Bliss

 DVD, Voyager S5 (Bliss)

The desire to achieve what you want to achieve can sometimes be a weapon with which to beat you, that would be one message I interpreted from this enjoyable foray into my favourite sub-genre: the nature of reality. It's really an amalgamation of a number of previously-owned Trek parts, but they're arranged in such a way, much like Qatai's junky vessel, so as to be perfectly functional and somehow reassuring. You have the space amoeba from 'TOS,' or various space-borne entities from 'TNG,' crossed with V'ger of 'The Motion Picture' (travelling through the inside of a gigantic beast), with a little of the giant space worm of 'The Empire Strikes Back.' 'Persistence of Vision' from the series' own history, was very similar in the sense that the crew were incapacitated by dreams 'coming true,' though that was more affecting and also nastier. Then there's Data taking over the ship or rescuing/protecting it in various episodes like 'Brothers' or 'Clues,' and this had a very 'TNG' flavour to it, except with the 'Voyager' twist - it's somewhat ironic that on a ship full of families they didn't come up with a good way to use children generally on the Enterprise-D, but on Voyager they only have one and they quickly learned to incorporate her well. Naomi Wildman shines in this story as sidekick to Seven, while also showing that sense of family that she belongs to the whole crew as their firstborn aboard ship. You only have to look at the way Uncle Tom treats her when she's with him and Seven on an Away Mission aboard the Delta Flyer!

It's strange, but the things I find of extreme irritation and annoyance, which push me away from modern Trek, seem to work in 'old' Trek! For example, 'the casual way they speak' is a common complaint for me, yet in this episode Tom's being very casual (and is one of the most casual characters in Trek!), but I warm to him. Some of the colloquialisms spoken in the episode, like Janeway or even Qatai, show that it's not a new thing for Trek to be speaking like our future characters are the same as today. Then there's Seven breaking out the big guns, going around with a rare Compression Phaser Rifle - in 'Picard' I can't stand all that, having her be this gun-toting 'action babe,' always ready with a quip and hefty blast of fire as she takes on space pirates. I suppose it must be context, partly, and also the amount of time given over to it, but also that because she's such a controlled character here when she does go rogue, as it were, it's only for a brief time and it's never filmed in a way that glorifies her like a superhero (which it clearly is in 'Picard' to the extent that in Season 2 she's literally associated with that in dialogue!). 'Voyager' seems so much more real. There was a reason Trek generally stayed away from space pirates, and that is there's very little that's interesting about them, there's no structure or sense of a group that there is when dealing with races of people, while in 'Picard' they can just show up to be killed by Seven as a 'Ranger.' One of the few examples I can think of is Arctus Baran from 'Gambit,' probably because Qatai looks like a cross between his lion-like makeup and that which would become the Tellarites in 'Enterprise.'

It really was great makeup, too, and I can see the origin of Michael Westmore's direction for the famous race of 'TOS' quite clearly: the sunken eyes, the large nostrils, the deeply lined face, the beard and straggly hair... It would be just over four years later that we finally got a modern revamp of the Tellarites, but he must have been pleased with Qatai to follow it so closely. It could have been fun if he'd turned out to be a Tellarite, lost in the Delta Quadrant, having followed this creature all the way from the Alpha after his family were killed there. The timing would have had to be different, more like a century that he'd been travelling instead of thirty-nine years, but think of all that our crew would have had to discuss with him if he had been! Maybe it would have added too much detail into an episode that was already neatly packed with story (and references), but the idea of someone from our area of space meeting Voyager out there on the other side of the galaxy was a good one (and would eventually be used in 'Prophecy' with the Klingon ship). I'm just musing, because Qatai was fine as is and we don't need to bring everything back into small universe proportions (it's just that Tellarites, though mentioned, had never been seen in that era of Trek, so it would have been fun!).

Even though Qatai is a new character there was some history with him from a production standpoint since he was played by W. Morgan Sheppard, previously famous for the great Ira Graves in 'The Schizoid Man' of 'TNG' (arguably responsible for giving precedent to the terrible idea of making Picard into an android at the end of Season 1, but that wasn't his fault!), in the Eighties, and the Klingon commandant of Rura Penthe in 'Star Trek VI,' both memorable characters. Qatai was also memorable, but Sheppard would have one more appearance in Trek with his role as a minister of the Vulcan Science Council in 'Star Trek XI,' though he won't be appearing in Trek again since he died in 2019, sadly. He was always a rough and ready roguish type with his scratchy voice and dishevelled appearance (so no wonder he was chosen to be a Vulcan by the modern regime!). I would say Qatai was his second best role as Graves was more enjoyable, here he's a Captain Ahab out hunting his whale, but without the same intensity of that literary character (or the brooding hatred exhibited by Picard in 'First Contact' as he fulfilled the same role). He comes across as a wronged, but pretty personable old man whose only real edge is in his scarred face. But he's not a fearsome figure, or driven by rage and beyond all sense which might have been more appropriate. Mind you, rage can't be kept up at an intensity for forty years so maybe he'd mellowed over the years and come to see the creature as part of a game that gave him a purpose in life, almost enjoying the intelligence and challenge of it.

