Envoys

 DVD, Lower Decks S1 (Envoys)

A moment of silence please as we reflect on the recent news that Season 5 will be this series' last... When they announced 'DSC' was ending with Season 5 I wasn't in the least perturbed, perhaps even a little relieved that the source of so much wrongness, what has really set the tone and style of Trek's current age, should finally be laid to rest. But 'Lower Decks' is something I've come to quite enjoy, in fact it's the only Trek I actively look forward to seeing these days, quite an achievement given that I don't like its type of 'adult' comedy, nor am I that keen on animation. It shows how far the other Treks have gone from the genuine article, but also that this particular series does have at least some of that within its concept. And so we come to the difficult second episode, traditionally not great after the superb pilots Trek used to do. That's not the case this time because the pilot wasn't all that great so that means this episode doesn't have much to live up to. Yay! I will say there was a small, but definite improvement with this one...

As if to contrast the first episode, which was ship-based, this one's main story takes place on a planet, Tulgana IV (which sounds a bit like Turkana IV, Yar's homeworld, but fortunately isn't as it would have been a very different kind of story!), with Mariner teaming up with Boimler when he's selected to ferry, or envoy, a Klingon ambassador, K'orin, to some talks. It's funny that, though worldly and streetwise, Mariner is actually more of a cause of Boimler's woes than his own mishaps - he wouldn't have got into them if she hadn't been there to take him off the straight and narrow of Starfleet rules and regs that he so religiously sticks to. Mariner just wants to have fun, and if she can teach her self-appointed protégé a lesson, all the better. We learn there's more to her than we'd so far been told - in the first episode we heard the Cerritos isn't her first ship and now we find out that she's been in 'grey ops' with the very Klingon Boimler was assigned to, plus she has a lot of firsthand knowledge of various aliens and their cultures, exactly the kind of thing Boimler wishes he had after all his book-learning and simulations. It sets the template for how the series is going to be, with Mariner getting Boimler into all sorts of trouble and then getting him out of it, with, along the way, myriad Trek references for the observant (and some for the less observant), to enjoy.

Naturally, this being an alien world it was absolutely rammed with familiar species, from a shot of Evora from 'Insurrection' (which I mentioned in my first review!), to Andorians, Risans, Lurians (before they became ten a penny in 'DSC' S3 onwards), and even a couple of 'The Animated Series' species that hadn't been seen since then (the bird creatures, Aurelians, and the shapeshifting Vendorian), making it of great interest to historians of animated Trek. In the same way that other current Trek series' brought in references, concepts and races from the Trek novels (not something I was keen on since the novels are all over the place, generally not very good, and contradict each other constantly, but then that suits the modern Trek model perfectly...), this series began to connect more and more with 'TAS,' the unloved corner of Trekdom, and as much as 'TNG' was the inspiration, essentially the progenitor of Trek animation. 'TAS' is undoubtedly non-canon as has been repeated on many occasions, and while its status becomes more confused when such things as 'LD' and 'Prodigy' are both supposed to be part of the real timeline, the idea has always been that it only becomes canon when referenced in other (live action), Trek, as they did in 'Enterprise.' I'm not an aficionado of 'TAS' but I have watched and reviewed all the episodes in recent years and I generally like it for being true in tone and style to 'TOS,' so it's a pleasure to see 'LD' pay tribute, especially when it comes to the more outlandish creatures seen there.

You wouldn't have thought that a simple Klingon would cause such waves appearing in an episode, but this is the first time one of the most prolific races in Trek had been seen since 'Enterprise'! Okay, Klingons had been in 'Into Darkness' and 'DSC,' but they were both redesigns, and ugly ones at that - here we have a genuine, ridged, be-haired and Bat'leth-wielding warrior, without any silly bulbous head or claw hands - there was concern we might never get a proper Klingon again after what had been done to them, so this was very nice. It's bizarre that there haven't been any in 'DSC' since Season 2, none in 'Picard' (other than Worf - what happened to Martok?), while 'Prodigy' and 'Strange New Worlds' would go on to feature them eventually, so it was another step in the right direction for 'LD' to set out its stall as ignoring the 'update' and giving us 'TNG' era once again! Not that we get any news of what the Klingon/Federation situation is these days, or really anything of development (presumably Martok is still Chancellor), but then that's par for the course with this series, they tended to be quite light and breezy (in fact the political and galactic status of current events is something largely ignored in the modern era, perhaps because it ties things down too much when so many series are, or were, happening in various time periods?), and it is supposed to be focused on those at the bottom of the Starfleet food chain, for all Mariner's knowledge.

While she and Boimler are running around on the planet getting into all sorts of scrapes that cause him to lose his self confidence and belief he's right for Starfleet, Rutherford is finding his feet in a similar way back on the ship when his entire career path is put into question due to him not being able to watch some stellar event with Tendi because he's got too much work to do. Now this storyline was typically ridiculous in the sense that being such a good worker I'm sure Chief Engineer Billups would be more than happy to have one of his star performers take a break in order to see the event. Instead Rutherford goes to extremes, trying out careers in Command, Medical and Security before realising his dream can't be had in any other way than Engineering. Though silly, it's still quite a sweet little tale and serves to underscore the various departments and who's in charge of them, possibly in a direct answer to complaints about the uncertainty over Discovery's hierarchy and structure to the extent we still didn't even know who was CMO or Chief Engineer on that ship seasons in! It's one of those things that makes 'LD' seem much more like Trek should be and it is fun to see Rutherford in different uniform colours being tried out for new roles.

No one ever questions why he should be jumping from one role to another, instead we get that strong sense of 'TNG' optimism where everyone is happy to be where they are and equally as happy for someone to take on a new task, very much acting in the impression of a society that works because they want to, as self-fulfilment rather than because they have to pay the bills in drudgery. If Rutherford kept going round and round I'm sure he'd get some serious help in finding the right place for him, but since it's only a few things it makes more sense that people are so accommodating in true Starfleet style - in the same way, he says Starfleet doesn't lie, recalling Wesley Crusher's statement in the early years of 'TNG,' easy to laugh at for his simple naivety, but also a laudable attitude. These qualities are exactly what was lacking in the miserable, moping, broken world portrayed in the other modern Treks up to this point and endears the characters in a way the others couldn't hope to. The fact that Billups is delighted to lose such a good worker shows just how positive and optimistic Starfleet is, and a very different time to ours.

The other supporting characters aren't used as much, but that only fits nicely into the notion that Trek explores certain characters more in one episode than in another, and in this particular series, concentrates on the lowest ranks. Captain Freeman has a fun aside which appears to be another instance of poking fun at the mores of modern Trek: in this case their insistence that every Captain must have a catchphrase to say upon going to warp in the way Picard used to say "Engage," but has been taken to a level of silliness synonymous with the current regime - Freeman suggests "It's Warp time!" though I believe in other episodes she eventually settles on "Warp me!" First Officer Ransom gets his time in the spotlight putting Rutherford through command simulations on the Holodeck in which the slightest, mildest decision he makes destroys the ship. Similarly with Dr. T'Ana who (ironically), lectures Rutherford on needing to have a bedside manner in order to work in Sickbay, and Shaxs, who puts him through his paces in what is basically a Kobayashi Maru scenario to test his reaction to failure when he fights a room full of Borg, though using his cybernetic implant enables him to become a brilliant fighter, bringing him into the 'Bear Pack,' as Security is known. (They missed a trick of his cybernetic ability being either an asset or a liability in dealing with beings of similar kind, though they were only holographic, perhaps real live Borg would be different).

