Author Topic: Been watching Star Trek Voyager...  (Read 7764 times)

houtex

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Re: Been watching Star Trek Voyager...
« Reply #20 on: September 26, 2014, 02:26:59 PM »
Trek, as a movie franchise, is... disappointing.

There can't be movies that use stories like TNG's Inner Light,  Conundrum, Darmok, or Measure of a Man.  There can't be movies like TOS's Let That Be Your Last Battlefield, or Plato's Stepchildren, or The Trouble with Tribbles, or even City on the Edge of Forever (my personal favorite TOS, even though they bastardised the original story, it's a hell of a story.  Both are.)  Among many others in all the series.

I could go on, but you get the point, I'd think.  There's no *TREK* in Movie Trek.  There can be inklings, true, but the real trek stories, such as The Motion Picture (V'Ger), Final Frontier (What does God need with a Starship?) and even Insurrection (Do we have the right to claim immortality by force?)  They didn't do as well as the action packed ones.  The Wrath of Khan was probably the best melding of the action and Trek, but the problem is, you can't keep doing that.  You've turned it into Star Wars, which isn't what Trek's about.

If it doesn't have a bad ass villain like Khan, Borg Queen, or Nero, or isn't a topical commentary about the collapse of the Soviet Union or the hunting of whales, then the philosophical, thought provoking Trek that I'd rather see, *as well* as the shoot 'em ups, bad villain, and a mix thereto of course... that's where the movies fall short for me.

Trek needs to retire for a bit.  Then come back as Star Trek:Excalibur or Star Trek:Discovery or such like that, IMO.  Trek is not a movie thing.  It's a series thing.  You can't grow Trek otherwise.

Eoraptor

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Re: Been watching Star Trek Voyager...
« Reply #21 on: September 26, 2014, 04:49:31 PM »
Yeah, a lot ofpeople have been calling for star trek on TV again, but paramount really couldn't care less. Sci Fi TV is wildly expensive to produce, and why risk doing that when they can just pump out one mediocre forumula movie every two or three years?
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doc7924

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Re: Been watching Star Trek Voyager...
« Reply #22 on: September 26, 2014, 10:53:56 PM »
Yeah, a lot ofpeople have been calling for star trek on TV again, but paramount really couldn't care less. Sci Fi TV is wildly expensive to produce, and why risk doing that when they can just pump out one mediocre forumula movie every two or three years?

Wasn't there a rumor about a new TV series based on the reboot movie?

Anyway what else could they really do? I thought out of all new the series - DS9 was the best overall it terms of story and character development.
Voyager was basically TNG in a different part of space. Plus the one thing that had made it different = having the 'bad guys' join the crew was made pointless when they all became Starfleet anyway -

Enterprise tried but in the end just wasn't popular enough, even though I liked it a lot - especially the last year. 

Kaos Arcanna

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Re: Been watching Star Trek Voyager...
« Reply #23 on: September 26, 2014, 11:57:06 PM »
Wasn't there a rumor about a new TV series based on the reboot movie?

Anyway what else could they really do? I thought out of all new the series - DS9 was the best overall it terms of story and character development.
Voyager was basically TNG in a different part of space. Plus the one thing that had made it different = having the 'bad guys' join the crew was made pointless when they all became Starfleet anyway -

Enterprise tried but in the end just wasn't popular enough, even though I liked it a lot - especially the last year.

If only Enterprise had started out in the first season as it did in the last season it would have had a seven year run.

houtex

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Re: Been watching Star Trek Voyager...
« Reply #24 on: September 27, 2014, 03:37:01 AM »
Indeed.  But having to retro-fit Enterprise in already established universe, and still come up with new stuff to do... difficult.  I liked it overall, and S4 was definitely the best. 

Just most people had given up at that point in watching it.  Shame, really.

Night-Hawk07

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Re: Been watching Star Trek Voyager...
« Reply #25 on: September 29, 2014, 07:21:56 PM »
Doesn't help that it was put on some obscure channel either. At least in my area, it was UPN2. If they'd have stuck it on Sci-Fi, I think that would've helped keep it alive a little longer. There's no doubt Season 5 would've been the start of the Earth-Romulan War, which IMO, would've given the Dominion War a run for its money if written well like the books are currently.

houtex, you forgot The Undiscovered Country. I'd say it too had a good mix of action and thought-provoking philosophy.

Angel Phoenix77

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Re: Been watching Star Trek Voyager...
« Reply #26 on: September 29, 2014, 07:47:27 PM »
Trek, as a movie franchise, is... disappointing.

There can't be movies that use stories like TNG's Inner Light,  Conundrum, Darmok, or Measure of a Man.  There can't be movies like TOS's Let That Be Your Last Battlefield, or Plato's Stepchildren, or The Trouble with Tribbles, or even City on the Edge of Forever (my personal favorite TOS, even though they bastardised the original story, it's a hell of a story.  Both are.)  Among many others in all the series.

