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Talondor wrote:I just got done watching the first ten episodes and one thing is perfectly clear, Paris is Eddie Haskel to Kim's Wally Cleaver.

Heh. Nice analogy. To be honest, Voyager didn't suffer the way TNG and DS9 from being painfully slow to start - it may have had a better start than the other two, it simply just never got off the ground much past it, whereas the other two soared after Season 2, and had some high moments before.

I have fond memories of Voyager as it was the first trek I watched. I imagin its the same for people who first watched TOS.

Teaos wrote:I have fond memories of Voyager as it was the first trek I watched. I imagin its the same for people who first watched TOS.

Indeed, I know you and I have had that discussion before.

Mikey wrote:

Teaos wrote:I have fond memories of Voyager as it was the first trek I watched. I imagin its the same for people who first watched TOS.

Indeed, I know you and I have had that discussion before.

I cannot disagree with that. I remember TOS reruns and the movies as a 3 year old, but when TNG debuted just shy of my 5th birthday, I vividly remember first viewings of nearly every episode, first with my father, then on my own as the series moved on. Some are horribly flawed and yet I can watch them time and again. Hell, I felt that way of Voyager, as it debuted as a preteen and my memory was that much better - I just find they hold up so poorly in comparison.

Some of Voyager still makes me cringe, but I find on a whole it was a constant 3.5 out of ten with the odd 8 and 9 thrown in. The others had a higher average, but often sunk lower for several episodes. I stopped watching TNG many times due to boring episodes. Voyager even when bad wasn't boring often. TNG was, at least in the first few seasons.

Teaos wrote:Some of Voyager still makes me cringe, but I find on a whole it was a constant 3.5 out of ten with the odd 8 and 9 thrown in. The others had a higher average, but often sunk lower for several episodes. I stopped watching TNG many times due to boring episodes. Voyager even when bad wasn't boring often. TNG was, at least in the first few seasons.

Certainly, even though I'm as old-skool as they come, I recognize that even TOS had a "Catspaw" or "Spock's Brain" for every "Balance of Terror" or "Space Seed." TOS had the advantage, of course, of never being in danger of retreading prior material. TNG suffered horribly from that very problem at the outset, probably due to the fact of folks wondering what the hell they were supposed to do with it without Roddenberry's direct, megalomaniacal, and viselike grip on all minutiae of the production. As a series, though, at least it showed an undeniable upward slope in quality from season to season. I cannot claim to be able to give an unbiased critique of DS9, because I was previously and will be in perpetuity a huge slobbering fanboi of Avery Brooks. Plus, the Terry Farrell/Vanessa Williams pottery scene, I mean - srsly. In general, though, I thought it displayed great consistency in the quality of the writing, but perhaps because it relied so much on a static show "bible," the flaws in that bible were very much exposed; by which flaws I mean things like the position/character of Nerys, the cartoonishly obvious aspects of the Bajoran religion (including Dukat's would-be endgame of offering himself for demonic possession!), the weirdness regarding the semi-permanent posting of the Defiant, etc. Despite that, I believe DS9 showed us some of the best and deepest interpersonal character-based writing of 'Trek. The best of VOY, as has been said, was as poignant as anything; but it was terribly inconsistent and regard for continuity - which should have been a real pressing issue to the show staff, given that they must have known by then just how we 'Trek fans are - was nonexistent.

And, that's it for 'Trek series, right?

I have seen TNG and DS9 multiple times. DS9 more so than TNG. Even now with TNG looking dated I can still enjoy it more than VOY.

I tried a couple of years back doing a marathon. I got up until the middle of season 2 before I lost interest.

There are gems in the series to be sure. But they are few and far apart. I'd rather just watch them then have to watch the really bad ones just for the sake of a complete marathon.

As have been mentioned, this series just had so many issues behind the scenes which makes sense in what we saw on TV.

Voyager could have been a darker Trek, even more so than DS9. VOY could have been BSG before there was a BSG. Voyager at the end of the series should have been a ship barely held together with alien tech and duct tape. The crew could have been towards the end a ragtag crew with other aliens on board maybe seeking sanctuary from other aliens. The surviving Star fleet and Maquis crew could have been this hardened crew that saw it all and survived because of their sheer will of wanting to go home.