As ever, there's a lot of silliness throughout, which can be off-putting (the blast shield, for example), and when I first watched these early episodes I really didn't like them because they were so full of the kind of contemporary dialogue, pointless running around and screaming that seemed to put this right in with the other recent productions. Seeing it now when I know the characters and have seen a number of episodes I really like has knocked some of the edge off some of the most glaring moments. Not that this is one of the good episodes, but I know what to expect having seen both Seasons 2 and 3 now. I like the way the characters are all quite clearly laid out, you know who they are, their names, their ranks, their divisions, it's such a far cry from the confusion instigated in 'DSC' and the non-Starfleet 'Star Wars' outsiders that began 'Picard' that I do find myself appreciating this more. Not to the extent that I can stomach all the swearing and puerile humour, and there was some of that, but generally not as much this time since we didn't have zombies running around vomiting black slime all over the place. There's still an over-reliance on references, some of which don't fit (like Boimler telling Mariner his manner of walking is what Section 31 do to conserve energy - how would a lowly Ensign know about the top secret group hidden at the heart of the Federation?), but other times it's fun to hear there's a 'Janeway Protocol,' though it's never explained, or reminding us of the Kaelons, having Napeans on the ship, and were those rock people in the bar fight meant to recall the abandoned concept of 'Star Trek V'? I wouldn't put it past them, they do love the obscure.

As do I! But it's not just the obscure we have, it's bringing back things that were once integral to Trek - I already mentioned the Klingons, but here we also have the first Ferengi to appear in Trek since 'Enterprise.' And it's another play on what we know when it's just a trick of Mariner's to get this aristocratic member of the race to show up as a snivelling, grovelling villain so Boimler can 'spot' him and regain his courage - the real sacrifice Mariner makes in the episode is putting up with Boimler's public ridicule of her being 'unable' to realise he was Ferengi and having to be 'rescued' by Boimler. It's about as ludicrous as can get since the Ferengi are about the most recognisable species out there thanks to their bald heads and massive ears, but Boimler is too flushed with pride to think of that! Uncharacteristically, I did spot an actual visual error - Boimler throws his combadge away, but when he meets the Ferengi there's some kind of glitch where the combadge appears and disappears on his dress uniform for milliseconds. I don't know how that could happen, or if it's a deliberate little detail meant to be noticed only by the most observant. Odd. It was nice to see Boimler wearing a dress uniform, though, as he should on meeting a dignitary.

There's also some throwaway fun at the beginning where some kind of sentient floating orb penetrates the ship (a bit like the one seen in 'The Child'), with evil intent, and instead is recognised flippantly by Mariner as 'one of those trans-dimensional energy creatures' and dealt with accordingly. When I was first watching the season through I felt it was laughing at 'TNG' and that era, but now I tend to take it as more celebratory towards that. Leaving aside that she shouldn't be able to handle something that is pure energy, so wouldn't be able to physically stuff it in a pod, it shows how the series can quite easily pivot from one Trek stereotype (Trekeotype?), to another in seconds, and has no bearing on anything in the episode. It's just a gag, and that's fine, although I wonder if the fact it ended up going into Freeman was meant to be another reference to modern Trek as I'm sure there was an episode of 'DSC' (Season 2?), where some piece of energy lands on Ensign Tilly's shoulder and there was all this speculation over what it might mean (leading her to see her invisible friend, as I recall). Perhaps they were trying to mischievously cause more speculation in that vein?

I didn't have time to comment much on the opening credits sequence last time, and I do like it, even if it makes no sense that the asteroids at the start can knock the ship away like they do at the beginning before it comes flying towards camera. But just the look of the ship, the cleanness, the detail, the other ships, like the Romulan Warbirds and Borg Cubes (and that each season a new part gets added to that battle), is all reassuringly Trekkie in design and style, so refreshingly true to what we knew, and so unlike what else had been created in recent times, care for the detail and accuracy. Add to that something else I failed to mention in my first review, setting right one of the major missing elements to modern Trek: episode titles on screen at last! This was a big thing for me, and the fact it's in the same font as 'TNG' makes it even better. I really don't know why they didn't add titles to all the series, other than they seemed to be aiming 'DSC' especially at an entirely different audience and in some weird reasoning thought it might put them off? It's the same kind of wonky idea of a few years ago that suggested films with colons in the title didn't do as well, which has been patently proved to be untrue and smacked of idiot marketing 'research' more than anything. It all seems much more like Trek should be, while 'DSC' came across like a twisted, feminine approximation of Trek (feelings, lack of care for science in the concepts, or visuals of ships, etc), and I think that's down to Mike McMahan's influence. So practically all is right with the world, and this episode ends with Tendi and Rutherford both in a Jefferies Tube appreciating beauty in their own way, but doing it together. Aah.

**

Stargate Origins: Catherine

 Download, Stargate Origins: Catherine (2018) film

Curiosity is what brought me to this, and that's what they were banking on, because as a film it was pretty poor. It lacked scope and scale, seemed pretty cheap in a TV film kind of way, much of the acting was amateurish, characters unsympathetic and it was long, so long. So sad that this is what a once great franchise came to - it's not the first, not by a long shot ('Star Trek,' 'Star Wars,' 'Dr. Who,' in fact any long running sci-fi seems to fall at last), but at least others have at least made an effort when it came time to attempt a comeback. This seemed rather halfhearted as if it was merely bait with which to catch the unwary. If I'm recalling correctly it was originally released in parts like a miniseries online. Or was it something to do with an MGM 'Stargate' streaming channel as the one piece of new 'Stargate' to entice the fans to a one-stop shop? Not being that aware of the production origins I don't know quite how this came to be or why they thought it was a good idea. All I knew about it beforehand was that it featured Connor Trinneer a stalwart of both 'Enterprise' and 'Stargate Atlantis,' it was obviously about the origins of the Stargate, and Catherine Langford, a character whom I believe began in the film, was a friend of Daniel Jackson, and progressed to 'SG-1.' I was expecting Ernest to be involved, her man who went missing when he stepped through the Stargate and never returned (and whom SG-1 found as an old man all those years later), so I was slightly confused by Captain Beal.

What I actually got was an awkward, jumbled, occasionally stilted attempt at making an adventure through the 'gate before they were ever supposed to have had one, no mean feat. Even though I don't think these writers were anything to do with the wider 'Stargate' franchise (why would you not bring back those responsible for all the successful spinoff series'?), and in fact it felt more connected to the original film than anything else, I will give them credit that they did manage to make it all work in the end in continuity terms. If the last few minutes had been what the whole film consisted of then it could have been quite good, but instead much of it was a drag, waiting for something to happen, the pace leadenly feeding it out, beat by boring beat, unable to disguise its humble means while trying to suggest the scale of the original film. I'm not sufficiently well versed in the origins to be able to say for certain this or that should happen, though I was pretty sure they hadn't been able to operate the 'gate other than when Ernest went through, but they did make it a prequel story that fit: Aset, the consort of Ra (who's apparently gone off planet for a while), is keen on revolution against him and sees this SS Officer, Brucke, as a potential source of an army to use in an uprising, or that's the implication I got. When she's foiled she wipes the minds of Professor Paul Langford and his daughter, Catherine, plus Kasuf, sending them all back to where they should be with a subconscious directive to return with a team of people to overthrow Ra, cunningly setting up the film to occur all those years later (this is 1938, ten years after discovering the Stargate).

