Workforce, part II

DVD, Voyager S7 (Workforce, part II)

As often happens the second part of a two-parter doesn't quite live up to the first part. The margin is close this time and there are plenty of suitably affecting scenes between characters as the crew begin to come together and realise they aren't who they thought they were. They could have made a twist in the tale by having Jaffen revealed as a traitor who informed the authorities about Chakotay's whereabouts or Janeway's sabotage at the plant, giving her an easy excuse for dumping him and moving on, but instead they go for a more wrenching resolution that suits what was her best connection with someone probably since her fiancee, Mark.

The story suffers a bit in that there is too much of the populace of the planet unravelling a conspiracy and helping the Voyager crew instead of them working it all out themselves and pulling off a 'Mission: Impossible' style rescue of their fellow crewmates. There's still some excitement with Janeway performing a daring drop to the floor from an upper level, or the ship-based danger the ECH, Kim and a growing crew experience, but things are less well pulled together and chopped about a bit so the story appears less organised. The resolution to the cliffhanger wasn't quite worthy, and how does Chakotay whip off his disguise with a mere wave of a dermal regenerator? You'd think it would be more involved.

There has to be a lot of back and forth, cutting to the various protaganists, which doesn't help the flow, making it consist of lots of little meetings between people, and there were some unsatisfactory moments - what happened to Tuvok? He's almost forgotten by the end. I think Janeway should have been given some new crewmembers as a recompense for what they were put through, I'm sure some workers would have liked to leave for a new life. But it is a relief to see the status quo as everyone takes their station again. Could Chakotay's reaction to Janeway's newfound happiness have been worked in a bit more? I think so, but it's not a bad resolution to a more outlandish start and was good to see something so different tried out.

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