I could go on, but you get the point, I'd think.  There's no *TREK* in Movie Trek.  There can be inklings, true, but the real trek stories, such as The Motion Picture (V'Ger), Final Frontier (What does God need with a Starship?) and even Insurrection (Do we have the right to claim immortality by force?)  They didn't do as well as the action packed ones.  The Wrath of Khan was probably the best melding of the action and Trek, but the problem is, you can't keep doing that.  You've turned it into Star Wars, which isn't what Trek's about.

If it doesn't have a bad ass villain like Khan, Borg Queen, or Nero, or isn't a topical commentary about the collapse of the Soviet Union or the hunting of whales, then the philosophical, thought provoking Trek that I'd rather see, *as well* as the shoot 'em ups, bad villain, and a mix thereto of course... that's where the movies fall short for me.

Trek needs to retire for a bit.  Then come back as Star Trek:Excalibur or Star Trek:Discovery or such like that, IMO.  Trek is not a movie thing.  It's a series thing.  You can't grow Trek otherwise.
The reason there can't be star trek movies such as the episodes is because they are boring. Look at the first star trek movie it flopped not because it followed Roddenberry's original star trek series it flopped because it was boring.
People now a days don't want to watch peaceful movies they want to see someone get killed in them. Whether you agree or not the reboot movie made more money than the first movie and if I remember correctly the only original movies it did not topic was star trek 2, 4, and 6.
One day the Phoenix will rise again.

houtex

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Re: Been watching Star Trek Voyager...
« Reply #27 on: September 30, 2014, 02:43:36 PM »
Doesn't help that it was put on some obscure channel either. At least in my area, it was UPN2. If they'd have stuck it on Sci-Fi, I think that would've helped keep it alive a little longer. There's no doubt Season 5 would've been the start of the Earth-Romulan War, which IMO, would've given the Dominion War a run for its money if written well like the books are currently.

houtex, you forgot The Undiscovered Country. I'd say it too had a good mix of action and thought-provoking philosophy.

I didn't forget.  It played on the same thing as the others.  Action and topicalness. 

I'm not saying it wouldn't have done well if the USSR hadn't collapsed... but...

It was a worthy sendoff for TOS, for sure.  Then they had to have freakin' Generations screw it up.  PAY THE LIGHT BILLS, Starfleet.  Geez.

Although we did get that awesome Stellar Cartography room.  That was freakin' sweet.

And they made up for it with First Contact, so there's that.

Eoraptor

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Re: Been watching Star Trek Voyager...
« Reply #28 on: October 01, 2014, 11:08:20 PM »
I didn't forget.  It played on the same thing as the others.  Action and topicalness. 

I'm not saying it wouldn't have done well if the USSR hadn't collapsed... but...

It was a worthy sendoff for TOS, for sure.  Then they had to have freakin' Generations screw it up.  PAY THE LIGHT BILLS, Starfleet.  Geez.

Although we did get that awesome Stellar Cartography room.  That was freakin' sweet.

And they made up for it with First Contact, so there's that.

The older I get, the more mixed feelings I have about First Contact... On the one hand, it had a good mix action and drama that we really haven't gotten since, with every other movie since veering wildly from one extreme to the other (Insurrection was 95 minutes of political statesmanship and joystick grabbing, Nemesis was a bog standard evil twin story with a giant gun and daddy issues, ST was a big chase movie, and ITD was... a love story to fan fiction or something) And the central plot point about the legendary founder of earth's space age being not what he was cracked up to be was great... buuuuuuut it really drove the stake into the borg as a truly "alien" menace who worked, acted, and thought nothing at all like we did. It dumbed them down by giving them a queen and human motives, a ball which Voyager then took and ran with until they'd been driven right into the ground.

eh, just yammering, don't mind me.
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houtex

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Re: Been watching Star Trek Voyager...
« Reply #29 on: October 02, 2014, 01:56:53 AM »
Nope, you nailed that.  That just about sums up what I thought of the Borg Queen/Voyager as well.  I thought it humanized the Borg and lessened them, to have a sole Queen to rule them all.

It's no longer a *collective* if you've got a ruler.  It's a dictatorship/monarchy.  What part of 'collective' don't you writers get?!

doc7924

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Re: Been watching Star Trek Voyager...
« Reply #30 on: October 15, 2014, 05:00:30 PM »
Nope, you nailed that.  That just about sums up what I thought of the Borg Queen/Voyager as well.  I thought it humanized the Borg and lessened them, to have a sole Queen to rule them all.

It's no longer a *collective* if you've got a ruler.  It's a dictatorship/monarchy.  What part of 'collective' don't you writers get?!

I felt Voyager made the Borg into a joke. I mean the Borg massacred the Federation at Wolf 359 and probably other places, yet one little stupid ship, in BORG SPACE no less, defeated them over and over.

I guess First Contact tried to make them menacing again.


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Re: Been watching Star Trek Voyager...
« Reply #31 on: October 27, 2014, 10:49:11 AM »
I guess I'm one of the reasons it stayed on the air for 7 years.   I loved it.   Voyager is my favorite ST series.

One reason being that the Doctor is my favorite character in that entire universe.  I find his story to be fascinating and Robert Picardo was wonderful in the role.   His evolution alone was enough to keep me around.  "Latent Image" from Season 5 was especially powerful.

