Tom Paris - awesome or vastly underused?

[DavidGutierrez]

I've always felt like an interesting arc for Tom's character would have been to give him more responsibilities. I loved seeing him in charge, and I wish they had given him more command opportunities, like in "Initiations."

Is this just me?

 

[C.E. Evans]

I thinki the only way they could have gave him more to do was to make him the first officer. Still, he had more to do than Trek characters who've held the conn position over the years.

 

[Ln X]

Somehow Tom never became redundant, unlike poor Chakotay and Kim...

 

[Vorta]

We should turn this into The Tom Paris Appreciation Thread. He's brash, cocky, yummy, funny, and smart. What's not to love?

I say he's vastly underused.

 

[Guy Gardener]

So when Tom and Harry would double date the DeLanney sisters and Harry was in love with the wrong Twin.... The right twin was on Tom's arm, grabbing his ass?

So how far did Tom get with the right twin all the while that Harry was trying for swapsies, before finally in the name of good taste he closed a door to a sure thing that harry could never open?

 

[exodus]

No, he was used just right.
If he were overused, his zingers would have gone from funny to annoying.
The best way to keep him fresh was not to over do it.

 

[TEACAKE'S PLEATHER DOME]

He was blandly okay in a boy way.

 

[Guy Gardener]

I feel let down that we never saw him reading bad poetry while dodging furniture.

Do we think B'Elanna can heft beds at Tom or nothing larger than a loveseat?

 

[RoJoHen]

I would not have minded if Tom had gotten more screentime, but as it is, he's one of my favorite Star Trek characters. He never got dull or annoying, and I really enjoyed the dynamic he had with the rest of the cast. I feel like he had chemistry with everybody, and Tom and B'Elanna remain to this day my favorite Trek couple. At least B'Elanna was bitchy because she was half-Klingon. What was Keiko's excuse?

Actually, come to think about it, one thing that really disappoints me about Tom is how little we saw him interact with his father. I would have loved to see a "welcome home" scene where Tom and Admiral Paris reunite, and Tom introduces him to his granddaughter.

 

[DS9forever]

The character nearly always got some pointless dialogue in the vein of Troi and Chakotay. It often seemed that the writers had to tell the audience what to think of a character that had just appeared on the viewscreen by Paris' reaction to them.

 

[exodus]

I would not have minded if Tom had gotten more screentime, but as it is, he's one of my favorite Star Trek characters. He never got dull or annoying, and I really enjoyed the dynamic he had with the rest of the cast. I feel like he had chemistry with everybody, and Tom and B'Elanna remain to this day my favorite Trek couple. At least B'Elanna was bitchy because she was half-Klingon. What was Keiko's excuse?

Miles was a great Engineer but he was a dimwit as a husband.
Keiko did have reason to get annoyed with him when she did. Keiko was very mature, Miles acted like a little boy allot. Keiko was raising a child while Miles was playing with toys and video games with Julian. She treated him how he acted.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Tom was okay, but I have never much cared for fictional characters like that in general. I don't like rogues, be they in TV, film, or print. Their snarky and sarcastic attitude does not appeal to me at all.

Han Solo, Tom Paris, pretty much every character Joss Whedon ever wrote...not my thing.

 

[exodus]

Tom was okay, but I have never much cared for characters like that in general. I don't like rogues. Their snarky and sarcastic attitude does not appeal to me at all.

How are you a Yankees fan?

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

^ Fixed that for ya.

 

[Sindatur]

Up to 4.18 Tom did an awful lot. Top Pilot, Fathered an entire advanced Civilization, went on Away missions, helped with Engineering, was the nurse, was in the Holodeck many, many episodes.

After this point, from what I know, he continues in all these aspects, plus builds the Delta Flyer.

I don't think he was underused at all The only thing more you could do with him was make him First Officer, and that didn't help Chakotay's character much

 

[Ln X]

Up to 4.18 Tom did an awful lot. Top Pilot, Fathered an entire advanced Civilization, went on Away missions, helped with Engineering, was the nurse, was in the Holodeck many, many episodes.

