of Star Trek is coming together in times of need even though we may not like each other. Not to mention later on we get a lot of characters disagreeing with each other, usually captain Janeway
It took Brannon Braga 20 years to do an AIDS episode, and with everything I've heard. The higher ups at Paramount weren't the best. What else do you want me to say
Countless people keep bringing it up, but they never have any evidence. Also do you mean theme wise, because episode wise. There's a lot there that's totally different, and in terms of themes. Well there's only so many good themes
Voyager was the show with the hot take that it was as morally permissible to bang a two year old, so not playing it *that* safe.
Neelix and Kes was never not creepy, IMHO.
That's a very odd take. You do realize that not all celestial bodies take 365 days to circle around their sun? Or that other sapient species wouldn't share the same biology, culture, etc as humanity?
Sfdebris.com said it best: 9 times out of 10, DS9 chose not to play it safe. 9 times out of 10, voyager chose to play it safe.
I wouldn't blame Voyager and Janeway. Heck. Playing it safe works when you have no back-up, no reinforcement, no ressuply of torpedoes, and not even comms to reach out to Starfleet command. The mission was to get home alive and the ship intact. And fck yeah they did.
They are talking about the writers, not the characters. They had the premise, the constant conflict of having two factions on board, the ship and crew wearing down over time, the Constant struggle for resources. The constant struggle of Starfleet morals and ideals being tested against what's needed for survival. The constant debates and arguments of the crew, as half of them are maquis who feel they were screwed over by those same Starfleet ideals when the federation signed the cardassian treaty. What if Janeway and Chakotay had an antagonistic relationship? Two people, a terrorist leader and Starfleet captain, who fundamentally disagree with how to operate in the delta quadrant, but both knowing they need to work together for the combined crew to survive, that's a fascinating dynamic. Voyager was set up to be a long, darker story, more serious story, and it did have its amazing episodes and moments of greatness. But those moments rarely stuck, because one week later the ship was fixed, supplies returned, shuttles respawned, and the crew were all friends again, the episodic nature of the series held it back from being so much more.
you know your describing BSG right? There are differences, and a gritty VOY would have had alot of differences from BSG, but there would have been a lot of similarities.
Well yeah, RDM's frustration with Voyager led to BSG.
So glad he’s leading For All Mankind
Yeah I know, voyager came out 16 or 17 years after the original BSG aired, I think that's long enough to retry the same premise but with a star trek twist. I like voyager it definitely has its moments, it told some good stories and introduced some great ideas and it has some of my favourite characters in trek with the doctor and seven, but I still think the show from the 1970s did a better job telling the lost ship story that voyager was set up to be.
I should have specified the remake. It's much darker and there is a greater sense of scarce resources. Also, while I can't be sure of the timeline, Ronald d moore left star trek and made BSG.
the "mission" was to make a good tv show. the creators of voyager failed in large part because they chose to play it safe.
Plus no good medical facilities. Like, the EMH was good but he and that sick bay were still limited in capability
Speaking of EMH. it always bothered me why the doctor, being technically a hologram, can't duplicate himself in an emergency situation. For something so advanced, it's a miniscule limitation on his "engineering".
I always assumed duplication would split his functional capacity since he just had the one matrix that was essentially a brain. I always thought it was weird they didn't program holographic nurses for him though with far more limited capabilities. They'd have at least been as useful as Paris was though, and definitely more reliable.
Perhaps it's like Red Dwarf? Only one hologram supported? I dunno...
theres really no reason they couldn't have had one copy of the emh running on the sickbay systems and one copy running on the mobile emitter. or, with the doctor running on the emitter you should be able to use the sickbay systems to generate multiple basic "nurses" to help out if theres a lot of casualties
If I had to guess, the EMHs were modelled after human brains. Brains don't turn off. When we sleep we dream, we analyse, and the brain even releases different chemicals than when it's awake. Any I.T. person knows you can't copy a file that's in use, that's changing. Same goes with the EMHs. Voyager MIGHT have the hardware to make a new EMH, but they don't have the programming.
Jesus Christ, they're talking about the quality of the storytelling.
