(no subject)

[ivyfic]

I am continuing with my very flawed project of watching all of Star Trek. The fact that Voyager can have an episode in season three where two characters discuss how wonderful it is to be on Voyager and how they feel very fortunate to be there means that THEY HAVE JETTISONED ABSOLUTELY EVERYTHING THAT COULD POSSIBLY BE INTERESTING ABOUT THE PREMISE OF THE SHOW.

It's rather like people on Battlestar: Galactica treating it like summercamp. You are stranded so far from home you will probably never get back in hostile territory where you have no support system, no way to replace anything that breaks, and no reenforcements to call on. You will most likely die on some backwater planet and no one back home will ever know what happened to you. Yeah. Sounds like a FANTASTIC time.

(What other show treated a similar set-up like it was summercamp? Oh, right. Stargate: Atlantis.)

Comments

[jethrien.livejournal.com]

Yeah - how was it that DS9 was so much angstier? I mean, yes, war against people who can look like anyone and their berserker troops of rage, but at least the DS9 folks had supply and communication lines. Voyager should have been an exercise in getting dingier and dingier at very best. Every time you lose a crewperson, not only is it "woe my friend is dead", but also, "shit, we don't have anyone left who knows how to run the power junction on level 4".

I think part of the problem, actually, was the replicators. They declared hand-wavingly that they had to avoid using them (why?) so they could justify comic-relief Neelix and the occasional side quest for a planet with caffeine. But if the replicators really can't be used, how come they still have clean uniforms? Every time a uniform gets torn for drama in a battle, it shouldn't be replaced. The carpets shouldn't stay clean, the glassware shouldn't stay unchipped. There should have been far more jury-rigging and systems going offline. Either the holodecks should have been off limits because of power usage or they should have been completely occupied all the time because that was the only place where shit wasn't broken. There should have been far, far more desperation about finding food. And about what to trade for it, since any electronic currency is worthless and they have a very limited amount of stuff left. And how does their air filters work? (Because I feel like the easiest way to deal with air purification if you've got replicators is just to use those to convert other gases to oxygen.)

I know starships are supposed to be pretty self-sufficient, but this one lost a lot of its crew. And it's just too convenient that the Maquis happen to fill those gaps. There should have been five communications guys where you needed two and no environmental engineers, and an angst and orgy of people trying to cross train themselves. Not to mention all the psychological issues they barely paid lip service to.

Yeah, this show should have been really grim. And yet it was much brighter than DS9.

[cubby-t-bear.livejournal.com]

It was the lighting. DS9 was much darker. Getting a starbase on the cheap from a totalitarian state (with color scheme to match) meant that they could avoid the Federation standard issue bright lighting.

[slothshaman.livejournal.com]

...and Seaquest.

[ivy03.livejournal.com]

What are you talking about?? That show only had one season.

[slothshaman.livejournal.com]

3, actually.

[ivy03.livejournal.com]

See that? That was sarcasm.

[mithras03.livejournal.com]

What episode was that? I'm seriously starting to believe that I've blacked out much of Voyager; my brain has just erased my memory of it - particularly the first three seasons - as a form of self-preservation or something....

[ivy03.livejournal.com]

Some Neelix-centric drivel where he accidentally gets involved in drug dealing while trying to procure a map. Honestly, I was reading while it was on.

[jethrien.livejournal.com]

I hate Neelix. Not as much as I hate Kes, but still quite a lot.

[ivy03.livejournal.com]

There was a kernel of something that could have been interesting in this episode--here's this guy who's weaseled himself into a sweet gig and the most luxurious (and probably safest, despite their enemies) ship in the sector. But he was brought on as a tourguide and they've reached the end of his knowledge, and he's anxious about staying.

Except they turned it into this shmoopy we're all a family crap when they should have been like well, you want to stay? There are some waste recepticles that need cleaning.

[jethrien.livejournal.com]

I feel like in DS9, they would have gone there.