TL;DR Awkwardly executed, but with a truly Trekkian and compelling ethical dilemma. The Seven and Neelix scene near the end is worth the price of admission for subtly showing a socially and philosophically matured Seven.
Voyager's weak point has always been not knowing what to do with most of its main crew. Tom and Harry are boring and handled unnaturally, and the beginning of this episode is no exception. Then, suddenly... DRAMA, YELLING. Unsurprisingly, I was not invested in the stakes or the actions. BUT.
But, there is a compelling ethical question at the heart of the episode, and it's as Star Trek as you can get. There's also a great Seven scene when she's talking to Neelix. It's still not handled as well as later TNG episodes or DS9 episodes, but it was a great character moment that was a long time cooking, and came out naturally, and was profound, and fittingly uttered with a tempered explanatory tone by Seven in an Evo-Devo perspective, which suited her perfectly.
The problem with the story's delivery was that it was clear where it was going, and factually apparent what did not happen, and clearly suggestive what was going on, and I was the one yelling at the TV by the last 8 minutes when they finally had Janeway realize what was going on.
However, the final scene where she decides what they should do about it was handled about as well as can be expected with Voyager, and I actually agreed with this version of Janeway, which is a lot closer to what kind of ethical steerswoman she should have been throughout the show to this point.
Review by LNeroBlockedParent2020-10-12T03:36:44Z— updated 2021-01-31T02:30:55Z
TL;DR Awkwardly executed, but with a truly Trekkian and compelling ethical dilemma. The Seven and Neelix scene near the end is worth the price of admission for subtly showing a socially and philosophically matured Seven.
Voyager's weak point has always been not knowing what to do with most of its main crew. Tom and Harry are boring and handled unnaturally, and the beginning of this episode is no exception. Then, suddenly... DRAMA, YELLING. Unsurprisingly, I was not invested in the stakes or the actions. BUT.
But, there is a compelling ethical question at the heart of the episode, and it's as Star Trek as you can get. There's also a great Seven scene when she's talking to Neelix. It's still not handled as well as later TNG episodes or DS9 episodes, but it was a great character moment that was a long time cooking, and came out naturally, and was profound, and fittingly uttered with a tempered explanatory tone by Seven in an Evo-Devo perspective, which suited her perfectly.
The problem with the story's delivery was that it was clear where it was going, and factually apparent what did not happen, and clearly suggestive what was going on, and I was the one yelling at the TV by the last 8 minutes when they finally had Janeway realize what was going on.
However, the final scene where she decides what they should do about it was handled about as well as can be expected with Voyager, and I actually agreed with this version of Janeway, which is a lot closer to what kind of ethical steerswoman she should have been throughout the show to this point.