Ra turns up and punishes her disobedience. I didn't quite remember the stuff about the Harsesis, a baby, though I'm sure that was part of the story in 'SG-1'... There's also talk of Naquadah, the material that has properties of great power which would later power the 'gate, though it's not very clear and if you didn't know 'Stargate' I think that would've been lost on you as they don't explain how it would help Brucke. Otherwise there's a little classic alien technology - you get the power glove or whatever it was called that allowed Goa'uld (a name never spoken), to knock people about or wipe their minds, then there was the return of the staff weapon, most famously Teal'c's favourite bit of kit, now with a nasty curving blade on the other end, wielded by Aset's single bodyguard Serqet. You get Ring Transporters, you get a long shot of Ra's pyramid starship and you get Ra at the end, but it's a lot of poor scenes between unlikeable characters most of the time: Catherine is the worst offender, this obnoxious, violent, argumentative, unbalanced slip of a girl, nothing like the interesting character we'd known before (though I'll admit I don't remember how she'd been portrayed as her younger self). She's nothing like a 1930s woman, really no different from some modern superwoman that can ridiculously deal with anything. But she has to have her wet and weedy love interest, Captain Beal, to tag along and make her look a bit tougher, plus they had to have some 'hilarious' japes and banter, which was almost universally terrible. Finishing out the trio of main characters is the comedy Egyptian, Wasif.

Other characters include Trinneer's Professor who doesn't really get much to do other than be slapped down by evil Nazi Capitan Brucke, who typically foolishly sees the possibility of becoming more powerful than Hitler himself. At least Langford is able to use his wits to some degree when he translates what he wants to say between Brucke and Aset, since he's the only one that can speak ancient Egyptian. There are a few other characters here and there, but all are forgettable and it was quite impressive they could make not one character shine in an almost two hour film! Bizarrely, the film, which was pretty much a family friendly affair all the way through, with only some mild swearwords and the odd thumpy fight scene, suddenly goes into adult territory with male kissing, an extreme swearword uttered out of the blue by Kasuf and shown as a subtitle, and a bloody death for Brucke! I don't know where all that came from, but it certainly wasn't appropriate to the tone of the film, which had been (at least attempting), a light, comedic adventure. It wasn't funny (other than a line Wasif had when Catherine asks him why he never said he could understand the language, and he mistakes her meaning that he never told them he was Egyptian, and said it seemed obvious!), it was quite a trudge.

I was fortunate that it cost me absolutely nothing as I had a voucher to use on iTunes, and since the film was never released on DVD (I can understand why now!), this was my only way to access it. Maybe I should have just rented it because I can't imagine life ever being long enough for me to want to watch it again! They wanted to have an adventure before they were supposed to have been able to have an adventure, and they tied it all up pretty neatly, Captain Beal missing (killed by Serqet before he can get through the 'gate), the others with amnesia assumed to have come from tampering with the Stargate, Ra's revolution is tamped down and the seeds are laid for it to arise upon humans returning to Abydos (though again, it's never named). I couldn't avoid seeing the bad rating it had been awarded on iTunes, but I hoped it would be better than that perception of it. In fact it was exactly as bad as feared and if this is to be the last entry in this universe then it's a sad way for it to go out. Having recently finished reviewing all of 'Stargate' (other than the non-canon cartoon series, 'Infinity'), it's a bit of a comedown from the quality and inventiveness of 'Universe.' I hear there may be a reboot coming, whether that's true or not it's been talked about many times over the years, but if it's anything like this production they may as well forget it.

*

Unimatrix Zero (2)

 DVD, Voyager S6 (Unimatrix Zero) (2)

Not another Borg story. That's the attitude coming into this one, but I can see why they would bring the big bads back yet again because they were good for the ratings. It's also a 'full Borg' story rather than a tangential connection to them - those kinds of stories, it could be argued, whittled down the uniqueness and made them seem too integrated into the series, but looking back over the season there haven't been all that many even tangential Borg stories. The issue comes from Seven of Nine stories because they can count as Borg episodes in some ways since she is a former Borg drone, so we're dealing with the Collective to some degree, even if it's only the fallout of her experiences there. The perception is greater than the reality when it comes to actual full Borg episodes where Voyager has to deal with a ship or group of the race (if you can call a group of beings that assimilate other races into themselves, a race). The biggies are 'Scorpion' and 'Dark Frontier,' both two-parters (or in the latter's case, a double-length TV film), and this was the third in that trilogy (though fittingly for a Giger-esque design, it'd become a quadrilogy when the series finale was taken into account - yes, I know there are more than four 'Alien' films, but when 'Voyager' was in production there were only four, and you could say any without Sigourney Weaver don't really count anyway!).

I will give them credit for finding a new, engrossing angle, not simply giving us yet another ridiculously outmatched fight with the Borg. And it is a ridiculous idea that one starship could take on a Cube, that's been one of my main complaints when using this race, because when you look at the times they were most effective it was when it was a single, solitary vessel meting out catastrophic damage to the Federation fleet, an unstoppable force that required every ounce of ingenuity and sacrifice to defeat: 'The Best of Both Worlds,' 'First Contact' and 'Scorpion' - in the last case it was another new spin with the Borg having the fight brought to them. In some ways you wonder why they didn't introduce the Borg Queen there, but it was shortly after 'First Contact' and they hadn't thought of a way to bring her back well. That's why 'Dark Frontier' worked, having a personal connection. Though the problem with making it personal is 1), the Borg Queen was a bit of a stereotypical pantomime villain, all gnashing of teeth and vindictiveness (which doesn't say much for the Borg's idea of perfection!), and 2), you wonder why she doesn't crush Voyager like an egg at any time. We see here that she can get in contact with them easily and if there's a Tactical Cube so close to their position then that must mean Borg are everywhere - we know they have their transwarp conduits, which the Queen uses as a bargaining tool to offer to get them home quicker, but she seems a petty enough character that if she really hated Janeway she'd deal with her.

It's another case of the Borg wanting to make a deal with their enemy, to help them quell this resistance that's developing within the regenerating minds of the drones. I'm not sure why she wants them to be destroyed when it doesn't seem to make any difference to Borg operations - they can only be free in their dreams, which actually makes us sympathise with these poor beings trapped by a powerful force, slaves to a hive mind and the Queen's will. I'm surprised she didn't draw on their common goal in dealing with Species 8472, not that that ended well, and certainly the first encounter they had with the Queen wasn't exactly cordial - maybe that's why she doesn't destroy Voyager, she still wants Seven back at some point, maybe she wants her to want to come back to the Collective, the Queen is pretty delusional. Of course Janeway wouldn't countenance helping the Queen against her own slaves, and instead rises to the challenge to help the slaves themselves. In this respect it's a good story, there's the initial moral quandary of whether it's a good idea to help your enemy, which Janeway sees as a chance to exploit a weakness in them, but also comes to see it as bringing freedom to the oppressed.

We see her inconsistency as a Captain play out again when, rather than ignore Chakotay's misgivings as she usually does, she actively requests his input on the decision. Maybe she knew he'd agree with her inclination, perhaps she was feeling unsure of where her convictions on the matter lay, but I applaud her involving him, it's just a shame so often she's ridden roughshod over his objections. It's strange that he's in favour of going for it this time, he's always been so adamantly opposed to going anywhere near the Borg, but I will say that it does at least give them something to talk about and one of the best moments of the episode is when they're on the Bridge basically saying goodbye in so many words - I wish there were more of these scenes for the pair as they should have grown and developed as the series went along, but too often Chakotay was relegated to being a yes-man, with perfunctory dialogue and involvement in the ship's missions in these later seasons.This mission is foolhardy even by Janeway's standards: to get aboard a Borg vessel, not merely an ordinary Cube, but a newfangled Tactical Cube, and then somehow get a virus into the system that will spread to other ships, while actually planning on getting captured.