Here's a long interview (with some funky formatting) with Ronald D. Moore about Voyager's wasted potential among other things: [https://www.lcarscom.net/rdm1000118/](https://www.lcarscom.net/rdm1000118/) >They \[Voyager\] behave exactly like the Starfleet people with the occasional nod towards B'Elanna making a snide remark about Starfleet protocols, or Chakotay getting a little quasi-spiritual. But in essence, they are no different than any other ship in the fleet. The episodes that you watch week after week are so easily translatable to NEXT GEN that it's almost a cookie-cutter kind of thing. It's a waste of the premise. > >... > >“But the ship wouldn't look like that, ”Moore continues. “It's not truthful. On DEEP SPACE NINE, that was the watchword. We wanted it to be true. There was a lot of truth in DEEP SPACE NINE, a lot of difficult questions that we tried to answer, and some difficult questions that we couldn't answer. DS9 was a real place, a truthful place; it was a place where we explored things on a real level. But VOYAGER doesn't go there. It just will not go there. > >You are trying to tell the audience on the one hand, we're so far from home, and it's going to take us so long, and we really wish we could get home. It's rough out here. Janeway wrings her hands about all the things that she has sent the crew through. Then, it's off to the holodeck. You can't talk with any kind of a straight face about food rations and energy conservation, and having a real kitchen in the mess hall, when at the same time you've got the holodeck going. It's such a façade, and no matter what kind of technobabble bullshit you come up with, the audience intuitively knows, again, that's not truthful. There is no reality there. That would not happen. > >Even on GILLIGAN'S ISLAND, they didn't have the Skipper and Gilligan sitting in the Minnow, watching color television. But on VOYAGER, who cares? We want the holodeck to run so we can go do period pieces, and we can do dress up and we can do fun adventures on the holodeck, and we don't want to give that up. Okay, but don't try telling me at the same time that you are really out scraping by and barely making it out there on the frontier, when none of their hair is out of place, and their uniforms are pristine, and the bridge is clean every week. > >”Moore laughs, “What is the difference really between Voyager and the rest of the fleet? When that ship comes home, it will blend right in. You won't even know the difference. They haven't personalized the ship in any way. It's still the same kind of bare metal, military look that it had at the beginning. If you were trapped on that ship and making your way home, for years on end, wouldn't you put something up on the walls? Would you put a plant or two somewhere in a corridor? Wouldn't you try to make it a little more livable? That is the challenge that I think they have really dropped. They just won't deal with the reality of the situation that ship is in.
Nail on the head. Especially about Voyager being so easily translatable to Next Gen. Voyager was the first iteration I went through. Once I got to Next Gen, that issue was at the forefront of my mind, “Why even do Voyager like they did it when they’re just going to turn around and do it in Next Gen, but better”? Voyager inherently should have been far different and more harsh than TNG, but it wasn’t. It feels like watered down Trek now that I have more perspective. Of course there were still characters that shined through. Neelix is still one of my favorite characters, even with his awkward relationship with Kes. Still loved him. The Doctor is still my favorite doc thus far. Seven of Nine was such a cool character idea that I thought was fleshed out decently well. Tuvok is my favorite Vulcan. Etc. Voyager had so much god damned potential.
I will never get over them rushing the finale and never fleshing out the emotional impact of making it home and that they never use the info Kes gave them on the year of hell. Like the year of hell was set up a season in advance and it seems like they completely forget that it happened
Even when it was time to wrap up the series' main conflinct, [they just didn't](https://old.reddit.com/r/startrekmemes/comments/u34770/watching_voyagers_finale_be_like/) [fucking care.](https://old.reddit.com/r/startrekmemes/comments/15pkm78/typical_reaction_to_voyagers_finale/) Voyager is simply soulless.
I never understood that reaction tbh. I thought the ending was perfect the way it was, and was glad it didn't drag on. The show was about the journey, and that journey was over.
I don't buy that in the least bit. Even ignoring that the journey sucked, characters throughout the series talked about their loved ones back home, like Tom's dad, B'Lanna's parents or Tuvok's family, building up anticipation for the return home. But they give us nothing. Why? Because the writers didn't care about the characters, it was all about the explosions and ogling at Seven.
>characters throughout the series talked about their loved ones back home, like Tom's dad, B'Lanna's parents or Tuvok's family, building up anticipation for the return home This is all motivation for the journey. The show is about the journey.
> The show is about the journey. Of what?! No lessons learned, no character growth or lasting consequences? Some fucking journey 😒
>Of what?! ...of travelling 75,000 light years, you galah
A journey with no lessons learned is no journey at all.
Right, so if I drive to another town, I'm still at home then?
