“Workforce, Part II”
Written by Kenneth Biller & Bryan Fuller & Michael Taylor
Directed by Roxann Dawson
Season 7, Episode 17
Production episode 263
Original air date: February 28, 2001
Stardate: 54622.4
Captain’s log. After a summary of Part I, we see Chakotay using his mad Maquis skillz to trick the cops into thinking he’s jumped over a fence and then taking them out, though he’s wounded in the process.
In orbit, the ECH uses his mad tactical skillz to escape the two Quarren ships firing on Voyager. When Kim asks what he’s going to do, the ECH smugly says, “Watch and learn.” Unfortunately, while his photonic burst to escape the two ships works, there are five more ships closing in on them, so they have to retreat.
Chakotay goes to the bar, hiding his shoulder wound. Janeway apologizes to him for Jaffen’s rudeness, but says it was for a good reason: she’s moving in with him! Chakotay pretends to congratulate her.
An investigator named Yerid arrives in the bar. Neelix and Torres are missing and “Amal Kotay” is wanted for questioning. Paris is livid that Torres is missing—the city is supposed to be safe!—and he says that Kotay is right here in the bar. But when he looks to Chakotay’s table, he’s gone.
After Voyager settles in the crater of a moon, the ECH gets to go back to being a doctor to treat Torres. Her memories have been very selectively altered. Neelix confirms this from his experiences, mentioning also that Paris still remembered being named Tom Paris and being from Earth, but also believing that he gets space sick. The EMH says the treatment will take some time, and he and Neelix agree to have the latter take her around the ship between treatments to help jog her memory.
Sure enough, Torres starts to remember bits and pieces of her previous life, though she is surprised by the picture of her and Paris where they’re obviously a romantic couple, though it serves to explain to her why he was so interested in her well being. She also remembers that he likes old cartoons. Neelix later cooks her her favorite breakfast.
Kadan and a novice doctor, Ravoc, are examining Tuvok, who is sedated. Kadan asks leading questions of Ravoc by way of seeing how much he’s learned, and they conclude that his Dysphoria Syndrome—for which he’s already been treated once before—has recurred and he needs engrammatic resequencing.
Hansen is talking to the supervisor about Tuvok. She claims that the workers are concerned that his condition is contagious, but she’s really worried about herself: her mind-meld-induced flashes are worrying her. The supervisor assures her that it’s not contagious. Yerid then arrives to question them about Neelix, Torres, and Kotay, with Hansen confirming that none of the three of them have reported to work today.
Janeway is moving her stuff into Jaffen’s place. When Janeway goes to get more things, she finds Chakotay, who hid there thinking that, since she was moving out, it’d be a good hiding place. He tries to convince her that several of his crewmates have been brainwashed. She’s not entirely convinced (his holding a weapon on her doesn’t help, though he does lower it when she points that out), but she’s willing to swipe a dermal regenerator from the plant to heal his wounds. Hansen catches her doing that, but she buys Janeway’s cover story that Jaffen got hurt during the move and is too stubborn to go to the hospital.
After Janeway leaves, we learn that Hansen is at the plant in order to learn more about Tuvok. She’s stunned to realize that there’s no information about his species in the database. Tuvok also has been accessing information about several of the newest hires.
While Janeway heals Chakotay’s wounds, Kim contacts him through the subcutaneous transponder. Voyager can’t beam him to safety, as they’re too far away—they’ve only been able to contact him using some technobabble trickery. Janeway is shocked when Chakotay identifies her as their captain. After the communication ends, Chakotay uses the dermal regenerator to remove his alien disguise, hoping that his real face (and that he and Janeway are the same species) might convince her that he’s legit. It doesn’t, entirely, and when she tells Jaffen about what’s going on, Jaffen is aghast and convinced that he’s lying, and that they should call security.
