Innocence

DVD, Voyager S2 (Innocence)

Tuvok is one of the most comforting presences on the series and these reassuring qualities are highly important when he finds himself stranded on an alien moon with some equally abandoned children. We learn plenty of things about Vulcans, and specifically about Tuvok and his own children. His children are well-behaved and as logical as would be expected, Tuvok admits he is not complete without their presence, and much to the amazement of his three child-like wards, he tells them he never gets frightened. The child actors do a good job, assisted by some very true childish dialogue (in the best possible sense of course), and the resolution of the story is typical of the great science fiction ideas.

The lush moon set is very close to convincing us that this is indeed an outside set, though it had been used in other episodes in the season, such as 'Tattoo'. The Drayans prove to be a conflicted race - usually averse to all outside contact they have strict beliefs, but their leader is intrigued by Janeway's story and lets down her guard long enough to become annoyed that her people's practices have been interfered with when Tuvok's shuttle is found on the moon. Their clothing is in keeping with their belief that the physical life is just a brief part of the whole existence, with veils and shrouds seeming to cover them, especially the faces.

This all adds up to showing the Drayans in a bad light, especially when it appears they leave defenceless children on the moon to die. Appearances are often deceiving and they certainly were in this case. Tressa and the other children's concerns are true to childhood - not understanding what's happening and fear for their circumstances, but when the twist comes and we find out that the children are actually old people, since the Drayan's ageing process is in reverse, this way of behaving is equally true of old people coming to the end of their lives. The story ends beautifully as Tressa, the only one still living, finishes her time with Tuvok, as comforting as ever, helping her accept her natural course of life.

The episode has some fun with shuttlecraft, showing us no less than three - Tuvok's old box, the Drayan shuttle, and the sleek Tom Paris-piloted one at the end. We even get to see it leaving Voyager out of the docking bay and, for this series at least, quite a bit of flying through the atmosphere. There are questions posed by the episode - on life and death, and whether B'Elanna could really stand going off on a mission with Neelix (I imagine it was something like when Kira and Bashir first went off on a Runabout together!), and how the Drayans were born: were they just 'created' out of the energy, appearing in the caves, or did they give birth to wizened old husks that gradually became younger?

Tuvok once again disagreed with the most famous Vulcan, by showing doubt in the katra - Spock would beg to differ since if his katra hadn't been transferred to Dr. McCoy he'd have never come back to life! It's probably a very rare event in Vulcan lore, and maybe classified information in Starfleet... Most importantly of all, Tuvok demonstrates his fine singing voice (Tim Russ, after all, was a singer), and even without his Vulcan lute, he's good value. After the previous episode's strong ensemble feel, this is definitely a one-man show for Tuvok, though Janeway handles the B-story diplomatically as ever, but surely the Prime Directive would call for the sacrifice of one crewman to uphold the Drayan's demands that no one land on the moon?

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