Join us as we explore the 10 dumbest, silliest, and most questionable moments from Star Trek: Voyager. From infamous plot holes to baffling character decisions, this is a loving look back at the things that made us scratch our heads.
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Packed with fresh ideas and the opportunity for new adventures unrestricted by the Alpha and Beta Quadrants
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Janeway and the crew took the Borg by the Simulation Tubules and headed right on home
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Well, almost. The journey was diverted and downright interrupted on occasion by some of the deadliest opponents and situations ever faced by a Federation starship
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Yet there was still the occasional time for a Fromage-based emergency or a holodeck jaunt to break the tension
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Here, though, we're going to be looking at those moments, plot points, and characters
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that could have been avoided and likely would have shaved a few dozen light years off of
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the trip back to Earth. Of course, if they just shifted into high warp and aimed a line for the Alpha Quadrant
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seven seasons of Janeway sipping coffee and Neelix's cooking would have become rather
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tedious for viewing public. So, of course, there has to be some intrigue and story to make this a truly great Star Trek
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show, which Voyager heartily delivered in spades, week in, and week out. But that also means there
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were a few times the sillier ludicrous did creep in. Prepare for story time, rapid builds, rug
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sweeping, and most importantly, lizards. I'm Bree from Trek Culture, and join me as we take a
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stumble down the path that is the dumbest things in Star Trek Voyager. One second, it's Rillig
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Hello? Okay. Wait, where? You're stuck on Ryza? How did you... Never mind
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Okay. Yep. Editor's note. Duncan has a special message for us. Can you just go ahead and play it here
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Hi, I'm Duncan Rillick, no relation. I collect products from before the burn, but we have a situation
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Halsgern have sent me their limited edition DS9 watch, but I'm stuck on Risa
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I lost my temporal transporter during Jamaharan. All of Halsgern's products are made from natural materials, no dilithium
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and producing small quantities to ensure responsible and ethical production. And I'm all about that conservation resources
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They've got the 1701, the 1701D, and DS9 watches. Plus watch straps and necklaces in Operations Jasper
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Sciences Aventurine, and Command J. I'll be hopping on the next transport toward the Relic Pathway
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but make sure you get yours fast by clicking our link. And remember, if it's a relic, then it's by Relic
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Number 10. Tiny Little Legs We could land the ship, announced Captain Janeway in the 37s, marking the first occasion that a starship would make planetfall, and not end up a burning hulk of twisted metal
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The audience held their breath as she descended into the atmosphere and the 400-year-old mystery of Amelia Earhart
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Successfully completed more times than the Enterprise-D saucer separated, USS Voyager's party trick wasn't just limited to the intrepid class
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but would be the only craft during this era of the franchise that would touch down
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With blue alert flashing and no need for a bulb change, the tidal vessel would descend from the stars, through the clouds
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and gracefully come to rest on the surface. However, it would do so on the most inadequate set of landing gear
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The nearest equivalent in current times might be standing a Boeing 747 on four bricks
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But whatever way you look at it, the inertial dampeners have a lot of work to do
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For one, the ship is saucer heavy with all four landing feet aesthetically having to be located
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on the underside of the engineering hall. One may even expect Tom Paris to step out and stick up a prop rod for precautionary measures
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Whatever way you look at them though they are very very small and just to emphasize this nearly every shot of Voyager landed has the feet concealed somehow In Basics and the 37s they are hidden
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behind rocks or a cliff face. And in future sightings, Voyager is often seen from above
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rather than highlighting the landing gear. Number nine, Salamander Babies. Classically up there among
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the dumbest and therefore one that is inevitably on this list. Let's deal with it now. The concept
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of Threshold and the potential to hit Warp 10 and be everywhere in the universe is mind-bending
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Full of potential for storytelling and the epic of Voyager's return to Earth
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it could have been an early turning point, even tying back to TNGs where no one has gone before
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Instead, Tom Paris and Catherine Janeway mutated into lizards and did the business
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There's really no other way to put it frankly because that's just how silly it sounds
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The fact that it's summarily swept under the rug and never mentioned again
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is a silence that speaks volumes. What may have seemed like a good idea on paper should have resulted in at least some fallout
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yet there isn't even a concern for the offspring of said relationship
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At least Lower Decks nodded that one of them potentially survived in Much Ado About Boimler
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although they weren't faring very well. The we fixed them ending which again avoids any explanation
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of how the captain and helmsman are returned to human form is an insult to the intelligence of
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the audience. That even involved reattaching Tom's tongue which must have just been lying around the
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ship somewhere. The only time there's been a quicker mop-up was Scotty transporting the
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tribbles to the Klingons. Number 8. Space Friends. Pages of space have been given over to the speedy
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way in which the Maquis and Starfleet crews blend together before the caretaker's rocky remains have
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even cooled. Promoted as an opportunity for conflict and character development, Voyager's
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melding of two factions offered a new spark to the franchise that was set up in the later days of TNG
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and the second season of DS9. Yet it failed to pay off in any respect
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The nearest fans got to seeing this conflict in action was Torres and Carrie clashing over who would become chief engineer
