Learning Curve (VOY)

This is the way the season ends - not with a bang, but a... bottle show? It is true that "Learning Curve" is the final installment of Voyager's first season. And while not terrible, it doesn't exactly leave me clamoring for more. First off, it's a Tuvok episode. On a show with a lot of relatively bland characters, Tuvok takes the blandness to an entirely new level. This would be very well and good if the episode focused on some flaw in Tuvok that he had to work to overcome and, well, it sort of does, but the change feels incredibly forced and artificial. Tuvok doesn't really grow as a character, nor does he ever feel particularly vulnerable or easy to relate to. It doesn't help that the bland guest stars aren't so bland that they don't upstage Tuvok, either.

Let's back up a little. Remember the Maquis? We haven't really mentioned them since "State of Flux", but it turns out Seska isn't the only one who was having some trouble fitting in. Dolby, a bland white guy with a troubled past, Gerron, a surly Bajoran, Henley, a woman (seriously, that's all the characterization she gets) and Chell, a fat Bolian (is there any other kind?) are all having problems adjusting, so Janeway assigns Tuvok to give them a crash course in Starfleet discipline. It's frustrating to me that the white guy is the only one who gets any character development at all, as if the other three don't need personalities because they have the fact that they're aliens or women to make them identifiable.

The offending cheese.

The "cadets" are rude, insubordinate, obstinate, and proud. Tuvok is rigid, compassionless, and kind of a jerk until Neelix advises him to lighten up. Meanwhile, something has infected Voyager's bioneural circuitry, causing systems failures all over the ship. B'Elanna enlists the help of the Doctor, who can't find the source of the problem until Tuvok realizes its... cheese? I guess Neelix wanted to make cheese and the alien bacterial spores infected the gel packs? It seems odd to me that the writers, faced with an A-plot that feels like more of a B-plot, would write an B-plot that literally involved Voyager being endangered by cheese.

In order to solve the cheese-induced gel pack problem, Voyager has to turn the engines up super hot to kill the bacteria. Unfortunately, life-support goes out and this threatens to kill everyone on the ship. Even more unfortunately, everyone forgot to tell Tuvok and his cadets this, so they get trapped in an irradiated cargo bay and almost killed. But they work together to escape, and suddenly some how this makes everyone's problems go away. Or maybe not. It's hard to say because we never see Dolby, Henley, or Gerron again. (Chell apparently appears in one other episode.)

Okay, I lied at the beginning of my post. This actually was a terrible episode. The only redeeming factor of the entire forty-five minutes is that it contained the line "get the cheese to sickbay." That's it.

Random Observations:

Chakotay would probably be less bland if he punched people more often.

Gel Pack count: 45 (doubt we'll use that one again.)

Shouldn't the Starfleet dress code have an exception for the Bajoran earrings? They're a religious thing. But I guess we've never seen a Starfleet officer sporting a head scarf or a yarmulke either.

The Doctor talking to the Gel Pack was pretty funny. So was overheated Kes's death glare.

Chell is also featured in the Elite Force video game.

Kes gives the Doctor her "Are you fucking kidding me?" stare.

Jetrel (VOY)

Double TNG Next Week!

This week, Voyager takes a dark turn. Neelix has always had echoes of the sad clown, but now we discover the tragedy at the heart of his character - his entire family was killed in what was basically Hiroshima, and he was among the first to witness the devastation first-hand. "Jetrel" brings Neelix face to face with the scientist who invented the weapon.

It feels more like a Deep Space Nine story, with Jetrel telling lies upon lies to mask his true intentions, and perhaps the Deep Space Nine writing staff could have handled it better. As it is, the writing lacks the depth it needs to fully explore its premise. It asks some interesting questions that have been percolating in science fiction since the deployment of the A-Bombs - what is the moral responsibility of scientists? Is a blast that kills millions justifiable if it ends a war that would have killed billions? But it doesn't take full advantage of science fiction's ability to explore these questions divorced from their real world contexts.

While it largely fails as an exploration of morality, technology, and war, the piece succeeds as a
character piece for Neelix, revealing his tragic past and really bringing the character's essential conflicts into focus. While Kes has thrown herself wholeheartedly into life on Voyager, Neelix has always held the crew at arms length, ready to strike out on his own at the first sign of trouble. But his reluctance to form a family bond makes total sense from someone who lost his entire family, and his joviality is more believable as a facade he forces on himself to protect his psyche from the terrible darkness of the things he's seen than it is as just sheer optimism.