I think that was the idea, though I didn't remember much about the two-parter, it was only when Chakotay expressed satisfaction that things were proceeding correctly that it's clear they were meant to be assimilated. Bit of a bold move there, but again, it devalues the horrific trauma of becoming a Borg. I think that needed to be played up: how heroic it was of them to voluntarily go into the Borg's fastnesses and be taken - for all they knew they could have irreparable physical and psychological damage done to them. It's just another step in making the Borg lose that terrible, horrific nature that we abhor. We see the Queen literally putting heads on spikes so I'm not saying there wasn't an impression of horror and danger, but they chose to make the big cliffhanger a shot of Janeway, Tuvok and B'Elanna as Borg, it's supposed to be a shock surprise, but they'd already hinted it was all part of the plan. My theory is that modern Trek has taken a lot of its bad cues from 'Voyager,' and it's exactly this kind of drama for the sake of it that could have been eschewed for a deeper, more involving method of telling the story: if we knew they were going in expecting to be assimilated and they had to train themselves up, discuss the possibilities, what it might be to lose an arm or an eye, rigorously prepare, it could have been much more satisfying. Instead it's more an impression of a comic book hero rushing into action.

No question they're heroic and it was a dramatic reveal on first viewing, it's just the more you think about it the more you realise it was done for surface sparkles rather than going deeper as Trek should. It's one of the main reasons I think less of this episode now, whereas in the past I felt it was terrific. The Borg are made to look weak - it's true Voyager is just about able to escape intact, but the Cube should have no trouble tracking and following her. They're far too easily and lightly taken on, with the only casualty being the destruction of the Delta Flyer in a somewhat disappointing CGI explosion. That's another part of it all that hasn't aged so well: sometimes the CGI works and others not quite so much, and whether they were rushed for time or the budget wasn't as high, the visual effects weren't as accomplished, from the Queen's construction to the asteroid colony (both of which had been done much better in live action - obviously they had a big budget for the film, but the model work in 'DS9' for similar asteroid facilities was so much more realistic). Voyager attacking the Cube wasn't bad, but even that had a CG sheen to it that is noticeable. The internal production was as good as ever, they knew how to sell an inhospitable environment they'd done it so many times - it's an assault on the senses, the harsh electrical flickering of the lights, the cramped corridors and confusion of piping and jagged edges everywhere. My only complaint in that regard was it did seem as if they'd only built a small portion of the Cube so they were going around in quite a small area.

What initially warmed me to the episode was the virtual construct of Unimatrix Zero itself, this idyllic refuge of the mind for poor, beleaguered Borg, a chance to live a fragment of their lost lives and a kind of redemptive compensation for their living death. It's exactly the kind of thing Trek has done so well - I was about to say always does so well, but I can't say that for the majority of modern Trek. Giving the enemy some personality, something you can sympathise with, while still seeing them as the enemy, something to work with. In the Borg this might seem another terrible way to make them more like us and lose their implacable, insidious nature, but we already knew they can be rehabilitated with the right care and the reality is they're prisoners within their own bodies and this was a good way to express that idea. It's also a great way to see Seven as she should be: more human, warmer, softer, gentler, released from her inhibiting technology and so far from the harridan avenger, bitter and twisted, that modern Trek forced on us, utterly ruining the character's journey. She has loved and been human as an adult in this world (which must have been inspired by 'The Matrix' which came out only the year before), even though she was assimilated as a child, and there's some tragedy in that Axum has awaited her return all this time and now she's uncomfortable with things being so personal. A long, long way from what they did to her in 'Picard.' Seven's new side to her personality, the ideal of what she could be, feminine, unrestricted by her emotionlessness or repression, was how her story on this series would play out, but clearly was not followed up on in the dystopian version of Trek that has blighted us since.

Even taking on her human name again, Annika, was a choice they went entirely against, turning it into a misguided issue of someone's 'chosen' identity when her Captain on the Titan refused to call her by her 'proper' name of Seven of Nine. It was a topsy-turvy, messed up inversion of how things should have been (but I'll get onto that when I review 'Picard' Season 3, coming soon!), and seeing her here as she should be was a balm after all that I've seen of the character in recent years. I always thought Seven was one in a million and we get it confirmed here as that's how many Borg have this rare mutation, or whatever it was, which allows them to enter the dream state and meet together. I do have questions about Unimatrix Zero, however: can they conjure up anything with their minds? How else could the Klingons bring Bat'leths in to fight the Borg with? And if they can do that then why not powerful weapons that could defeat any invading drones more easily? For that matter how can drones enter into this space without reverting to their true, pre-assimilated minds? I didn't feel that was explained, they just show up and start tearing through the landscape, chasing and taking out the dreamers. I can see it from the drama perspective, but not from the story making sense.

There was a bit of nice continuity, like Laura who mentions she was assimilated at Wolf 359, or Janeway referring to the last time she heard 'your mind to my mind' she had a headache for two weeks! Was the last time she took part in a mind meld in 'Flashback'? Tuvok's bridging of two minds seemed a bit like the Fal-Tor-Pan ceremony from 'Star Trek III' where the high priestess transferred Spock's katra from McCoy back to Spock's regenerated body, though not quite the same thing as this was more like a double mind meld. Shame we didn't get the Vulcan word for it. Janeway was inconsistent in more than her attention to Chakotay as she says early on she prefers to call what's happening a resistance rather than civil war, but later, when talking to her First Officer she claims they could be putting the ship in the middle of a civil war! Make your mind up! It was nice to see Tom Paris reinstated to Lieutenant, and though Kim was joking when he notes he didn't find a little box on his chair, he said it so hopefully that you have to feel sorry for him - after all he's (almost) always been a straight arrow, no criminal record like Tom, yet the former convict has been demoted and promoted while Harry remains an Ensign six years on! Life on Voyager can be unfair.

At least B'Elanna was more involved this time. Neelix is left out almost entirely, but he did get the previous episode based around him. Tuvok's involved, Chakotay's involved. Seven and Janeway are central, but there is a greater sense of the ensemble than there sometimes can be. On the whole I'd say the season wasn't too bad in that regard, against my impressions, though perhaps Season 7 will prove those right, I don't remember. The guest cast have some prior connection to Trek, the obvious one being Susanna Thompson (of various roles in other Treks), reprising her Borg Queen from 'Dark Frontier,' though there was always the sense she was a mere stand-in when Alice Krige was unavailable as the 'true' Queen, since she'd return for the finale, 'Endgame,' as well as providing the voice in both 'Lower Decks' and 'Picard' in recent years. Mark Deakins (Axum), had been in the series before as a character called Turanj in 'The Killing Game,' though it must have been a very small role as there's nothing in the encyclopedia about it, nor his other named role in 'Insurrection.' And one of the Borg drones was played by Tony Sears who'd also been a Prometheus officer in 'Message In A Bottle.' The Klingon name Korok, was confusingly used again in 'Enterprise' (not that you can't reuse names, but when it's only a single name you tend to associate it with one person), though they were different characters and actors.

And that finishes up Season 6 for me. I've really enjoyed going through it again after so many years, a season that was among my earliest reviews when I began doing this fifteen years ago, and now when I'm coming near to the end, at least in terms of having a lot of things I want to write about, I've done it all again in more detail. So much has changed in those years, we've had the start of a new film series and the flopping of that series, the start of a whole new era beyond that, of series-based Trek, and one that is continuing for the foreseeable future (or until Paramount runs out of money!). It's a shame that so much of it has been unappealing to me, but that's what has made going back to 'Voyager' again so rewarding as it's strong Trek, for all its flaws, and this has been a great season. I really must do in-depth reviews of Season 7 at some point...

