Voyager: Season 1

[Trekker4747]

I'm starting a Voyager rewatch and, you know. Season One as okay. There's episodes I really enjoy and actually say are good and some good arcs with The Doctor and Kes.

I find elements of "The Cloud" to be great.

And really, Voyager's opening title sequence? Mmmwah!

The ship flying through fantastic space visuals 70,000 light years away. It's the feeling I want from Star Trek with that theme.

I listen to it with my eyes closed and hearing the swoosh as it flies by, the tingle of the rings around a planet, than a burst of light through my eyes as an eclipse breaks, Voyager lifts her nacelles and flashes into the unknown.

Star Trek.

Get some Sativa in me and it feels truly unworldly.

I struggle to think of a Voyager episode that Iands "truly great" on the levels of CotEoF, Tapestry, The Inner Light, The Visitor and others but maybe I will rediscover it (elements if The Cloud kinda reach it.) And, I know Voyager has its issues in its run but I watch it now, I look at it, and...

Well. I "like" it more than DS9, or enjoy it more. DS9 is better in many ways (again it holds one of my top episodes in the franchise) but, again. Voyager flashing to warp against deep space visuals.... It gets things moving more than shots of a static space station.

 

[Michael]

My wife and I just started another Voyager rewatch a couple weeks ago and we’re on “Jetrel” right now. I totally feel some of what you’re saying. Deep Space Nine is my absolute favorite show, but I always love getting back into Voyager again. The characters are all great and the premise of the show is very strong, especially in the early seasons, which I mostly love.

I’m slightly biased, because even though Deep Space Nine is the first Trek show I ever watched as a child, Voyager is the first “new” show I remember consciously watching and being enthusiastic about. I remember getting the first episodes on VHS from a video renting store and collecting every scrap of info I could find about the show in magazines. Ah, good times. So watching these episodes, especially the first season, is very much like a window to my childhood.

So even though I recognize that some episodes, like “Time and Again”, “Emanation”, “Ex Post Facto” or “Cathexis” aren’t necessarily great, I still enjoy them for nostalgic reasons. But even if you ignore these kind of episodes, I think there’s some genuinely awesome outings in the first season:

• “Caretaker” is just a great Star Trek pilot period; everything is in its right place in this one and it sets up the premise and the characters beautifully.
• “Parallax” is a wonderful follow-up to the pilot; it’s a bit low-key, but that’s what I love about it. It’s great to see the character interaction and conflict in this one.
• “Phage” and “Jetrel” are great episodes for Neelix, who we learn isn’t just all silly and comic relief.
• “Eye of the Needle” beautifully toys with the hopes of the crew of getting back home. As viewers we know they won’t make it at this point in the show, but the process of getting there and seeing them adjust their hopes just to be crushed once again plays out really well. I personally consider this a perfectly written episode and one of the best of the whole franchise up there with some of the ones you mention.
• “Prime Factors” explores a similar theme of the crew getting their hopes up about getting home and forcing them to consider how much they’re willing to compromise their morals.
• “Heroes and Demons” is cool in that it shows the doctor going on his first adventure and becoming more of a person in his own right.
• “Faces” is interesting in the way it explores Torres’ inner conflict, even though the premise is a bit out there.

All in all I would just say the writing is really strong in the first season. It’s not perfect and there’s absolutely some missteps, but otherwise it’s very much consistent in how it explores the characters and the premise of the show. I also like that there’s little mini arcs, like B’Elanna becoming chief engineer and becoming less aggressive, Kes helping the doctor to become a person, Seska being a troublemaker on the ship and then betraying them …

 

[Tosk]

The only two eps from season one that I dread sitting through are Ex Post Facto and Heroes & Demons. For me, they just drag sooo much. I cannot engage with either of them. Everything else for me varies between good and "Eh, it was okay I guess".

Voyager, speeding from place to place. DS9, staying put week in and week out. But which one was more static in terms of storytelling?