Ethan Phillips, Jennifer Lien, and Star Trek Veteran James Sloyan all really pull their acting weight, which sort of rescues the episode from the mediocre writing that plagues its more dramatic sequences. I can definitely see that the writers struggled with how best to tell this story. I just don't think they ended up with something totally cohesive. The ending in particular seems like it was thrown in for the sake of having a twist, and puts forth a lot of questions it doesn't even try to answer (using Voyager's transporter's to resurrect an entire dead colony surely must violate the Prime Directive somehow.)

Ultimately, this episode is about survivor guilt - its about Neelix forgiving himself for not dying with his family. The final scene, where he forgives Jetrel, doesn't feel earned at all, because the dramatic scenes haven't done the work of bringing him to that point. It definitely puts me in mind of Deep Space Nine's "Duet", but it doesn't achieve anywhere near the nuance of that episode.

Perhaps I'm being too hard on a first season episode from what is generally considered a weaker series. But mediocre episodes always bother me most when I can see the potential in them, and this may have been the most potential-full Voyager plot to date. It wasn't bad, it just wasn't nearly as good as it might have been.

Random Observations:

The pool scene at the beginning was a nice way of keeping us in the world and quickly reestablishing Neelix - light-hearted, but shrewd.

Nice to keep reminding us of Kes's abbreviated lifespan - conveniently timed with how long a Star Trek show runs. I wonder what their plans were for the character?

Janeway's ready to take a big detour for Neelix's sake. We're never getting home at this rate.

James Sloyer is no stranger to doing heavy drama in heavier make-up. He previously played Odo's "father" Mora Pel on DS9 and K'mpec on TNG's "Firstborn".

Faces (VOY)

I have seen this episode more times than any other episode of Voyager. I wrote a paper on it for my Feminism in Theatre class in college, and later adapted that paper into a panel which I ran at Connecticon last year. Both of these focused on B'Elanna's racial identity and her expression of gender, looking at the Klingon/Human split as a metaphor for the masculine and feminine aspects of her personality, and also delving into racial stereotypes of Latino women (its easy to forgt B'Elanna's human half is named Torres and from South America.) As fascinating as that discussion was, I don't really feel like rehashing it. I'd like to look more at the craft of this episode, and how despite an absurdly cheesy premise it still manages to shine as one of the gems of the first season.

This is basically only the second B'Elanna episode we've had -possibly third, if we count her sub-plot in Prime Factors, which at least that gave her some good characterization. But the point is we don't know her that well, which makes splitting her in two kind of a risky proposition. This isn't "The Enemy Within" - neither B'Elanna is evil, and in fact the episode is really about B'Elanna being forced to confront the fact that while she may not like her Klingon heritage, it is a part of her she can't deny. But turning a character's internal conflict into an external one is very difficult to do without a certain amount of ham-fistedness.

The use of the Vidians is a really smart way of making the whole concept easier to swallow. The fact that they can essentially clone B'Elanna but can't, you know, grow themselves some organs instead of stealing them from people seems a little off, but other than that the idea of Klingons being resistant to the phage creates a perfect justification for Sulan making the split and also fits perfectly with what we know of Klingons from previous Trek episodes. The Vidians are also interesting characters, and Sulan's scenes with B'Elanna give us more insight into why they do what they do than we got in "The Phage". Finally, it means the episode can do a cool, sci-fi concept, and develop an under-developed character, and develop a recurring villain all in one episode without it feeling crowded, which is quite impressive.

Sulan grafting Durst's face onto his own is the creepiest moment on the show so far. Partially this is because of the inherent creepiness of face-stealing, but part of it is definitely the fact that Sulan genuinely thinks this will make it easier for B'Elanna to trust him. This just shows how warped and bizarre Vidian culture has become. When Sulan says that Durst's organs will save dozens, there's almost a reverence in his voice, like he actually buys this "greater good" idea. The Vidians are extremely evil, but they are also extremely pitiable.

Back to B'Elanna - we learn about her childhood here, and I think that scene is worth looking at. The story she tells Paris here will be told in greater detail in "Lineage", with flashbacks, but its all laid out in the first season, and will inform B'Elanna's character as we go along. Even though each show has had a character of mixed human and alien heritage, B'Elanna is kind of a backwards approach. Spock had occasional flashes of conflict, but ultimately had chosen to embrace his Vulcan side. Deanna Troi lives a well-balanced life, leaning more towards her Betazoid side. Worf struggles to be more Klingon. But B'Elanna has grown up hating her Klingon side, for reasons both political and personal. She blames her Klingon side for her fighting spirit and her uncontrollable temper, but really her temper comes from her self-loathing and inability to find peace with her own identity. It's a struggle that will keep coming around, and it makes her one of the most compelling characters on the show.

