Yeah, I'm blogging about Star Trek again. What can I say?
Anyway, of all the Treks, I like Voyager the best. I don't think it was the best, but the reason I liked it is that it was semi-serialized and the characters were constantly thrown into situations that they had to be clever about to get out of. However, as I've been watching it, I've noticed several things that Voyager had offered earlier on, but didn't follow through with. If they had kept up with these plot lines, the show would probably have been better appreciated by both Trekkies and geeks (Seven of Nine notwithstanding).
Starfleet vs. Maquis
When the show first aired, we all got to see the potential of a very tenuous trip hope. Not only was this ship 70,000 light years from the Alpha Quadrant, but you have a primarily Starfleet crew working with a good amount of Maquis, former Starfleet resistance fighters, together on the same ship. There were some conflicts between the two groups in the first season, but after the second, they grew less and less.
What gives?
Just like that, the two crews are working together just fine? Sure, we have Michael Jonas, the former Maquis working with double agent Seska after she defected to the Kazon, and Lon Suder, who actually killed a Starfleet member, but all three of them got the axe (although Suder redeemed himself by sacrificing himself for the marooned crew), that was pretty much the end of the Starfleet/Maquis conflict storyline.
Sure, some minor conflicts popped up over the seasons, but it seems to me that it would've taken longer than a few months for the two crew to work together harmoniously. The sad part too is that the first two seasons of Voyager really weren't that great, but the ones involved the previously mentioned characters above were some of the best. If the writers had kept those conflicts going, it may have made the series itself stronger before they had to resort to Seven of Nine (not that she's a bad character, I do like her).
Minor Characters
How many of you guys know who Ayala is? According to IMDb, he appeared in 113 episodes! That's more than Kes! He mostly gets mentioned and ordered around, but he's in just about every episode. So why don't we get to know him better? This is a small ship! Shouldn't we get to know some other characters besides that main crew?
If you take a look at the other series, which all took place in the Alpha Quadrant, they all utilized minor characters pretty well. For TNG, you have characters like Guinan, Barclay, Alexander, Mot and Ro Laren to name a few, who showed up every now and then and added a little flavor. DS9 had a lot of recurring characters who were not part of the main cast either. Now Voyager did have several recurring characters besides Ayala, but most didn't pop up more than once (death was sometimes a factor).
What the writers should have done is kept the same actors for the minor characters. I don't know how many actors they used during the show for crew member roles, but they had lots of new ones every week. Several nameless ones were on multiple episodes, but for a crew of about 160ish, they should have shown more minor characters because they weren't going to have any other Starfleet officers transferring to this ship. The casting should have been consistent with the nameless crew members, and we should've gotten to know some of them better. Particularly Ayala.
The Equinox Crew
This one kind of piggy backs on the previous point. The USS Equinox, a Starfleet vessel that goes rogue and is eventually destroyed by Voyager, takes on a handful of survivors at the beginning of season 6. The final act of this episode includes Janeway debriefing these crewmen and telling them they will have limited freedom aboard the ship based on their crimes. And that's that.
We never see or hear from them again.
"Equinox" was easily one of the best episodes that came out of the series. Janeway had a rare opportunity of being able to get new crewmen on board, and despite their horrible actions in part one, it was exciting to see more Starfleet officers. So why did we get the excitement of getting new crew members without knowing what happened to them?
Sure, these guys were pretty rotten and even used the oft-used phrase of "we were only following orders" to get past their crimes. But with them being so far from home, and being part of a crew that has stuck to the Prime Directive, they have just about as much adjusting to do to this crew as the Maquis did. And they had less freedom. It would have been interesting to see how they adjusted to their new life with more limits than the former Maquis did.
There could have been several episodes that showed this struggle and kept the season interesting. Now season 6 was a particularly good season, but remember that Voyager is not considered the best Star Trek. With a storyline like this added into the mix, the season could have been better. We could've done without the Borg kids.
Speaking of which, what the heck happened to that Borg baby???????