***

Second Contact

 DVD, Lower Decks S1 (Second Contact)

Two and a half years have passed since I wrote my final review of the current era of Trek, the season finale of 'Picard' Season 1, the season that broke me at last, took away my desire to write about this stuff and consigned me to a mere grudging watcher with no wish to air my thoughts. Since then I've had time to be somewhat rehabilitated, mainly thanks to a return to 'Voyager,' a Trek series I actually love (number two behind 'DS9'), reminding me what appeals about this universe. But I've also come to a different point in viewing current Trek, too - I still can't say that I like it, far from it in most cases, but I can at least say I don't want it to go away and leave me alone! In large part that's thanks to this series - I wasn't enamoured by it when I first watched Season 1, to the extent I almost didn't buy Season 2. But the price went down so I thought I'd give it a shot and found I actually enjoyed some of the episodes in the way I enjoy old Trek. Since then there have been ups and downs, with 'Picard' Season 2, incredibly, being worse than Season 1, the series then somewhat redeemed by 3, and for every bungling season of 'DSC,' or canon and continuity-ruining 'Strange New Worlds,' there has been this 'Lower Decks' to bring me back to a semblance of hope for new Trek.

I never would have thought it, especially not after first seeing this premiere episode which had everything I could have feared a so-called 'adult' comedy would bring to Trek: it's obnoxious, sweary, shouty, screamy, runs at ten to the dozen speed, with ker-azy kharacters and too often little more going on than machine-gunning in references to other Trek in order to disguise its thin premise. That's what I thought at first, and to some extent, at least about this episode, I still do - it takes things way too far, and as in all these other current generation Trek productions, is often written by apparent teenagers (or those with juvenile minds), to appeal to teens, with characters that act like modern teens and speak like modern teens... This episode was worse than most and herein lies the key: when the series settles down a bit, stops trying to rattle along at warp 9.975 all the time, it allows you to get to know the people. It gets to show what Starfleet in this time period is like, and what it's like is 'TNG'-'DS9'-'Voyager' era, which is my favourite. Would I have preferred a serious, live-action series set at this time period, written in the manner and style of 90s Trek? One thousand percent Yes, but I have to look at 'Lower Decks' in its own context and decide what I think in reaction to it, and it alone. That goes for this episode, too - I know I'll like other episodes, but that doesn't colour how I feel about this one, and I have to say it's one of the worst Trek pilots ever made.

That sounds quite a harsh criticism, especially in a world where 'DSC' exists, not to mention the aberrations of 'SNW,' and I actually did enjoy it more on this, my second viewing of 'Second Contact.' I can't help but be coloured by what I've seen later and so it didn't seem quite so hare-brained, madcap, OTT, wacky-crazy nonsense as when I first saw it. But that's not to say I think it's good now. I still think it's a pretty weak episode when the 'pilot' was traditionally among my favourites of a new series (in fact both 'Voyager' and 'Enterprise' remained my favourite episode of their entire series, so much did I love the setup). But it has grown on me a bit more, it's not right down there at the bottom, close to being considered as poor as the worst episodes of 'DSC,' and that's because I've become somewhat accustomed to the antics and style of it. I would still say in a large part it isn't aimed at me, but weirdly at the same time it is: who's going to recognise the obscurest references, some of which could be merely me reading into it, but judging by how deep-cut they go in this series, I suspect they were deliberate: like Beckett Mariner, the hyperactive rebel, secretly daughter of Captain Freeman and her superior, Admiral Freeman. She's tipsy on Romulan Whisky and points out how you'd expect it to be green, but it's blue. Something like that would flash by for the average viewer, but for someone schooled in Trek who's followed every iteration with intense scrutiny, that's exactly the kind of thought we have! The colour that denotes Romulan culture is green, just like it's blue for the Federation, red for the Klingons, etc.

They knew what they were doing, so when you see a huge multi-legged creature chasing the characters on an alien world, that has to be wink at the kind of silliness that went on in the Kelvin Timeline films. It's a sendup, just like having two of your main characters end up in their underwear in the first episode - that has to be a sendup of 'Enterprise' and its infamous decontamination scene. Or the shot of a recovered Vulcan still with black ooze round his mouth like Mirror Spock's beard... They're the kind of references that, while not exactly funny, evoke a knowing nod of the head and a certain satisfaction that has been bled out of the shallow, superficial Treks that make up the output of current Trek programming in general. 'LD' could be described in those terms, too, but at least they have the knowledge... And they're willing to use it! I never accepted the misguided idea that each series should be a different flavour to the others: 'DSC' is all feelings and teen melodrama (even though most of the characters are well out of their teens, which just makes it even more bizarre), 'Picard' is off the beaten track, outsider losers who come together, 'SNW' is a steamrollering of 'TOS' canon, lore and continuity, with a comedic bent to counteract the general melodrama of the others. And 'Prodigy' is the kiddie cartoon. The great thing about past Trek was that it could be whatever it wanted from week to week, that's how it worked, but they became hogtied by trying to squeeze the formula into a heavily serialised galaxy- (and in some cases, universe-) ending storyline that didn't allow for much deviation or exploration, either of the physical galaxy or any of its concepts!

'LD' at least positioned itself in the lower echelon of expectation: it's a comedy. It's animation. It's not going to be deep. Oddly, the reverse was true, it's generally not that funny, but it does go deeper than just about any of the other Treks made today, and a large part of that may be its episodic sensibilities with ongoing arcs, the ideal mixture as seen in 'DS9.' You can see they strive to fit into the existing history of Trek, they care about the continuity, and that's why this has gradually taken the (admittedly dubious, given the opposition), position at the top of the tree as the best of modern Trek. 'Picard' Season 3 (another piece of the current pie I'll be examining in weeks to come), gives it a run for its money thanks to revolving around so many classic characters, and it is close, but 'LD' has impressed to the extent I'd say some of its episodes have been the best, almost at classic status, which is saying something considering my negative views on what's been done in general with these series'. And that's not to say I don't find any of it amusing - I baulk at the unfriendly gore, swearwords (with 'comedy' bleeping, or without), and the silliness, though you can get away with a lot more in this format than could be stomached in live-action. Trek has never been po-faced and miserable, some of its best episodes have been comedies (my personal favourite episode of my personal favourite Trek series is 'The Magnificent Ferengi' and everyone remembers the Tribbles episode from 'TOS'!), it's just the style of humour which can work or not as the case may be.

What worked for me in this episode were simple things, not guffaw moments - when Boimler has the choice of anything his imagination can conjure up on the Holodeck when Mariner and he are giving Tendi the tour, he chooses the Warp Core, something he could see for real, but just loves it so much he's happy to see a recreation of it. That's another thing, this series really applauds the type of people we used to see all the time on Trek: the professionals, the experts, those that care about the minutest detail. These have been the kind that have either been swept away by the need for 'heroes' (usually that means people being sassy and quippy, or breaking out into martial arts moves in a glamourising of violent confrontation), who always have the right answer without doing any work, or the other extreme, genius savants (Chekov in KT, Tilly in 'DSC,' etc), who innately have knowledge and lightning-struck inspiration all the time. At last we have some, dare I say it, more realistic people portrayed - yes, Tendi is extreme in her love of all things Starfleet, space, all things everywhere in fact, and I wouldn't say she's an endearing character in this one. But we only have twenty-five minutes to tell this story rather than the ninety minutes Trek used to spend on a pilot, or even around an hour for more recent examples, which partly explains the hyperactive pace at which everything happens and the characters speak. But an Orion on the crew, that's something to pay attention to.