Random Observations:

Love the little Neelix/ Tuvok scene at the beginning. Those two are too much fun.

Durst becomes our first real casualty since the pilot.

Minor Character Watch: Lt. Ayala's name is mentioned for the first time in this episode.

The Doctor has some of that amazing Starfleet Plastic Surgery in his programming.

The lies that the Vidian guards tell when they take someone to Organ Harvesting are hilarious. "Where are you taking me?" "A shower and a hot meal."

It's a little weird that Voyager doesn't even try to rescue the other prisoners. Like, even the Talaxian who helped them.

This is the beginning of the Tom/B'Elanna ship.

Tom does that thing that men/ white people like to do in discussions of gender/ race where they compare some negative experience they've had with the other person's experience of oppression even though its totally unrelated, and it really gets on my nerves. It feels like he's belittling her experience by comparing it to his bad haircuts.

Cathexis (VOY)

Sometimes I feel like we're just kind of running through a checklist of overdone Star Trek plots, with a few truly original gems in the middle, and it makes me wonder why I love these shows so much. But then I realize that sitcoms and procedural reuse lots to exactly the same degree, and what it's about, when faced with an episode that seems totally unoriginal, is the characters. "Cathexis" gives us some fun interactions, and manages to put a little bit of a twist ending on the whole "brain-posessing alien" plot that makes the whole thing a little less predictable. The result is an episode that, while no one would call it strong, at least keeps us feeling like we're not wasting our time with the show.

In the teaser, Tuvok returns to the ship with a comatose Chakotay. Apparently they were attacked, and some kind of energy weapon was used to knock him out. The Doctor thinks he can restore Chakotay if he can find the weapon that did this, so they head for the nebula where the attack took place.

Unfortunately, Tuvok and Chakotay brought a stowaway along, an alien being that can possess crew members for short spans of time, and it seems determined to keep them from reaching the nebula. The crew battles the alien's sabotage, as well as the paranoia of knowing it could be in anyone at any time, until it is skillfully revealed that the consciousness possessing everyone isn't evil or alien - its Chakotay, and the actual alien has been possessing Tuvok all along.

The twist works, we see it coming but its not too obvious, and the climax is pretty exciting, but the episode on the whole doesn't offer a lot in the way of characterization or explanation of any deeper part of humanity. The idea of the alien making the crew turn against each other is cool, but not explored in enough detail, and other episodes have taken that tactic far more effectively. The most novel and interesting part is Chakotay's disembodiment, and how it interacts with his religious beliefs, but the show is too scared to delve particularly deeply into that part of his character, so it remains a tantalizing possibility.

There are some lovely moments between B'Elanna and Chakotay in this episode, even though Chakotay is unconscious for them, we get a great sense of how much she cares for him as a friend and mentor. The other relationship that really gets built up here is Janeway and the Doctor, as she makes the decision to entrust him with Voyager's command codes, showing a kind of trust that seems abrupt for someone she just weeks ago was still thinking of as hardware.

Random Observations:

The teaser scene with Janeway's Gothic Holonovel has no connection to the plot even thematically (I guess there is kind of a ghost theme in Gothic novels, but its a weak connection.) It seems like an attempt to feminize Janeway but it doesn't really work.

Kes's telepathy becomes relevant again, but the Tuvok alien is smart enough to shut her down before she can be helpful.

Tuvok is a pretty good choice for an alien to possess - its much easier to impersonate someone who shows very little emotion. It's sad that even Janeway can't tell her best friend is possessed until its too late.

They ejected the warp core, but we didn't see them have to go through the process of reinstalling it.

If phasers with wide beam dispersal are a thing, why don't they ever use them again?

Minor Character Watch: Lt. Durst plays a major role in one other episode, coming up very soon.

Heroes and Demons (VOY)

            It’s actually incredibly cool that immediately on the heels of TNG’s first foray into the “Holodeck episode” we get to see what Voyager has learned from seven years of trial and error. “Heroes and Demons” isn’t a great episode, but it’s more than watchable – great humor and character acting from Robert Picardo help sell one of our cheesiest plots to date. It helps that the Doctor actually learns something about himself from his time on the holodeck.