Nope we got a TNG lite with little direction.

McAvoy wrote:VOY could have been BSG before there was a BSG.

I can't think of a way of Voyager being produced before TMP. If you can, then I'd like to hear it.

Captain Seafort wrote:

McAvoy wrote:VOY could have been BSG before there was a BSG.

I can't think of a way of Voyager being produced before TMP. If you can, then I'd like to hear it.

NuBSG. But you knew what I meant.

Okay, so what is the first thing any of you would change to improve the series?

Number one, don't integrate the Maquis fully into Voyager within the first few episodes.

I've said before, I would have made Chakotay a much, much darker character. To Janeway, he would have been a loyal officer. Behind her back to the Maquis, he would be telling them he was just playing along, and they must too, as they gather the trust and information needed to take over the ship.

He'd actually be playing both sides against the other. So for instance he might discover that there was a small group of Maquis who thought he'd become Janeway's pet, and they were going to launch a coup themselves. So he betrays them to Janeway, who dumps them on a nearby planet. He gains trust and favour with her, and sells it to the other Maquis as "I'm in charge, cross me and you're DONE.".

Then in another episode a Starfleet crewmember overhears Chakotay planning something, and he kills the guy. Flat-out murders him.


Number two, I would have written Voyager as gradually falling apart as time went on. They said they had 30-odd torpedoes at the start. Use them up, and then they don't have them. Keep the whole Neelix cooking thing, but move it on a couple of seasons - because the food replicators fail. The holodecks break down after a couple of years. We start seeing crew in civilian clothes because their uniforms get ripped up and they can't replicate replacements. Discipline starts to break down.


Number three, Janeway. Write her consistently. Or at least, have the changes be consistent. By which I mean, have her start off as a typical by the book Starfleet captain, but gradually make more and more compromises. Kind of like how they played Archer in the Expanse, where he starts out okay, but eventually he's putting guys into airlocks and attacking helpless innocents to steal parts. Imagine if Janeway had gotten to a point where she chose to attack other ships because they absolutely HAD to get a spare warp coil... only they had to do that once or twice a season. Imagine Chakotay arrests her for it and holds a trial on board the ship. It's a valid way to seize power, and have the Starfleet crew go along with it, even approve of it!


Number four, the Kazon sucked. Waaay too much like wannabe Klingons without the stuff to back it up. The Vidiians were better, but kind of silly. I rather liked the Devore. What if the Devore had been a gigantic empire that took years to pass through? Hiding the telepaths, for all that time? Would Janeway eventually come to think that she should drop them off on some isolated planet? Or hand them over to the Devore, even?


That's some things I'd have done.

Umm.. yeah, that. In other words, have the show actually follow the premise. The idea for some novelty in the series - that is, some way to set it off from TOS, TNG, and DS9 - was obviously to have a smaller type of ship cut off far from home, away from the things that proximity to Starfleet could provide. So what happened? The writers provided them anyway, through some barely (or often, never) explained torpedoes ex machine. Would Janeway have to gradually weigh in the balance principles against survival? Hell yes. Would the Maquis remain independent, probably feigning a submissive stance in order to gain the priveleges of being adopted into the crew? Hell yes. Would the ship be held together with chewing gum and baling wire by the fourth season? Hell yes. Would they have the wherewithal, after some time cut off in the DQ, to design and construct an entirely new class of shuttle/runabout, with more advanced systems than Starfleet-designed shuttles, in an apparently TARDIS-like hangar? Hell NO!

One thing I always thought was that the shuttlebay could be bigger.



Look where they put the warp core, so far back! I'd move it forward to what that "spare" core is. Then you would be able to extend that hangar forward, increasing the length from 38 m to upwards of 100. Far more sensible.

I hadn't noticed that before, not being a meticulous student of Okudagrams, but you are absolutely correct. One would think efficiency and compression, rather than comfort and elbow room, would have been the priority for a ship of the Intrepid-class' intended role. Your suggestion would also have allowed the Delta Flyer actually fit within the hangar in which it was built.

One small thing, have people in the background fixing things, reusing things, have dirt and grime on them. Make it all look used.