There were several episodes where Janeway was simply wrong, usually Chakotay was the one having to point out the error of her ways. Certainly she slipped more than Picard (unless you count every “Shut up Wesley” as an outright mistake).
Indeed in Equinox she abandoned her principles so completely that it stretched credulity somewhat (IIRC). At the end of the episode Chakotay helped her put back up some plaque of the ship, symbolically relating to her letting herself, and the crew, down, and having to get up and start again.
That’s the kind of conceit that applies to all the Treks. Sure they have starbases and all that, but the numbers never really add up. Essentially they all have magic elves that can repair the ships instantly, no matter how little of the ship actually remains.
But there are some episodes that played with that idea. In Year of Hell the ship’s FUBAR almost the whole two-part episode and they have no opportunity to repair anything.
BTW That’s a great episode to watch for those people who claim Voyager was always terrible (Well Part I anyway; Part II kinda went by the numbers in tying things up).
The article cited in the OP is dead wrong. I hated *Voyager *because it sucked, in *so many *ways. Kate Mulgrew can’t act her way out of a paper bag, the premise was abandoned immediately, the writing was terrible, the characters uninteresting and the whole show stupid.
DS9, OTOH, was excellent, and I say that while hating the actor who played Sisko.
You might be right- I didn’t watch much past the 3rd season, so that could be part of it. For whatever reason, the image that stuck in my head of Janeway was that she was an uber-Captain who was never wrong.
I believe intelligent minds can disagree about whether Picard (my vote) or Kirk is the best Captain, but to say that Picard and Janeway are tied is indefensible. Janeway isn’t in Picard’s universe.
I agree that the writing on Voyager sucked noogies for the most part. If I were commander of a hostile vessel, though, I’d still find Janeway a lot scarier than Picard and be less likely to get close enough to carve huge chunks out of her primary hull. There were times when Jean-Luc’s stern moral uprightness just grated on me.
And Year of Hell is one of the best Voyager episodes that I recall watching, specifically for that reason. Of course, Trek being Trek, they brought in a great honkin’ big deus ex machina at the end to magic it all away, and there were no lasting consequences from the period of time when two-thirds of the ship’s crew died and they were down to wearing tattered uniforms, eating the decorative plants in the botanical gardens, and drinking their own recycled urine.
To fill in that part of the picture, I’d say that in general DS9 was a bit lighter on that than most of the franchise, except that the Mirror Universe episodes totally wrecked the curve.
I really liked the doctor and some of the 7 of 9 borg stuff but too much doctor made even the good doc episodes stale. The rest was garbage from the get-go. Kes, Harry Kim, Neelix, Chakotay, Paris, Janeway…
The Doctor is my all time favourite Trek character. He single-handedly made the show watchable. His dialogue, at least, was well written, even if the rest stank.
The funny part is that Tom Paris and the Doctor (while a hologram, definitely a White Male oddly enough) were ridiculously competent, while everyone else was largely defined as sucking at their job as much as possible. Except for Harry Kim, whom the universe hates with a passion. Poor, dumb Harry. Seven of Nine was competent in later episodes, but did tend to drag everything out with her plot arc and make stupidly idiotic choices and miss the blatantly obvious.
So, in short, Voyager demonstratew that women and minorities were as useless as possible, and this is why it’s a Feminist Triumph… I guess.
I tried to watch Voyager, but it sucked so much I never tuned in, and only saw it later free on Hulu when I was really bored. The sad part was that they did have some very, very good episodes. Arguably the best episode of the first season was a Neelix episode - Neelix!
Even if you go beyond the “Janeway-Doctor-7of9 Variety Show” the expanse of the show never strayed beyond what was generally going on with the bridge crew. It was with rarity that the show focused in on a random character and, if they did, it was a throwaway person who never showed up again. It’s one ship. Alone. For years. There are no “background characters.” We should have gotten to know practically everyone on that ship by series end, but instead they ignored everyone in favor of senior command.
Plus, yeah, the premise of Starfleet and the Maquis working together and being one disagreement away from mutiny and death was a series ripe with storylines. Too bad none of them were explored.
My ears are burning. Actually, my name is not based on this show, which I gave up on after a year and will eventually get to on DVD. One really great thing about TOS when it came out was that it was not a Gilligan’s Island/Lost in Space/Time Tunnel remake. The “we are lost” show has an easy premise and a guarantee that they will not get home until the last episode. Lazy writing. And guaranteed to raise all the problems you mentioned.
I really wanted to like Voyager but I pretty much disliked all of the characters (don’t get me started on Nelix).
Chakotay was mostly likable but of course since he was a Native American he had to be all mystical and stuff. Can’t have any agnostic Indians. Nope.
And you’re not the only one. Admittedly, the “bad” eps of Voyager (like the one where Janeway and Paris turned into huge slugs . . . then mated) were much worse than the “bad” eps of the other series, many of the others were excellent.
And frankly, my best reason for watching DS9 was that I had a huge crush on Dr. Bashir.
I agree. I thought the show had a lot of promise- while I didn’t really like Neelix much, or Kes either, I figured that they were going to be much more interesting as sort of “indian guides” to Voyager’s exploration of the Delta Quadrant.
Instead, they packed Kes off really quickly, and Neelix became just some kind of silly alien comic relief and some sort of really annoying conscience.
The problems with the characters had nothing to do with gender or race, rather it had to do with the fact that they were generally unlikeable to me. Tuvok was a dick for the most part, Harry Kim was a pussy, Tom Paris was kind of a dick, Janeway seemed just… horrible for the most part. As in, wouldn’t want to talk to her at a party, much less work for her. 7of9 was interesting, and B’Elanna seemed insane. Chakotay was cool, and so was the Dr, most of the time.
So combining the “alien of the week” with the unchanging nature of the ship cruising through the Delta Quadrant like nothing had happened, well seasoned with a dose of unlikeable characters meant that I trailed off pretty seriously in watching it after the 1st season.
I agree, the article is tripe. There may be some valid points in there about a different approach or perspective, but those weren’t the things that I didn’t like.
They started with a premise to really (1) return to the glory of TOS, i.e. the starship alone on a mission and the captain is the only authority; and (2) stand Star Trek on its head, by creating intercrew conflict and tension, more than the good natured rubbing of TOS and much different than the close friends of Next Gen, there were two enemy crews merged into one for survival. There was fertile territory with the concerns over supplies and weapons and resources, etc, that was largely dropped and ignored. There was the opportunity to really put the values of the Federation in a crucible.
Yet that’s not what we got.
Chakotay and his religious crap was annoying. Neelix was frustratingly annoying, which was put up with so we could have Kes, and then they took her away and left us him. The problems with Janeway had nothing to do with her being female.
Actually, my name is not based on this show, which I gave up on after a year and will eventually get to on DVD. One really great thing about TOS when it came out was that it was not a Gilligan’s Island/Lost in Space/Time Tunnel remake. The “we are lost” show has an easy premise and a guarantee that they will not get home until the last episode. Lazy writing. And guaranteed to raise all the problems you mentioned.