            The plot, in brief – B’Elanna and Janeway take a sample of some weird “photonic matter” from a nebula, because apparently it will “boost power converter efficiency.” Captain Janeway wants Harry to help B’Elanna harvest the stuff, but he’s in the holodeck, and won’t answer his calls. Then it turns out he’s not on the ship. And the Holodeck won’t turn off. So Chakotay and Tuvok go to investigate, and soon find themselves also vanished. Not wanting to risk any more crew members, Janeway sends the Doctor, who should be immune to being converted into energy since he’s already mostly energy, on his first away mission.

            Our destination this week is a holonovel based on the epic poem “Beowulf.” Unlike Dixon Hill, this is a real (if conveniently public domain) story, and the writers have some fun with that in the script. Unferth, for example, who in the original story challenges Beowulf to a duel to prove he is man enough to face Grendel, does the same to our heroes. The script also plays with the idea of the Holonovel as an interactive story that would actually be programmed, able to improvise but with obvious limitations. The characters greet each new “player” in much the same way, as if anyone entering the holodeck is essentially Beowulf. It feels much more like an interactive character screen in a video game, where it says “What is your name?” and the default is Beowulf, but you can enter something else if you want to.

            The cheesy fantasy-movie costumes and speech patterns, as well as the shoe-horned-in romance, all add to the feeling that we’re getting the 24^th-century Hollywood version of Beowulf. If all this episode was was Tuvok and Chakotay or Janeway wandering through this low budget sword-and-sorcery flick trying to find Harry, it would be a funny, if unmemorable episode. But adding in the photonic alien as the source of the malfunction (as opposed to “The Big Goodbye” and its totally unexplained malfunction) helps a lot. And what helps even more is that this plotline is used to force the doctor to recognize how far he has evolved beyond a simple program.

            The thing is, it’s not just his indestructibility that makes the Doctor ideally suited for this mission. While Chakotay and Tuvok talk past the Holodeck characters and treat them like they’re not real, the Doctor, himself a hologram, interacts with them as people and treats them with respect. This draws into focus how many of the crew still treat the Doctor, as a tool rather than a comrade. And ultimately, the Doctor rescues Kim, Chakotay, and Tuvok not by slaying “Grendel” but by communicating with him, which helps tie everything together thematically.

            “The crew accidentally captures a lifeform” isn’t an original plot, but it works well enough as a macguffin to drive the rest of the episode. I really admire the writing staff’s ability so far to know when something needs to be an ensemble piece and when it can put all the heavy-lifting on one actor, and while this is really The Doctor’s show, almost everyone is used effectively. Janeway, B’Elanna and Tom work well as his mission control team, and Kes, as always, is his moral support. Chakotay and Tuvok, in the one scene before they get captured, continue to have a really nice, developing relationship. Neelix doesn’t show up, which is fine as he’s really not needed.

Random Observations:

Vulcans apparently have no monsters or demons in their mythology. I find this hard to believe.

Janeway’s version of how holodecks work conflicts with Wesley’s brief explanation in “Encounter at Farpoint”, but I think its more consistent with Deep Space Nine and later TNG, especially “Ship in a Bottle.”

Again we see the effect of Janeway having moved into command from Engineering. She knows her ship better than Jean-Luc knows his, at least from a tech standpoint.

I’ll say it once more, Holodeck safeties should really be hardwired.

The effects in the Grendel scenes look really spectacular, and not cheesy at all. Well, aside from the Doc’s arm getting vaporized.

The Doctor chooses a name (Albert Schweitzer), but then decides it’s not for him.

Harry Kim Death Count: 2

State of Flux (VOY)

            Star Trek and The Next Generation were both extremely episodic, designed for the casual viewer who watched maybe one or two episodes, maybe not in order. Deep Space Nine, on the other hand, is highly serial – episodes build on the events of previous ones, and its best watched as a complete project. Voyager tries to strike a balance between the two, and “State of Flux” is an episode where this experiment is in full effect. As such, it kind of has to be two different episodes, and it makes some sacrifices to achieve that end. I’m not sure it’s a complete success, but it’s certainly not a complete failure – it’s watchable, and exciting, and it introduces us to one of Voyager’s most memorable recurring villains.