Another reason is that Janeway is my favorite Captain.  She actually seemed more flawed than the others in that she struggled with her passions a lot.   I liked that she was impulsive at times and it cracked me up that she drove the time travel cops crazy. (one of them literally crazy)   Also, Kate Mulgrew owned it.   I put her acting right up there with Patrick Stewart easily.  I remember being enthralled by her acting in an early episode when she had to confront Tuvok about an act of insubordination.   I could feel her anger and heartbreak at what she considered to be a betrayal.  Very powerful scene in her stateroom.

Next would be the premise.   Different than the others.   ST and ST:NG were pretty much the same.  DS9....meh...never got into that static setting enough to give it much of a chance.   ...Voyager...that interested me!   Trapped 75 years from Earth with no help?   Now that's different!

Also really loved Tuvok.   Again the acting of Tim Russ was the main reason.   I'm not sure I've ever seen an actor look to be constantly struggling to keep his emotions in check like he did.   I knew that Vulcans were suppressing a violent side with Spock...but I could really feel it with Tuvok.

Really liked the 7of9 character for the most part.   Disliked her costume, but the character really interested me.

B'Elanna Torres was another favorite.   Liked everything about that character plus loved the acting of Roxann Dawson.  She got a chance to illustrate exactly what the inner turmoil was about in the first season episode where her human and Klingon sides were separated.  Dawson played two dramatically different characters to perfection in that episode.

Chakotay...eh....didn't love him or hate him.   At times he interested me and at times I was bored with the "mystical spirit guide" stuff.

Harry Kim was ok too.   I got to like him more as the series went on.  I was deeply moved by his character in "Timeless" in Season 5.

Didn't like Neelix to be honest.  I found him irritating at times.   No idea why Kes would be interested in him.   I would have put him off the ship if I were the Captain.

Kes really interested me too.   I heard that Jennifer Lien had some personal problems which were behind her leaving the show.   That's too bad....they didn't really get a chance to tell her story like they planned.   A unique race.

Tom Paris....he bored me at first but another one that really grew on me as the show went along.

One of the episodes left me so greatly moved I was stunned.   It was "Course: Oblivion" from Season 5.   The original crew had been copied the previous season on "Demon" and the copied crew was left behind.    Turns out they came to believe they were the original crew and were attempting to get back to earth.   We join them without knowing they are the copies and watch as they slowly begin to die.   The episode ends as they are desperately trying to leave some trace of their existence behind....even trying to send a message to the original Voyager.   But the ship falls apart before they can contact Voyager.   Voyager does pick up their last distress signal but only finds debris.   Janeway makes a poignant entry which is basically the only record that other crew ever existed.   "We received a distress call at 0900 hours...arrived at the vessel's last known coordinates at 2120. The ship was destroyed. Cause unknown. No survivors."

They wanted to be remembered so badly...and that's all they got.   Hit me hard.


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Re: Been watching Star Trek Voyager...
« Reply #32 on: October 27, 2014, 12:05:55 PM »
Argh... That episode was one of many that just felt like a pointless waste.  It had no impact or bearing on anything.  They didn't even need to reset the timeline and make it so the events never actually happened to make the events meaningless.  It was just a worthless segue like the mirror universe 2 parter for Enterprise.  It was not the first time I finished an episode of Voyager and said "what the heck?  Why?!" but it did elicit one of the more vehement outbursts.

The only thing that could've made it worse is if they'd said that many of the episodes since the demon planet had actually been following the fake crew.

Just finished Enterprise.  The bad Trek wounds are freshly opened, and not even the awesomeness of Jeffrey Combs can completely salve them.  The worst part is that after the temporal cold war and Xindi nonsense, the series was looking up.  Then it had that mirror universe story - that might not have been bad if it tied in with the regular Enterprise universe, and didn't have a horrible CGI lizard - and that awful TNG holodeck finale.  Recalling the worst of Voyager is just salt in the wound.
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Re: Been watching Star Trek Voyager...
« Reply #33 on: October 27, 2014, 01:45:32 PM »
Nope, you nailed that.  That just about sums up what I thought of the Borg Queen/Voyager as well.  I thought it humanized the Borg and lessened them, to have a sole Queen to rule them all.

It's no longer a *collective* if you've got a ruler.  It's a dictatorship/monarchy.  What part of 'collective' don't you writers get?!

I always assumed that the Borg were much like a colony of ants, with different drones for different kinds of work. The queen was there to keep things going. In that context, I never felt it was out of place - with maybe the exception that the queen was presumably human and ...somewhat oversexed.
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Harpospoke

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Re: Been watching Star Trek Voyager...
« Reply #34 on: October 27, 2014, 10:36:33 PM »
Argh... That episode was one of many that just felt like a pointless waste.  It had no impact or bearing on anything.
Exactly why it felt so powerful to me.   They wanted so badly to be remembered and for a record of their exploits to exist.   In the end, they were a brief log entry that no one would ever look at most likely.    Appeals to my nihilistic nature I think.