There's an argument to be made against the predictability of this episode, and I acknowledge that. But there are so many layers to Caylem's character that I never really caught in previous viewings!
Before tonight, I just remembered Caylem as "the hat guy" because of his little routine with the Mokra guards early in the episode. I didn't pick up on it the last time I watched this episode (several years ago), but it seems clear to me now that Caylem is suffering from a form of dementia. Perhaps I'm projecting that onto him because my grandfather recently passed after spending several years fighting his own battle with Alzheimer's, but it's really striking. His struggles to recall recent events like the letter he (presumably) forgot to write coupled with his strong, robust recall of the distant past are uncannily similar to the way my grandfather would spin his wheels sometimes trying to remember something. The way Caylem gets stuck on a topic is identical to how conversations were with my grandfather a few years ago, when he was still able to hold them but was suffering the effects of memory loss.
I tried to watch an episode of Enterprise but the hotel wireless is throttled too low to stream it, so rather than try to limit the quality or anything I just picked the next episode of Voyager in my queue instead. It happened for a reason.
Review by dgwVIP 10BlockedParent2018-01-03T10:03:24Z
There's an argument to be made against the predictability of this episode, and I acknowledge that. But there are so many layers to Caylem's character that I never really caught in previous viewings!
Before tonight, I just remembered Caylem as "the hat guy" because of his little routine with the Mokra guards early in the episode. I didn't pick up on it the last time I watched this episode (several years ago), but it seems clear to me now that Caylem is suffering from a form of dementia. Perhaps I'm projecting that onto him because my grandfather recently passed after spending several years fighting his own battle with Alzheimer's, but it's really striking. His struggles to recall recent events like the letter he (presumably) forgot to write coupled with his strong, robust recall of the distant past are uncannily similar to the way my grandfather would spin his wheels sometimes trying to remember something. The way Caylem gets stuck on a topic is identical to how conversations were with my grandfather a few years ago, when he was still able to hold them but was suffering the effects of memory loss.
I tried to watch an episode of Enterprise but the hotel wireless is throttled too low to stream it, so rather than try to limit the quality or anything I just picked the next episode of Voyager in my queue instead. It happened for a reason.