            From an episodic standpoint, “State of Flux” falls a little bit flat. It’s trying to be a mystery story, but there’s no twist. Well, there is a twist, but it comes at the wrong point in the story to be effective. A good mystery story leaves you wondering who’s guilty until the end. I think even if I hadn’t been spoiled, I would never have suspected anyone but Seska. The scene where they interrogate Carey falls extremely flat, like the interrogators are talking to the audience and saying "look, it really could be this guy, see!"

Chakotay makes Carey squirm.

            There’s also some wonderful set up of Chakotay and Tuvok as partners – kind of the classic buddy-cop-movie pairing of the by-the-book cop and the loose cannon who doesn’t play by the rules. There’s even a little acknowledgement of the history between the two characters – Tuvok did gain Chakotay’s trust with the intention of betraying him, and that’s not something you forgive easily. These two needed an episode to get into this stuff, and I can’t help but feel they got shortchanged.

            So a little more time could have made this episode a much better mystery and a better Tuvok/ Chakotay story. Where did that time go instead? It went to developing Seska as a character and making us care about her betrayal. It went to establishing her relationship with other characters like B’Elanna and Chakotay. All of this is extremely important when we realize that Seska is going to be Voyager’s nemesis for the next two seasons. The fact that she lived and worked with these people, that she and Chakotay were lovers, makes her a much more interesting villain. But all of this could have been built up slowly over several episodes.

            Or State of Flux could have been Voyager’s first two-parter. It had enough going on to justify one, and the stakes were high enough. But I understand the writer’s not wanting to take the risk. Two-parters tend to be heavy on the action, which this episode was not. But I can’t help but feel there were a lot of missed opportunities.

But Seska makes Chakotay squirm even more.

            The serial aspect of the episode is more of a success. I especially like how much it draws on not only Voyager’s past, but Star Trek’s as well. On the one hand, we have the most recent past – in the previous episode, both Seska and Joe Carey showed they were willing to bend the Prime Directive to get Voyager home. Now that a more serious breach is committed, making them the primary suspects is excellent payoff for that episode. Going back to the pilot, we see the Kazon make good on their promise to “make Voyager rue the day”, and we see the horrible effect of ignoring the prime directive and giving them technology.

            But what really works for me is the reveal that Lt. Seska is a Cardassian sleeper agent. A Cardassian is the perfect villain not only from a plot standpoint (it makes perfect sense for them to have put a spy on a maquis ship) but also from a psychological standpoint. The Cardassians work as villains on Deep Space Nine because of the stark contrast that their militaristic, collectivist culture poses to the Federation. When you think about what we know about Cardassian psychology, Seska’s actions up until this point make sense. She wants to get home. She’s willing to break rules and make back-handed deals to do it. She also has the Cardassian penchant for speechifying, which helps immensely.

            Seska is not often mentioned when the great villains of Star Trek are recounted – if Janeway has an iconic nemesis, it’s probably Susanna Thompson’s borg queen. But at this point, she has all the hallmarks of being truly memorable, and she really never stops being a thorn in the Captain’s side, even seasons after her death. I’m looking forward to seeing her reign of terror continue to develop, and seeing how Chakotay takes this ever-increasing tide of betrayal.

Random observations:

Seska and Chakotay’s banter is nice. The whole “Mushroom soup” scene did an excellent job of showing how awkward Chakotay’s position is as first officer and Maquis liason.

I hope the gross leola root becomes a running gag. Incidentally, it looks like someone shellacked a piece of ginger.

B’Elanna doesn’t use Scotty’s patented Chief Engineer exaggeration technique. If she says it will be done tomorrow, it will be done tomorrow.

The scene with Tuvok and Chakotay playing gin during the stake-out was amazing. I want to see more little slice-of-life-on-Voyager moments.

Tom Paris hasn’t been involved in a plotline in a while.

Maj Cullah just makes hairdressers squirm.

Maj Cullah is probably even less memorable as a recurring villain than Seska, but I should probably note that we meet him for the first time in this episode.

Despite all the bluffing back and forth, no shots are actually fired in space (no torpedoes expended)

No fatalities, but we can definitely count Seska as a lost crew member.

Prime Factors (VOY)

            Most of the time, when aliens are really ridiculously friendly and also pretty and only want to help the crew, it is because they are secretly trying to eat us or involved in some kind of mind-control plot. “Prime Factors” subverts that expected twist – the Salcarans genuinely are as nice as they say they are, pretty much. Ultimately, though, Voyager’s crew gets greedy and screws things up, and in the process B’Elanna finds her loyalty tested.