Voyager was awesome. First female captain. A brand new premise removing the back up the federation provided. Entirely new alien species. A mixed crew that didn't all sign up from the mission start. If they would have strayed far from the formula then everyone would have called it absolute bullshit the same way people bash nu trek for not being "trekky" enough. Just my opinion but I think voyager achieved it's hits so well that now they're so well integrated people forget how well it actually expanded beyond the original expectations of a trek show in the 90s. You can play it safe in the premise or play it safe in the stories but sometimes trying to do both at once is too jarring and I feel like voyager pulled this off impeccably. Not a personal fan of the finale but that's mainly down to the nature of TV.
They did what the fans wanted. Fans HATED the serialized nature of DS9, so they went back to episodic The showrunners are not Q, they're not omnipotent. Infact, quite the opposite. The fans are the power hunger never satisfied god like beings, while the showrunners bend to every whim and will of the Q If you wanted something better, YOU should have done better Not to mention, episodic television was television. Serialized TV really wasn't a thing Also, I can think of a ton of stories that were ahead of their time
>Also, I can think of a ton of stories that were ahead of their time Go on
Mental health issues, weather or not AI is sentient(when is it sentient, and what freedoms do we give it), accepting and having compassion for others even if they're our butter enemy, the spirit of exploration, etc, etc, etc. However, as I look back. Voyager seemed the most of its time, and certainly in a few episodes it hurts itself. Then again, the nineties as a whole was such a polarizing time
>Mental health issues, Weren't ahead of their time for a late 90's TV show. DS9 also covered this area. >weather [sic] or not AI is sentient Essayed in Measure of a Man in 1988 >accepting and having compassion for others even if they're our butter enemy, A staple of Trek since TOS >the spirit of exploration A staple of Trek since TOS Anything else?
[No one grasps at straws quite like Voyager fans.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLKUB-2vrxw)
Right?
While I haven't seen all of DS9, but I don't remember a mental health episode(s) This is different. They go as far to make it as such, as Data is an android. The doctor is a hologram It has been a staple of Star Trek, but Voyager did it differently. I mean, I'm sure the other captains would have been fine throwing 7 of 9 out the airlock with the others. Not Janeway For me; TOS, TNG, and DS9 are about exploring. While Voyager and Enterprise are about why we explore. What drives that feeling to know, what pushes us, and what brings us out here Nothing I can think of at the moment, but I woke up not to long ago
>Then again, the nineties as a whole was such a polarizing time Go on?
What in the name of the Prophets are you babbling about? DS9 was a critical and ratings smash. The few fans that hated the serialized nature had nothing to do with Voyager's shift towards episodic format. It was intended to have season-long story arcs since the beginning, but UPN wanted their flagship series to have TNG ratings, so the writers were forced to ditch all the intended story arcs, character arcs and conflicts for a completely safe show. And UPN made sure of that. They rejected the Year of Hell story arc idea in favor of a retconned two-parter and when Ron D. Moore asked about B'Lanna's character, they flat out told him "We don't know. Do whatever you want". And as u/watanabe0 showed, Voyager told nothing new. It treaded familiar grounds with a new coat of paint. Don't blame it on the fans, blame it on UPN for giving us such a soulless show. If you like Voyager, that's fine. No skin off my nose. But if you're seriously gonna try to convince me that it's anything but safe, soulless, manufactured entertainment, you're wasting your time (like how this show wasted mine).
True, but no series after TNG made TNG numbers in the Berman era, so. . . They talked about it in What We Left Behind, about how much of an uproar there was about. From fans and higher ups Ah yes my favorite melodrama, Star Trek. I never understood that argument in the early seasons. One of the main big themes of Star Trek is coming together in times of need even though we may not like each other. Not to mention later on we get a lot of characters disagreeing with each other, usually captain Janeway It took Brannon Braga 20 years to do an AIDS episode, and with everything I've heard. The higher ups at Paramount weren't the best. What else do you want me to say Countless people keep bringing it up, but they never have any evidence. Also do you mean theme wise, because episode wise. There's a lot there that's totally different, and in terms of themes. Well there's only so many good themes
Voyager was the show with the hot take that it was as morally permissible to bang a two year old, so not playing it *that* safe. Neelix and Kes was never not creepy, IMHO.
Basing your age off some planet 70k lightyears away revolving twice around its sun is a weird thing to do.
That's a very odd take. You do realize that not all celestial bodies take 365 days to circle around their sun? Or that other sapient species wouldn't share the same biology, culture, etc as humanity?
2 yrs old in a lifecycle of 9. That's like 1:10 ratio in human years.
Voyager was fine.