Star Trek: Voyager
#star-trek

Janeway chose to maroon them in the Delta Quadrant for no reason. She took one look at the Kazon, decided they were savages, and felt the need to prevent them from getting technology above their station. Her racial hatred impaired her cognitive function to such a degree that she forgot she could just set a bomb to go off after they left. Or maybe they just don't have alarm clocks in the Federation?

Chakotay is just... fine with all this? Says it's up to her. And... joins the crew. (???)

Every Voyager episode feels like a crappy TNG episode.

Seska is the only person who has an accurate assessment of Janeway's actions and bears a grudge, and she's an incredibly competent Cardassian agent. Yet the writers decided to turn her into a mishmash of crazy ex-girlfriend tropes culminating in a "used condom" type pregnancy for no discernible reason other than to manipulate Chakotay, despite how it could jeopardize her standing and despite that she could easily just fake it. (She doesn't know, but in fact, it turns out not to be his!)

Enterprise used a similar idiotic plot point when the human fascists stole T'Pol and Trip's DNA to make a baby for propaganda purposes, when they could have just stuck pointed ears on any random baby.

Janeway thinks they should stop Ferenghi from making a buck at all costs, but investigating genocide is not their place.

Weird continuity error? In S03E23 "Distant Origin", the Galileo aliens find Voyager using the signature of their warp plasma from a container identical to the one used in Neelix's sting op on the space station in S03E13 "Fair Trade". But not only was that not Voyager's plasma, it blew up in the end. So did they forget that, or did Voyager also happen to legitimately trade plasma off-screen?

She formed an alliance with the Borg to ENHANCE THEIR POWERS? After swearing off alliances after the humiliating, disastrous, easily avoided Nazi incident? When she could just fucking GO AROUND the other aliens?

Did they write off Kes when Seven of Nine joined the crew because they didn't want to increase the number of women?

Hell Year: did Janeway forget Kes's warning about the Crenim? Also, they met them after Kes sublimed and threw them 10k lightyears. So in the first (?) iteration of Hell Year they must have gotten a boost some other way.

S04E17 "Retrospect" is one of the biggest pieces of shit I've ever seen. It's a false rape accusation story where the rapist is treated as the victim, the accuser is treated as delusional, and her supporters are treated as dangerous fools for pursuing an investigation. It even blames the accuser (Seven) and her supporters as responsible for the rapist's death, and the mere act of accusing and investigating as violations.

More infuriatingly, there is never any evidence uncovered that the man was innocent, just lack of evidence supporting the accuser. And in fact there was hard evidence (the only hard evidence) that her memories of the attack had been suppressed. It also just strains credulity that it would take her two hours to reconfigure a thermal doodad, so the circumstantial evidence supports her.

I haven't been this pissed off by a Star Trek episode since Enterprise S02E22 "Cogenitor", a repulsive story about how it's fine to keep third-sex people as sex slaves.

The show is actually pretty good on its own merits once you get past the first season or two. The problem is that compared to DS9, it's a big downgrade: mostly episodic, worse writing. And compared to TNG, it's incredibly derivative.

Neelix's departure was touching but kind of undermined his whole narrative. The bond of shared heritage with people he just met was stronger than the one with his chosen family on Voyager. Naomi was like his child or niece and he ditched her for a random kid he shares DNA with.

Seven is a very interesting character even though the show is immensely disrespectful toward her. This is most obvious in her attire, but the terrible series finale showcases narrative disrespect: Seven's relationship with Chakotay. This abruptly changes her character trajectory from one of acceptance of her identity as an outsider, to one where she's just like any other human. Worse, the change happens off-screen. And it just doesn't make sense! Like Odo and Kira, they have zero chemistry.

Enterprise dialed this phenomenon up from Seven to eleven with T'Pol. She too is banned from wearing clothing, but the sexualization is relentless. One episode even opens on a shot of her ass! The narrative disrespect is much worse: T'Pol is characterized inconsistently and frequently subjected to sexual violence. Yet, she too is a compelling character, thanks largely to Blalock's fantastic, subtle performance and the existence of of actual chemistry between her and Trip.

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