Chakotay is arrested in Janeway’s apartment and taken to a hospital. Yerid questions him there, and Chakotay decides to confide in him, particularly when some officers show up to take him to Division 6—neuropathology. Yerid insists on keeping him, but the orders are from his supervisor. Yerid is not happy, especially given Chakotay’s claims of kidnapping his entire crew.
After being taken to Division 6, Chakotay has been given the memory-altering treatment, and at Kadan and the supervisor’s direction, he contacts Voyager and tells them that he’ll bring the shield grid down. Kim and the ECH believe him and leave the safety of the moon.
Ravoc is concerned that two people in the plant are now suffering Dysphoria Syndrome, and there might be an outbreak, but Kadan assures him that measures are being taken to assure the workers’ safety.
Hansen speaks to Yerid, as she’s concerned. One hundred and thirty-eight people—including Hansen herself, as well as Tuvok—were all hired on the same day, all processed through Division 6. Yerid, unfortunately, has been relieved of duty, so he has no standing but he wants to figure out what’s going on here. So Hansen goes to the hospital instead, and tells Ravoc that she’s been having strange thoughts and dreams. Ravoc says it sounds like symptoms of Dysphoria Syndrome, but they have the leading expert on that disease in the hospital. Hansen badgers Ravoc into fetching Kadan directly, and once he’s gone, she uses her mad Borg skillz to break into the hospital database.
Yerid, meanwhile, questions Janeway and Jaffen. They try to deny even knowing Chakotay, but Yerid pierces those lies pretty quickly.
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In the Watchful City
Ravoc and Kadan find that Hansen has left the hospital—she was a voluntary patient, so nobody stopped her—and they discover that she accessed sixty-four hospital records, all cases of Dysphoria Syndrome. Ravoc is stunned that there have been so many cases of what is supposed to be a rare disease. It isn’t long before Ravoc puts it all together and realizes that the ravings of Tuvok and “Amal Kotay” are completely accurate. Kadan admits it, secure in the knowledge that there’s no one for Ravoc to report it to, as Kadan has several powerful people on his side.
Security goes to the bar and asks if Paris has seen Hansen. He says no, then when they leave, we see that Hansen, Jaffen, Janeway, and Yerid are all hiding at the bar. The evidence Hansen uncovered at the hospital proves something hinky is happening. Janeway is one of the patients she found, also. Janeway recalls that Chakotay said there was proof of who she really is on Voyager, and also recalls the technobabble they used to contact him. There’s a subspace transceiver in the plant, so she, Paris, and Jaffen decide to go there and contact Voyager while Yerid and Hansen go to the hospital.
Janeway tells Jaffen he doesn’t have to help her—Hansen didn’t find his name in the database—but he cares too much about Janeway to let her go it alone.
Yerid brings Hansen in as a patient, knowing that Division 6 wants to get their hands on her in any case. Once they’re inside, Hansen “wakes up” and they threaten Kadan at phaserpoint. They find Chakotay, Tuvok, and Ravoc all sedated.
Janeway contacts Voyager, and is shocked to see Torres in her Starfleet uniform, confirming everything Chakotay said. However, security has found them, and Voyager is also being ambushed by Quarren ships. While Paris and Jaffen fight off security, Janeway does the same thing on purpose that she did by accident her first day and makes the computer think there’s a core overload, which shuts down power—including to the shield grid.
Meanwhile, Kim comes up with a plan. When the ECH asks what it is, Kim smugly says, “Watch and learn.” He launches three escape pods, then leaves the ECH alone on the bridge to make the Quarren think Kim, Neelix, and Torres abandoned ship. Then, once the Quarren tractor the escape pods, they explode, taking the Quarren ships out. Then Torres is able to beam all of Voyager’s people back onto the ship.
It soon becomes clear that this is a widespread conspiracy—Voyager’s crew aren’t the only ones who’ve been kidnapped and memory wiped. Jaffen beams on board—he, at least, was a legitimate person who came to Quarra to find work—and he and Janeway say their goodbyes. The good news is that Jaffen has been promoted to shift supervisor. The bad news is they’ll never see each other again, though Janeway did consider asking Jaffen to join the crew.