 

[Oddish]

For some Trek series (TNG and ENT to name two), their first season was notably weaker than the rest of the series. Voyager's not like that... most of the actors seem to have a good bead on who their characters are, the Kazon may not be great villains but Seska is, and my most frequent complaint about the show doesn't exist yet. Admittedly, "Parallax" pisses me off, because promoting an officer for assaulting a superior is just ridiculous. And the holodeck setting (Janeway's novel) is the weakest of the bunch (yes, Sandrine's, Paxau, Fair Haven, and Captain Proton) were all better. But the show was actually honoring its original premise at the time.

 

[Trekker4747]

Jeri Taylor I think played a lot in making the seried good during her tenure (though she played a role in Threshold, an episode I will skip.)

Eye of the Needle is fantastic in many ways, Mulgrew acting against nothing in her audio-only call with the Romulan Commander is fantastic. Well let in her darkened cabin with the starscape outside and her trying to get him to agree to communicate with her, and great stuff with Picardo and the Doctor cracking some ground on the Doctor's sentience and Janeway realizing through Kes who/what the Doctor is. Great stuff from both Mulgrew, Picardo and Lein. If Voyager had kept this kind of theme and feel it could have been really fantastic.

It's been a long time since I've done a Voyager watch, and I know the pain ahead, but I also know the good ahead.

I'm a Next Gen through and true. But of the Modern Trek series series I enjoy Voyager more than DS9 and Enterprise. (Though, DS9 is better made in many ways, mostly because B&B didn't seem to rule over it as much.)

If Taylor and Piller had been given a bit more leeway on the show's arcs and continuity.... I dunno, maybe? Because the continuity problems is one of the "bigger" issues.

In a good episode, "The Cloud" it ends with Janeway saying they expended a lot of resources to help a spatial life form they encountered (initially entering it to get resources thinking it was a nebula/spatial cloud) and having to go out of their way to hopefully get some more. It's a neat theme and tone to see Janeway sharply tell Neelix they're going back to treat the lifeform they harmed. That's just... Beautiful. It's Star Trek. They got out of it without gaining the resources they though and by the skin of their teeth, discover it's alive and need to go back to heal it. That's Star Trek and 24c humanity. I love it.

I enjoyed the Doctor's frustration with how this activation is treated and how the officer he's caring for treats him until the Doctor expresses his superiority over the officer he's treating him (threatening to report his injuries to Janeway if he continues to harm himself in his extracurricular actions) it's well done.

Also another good acting moment in EotN is Tim Russ's Tuvok as he talks about the Romulan commander's disbelief in Voyager's location. The way he delivers the line " telling him we're in the Delta Quadrant, an impossibility as far as he knows" as he rhythmically types on the console to the syllables to his line is well done. Russ is one of the better Vulcan actors.

 

[Lynx]

My wife and I just started another Voyager rewatch a couple weeks ago and we’re on “Jetrel” right now. I totally feel some of what you’re saying. Deep Space Nine is my absolute favorite show, but I always love getting back into Voyager again. The characters are all great and the premise of the show is very strong, especially in the early seasons, which I mostly love.

I’m slightly biased, because even though Deep Space Nine is the first Trek show I ever watched as a child, Voyager is the first “new” show I remember consciously watching and being enthusiastic about. I remember getting the first episodes on VHS from a video renting store and collecting every scrap of info I could find about the show in magazines. Ah, good times. So watching these episodes, especially the first season, is very much like a window to my childhood.

So even though I recognize that some episodes, like “Time and Again”, “Emanation”, “Ex Post Facto” or “Cathexis” aren’t necessarily great, I still enjoy them for nostalgic reasons. But even if you ignore these kind of episodes, I think there’s some genuinely awesome outings in the first season:

