Muse

DVD, Voyager S6 (Muse)

One to keep you watching. There are many little observations, a noteworthy guest cast, and sets just right, but there's also the introspective heart of the episode, the belief that you can influence someone with entertainment, for the better, something that 'Star Trek' is all about. It works on more than one level, with the basic crash plot; explaining away Starfleet presence; putting familiar future technology into historical terms to aid understanding; then there are the plays themselves, a fine art, that gives the episode a unique and satisfying quality; then the play within a play of the episode being about itself, the characters played with on stage, that makes us smile at the 'play' of the 'real' characters.

The narrative neatly dovetails into shipboard scenes by commenting on the characters and their traits, then showing them in reality. The playwright asks about Vulcans and we go to see Tuvok, going without sleep for days, to assist in the search operation. The funny in-joke of Janeway kissing Chakotay, is both amusing, but also tragic because it came so close to happening, and we see the pair interacting back on the ship, an unsaid distance between them (they really should have sorted that out before series end, as it's another loose thread never tidied up).

If there is a complaint, it is that Harry's trek through the mountains might have made for a dramatic scene or two, but then again, his appearance at the crashed Flyer is a high point of the episode as the music swells, and that might have been lost if we knew where he was. And talking of swells, the episode itself draws to a close on a crescendo of emotive storytelling, the playwright a good representative of Trek's own creative team, doing that kind of flourish at the end of a story as they have done many times. The jealousy of the girl (played nicely by Kellie Waymire - it's so nice to see her again, as I'd forgotten she'd been in this series), gave added depth, but the masterstroke of the old narrator, showing his skill was as valid as the younger generations, saving the play and their necks, was truly great.

John Schuck was a name I recognised (though he’s miscredited as ‘Jack’ Schuck in the ‘Voyager Companion') - I'm pretty sure he went on to play a Klingon in 'Enterprise', and Tony Amendola the good old Go'auld guy from Stargate SG-1 was in it, though with not that much to do. The whole set up with the old-fashioned play, the crash in the woods, the believable aliens, all added up to a very good episode, even if it did have almost the same title as a DS9 episode from a couple of years before this.

I always love it when they have a shuttle crashed on a planet as it makes the lighting, with natural shadows and such, so much of a dramatic change, and adds realism. There were funny moments with Tuvok's snoring (something no one could imagine, but with his days of work with no rest, he retained his Vulcan coolness!), and I liked that B'Elanna showed how much she's changed into a much more diplomatic person. In an early season she'd have lashed out as soon as the bonds were cut. And credit must go to the central guest star who carried the episode, with a realism you don't always get with guest aliens. A pleasure.

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