We know very little about that culture so it's one ripe for exploration - while the other Treks, in keeping with an apparent wish to homogenise all eras to being the same (or is it a budget issue, I never have quite worked it out), tend to show the same few races all the time: Vulcans, check; tusky Tellarites, check; blue Andorians, check; green Orions, check... Doesn't matter if it's set in the 23rd, 24th, 25th or 32nd Centuries, they all bring in these races and they always look the same (ie: different to how they'd previously been shown, even when we'd had multiple different designs for different eras, so the Andorians from 'Enterprise' look different from the Trek films, for example and help to create a different time period), and worse, don't give them depth or go into their cultural attributes when constructing stories. One thing you notice with this series is how many other races they throw in - there's no limit on budget in terms of what you can draw, so you can have a familiar alien (Bolian), a new one (Galordonian), or an obscure one (Benzite, relatively), they're interchangeable. That doesn't mean you need to flood the place with them, and they didn't, just enough to play spot the alien. This does come under the category of references to distract from a weak story, but again, the story was something that hadn't quite been got down yet, trying to tell one in about half the time of a traditional Trek runtime. The last time Trek had done this (other than the 'Short Treks,' which don't count), was with 'The Animated Series' in the Seventies and they had the benefit of a strict template of 'TOS' to follow and most of the original voices for the characters.

I must admit, while I didn't mind Tendi, I was less sure of Rutherford whose status as a new cybernetically enhanced man was questionable - he's only had the implant for two weeks and is still getting used to it, but at this stage we don't know why he has it, what happened to him, or anything along those lines, it's entirely played for comedy: so it goes wrong at awkward moments or changes his personality, and it was all a bit difficult to accept. Trek tech should be flawless, not seen to be full of malfunctions, it makes whoever came up with it look bad - it seemed to imply the Vulcans had made it, but I wasn't completely sure, he may have been referring to the programming, or part of it, when explaining to his friend Barnes, I wasn't clear. It didn't help that it doesn't look great - think back to Geordi, the prototype tech-augmented character, and it was ergonomic, and counter to Dr. Soran's opinion, stylish! It looked like something someone of the future might wear rather than some punky accessory (like Detmer in 'DSC' - you'd think they'd be able to make something far more cosmetically appealing, especially for a young woman). Rutherford himself was highly likeable, especially in that he was too concerned with running a diagnostic on the door that was overridden by Red Alert, and the puzzle of why that happened, than he was open to romance at an inappropriate time. It's amusing, but it's also laudable, the kind of character trait you can respect, but isn't seen on the other modern Treks so much where it's more about feelings than good sense, expressing them no matter if it's an appropriate time! And it nicely gave him and Tendi something to bond over at the end, helping to cement friendship, though you get the impression she'd be friends with anyone, just say one nice word to her and she'll be mates for life!

The others are a bit more hit and miss. Mariner and Boimler seem to have served together for a little while at least, though it has to be less than a year since she says she was on the Quito last year, which is when she first came to the Galordonian homeworld, this planet of short, piglike aliens and their giant domesticated cow-spiders that appeared to have a role in their farming, whether giving milk or maybe ploughing (you see them scuttling across the farmers' fields at the end). These aliens were a weak spot, they looked pretty silly in the way Trek rarely did (though sometimes - look at the squat Evora from the diplomatic function at the start of 'Insurrection,' for example), and the cow-spiders are exactly the kind of ridiculous CGI monster creature I loathe in these things, whether it be the ones in 'Star Trek XI' or 'Star Wars Episode VII' - though I do love the Horta or the creature Odo morphed into in 'DS9' episode 'The Alternate,' so it's all about selling it and its level of believability. We know roughly when the series is set from dialogue, since in the C-plot (how much fun it is to have those traditional A, B and C stories playing out, even if they aren't all that strong!), Freeman interviews Boimler in her Ready Room to task him with reporting on Mariner's behaviour, and says he was commissioned in 2379 (actually she says '79, but from the tech and aesthetics it's clear what century we're in, one big reason to like the series), so it can't be much after that, and for those who know their Trek timeline, 2379 was the year 'Nemesis' took place - at last, what we've all been wanting: a series that takes place post-'Nemesis'!

Okay, we'd already had 'Picard,' this is the third series of the Kurtzman-era, but that was so bad in so many ways, not showing much of Starfleet, not portraying the manners and style we knew (one thing 'Picard' had in common is a desk clerk who isn't impressed or a good example of Starfleet attitudes - the guy that accepts Tendi on board and the guy Jean-Luc speaks to when he visits Starfleet HQ), and while this was tough to take for its wackiness, at least the ship does seem like a proper Starfleet ship with hierarchy and discipline - Boimler must still be fairly new as we see him visit the Bridge and he's severely fazed by the experience, practically traumatic because he's so awed by it. That's a trait that is appealing, that he's so serious about the regulations and modes of conduct, while Mariner is all breezy, seen-it-all-before attitude. Somewhere in between (closer to Boimler than Mariner, I'd say), is the sweet spot and together they complement each other well. The thing that gave me pause before I'd even seen the series (other than the fact I never liked the idea of Trek being specifically comedy rather than having that as one string to its bow), was when the series was summed up by talking about the lower deckers as being the type of people that would put the yellow cartridge in the Replicator to get bananas, or some quote like that. I was instantly concerned how much lack of knowledge that showed about Trek, but I think it must have been hyperbole or simplification because the series was actually pretty true to Trek tech and design.

Even the hoe and shovel which are among the farming implements Mariner has chosen to bring out to the farmers has a distinctly Starfleet look to them, without having to slap a Delta Shield insignia on everything the way 'DSC' did right from its first episode which made everything look tacky and ridiculous. An aside: the only story issue I saw with this episode, perhaps partly because there was a lot less running time, but also things did seem pretty tight, was Mariner thinking Starfleet bureaucracy would mean these farmers would starve before they got the needed equipment. It could simply be that this was emphasising her character, and that while she's rebellious she's goodhearted, or she just fancied a drive out, or was trying to annoy her Mother, or even a combination of all these motivations. It made no sense Boimler would accuse her of selling weapons because Starfleet don't sell anything, either! And I didn't like the Argo-style wheeled vehicle, something I've never appreciated in Trek ever since they introduced it in 'Nemesis' - why have wheels when you can hover, it makes no sense (one reason I'm happy 'TAS' is not canon since it was the first to introduce such land vehicles, wisely ignored ever since if not for that film - though now that animation is canon does that mean that is too? It's so confusing!). Back to the design: it's an absolute triumph and one thing I love about the series, it's clean lines, grey tone and every aspect of the design is true to the era it's in. That includes the oval shape of shields, and lacing out lines of Phaser Beams, and even the tiniest detail: the warp flash once the ship's sped off into warp as seen in the brilliant opening credits!