• “Caretaker” is just a great Star Trek pilot period; everything is in its right place in this one and it sets up the premise and the characters beautifully.
• “Parallax” is a wonderful follow-up to the pilot; it’s a bit low-key, but that’s what I love about it. It’s great to see the character interaction and conflict in this one.
• “Phage” and “Jetrel” are great episodes for Neelix, who we learn isn’t just all silly and comic relief.
• “Eye of the Needle” beautifully toys with the hopes of the crew of getting back home. As viewers we know they won’t make it at this point in the show, but the process of getting there and seeing them adjust their hopes just to be crushed once again plays out really well. I personally consider this a perfectly written episode and one of the best of the whole franchise up there with some of the ones you mention.
• “Prime Factors” explores a similar theme of the crew getting their hopes up about getting home and forcing them to consider how much they’re willing to compromise their morals.
• “Heroes and Demons” is cool in that it shows the doctor going on his first adventure and becoming more of a person in his own right.
• “Faces” is interesting in the way it explores Torres’ inner conflict, even though the premise is a bit out there.

All in all I would just say the writing is really strong in the first season. It’s not perfect and there’s absolutely some missteps, but otherwise it’s very much consistent in how it explores the characters and the premise of the show. I also like that there’s little mini arcs, like B’Elanna becoming chief engineer and becoming less aggressive, Kes helping the doctor to become a person, Seska being a troublemaker on the ship and then betraying them …

I really like season 1 of Voyager, even if I do find season 2 better. Season 3 is good to but has more mediocre episodes than season 1 and 2.

I agree on what you have written when it comes to season 1of TNG and DS9. Why these great series were a bit slow to start with, Voyager started with a bang!

Due to the stupidity of a TV channel which cancelled DS9 after only one season, I had only watched one season of DS9 when I started to watch VOY and at that point I thought that DS9 was an OK series, a decent spin-off to TNG.

It was only in later years I had the chance of watching all of DS9 and found what a fantastic serie it is.

But Voyager started great. I remember watching Caretaker and thought that "this is amazing!"

I also took an immediate liking to all the main characters in the series. The only other series I had the same immediate liking for the main characters at once was NCIS and CSI New York.

The only episodes of season 1 I'm not that fond of is Emanations and Elogium.

Emanations is plain boring, Elogium is a bit dull. It leads nowhere and has all those stupidities about the Ocampa which the writers never should have come up with.

Most of the other episodes are great with Caretaker, Jetrel, Projections and Time And Again as my favorites.

Note that I count the episodes Projections, Elogium, Twisted and The 37's as season 1 episodes due to the Stardates which show that the episodes all take place in the year 2371 and therefore were planned to be part of season 1.

Here are my ratings for the episodes:
5 Excellent

4 Very good

3 Good

2 Average

1 Bad

0 Lousy (should have been thrown in a trashcan)

Caretaker: 5

Parallax: 3

Time and Again: 5

Phage: 3

The Cloud: 3

Eye of The Needle: 5

Ex Post Facto: 4

Emanations: 1

Prime Factors: 3

State of Flux: 4

Heroes And Demons: 2

Cathexis: 4

Faces: 3

Jetre: 5

Learning Curve 3

Projections: 5

Elogium: 1

Twisted: 4

The 37's: 3

 

[tomalak301]

Of all the series from 2005 and before, I considered Voyager's Season 1 the strongest. So many great episodes to kick the series off, especially Seska and the build up to State of Flux and her reveal. I also consider Caretaker tied with Broken Bow as my favorite Star Trek premiere. In terms of all of it including the streaming shows, SNW had a pretty strong season 1, Discovery was kind of all over the place in it's Season 1, Picards Season 1 was ok, but some decisions were made I didn't like, Lower Decks was decent, and Prodigy got off to a little slow start but really took off after Kobayashi. I think I would put Voyager's below SNW.

 

[Oddish]

In some ways, early VOY was stronger than later.
- It had good villains in Seska and the Vidiians.
- Some Maquis were still having trouble fitting in.
- Voyager still felt like a ship trying to conserve resources.
- There were some recurring characters.
- Harry being an ensign made sense.
- They were spreading the love around instead of focusing on a few characters.
- And the Bun of Steel was still a thing.

 

[Tosk]

Voyager still felt like a ship trying to conserve resources.

Except all those trips to the holodeck. Independent, incompatible reactors? Okay, sure guys.