There wasn't really time to get to know him fully, it was more about Seven and Naomi teaming up against the crew at first, then the creature. Coming back to the ship from an Away Mission of some kind and finding things not quite right is one of my favourite types of story - 'Macrocosm' is a terrific example, and I feel they didn't quite go far enough in this one. It was more like the crew were comfortably excited about this new prospect and it's played as if it could be true that Seven has her qualms because of an isolated anxiety about going back to Earth. Except we'd already seen that there was some creature from the teaser which features only Qatai hunting it. The thing is, it wouldn't be out of character for Seven to go paranoid and start acting as if everyone else is in the wrong and she needs to act, she's just that sort of personality, but the start was a little uneven in what it was trying to get us to believe. At another time we would see Seven as the one in the wrong and needing to be dealt with, and if I were Janeway I'd be looking into stopping her from being able to activate forcefields and take over Engineering, because next time it might be when she's gone off her rocker and it could be catastrophic! In this case it saved the ship, but what's going on with Tuvok - he created a program that dealt with what would happen if the Maquis mutinied and commandeered Voyager, and yet he doesn't have any failsafes in place to deal with Seven?

I liked that he was used (although you'd think when Security was called they'd send more than just him on his own, unless the others were coming from a different part of the ship, or the fact there were two Security Officers already in the Cargo Bay with Chakotay meant they only wanted Tuvok?), but it's a shame his Vulcan nature didn't fight against what was hardly alien to his race: telepathy. If this was 'TOS,' Spock would have been the one to sense telepathic influences, and Tuvok, being a full Vulcan should have been the star of this show, but sadly, because Seven was so easy to write for, he was relegated to the same fate as his mostly human crew-mates, which is a bit of a travesty. It may also have something to do with the fact the previous episode was a Tuvok story so they didn't want to go back to back on him, though that didn't seem to stop them with Seven in Season 4! One thing I loved about his involvement is that, like 'Persistence of Vision,' we got to see his wife, T'Pel. I'd actually forgotten we'd seen her before, but disappointing they didn't get the same actress back. I knew she showed up in 'Body and Soul,' but they went back to the original actress for that Season 7 appearance, so the character appeared three times and only the middle one was a different actress! But all three were 'fake' appearances since the first two were hallucinations and the third was a holographic recreation.

I love the continuity of it all, though, and strange dream sequences are another part of Trek I adore, so seeing Tuvok meet his wife and even do the two-finger greeting stroke down the back of her two fingers to remind us of the extreme restraint of Vulcans, dating back to 'TOS,' was gratifying (quickly dispelled in the more 'modern' series, 'Enterprise,' where T'Pol was shown to be quite comfortable with physical contact, Vulcan or non-Vulcan alike - another reason they failed that race on that series). Neelix also gets a vision, meeting Starfleet Admirals who want him to be an ambassador, and we get to see the old 'TNG' Admiral uniform because he wouldn't know what the current era's grey shouldered style would look like since it hadn't been invented when Voyager got sucked across the galaxy - again, good continuity, since he'd have researched Earth and Starfleet and would know what the older uniform would look like! I lost track of all the references thrown in, but Janeway mentions Mark (I almost thought they were going to bring him back when she's gazing so lovingly at the Viewscreen, in the way they did in 'Persistence of Vision,' but it was only Earth!), Tom runs down a list of Alpha Quadrant species, Harry mentions the Hirogen and Malon, and Naomi has her Flotter doll with her. It's a far cry from the kind of machine gunned references modern Trek does, especially 'Lower Decks,' which is sometimes unforgivable in its unashamed fourth wall-breaking (but works a lot better in Season 2, to give it credit), but all very admirably done for this series.