The one thing I wasn't so sure about was the uniforms. I would much rather they'd been what should have been Starfleet's look for this era, the grey-shouldered design of 'DS9' and the 'TNG' films, though that would be explained later that this particular range of ships and their second contact mission wear these brighter designs. From a production standpoint it's obviously to appeal to those that loved 'TNG' and the emphasis on bright colours does suit the visuals more, and at least 'normal' Starfleet ships are shown to be wearing the much cooler dark uniforms (which does tally with previous episodes where the 'DS9' uniforms of coloured shoulders were shown for the station, yet those on Starfleet ships were still wearing the coloured middle and black shoulders). Though I really didn't like the little boots they wear which just looked silly. Otherwise top marks, the look of it all is beautiful, even if they're taking their cues more from 'TNG' the series rather than 'TNG' the films. That goes for the credits sequence, too, taking a 'TNG' approach (unsurprisingly the USS Cerritos is very evocative of the Enterprise-D, perhaps from that generation since second contact isn't considered as important so it would have older vessels), with its bold, brassy theme as if 'DS9' and 'Voyager' and their more ethereal music had never happened. But the in-episode music is very close to that on all those old Treks, if, like the theme, it can sometimes be overdone (Chris Westlake, Composer of both, is name-checked by 'Nurse Westlake' being one of Dr. T'Ana's staff).

"I love science," claims Boimler, and that has to be a direct poke at 'DSC' for Tilly's dopey 'I love math(s)' comment and even more ridiculous, Spock's 'I like science,' yet even as a joke making fun of the worst Trek it still comes across as sincere and Quaid is a better actor for all his screaming, squealing, purple-haired evocation of weak manliness compared with Mariner's tomboyish, experienced bluster, both of whom seem more accomplished than most of their live-action counterparts. I wouldn't say 'LD' makes a disillusioned Trekker feel safe, that you've come home again at last and it's in a safe pair of hands, but there are signs even in this first episode that they know what they're doing, which couldn't be further from the truth with either 'DSC' or 'Picard'! Out of the three plots, second contact with the Galordonians, Commander Ransom (whom I presume is no relation of Rudy Ransom, Captain Janeway's nemesis in the 'Equinox' two-parter), being bitten by an insect and turning into a ravening rage zombie, and Boimler tasked with keeping eyes on Mariner's doings, I'd say the last was the best. If you also include Tendi being given her induction to the ship and Rutherford taking time to share a meal with a lady friend you could say there were also D and E plots to contend with. But whether it's because I like the characters now or got used to the zaniness, I didn't find it quite so off-putting as originally, and generally appreciated it more, they do manage to marshal all these storylines together in the jumble quite neatly.

What I really didn't like was the content, especially the extremes of the rage virus. It's far from the first time we'd seen such a thing on Trek, 'Impulse' from 'Enterprise' is the most obvious to spring to mind, but that had tension because it was serious. We're supposed to be laughing at the antics on display here, like Rutherford and Barnes getting to know each other in spite of the ship-wide crisis, which isn't as jarring to me now, and is mitigated by Rutherford's preoccupation with the door problem later, but still, the whole thing was ugly and disgusting, vomiting up black slime and chewing on each other, the kind of excess that turns me away from modern Trek. That it was done like this in the first episode was a very bad choice, I feel, and has an unsavoury taste about it all that didn't endear me to the series. While again, I didn't feel it was quite as horrible as that first shock viewing, it remains distasteful and goes too far, setting out the series' stall when it comes to tone and content. The graphic slicing into Boimler's leg by Mariner's Bat'leth (like an exclamation mark after  her gabbling, chattering introduction which itself confirmed my worst fears of what hyped-up animation might be like), was a smaller, but no less worrying example, emphasised by it closing out the teaser. And after opening the episode in full Trek mode, with starships orbiting a beautiful mushroom-shaped Starbase, Boimler giving a Captain's Log (something which had largely been missing from 'DSC' onwards at that stage), it was like they were gently bringing you in, lulling you into thinking this might be the first Kurtzman Trek that's good, wholesome, proper Trek, and then they cruelly laugh at you like a bully, shrieking in glee that you were fooled.

Obviously I don't feel like that about the series now, and as I pointed out in this review, there are clear signs that they want to make it good Trek grounded in Trekkiness rather than both previous series' that seemed to want to be something that wasn't like Trek, desperate to attract those not interested in traditional Trek. While the humour has gone too far on occasions, it isn't about laughing at Trekkers, but embracing them, pulling them in to smile at the most obscure corners of Trekdom. The way at the 'end' (in other words, the end of the experience for the command crew), they recreate Trek finales of old by having the Captain tell the Doctor she'll get to publish more award-winning research now and T'Ana replies, 'great, more paperwork,' and they all go off laughing, was a great showcase of the writers' understanding of the material, but also a way to show the differences in this series: unlike 'DSC' which purported to be about the lower decks, that was really only a concept at the start and utterly failed since Burnham was always the one with the answer, who always had to be listened to and the other characters were mostly the top bods in their departments, it just wasn't stated. Here we see the aftermath for real lower-deckers, much like the episode of 'TNG' this was named after, so you could say it's 'DSC' done right. That still doesn't mean I can hold up this episode (or much of this season), as being good Trek, but it did lead to good stuff later. And that's why I'm here tapping away on a keyboard, because otherwise it's hard to be interested enough!

There's added interest for me as I pick up little facts about the characters that I didn't care enough about, or didn't assimilate before, due to the frantic pace of the dialogue, but knowing Mariner was on DS9 for a while means I do perk up when I hear her history here: that she was demoted and sent to the Cerritos (sounds like a breakfast cereal!), after being on the Quito and has served on five ships (so can't be as young as she seems). One funny moment was her competing with Boimler on how many planets they've visited and he claims he's been to five, though it comes out that includes Earth and Vulcan which is 'so lame' to say it in Mariner-speak. That's the main thing above everything else that actually irks: the modern-day dialogue. They could still have spoken quickly, they could have raised their voices, they could have made everything a joke, but if they sound like 21st Century humans you'd meet in real life it does take you out of it all. It's not as egregious in animation because everything is stylised anyway, but it remains a sore point, one of many major choices inherent in the current generation Treks. Yet it was enjoyable to see these various characters we don't yet know, the Ransoms, the Shaxs' (is it Shax or is it Shaxs?), the Freemans, the Billups, and have these little synopses of their character that will come to the fore as the series travels onward. And the ship itself is attractive and not out of place in design continuity. It's wonderfully detailed (we even get a brief EVA walk on the hull for good measure), and with technobabble and mention of various ship operations (like Cetacean Ops!), there's a sense of a working Starfleet vessel you can believe in. It may be far from the sedate, considered warm bath of 'TNG,' the series it takes as its main inspiration, but it shows promise, and even in a weaker episode there's positive, upbeat enjoyment to be had.

**

The Haunting of Deck Twelve (2)

 DVD, Voyager S6 (The Haunting of Deck Twelve) (2)

The monster under the bed is... just trying to get home. A most Trekky story and one that felt a lot like an early season's episode for its nice character work, the emphasis on those people that get short shrift, or seem to (Neelix, Tuvok, Kim), to the extent that I'm wondering if my impression of the series' latter seasons was wrong? But then I think of poor old Torres and she's still pretty much sidelined, definitely the character to have missed out the most. But I will say that Seven and the Doctor aren't at the forefront, and Janeway, though integral in saving her ship, as the Captain should be, is the character in Neelix' story, so even though she gets a lot of the meat it's from his perspective. The only glaring omission is Naomi, whom I was surprised wasn't among Neelix' 'campfire' ghost story in the Cargo Bay. In practical terms it makes sense that it would be limited to the Borg children (if you can include Icheb in that category being obviously much older, basically a young adult!), since the narrative device is that they're woken in the middle of the night to frightening occurrences on Voyager. And when it's all over they go back to being 'tucked up' in their alcoves as Neelix so comfortingly puts it. In that regard I can see why bringing Naomi in wouldn't be quite so tidy, but if they wanted to include her they could easily have sacrificed a bit of neatness to explain why she would be brought to the Cargo Bay.