On the bridge, Janeway admits that Quarra really did feel like home, but she has absolutely no regrets about Chakotay coming to rescue them.
Can’t we just reverse the polarity? Apparently a triaxillating frequency on a covariant subspace band allows you to communicate over long distances without being eavesdropped on. Cha cha cha.
There’s coffee in that nebula! The memory-altered version of Janeway is apparently a pack rat, as she’s acquired a ton of stuff after only living there a few weeks.
Mr. Vulcan. Tuvok mind-melds with Seven to get her to realize that they are not who they think they are, which gets the entire ball rolling.
Half and half. Torres slowly starts to remember what happened. At the end, she kisses Paris for trying to help her out even though he didn’t remember they were married, and then smacks him for all the flirting he did as a waiter.
Please state the nature of the medical emergency. The doctor gets to be both ECH—coming up with nifty ways to avoid being destroyed and bluffing the Quarren coyote—and the EMH—coming up with a treatment to reverse Kadan’s brainwashing.
Everybody comes to Neelix’s. Neelix helps jog Torres’s memories through tours of the ship and cooking.
Resistance is futile. Seven’s hallucinations of her previous life allow her to pick up where Tuvok left off, her access as efficiency monitor proving very useful
Do it.
“I’m not here to hurt anyone. You have to trust me.”
“You’re pointing a weapon at me.”
–Chakotay saying he comes in peace, and Janeway expressing skepticism.
Welcome aboard. Back from Part I are James Read as Jaffen, Don Most as Kadan, Tom Virtue as the supervisor, Michael Behrens as the coyote, and John Aniston as the Quarren official. In addition, Jay Harrington plays Ravoc, while this week’s Robert Knepper moment is Robert Joy, probably best known as Dr. Sid Hammerback on CSI: NY, as Yerid.
Trivial matters: Neelix helps jog Torres’s memory by showing her things in her quarters like the television she got for Paris in “Memorial” and the bat’leth she was gifted at the end of “Prophecy.”
This only Roxann Dawson’s second time directing a Voyager episode, following “Riddles.” She has gone on to become a major television director, including ten episodes of Enterprise.
The toy ships on the mobile over the crib in Torres and Paris’ cabin are all Hallmark tree ornaments.
Set a course for home. “I’ve got a good job.” One of the things I particularly like about this two-parter is that it’s a particularly strong criticism of the work-is-everything dynamic that we particularly see in the United States. One of the common questions asked when getting to know someone is “what do you do for a living?” People’s lives are almost entirely defined by how they make their money, even if that isn’t the most important thing in their lives. Worse, it often is the most important thing in their lives. I clearly recall my ex-wife’s co-workers at an investment bank, who regularly spent ten-to-twelve hours a day at their jobs, and their apartments had no decorations, sparse furniture, and very little food in the refrigerator.
Tellingly, when Chakotay asks Janeway if she’s happy on Quarra, her response is, “I’ve got a good job.” That shouldn’t answer the question, but obviously the culture on Quarra is such that work is all-important—and also that there’s a labor shortage. Which makes people desperate to find workers. A ship full of people they could alter the memories of must have seemed a godsend.
What I particularly like about this two-parter is especially true of this second half: it’s a good procedural storyline. I like how the solving of what’s going on unfolds. I particularly like that no one person is responsible for saving everyone—it’s a team effort. Tuvok’s resistance to the reconditioning and his mind-meld of Seven starts one ball rolling, and Chakotay stirring shit starts another ball rolling. Plus, his and Neelix’s “kidnapping” of Torres gets Yerid involved.
Yerid is an excellent character, and a character type I’m particularly fond of: the dogged workaday investigator who just wants to learn the truth. His insistence on finding out the truth even after he’s been relieved of duty is a very large part of why Voyager’s crew gets out of this, particularly since he is able to put Seven and Janeway together.