One complaint could be that some characters get short shrift, but that's always the way. I almost thought we weren't going to see B'Elanna, but she does show up to get Phasered and she had a nice moment when the Doc awakens her and she starts seeing the Maquis again, believing they somehow survived. But it was unquestionably a Seven of Nine story and showed just how beautifully she could work with Naomi, since to some degree they're both children, and both outsiders to a small extent: yes, they're part of the Voyager family, but along with Neelix and the Doctor they weren't attached to Earth and don't have this overwhelming desire to return there. Actually, considering Neelix' eventual exit from the series right near the end, it's surprising that he wanted to go back himself. I can't remember if they got rid of his ship by this point or not, but he could have suggested staying in the Delta Quadrant. The only reason he left Voyager was to join a distant Talaxian colony, so the creature could have provided him with one to take with him, since it gave each of them just what they wanted. Perhaps more could have been made of this, although as I said, 'Persistence of Vision' covered some of this ground, but it would be interesting to see if the crew's desires had remained the same three years later. The important takeaway for Seven was that she realised an even stronger bond with Naomi as both had no great wish to leave Voyager, which had become home.

The story could have ended there with them in Astrometrics, but they wanted to have the symmetry of Qatai hogging the first scene of the episode and the last scene, and I can understand why, but at the same time I'm not sure what we got from his scene, other than he's just going on as before, approaching this creature. There wasn't really any examination of revenge and why it's wrong, he almost lost everything, you'd think he might have chosen to abandon the hunt (speaking of which, they could have involved the Hirogen, too, and made it into some big two-parter!), having learned his lesson, but in the same way he didn't seem extreme and driven enough to be stricken with desire for revenge, there wasn't the space for growth afforded to his interactions, he's more of a tool our crew use to learn what's going on. That's part of the reason why I don't like the episode quite as much as when I first saw it, it doesn't go far enough in certain areas, though I did appreciate the Doctor showing the Starfleet way is not to kill creatures, even when they're trying to kill you. It's not that they needed to understand it personally, other than that it was a predator acting on natural instinct, but to understand its nature and formulate a nonlethal strategy from that, which they did. There is a moral question about whether it was fine to leave it roaming the galaxy at large, with the potential to trick other sentient beings into becoming meals, but hey, it's not Voyager's region of space, so not their problem... Yes, there was a bit of a gap in logic there, another issue that needed fleshing out a bit, because as much as it was important to be compassionate and humanitarian, I don't think they'd be feeling too comfortable with the idea of leaving it alive if it was heading for a planet of children, or something like that!

Another thing that was of interest to me was seeing little bits of the ship we don't usually see. Specifically, we get the little office on the far side of Sickbay - usually the Doctor did office stuff in his main office with the transparent walls, but this time he used another console round the corner from there. The most striking moment was when Seven carries Naomi through Voyager and they walk along a corridor full of windows so they could show off the dark external view of this beast's belly. It was great to see, but I don't think we ever saw that before or after. I'm guessing it was just a redress of the Mess, somehow subtly curved, and usually they don't want to have to show imagery outside the ship too much, perhaps, but it made me think of that corridor Daniels takes Archer to in the 26th Century aboard the Enterprise-J. Naomi asks where are they, referring to the state of the ship, but I was asking the same question about where they were on the ship! I really like how Naomi was used (sadly her Mother only gets a mention rather than an appearance), whether she was telling Seven one thing to disguise her real reason (she claimed she wanted to be helpful, but really she didn't want to be alone, and Seven understood the direct approach when she didn't understand the subtlety), or caught between following Seven's commands or Chakotay's orders - though I'm not quite sure how she could obey his order to return to her Quarters since she was behind a forcefield!). Her comparison of a 'pitcher plant' didn't make sense to me as one was using pheromones while the creature was using telepathy, psychogenic/neurogenic manipulation. Still, she's a bright child for her age (almost three?!).

One little character moment could have gone completely unnoticed, but I had to mention it because it shows a side of Janeway that doesn't often come up: her science background. She sends an EM pulse to knock Seven out at her console, which was a resourceful idea, something I like seeing in her because it demonstrates she's not just Captain because she wanted to be Captain (as modern Trek tends to suggest about captaincy - not everyone is suited to the position!). Another good little bit of continuity was the effect of the wormhole with its internal visuals of little rippling pools in a similar style to the Bajoran Wormhole of 'DS9.' And Tom gets to be the one to say: "Please state the nature of the medical emergency..." While we're on classic lines, the Doc says: "I'm a doctor, not a... [dragon-slayer]," which is an always fun callback to one of Bones' catchphrases from 'TOS' and something all (classic-era: up to the end of 'Enterprise'), are sure to say in some version or other. It's strange that Qatai would want him along on his hunt, but he must grow tired of never having anyone to talk to. Then again he is a crusty old salt so he no doubt talks to his ship all the time, but after forty years of that you'd think he'd have become a little unstable. Maybe he is and we just didn't realise: ignorance is bliss (had to get that in there somehow).

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