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As the elephant in the room, the duality of the crew would play out in a holodeck for worst-case scenario
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but otherwise be firmly left at the roadside. It was backroom discussions that led to the removal of the friction
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between the crews of Janeway and Chakotay, yet to ditch such a fundamental element of the show and something intrinsic to its concept
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still leaves fans baffled today. Revisiting this controversially abandoned plot point only reignited the fires three seasons later
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Yes, it made sense for the two crews to work together and put aside their differences
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yet barely a line is given to exploring how it was all put to bed before the closing credits of Caretaker
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That decision may actually have been the real worst-case scenario, depriving the show of more character depth and exploration
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as opposed to checking out the next gaseous space anomaly. Number seven, please state the nature of the medical kerfluffle
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Before futures end, the Doctor is a character that is evidently quite difficult to manage
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Confined to either sickbay or the holodecks, the level of opportunities for the digital MD are, to a point, limited
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Even he asks to be included more as part of the crew, and treated with more respect than a light switch
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resulting in his ability to deactivate his own program. Yet his early appearances just fail to find that spark that a mobile emitter immediately does
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This limitation means characters either need to go to him or communicate via a monitor
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reducing Picardo's range in the series, something that was most certainly addressed
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It was a time where the series was still finding its feet, however, and it's as though the crew are just humoring him
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The Doctor was given time off, yes, actual time off, in projections
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which goes horribly wrong, and he was sent to tackle Anglo-Saxon history in Heroes and Demons
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which also goes horribly wrong. Yet those first seasons also tend to dumb down the character
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instead of building and exploring. The two worst examples of this show up in Parallax
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where his sickbay projectors play around with his stature, turning what should have been an
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involving character into a comedy turn. And secondly, there's also the time where his image
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is projected into space during the Kazon battle in Basics Part 1, again offering that comedy turn
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moment. It displays alarming ineptitude of the Voyager crew at the most crucial time of the
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series up to that point. Not only does it dumb down a high-tension moment, but it also makes
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viewers wonder if there's really no hope for the crew at this pivotal time
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Number six oh yes the shuttles How can any list of dumb Voyager things be complete without the mention of a shuttle bay larger than the TARDIS Voyager Rolodex of shuttles is a muddled mess of
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inconsistency that did two things. It highlighted the difficulty in keeping canon as canon for the
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sake of a story, and also that the Star Trek universe was becoming such a large animal that
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at times it rode itself into a corner that it just couldn't get out of. Hence the Voyager
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shuttle conspiracy. If one was destroyed in an episode, you could guarantee that four more
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identical ones would be available two weeks later. The Delta Flyer was introduced as a super shuttle
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to curb some of this overuse, although its revered status caused its own issues as has been explored
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in previous entries. There were shuttles that did survive multiple encounters. Ex-Astra Scientia
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indicates at least 10 were definitely lost, with a further 7 probably lost. As noted
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The second Delta Flyer was constructed overnight, so there's no reason that the same couldn't be said for Voyager
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although it is doubtful they had a vehicle replicator akin to that aboard the USS Protostar
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The official technical guide even suggests that the ship would only carry two regular shuttles
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so fans might assume that there are a ton and a half of spare parts just sitting around somewhere
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After all, Voyager does carry a spare warp core, just in case
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Number 5. Ranking Paris and Kim The blatant choice for anything to do with rank here would be Forever Ensign Harry Kim
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Yet the progress of Tom Paris makes even less sense when examined
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Once convicted criminal Tom Paris joins the Starfleet crew, he's officially given the rank of Lieutenant Junior Grade, immediately stepping above Harry
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Disgraced in 30 days, Tom is demoted to Ensign, but only until Unimatrix Zero
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receiving a return to his junior grade lieutenant status at that episode
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This again shelves Harry Kim so much so that even the former ensign notes that he's still missing that additional pip
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Your time will come, Harry. So why would this be dumb? Well, because from a crew morale perspective, this crushes anyone who's made Starfleet their career in the ranks or the enlisted ensemble
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If there's a real line behind all of this, it's that crime does in fact pay
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It makes it even more understandable how both character and actor Garrett Wong
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were disappointed with the development of Harry Kim. This led to some difficult times for the actor, who felt tragically underused
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Tom's contribution to the ship is no more or less important than Kim's
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who has faced his own series of trials across the breadth of the show
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I mean, clearly, surviving an attack by Species 8472 is just an everyday occurrence
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Maybe he should have mutinied and been bumped up to a full lieutenant. By the finale, it is resolved to some degree
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However, the choice to award him command of the USS Rhode Island, America's smallest state, feels like another jab
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Number four, blind to danger. A point more associated with the show's early and formative seasons, Voyager had a tendency to stop off a great deal and check out every planet and space anomaly that popped up
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Time and again, only the second episode almost screams how this is a bad thing as the ship's involvement with one planet leads to a catastrophic event