I was relieved that Jaffen turned out not to be one of the bad guys, as every cliché in the book dictates that he would turn out to be in on it and would betray Janeway. But thankfully, he doesn’t. Which is nice. James Read plays him as a genuinely pleasant person, and his chemistry with Kate Mulgrew is completely convincing. They make a superb couple, and their parting at the end is very bittersweet.
This isn’t a great two-parter by any stretch, but it’s a good one, doing what Star Trek does best: comment on humanity, in this case the obsession over work, plus also providing a fun adventure. Roxann Dawson also does a superb job directing, from the action scenes—both Chakotay escaping from the cops at the top of the episode and the shootouts in the plant at the climax—to the emotional journey that Torres goes on as she remembers her past life. And then there’s the impressively effective visual of Torres entering the field of view when Janeway contacts Voyager, the first time in the two-parter that we see Torres in uniform. It’s beautifully played: Janeway’s ice-water-in-the-face expression as for the first time she realizes that everything she’s been told is really true. She also gets strong performances out of Garrett Wang and Robert Picardo, who could very easily have overplayed the dueling “watch and learn” sequences of alternating battle strategies, but it has just the right tone, with a lovely coda at the end when the pair do the after-you-no-after-you dance when they leave the briefing room, finally smiling and walking out together.
One thing I meant to mention last time, as it was more evident in Part I, is that whatever else one may say about Voyager, it looked amazing. It’s been over two decades, but the show’s visuals have remained spectacular, whether it’s Voyager trapped in ice, the war-torn Vaadwaur homeworld, or the magnificently complex power plant seen at the top of Part I.
Warp factor rating: 9
Keith R.A. DeCandido will be one of the guests at the inaugural Suncoast Fan Fest at the Bradenton Area Convention Center in Palmetto, Florida. Among the other guests are Voyager’s Manu Intiraymi (Icheb), as well as actors Alaina Huffman, Corin Nemec, Casper Van Dien, Travis Wester, AJ Buckley, and Eddie McClintock, as well as several voice actors. More information can be found here.
As I said in Part I, I think this was a bit of a missed opportunity. I remember watching this the first time and sitting up straight in my chair when Janeway asks Chakotay “Why would I want all that responsibility?” because I was so sure we were going to get an interesting look into her character that just… didn’t come. They are approaching a decade of being out in the Delta Quadrant, her fiancé moved on, crewmembers getting killed, she has to face down horrible enemies with no backup- and she has always dealt with that head-on and with the belief that they would get through. It would have been really cool to see who Janeway is when all of that drive to get home is taken away- and it would have been interesting to find out that, after all this time, she is tired of responsibility, even if she doesn’t remember why.
Considering that we know they are going to be cured, and we know that of course Captain Janeway is going to woman up and take her place back in the big chair, it would have been interesting to explore more of who she was when she was just “Kathryn who pushes the buttons at the factory” instead of “Captain Janeway of the Starship Voyager.” Kind of like how “Family” lets us see Picard outside of his role as Captain of the Enterprise- the distance from the ship and the role allows the story to explore a new side of him that really can’t be shown when he is back on board, so he can have these more vulnerable moments without it seeming like it conflicts with his job. I wish we got to see a little more of that here with Janeway. Its a very competent little two-parter, but I wish it delved a little more into the character development (although the Torres scenes were nice, as well).
Seconded on how good this whole 2-parter looked. Quarra felt like a real place instead of a set, and a lot of that was due to some really great set design and cinematography.
Yes, work to live not live to work is my personal mantra.
Anyway, I need to force myself to watch this two-parter – I’m not sure I ever got all the way through Part One. I just recall being kind of surprised that this storyline was a two-parter when usually those are saved for something more epic kind of like “Flesh and Blood” and “The Killing Game.” Yeah, it’s nice to break from that template but as others have mentioned, this is valuable time that could have been devoted to the arc of getting Voyager home. While I don’t necessarily agree that the crew should have gotten home earlier in the season which I don’t believe the powers that be would ever agree to (Voyager finally getting home is the ultimate ratings stunt so naturally save that for the last episode). However, I don’t think it should have happened at basically the last minute of the last episode. But I’ll save my criticisms for the rewatch of “Endgame.”