The Borg Resistance
Yet another one of Voyager's best episodes: "Unimatrix Zero." How cool is it that Janeway is successful is liberating thousands, maybe even millions, of drones from the Borg Collective? They even team up with a Borg sphere under the command of former Klingon drone Korok to rescue Janeway, Tuvok and Torres from the cube they're trapped in. At the end of the episode, Janeway notes in her log that Korok will stay in contact. All of the liberated drones know that Voyager helped them and are now engaged in a Civil War against the Borg Queen and the Collective.
We don't hear a bloody thing about it.
Just like that, Korok is gone and that's that. No communications from other liberated Borg, no aiding in the battles, no "hey, how's it going?" drop ins from former drones. Good grief, Janeway! You get yourself assimilated by the Borg to deploy this sucker virus that liberates good drones from your worst enemy, and that's it??????
For the love of Quark, they even run into the Borg again in the season finale of "Endgame!" Why don't we get any reports or updates before then? And why does the Collective not try to destroy Voyager right when they're first detected? It's almost like the resistance never happened. It would have been a great storyline to have running in the final season. Janeway should've been numero uno on the Borg Queen's hit list after that, but nope. Just got ignored. Like poor Ayala. Which brings me to my next point....
Axum, Janeway and Chakotay
Seven of Nine has, at this point, been pursued by Harry Kim and the Doctor, and even herself pursued William Chapman at one point for a dating exercise (it would've been fun to see more of him). She's just not the dating type. But back to episode "Unimatrix Zero," we find out she'd been involved with a Borg named Axum for 6 years before being liberated from the Collective!
Their romance only starts to rekindle when Janeway orders that Unimatrix Zero, the safe haven where drones can act as individuals during their regeneration, be destroyed to destroyed in order to save all those newly liberated drones. As the unimatrix is decompiling around them, Axum tells Seven, "I'll find you." And then he disappears. He's out somewhere patrolling fluidic space on the other side of the galaxy, but he was able to find her through her regeneration cycle even after she became an individual. It's clear that his love for her is true.
It's unclear whether or not Seven's feeling for him return fully, but she definitely is upset when she realizes she won't be able to see him again without Unimatrix Zero. But instead of his assuming she was dead when she stopped coming to the Unimatrix in the first place, he kept looking for her. If he keeps that up, then I have no doubt he would find his way back to her, even if they are on opposite ends of the galaxy.
But does she wait for him? Noooooooooooooooooo....
She shacks up with Chakotay instead! This caused an uproar with many fans who were particularly excited when they heard that Janeway's fiance, Mark, had gotten married after Voyager got zapped to the Delta Quadrant. Janeway and Chakotay had good chemistry, and she never got much in the way of romance because she was the captain and it wasn't appropriate (although keeping Kashyk around would've been interesting). This was a romance that could've been, but didn't.
With Seven and Chakotay getting involved, it pretty much obliterated any memory she had of poor Axum. What would've happened if he'd jacked a cube, found a transwarp hub that brought him right to Voyager, only to find her wining and dining with the Commander? Pretty heartbreaking, I'll tell you that. Axum and Seven had the potential of being a great moment when they reunite. With Chakotay in the picture, it dooms that idea. And Janeway's still single. It should've been her with Chakotay, they have more stuff in common. And Chakotay doesn't play any instruments or have a big interest in music, which Seven has said before is a must in her relationship ("Someone to Watch Over Me").
And finally.....
The Borg Queen
Am I the only one who was rooting for the Queen in "Dark Frontier" when she brings Seven's dad out to drop the bomb of, "I am your mother!"?
Maybe it would've been a ripoff of Star Wars, but that would have been the best twist in Star Trek. It definitely would've beaten out Sela's reveal in TNG. Again, it would've added several conflicts, not just for Seven, but also for Janeway and the rest of the crew. The Borg Queen being Seven's mother would've knocked the socks off of every viewer that night. I think I'll just leave it at that.
So those are my points of what would have made Voyager better. Maybe one day I'll be able to be a creative consultant and help out, who knows. I would so rock that series!