After this point, from what I know, he continues in all these aspects, plus builds the Delta Flyer.

I don't think he was underused at all The only thing more you could do with him was make him First Officer, and that didn't help Chakotay's character much

Yeah Tom was extremely versatile as a character, which can't be said of Kim or Chakotay... I would say Tom is the second most used male character in VOY, second only to the Doctor.

 

[stj]

I never got a sense of what Tom's problem with his father was about, nor did I project any personal problems with my father onto the blank cardboard cutout.

The bad boy image was only believable by comparison to Kim, and there was very little onscreen interaction between Paris and Kim after the third season episode The Chute, for some reason. ()

His interactions with B'elana seemed designed to establish that 1) Tom was way too cool to be pussywhipped but 2) his superior sensitivity was balm to her Angry Warrior soul.

I didn't even buy the idea that he was particularly smart, even if he was supposed to warn about the failure in Timeless, establishing he was smarter than Janeway, Tuvok, Kim and of course 7 of 9. (Plus the other throwaway incidents along the same lines.) This may be partly because the actor couldn't/wouldn't do the "technobabble" lines, but that's still what I got from the screen.

It was clear that Tom was supposed to be pretty much perfect, in a Rebel Without a Cause kind of way. He was a Gary Stu, complete with the seemingly obligatory peculiar, not a real name, name. Paris? Why not Schenectady, except that Paris is cooler? His perfection seemed forced upon us, rather than showed to us.

For my part, this meant he was used far too much. The vacuousness of this character, used as a main cast member far more than more interesting characters (like Neelix or Chakotay before Seska and religious heeby jeebies castrated him) or more strongly drawn characters (like Tuvok or Kim) left an emotional blank at the heart of the series.

When the series first began, Chakotay had salt and pepper hair, while Tom Paris had a sweptback do that made him look ten years older. I don't there's any doubt than Paris was supposed to be the romantic interest for Janeway, except that they couldn't make Paris interesting enough to be a plausible attraction for Janeway. We should be grateful that we were spared that horror show!

 

[tighr]

I don't know where that came from, stj. I never got that impression.

I enjoyed Paris as a character, and thought he was one of the most well used on the show.

 

[Guy Gardener]

Tom had a choice.

He was angry, and felt rejected by B'Elanna, so with 4 gallons of spite pumping through his heart he asked Seven of Nine on a date with every intention of hatefucking her as publically as possible so that that Klingon *&^^% would know what a good thing she was missing out on.

In her broken condition, there's no way that Seven wouldn't have imprinted on Tom.

However.

10 seconds after asking that drone on a date, B'Elanna reaffirms her loving feelings for Tom and demands that he not be such a dick who would run away from his feelings for her too.

Anika is forgotten about.

Maybe this is why she fluffed harry in the mess?

Any way, Tom's part in the Seven of Nine Show, as Voyager became in all but name, would have been Rikki, rather than Fred Mertz, if he just would have taken that blonde out for that date she had ccepted, and lived happily ever after

 

[Ln X]

Tom had a choice.

He was angry, and felt rejected by B'Elanna, so with 4 gallons of spite pumping through his heart he asked Seven of Nine on a date with every intention of hatefucking her as publically as possible so that that Klingon *&^^% would know what a good thing she was missing out on.

In her broken condition, there's no way that Seven wouldn't have imprinted on Tom.

However.

10 seconds after asking that drone on a date, B'Elanna reaffirms her loving feelings for Tom and demands that he not be such a dick who would run away from his feelings for her too.

Anika is forgotten about.

Maybe this is why she fluffed harry in the mess?

Any way, Tom's part in the Seven of Nine Show, as Voyager became in all but name, would have been Rikki, rather than Fred Mertz, if he just would have taken that blonde out for that date she had ccepted, and lived happily ever after

I first I thought you were raving Guy Gardener, but then I remembered the little speech of Tom Paris (3rd episode of season 4) about him offering 'any' help to Seven. So you may be on to something. Maybe, just maybe, Tom had his eyes briefly set upon Seven before deciding to go for B'Elanna instead.