I think the main reason she wasn't included was because she knows Neelix a lot better than the Borg gang do, she knows his ways and tricks, but also that without her they're allowed to be themselves in all their blunt, atmosphere-dissipating, unimpressed alienness, and have to be won over by an experienced old storyteller. Before too long he has them eating out of his hand (not literally - snacks are irrelevant!), drawing them in, getting past their greater technical knowledge and nitpicking, or questions about lifeform designations which all serve to put a damper on his story, to suddenly go off about food at an exciting moment in the story so they demand he continue. It was a joy to see Neelix flourishing so much in his role as babysitter, something he's long excelled at. Not only that, he's made a big part of the events he recounts because naturally he has plenty to say about his own experiences during the creepy events. I've said it many times, but whenever a story includes creeping around darkened sets it's an immediate draw to me. Maybe it's because Trek ships are always so bright and inviting that when the lights go down they become suddenly menacing, hiding depths we can only imagine, shadows all around, and this episode was especially well directed. I mean that in regard to the whole production, not just the creeping through decks or crawling along Jefferies Tubes (which made me think of 'Civil Defence' from 'DS9' - the ship/station itself turning on its crew).

We get numerous dramatically different shots, whether that be the early view from the Replicator in Janeway's Ready Room, like a precursor to the ship taking on a life of its own, to shots of the inside of a Turbolift shaft which I'm not sure we'd ever seen before on this series (mercifully long before modern Trek made them seem like rollercoasters in vast empty space!), when Chakotay is almost killed - cleverly they sell what happens without ever having to show the First Officer pinioned to the roof of the Turbolift, we simply see him trapped in the lift, the external view as it plummets, and cut to Neelix to give the details verbally. We never usually see people peer through the Mess Hall doors' windows, either, as Neelix does here. But it's the lighting late in the episode that really stands out, the picture actually disappearing into pitch darkness between the eerie pulses of the Red Alert lights as the only illumination. The camera also moved dynamically a few times, like when Janeway was in Engineering striding around, or leaving. Throughout there's a flair to the direction which ably assists in telling such a different story. It's not that we haven't encountered non-corporeal life before, we have many times, but as I always say, it's not what you do, it's how you do it - in the wrong hands it could easily have been a dull, seen-it-all-before plod-factory product, but by emphasising certain things, framing it as a flashback and giving us a device to keep the audience in the dark as fellow listeners to Neelix' story, it pumps new life into an old Trek story.

Not to moan about 'Enterprise' (it had some good creepy episodes), but I think of 'Vox Sola' as the kind of story in this vein that didn't work (sorry Roxann Dawson - she was the Director). The concept of picking up an unwanted lifeform that then causes havoc can be traced back to plenty of other Treks (episodes such as 'The Child' and 'Q-Less' come to mind, and I feel even 'Voyager' had done this story before - maybe something like 'The Cloud'?), but they found a new spin on it. Much of the episode I felt was good, but not more than that, but it took off for me near the end when the supremely unsettling idea of the ship's computer talking directly to its Captain was introduced. For one thing I just love hearing Majel Barrett's voice, dripping with Trek history right back to the very first production (something I so miss from the modern era, she tied all Trek together back then), and it's always so easy to forget her place as Queen of All Trek when we're so used to hearing the occasional response from the computer. Here she gets to do more than mere dispassionate interjections, yet fascinatingly, though she has a lot more to say as the computer, it's all done in the same style. That makes its determination to wipe out Voyager's crew all the more horrifying as it's all done in such a matter-of-fact way. I suppose the lifeform wasn't really intent on executing the crew as it could easily have done that rather than warn them to abandon ship, but it was putting pressure on Janeway to get it back to its home. Interesting that it could control certain systems, such as forcefields, but couldn't drive the ship.

That was something I loved about it: they have this goal in common with it, no matter how alien it is, it wants to get home. Earlier, when Neelix is getting jumpy and encounters Tuvok wearing breathing apparatus (something that only added to the general ghostliness of appearances and further unsettled because we never see them having to do that - wonder why they didn't break out the EV suits? Probably as the story called for crawling about the bowels of the ship so it wouldn't have been practical), the Vulcan naturally has a calming effect in his sure, steady way, but also in the failure to jump to conclusions about the lifeform's hostility: he says it's intentions aren't clear. Again, it's a very Trekky attitude to take, that although on the surface it appears we may be under attack, we don't immediately make that assumption. I liked the characterisations, too, that Tuvok remains so Vulcan under pressure, even when he's been zapped he has the presence of mind to order Neelix to safety (even if the Talaxian disobeys and takes him along). Neelix draws on a happy memory to try and keep calm and that made sense, too: for his birthday he would have a meal made for him by the crew since he's the one that takes care of food for them the rest of the time. I'm not quite sure how comfortable it would be to have so many people all crowded around him as he tucks in, it would seem to make more sense (and give a boost to morale, taking on another of Neelix's roles), if the Captain and one or two others cooked, and everyone who was there were seated enjoying the meal as well, but this was a memory rather than the strict playback of an event, as evidenced by Neelix imagining the gas creature appearing instead of his meal!

Even Tom Paris' predilection for old technology is brought back when the ship's navigation becomes erratic and he makes the point that we rely too much on 24th Century technology - give him a sextant and chart and he could do it that way, a sentiment that's as pertinent now, if not more so than it was then, regarding our reliance on technology over skill and individual ability. Kim shows how much he's grown up by this point when he encounters Tal Celes in the corridor, so frightened, while he takes charge - it was nice to bring her back from 'Good Shepherd,' but strange they'd do that for just this one appearance - if they did it more often than not when there was a small speaking role it would give the ship's crew a greater sense of personhood when so often it's done with extras or a minor guest actor of the week. It was especially enjoyable to see Seven jumping to conclusions about what Tal had done, showing that for all her knowledge, much like the Borg children, she can make errors of judgement, she's not a superhero (as she'd be portrayed now - oh, in fact she has been portrayed now!). As a Gel Pack fan I loved seeing the squidgy blighters again, too! Disappointing that when Chakotay admitted he had conversations with his Maquis ship in the same way Janeway does with Voyager, he didn't mention the name of it (it's the Valjean, apparently, no thanks to dialogue - it would be on a readout in next season's 'Repression'). And it's nice to know that Janeway has a Coffee Cup Relief Officer on the Bridge ready to spring into action and take the empty mug off her hands whenever she strides in!

I can't help feeling this was one of those budget-savers as the penultimate episode of the season, making space for the big bad Borg bash that would finish out the year: it all takes place on Voyager's standing sets, there are only recurring guest stars rather than anyone new, and they saved money on electricity by not even having the lights on most of the time! All of that doesn't matter when an episode makes the most of its characters, that's what counts, and Janeway was at her heroic Captain best, using her last breaths to argue with the entity that had taken over the ship and steadfastly refusing to give in. Everything about this episode's style is unique - the way they're rolling up their sleeves in the best Chief O'Brien way (though not quite as high, we don't want to get to absolute O'Brien level, the series isn't ready for that!), the breathing masks, the novel directing, the lighting, the narrative device... I don't love it as I did when I first saw it, but I like it a little bit more than when I first reviewed it fifteen years ago. Maybe I've learned to appreciate the artistry of crafting tension and mood without the use of gore and violence after all that's been done with modern Trek. And for its continuing to subvert impressions of the series losing touch with most of its cast in these later episodes - for that I applaud it. But one last thing: what did Chakotay do when Janeway was shut out from getting to their escape pod? Did he turn round and try to open the door to find out what happened to her, or did he think he'd been tricked by his Captain once again and she was determined to go down with her ship?

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