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The Cloud tells you everything you need to know about the story from the title. In fact, Janeway's choice to take a diversion to grab some coffee may be one of the worst things that she does
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Well, maybe aside from allying with the Borg. If viewers step back a bit from the show, it becomes increasingly apparent that Janeway and co
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are some of the worst meddlers in Starfleet history. They are trying to get home, and do so on occasion by trying to find new technologies
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but it's almost as if they can't help themselves. Heading into the third season, they're still prepared to take extreme risks
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such as plugging into an alien computer to tackle a clown in The Thaw
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or, controversial mention, even later transporting refugees through dangerous territories in Counterpoint
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Turning back for more Kazon interactions seems like a picnic in comparison
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Dropping into orbit and getting involved becomes almost as easy as pulling off the freeway for a coffee and comfort stop at Bucky's or Wawa
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or Stratford Services if you're across the pond. Except that instead of getting an overpriced blueberry muffin
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they end up embroiled in planetary affairs and then wonder how it all went wrong
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It's almost fortunate that they only spent seven years on this journey home
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Number three, going back for baby. Seska's reappearance in Basics Part 1 shook the crew with the news
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that she was now a mother and the father was potentially Chakotay
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The final episode of season two aired the story works as a starship heist with or without the family element Fans knew in their hearts that Chakotay was very unlikely to be the father and even in the episode itself the crew note just how improbable this is
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It all feels too obviously like a trap, with the conclusion seeing that Kazon manipulation coming to fruition
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through no surprise to anyone. It's a rare, and some might say out-of-character instance
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of the Voyager crew acting really, really dumb, especially given their history with the Kazon and two full years of experiences in the Delta Quadrant
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So let's reflect back to Threshold, where the Captain and Tom had a full litter of salamander children
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who they left and never spoke of again, which makes you wonder if they have to have drunk the ship dry of its Romulan ale stash
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Yet, they still go back even after the multitude of events involving the Kazon alone during the second season
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Adding into this episode a chance to see those wonderful landing legs once more
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and it's a double bubble of dumb in less than an hour. Number two, Bendy Wendy Spacey Wacey
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Among four episodes held back from the first season, Twisted echoes a trope from some of DS9's initial years in that this episode as a whole
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doesn't need to happen and doesn't ultimately affect anything. One of several Space Anomaly stories that littered the 1995 batch
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Twisted's conclusion has the crew resolve their reality-bending predicament by doing precisely, and no more or less, than nothing
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It is perhaps less of a cringeworthy moment than taking a block of maturing milk to a medical facility
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but yet there still seems very little point. Overkilling it on the technobabble and racing around the ship attempting to get from one location to another
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no one stops to take a moment to think about precisely what is happening
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leaving the show to descend into a mineshaft of its own spatial distorted craziness
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Twisted is, in a way, a prime example of where Voyager's first season didn't work out
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and shouts at its falterings. The concepts were there, but when it came to satisfying resolutions
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that explained what happened and made viewers return, it did miss the mark
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Instead, fans got a twist that was in fact an untwist, and the reset button was firmly punched
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This complaint could even be leveled at the final two minutes of Endgame
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where it's another example of Voyager's ability to rug-sweep important moments and hope that the audience just doesn't notice
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Drinks all around it, Sandrine's. Now, let's take a left at the next Galactic Roundabout
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because after all, what's the next worst thing that could possibly happen? Number 1. Once Upon a Flutter. Aside from a nice easter egg on Soji's lunchbox and Picard
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this creation has no place on Voyager. At this later stage of the series, to pull out an episode
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that rivals the insanity of Threshold must have been quite a challenge to accomplish
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Framing a Porgorn's Teletubbies adventure against the more serious backdrop of a missing parent
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the fifth season's Once Upon a Time offered a parallel story that truly took any nuance or
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seriousness away from Ensign Wildman's potential peril. Originally an Alice in Wonderland concept
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its narrative was ripped apart and rewritten, giving rise to the ever-blue flotter
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Instead of spending quality time with Naomi, the crew allow her to bury herself away in the fantasy
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of the holodeck and with the two worst role models possible. Neelix's strains at becoming
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a parent only feel undermined further by the inclusion of the holodeck, which hauntingly
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reminds viewers of Barkley's predicaments back in TNG's Hollow Pursuits. But there's also another
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side to this episode, in that making the Flutter doll, it was hoped that fans would demand for one
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to be made, and the merchandising money would flood in. The demand obviously did not come
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Flutter is one of those points, like the chef in Enterprise, that viewers didn't need to see to
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understand. Bringing the character to life was an infuriating cash grab that Star Trek's powers
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that be should have stepped away from and respected the intelligence of its audiences
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which makes it really dumb. Huh, did you know Halskern means woodcore in German
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Don't forget to get your limited edition 1701, 1701D, and DS9 watches from Halskern this
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black week. Click our link in the description. And those were 10 of the dumbest things in Star Trek Voyager
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But with all that said, I hope you all have a great rest of your day
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and don't forget to live long and prosper