Lunch room gossip.

            The opening of this episode really captures that “family” feeling that made late TNG so watchable. Tom, B’Elanna, and ascended redshirt Lt. Seska are teasing Harry about a disastrous date he had with Jenny Delaney. Seska calls out that “there are no secrets on a ship this small” and we are happy to see a lighter side of life in the Delta Quadrant. Eavesdropping from a nearby table, Janeway and Tuvok are happy to see Starfleet and Maquis crew members finally coming together.

            Which of course cues us in that that bond is about to be challenged. It’s smart to make Harry and B’Elanna the focus of this episode, because their relationship has been a symbol of the integration of the crews thus far. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Voyager receives a personal invitation from the overwhelming hospital but hedonistic (and inexplicably French) Salcarans. The Salcarans offer the crew shore leave, edible plants for their hydroponics bay, new clothes, etc. They even throw a big party for the crew, and it  looks like  both Harry and the Captain are about to get lucky. But then Harry ruins everyone’s sexytimes when he discovers that the Salcarans have the technology to send Voyager halfway home.

Remember the Prime Directive? The one where we don’t interfere with the development of other civilizations? Where we’re not allowed to share technology? Turns out the Salcarans have it too, and as Janeway points out, it’s not so fun to be on the other side. Still, Janeway is not about to get her crew home by violating the laws of another civilization, so she sets about trying to change the Salcarans’ minds.

The person most likely to screw up Harry Kim's love life.

Which brings us back to our two Junior officers, both of whom face temptation. Harry, the young, impressionable rules-follower, is also the one who most desperately wants to get back to his family. Also, his new Salcaran girlfriend happens to have the black market connections that could get him the technology. B’Elanna, who was all for screwing over the Ocampa to get home back in “Caretaker”, is now in a position of leadership and doesn’t want to betray her Captain’s trust. But she, along with Seska and Joe Carey, has the engineering knowledge to use it.

            It’s great to see these characters conflicted on so many axis – desire to get home, duty to their Captain, observance of Starfleet principles – and their decisions are all in-character and believable. The real twist comes when Tuvok discovers the plot and, rather than turning the mutineers in, covers for them. His rationale – that he knew Janeway wouldn’t be able to defy her principles so he was saving her the decision – is rationale. It’s actually very Vulcan, to be willing to bend principle when it makes logical sense to do so, and his final scene with Janeway works because of the relationship that’s built up between the two.

The dressing down.

            Lots of characters barely appear in this episode – Paris, Kes, The EMH, and CHakotay are all mostly absent. But that gave the writers a chance to really let Janeway, Tuvok, B’Elanna and Harry work through this problem in their own ways. And that’s where this episode shines. Voyager is more full of strong personalities than the Enterprise ever was, and it’s at its strongest when those personalities get to clash a little. Janeway is a mother to her crew, but sometimes you disagree with your mother and you act out, and then you have to deal with the fact that you betrayed someone who cares about you. Janeway sees Tuvok as a mentor. She sees Harry as a son. She’s not sure whether to see B’Elanna as both a pupil or an antagonist, but Kate Mulgrew and Roxanne Dawson have great chemistry so I want to see those sparks fly over and over again.

The ending – we steal the technology, but it’s not compatible with ours and doesn’t work – is a bit of a cop-out. It’s the Gilligan’s Island principle, of course, in that if Voyager gets home there’s no show. But I don’t think the episode is undermined. On the contrary, I think it’s the strongest episode yet – it has a compelling conflict, the tension builds effectively, and the characters actually develop.

Random Observations:

Minor Character Watch:

Seska gets a name and a brother back home who’s birthday she’s missing.

Joe Carey has a wife and kids back home himself, and he’s more ethically flexible than we thought. He also seems to be adjusting well to being B’Elanna’s subordinate.

Jenny Delaney gets name-dropped again as the girl Harry will never make it with.

I love the fact that the Salcarans use stories as currency.

The Salcaran ship does not look like a recycled model. The set of their ballroom, on the other hand, is definitely a redress of the Professor’s house from Ex Posto Facto.

Discussion question: Is Harry Kim Wesley Crusher done right?

That climax sure had a lot of technobabble in it.

I’m gonna go ahead and guess that the reason Tom Paris wasn’t involved in the episode after the first scene is that he was out there nailing as many Salcaran chicks as possible.