It’s such a shame they edited the show on tape, making it impossible to remaster. TNG looks goddamn amazing on streaming since they had all the edited episodes on film and can just go back to the film to get better quality digital, but you can’t do that with Voyager without re-editing the show over again. They even shot it on film, but the editing is the problem. What I wouldn’t give to see the amazing visuals (except for Torres’s CGI baby) in high def today.
Quoth garreth: “this is valuable time that could have been devoted to the arc of getting Voyager home”
Again, that isn’t really something Voyager did. Like, at all. To expect it now just strikes me as a waste of energy.
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
To me, the biggest flaw with this episode is that Janeway’s boyfriend did not remain on Voyager at the end. It had been long explained that Janeway would not have a relationship with someone under her command, and here was the perfect opportunity because he would not have been a member of the crew, they were apparently in love, and we knew the show would be over in about six months anyway, so it’s not like they would have to invest in a long-term commitment to this character like they had with the likes of Icheb and Naomi
This seems to be a bit of a broken Aesop here. It has been previously established that Starfleet is populated by a bunch of Type A workaholics with a testing regime that weeds out most anyone who cannot hack such a lifestyle. If anything, Janeway is normally defined by her job as Captain. The difference is Starship commander is a more prestigious job.
Interesting that there would be a commentary on the importance of work given that Voyager is in a situation where the crew basically has lived at work for the past 6+ years.
They often wear their uniforms off duty and hang out with work friends all the time. Although they obviously get time off, there isn’t much flexibility in their current situation.
And everyone’s mostly OK with it, even those members of the Maquis who definitely never wanted to be in Starfleet.
I hate the way they wrote Kim and the Doctor in these episodes. It was awful and one of the reasons I hated the characters in seasons 5-7
@4/Krad: Watching Voyager was often a frustrating viewing experience because I knew it could have been so much more and better. I can’t help but gripe every now and then about it and particular directions they could have gone in.
@3/karey: That’s not quite correct. TNG, like DS9 and Voyager, was shot on film and edited on video including the visual FX. Because Next Gen was shot on film, it was just a (costly) matter of rescanning those film negatives in high-def and then also re-creating the VFX for the blu-rays since you can’t just simply transfer the VFX that was originally all done on video. It’s the exact same thing, well actually even more complicated with DS9 and VOY. While the VFX were initially done on video, they eventually switched over to CGI that were all saved on computer files. From what I understand, a lot of those files have been lost. TNG on blu-ray ended up not selling as well as hoped for parent company CBS so that effectively killed any hopes for also remastering DS9 and VOY which would have been an even more costly undertaking than TNG and those later spin-offs weren’t nearly as popular to justify the expected costs. You do at least get to see some remastered footage on the DS9 documentary “What We Left Behind” and likewise, we should see some remastered footage for the Voyager documentary that’s in the early stage of production.
I seem to recall reading about new software in development that may one day be able to render old SD video as HD without the fuss. I think it may have been open-sourced or crowd-sourced or something. So maybe someday we’ll see DS9 and Voyager enhanced in such a way, without the great cost.
Both parts of Workforce are two of the better episodes of Voyager, but they also expose many of Voyager’s issues. How many episodes like The Killing Game, Year of Hell, and Coda begin with the audience questioning why things in the episode are happening. These types of mysteries make writers feel clever, but in reality they are just trying to make the forced concept work. Audiences find this frustrating, not clever. Thankfully Workforce is the best example of this phenomenon; the other episodes listed are poor examples.
Part 1 has maybe the worst cliffhanger in Star Trek and Part 2 very quickly resolves the situation. It feels more like they shot one episode that was just too long and then decided it should be two parts.
Again, these things happen in one of the better episodes of Voyager.
“It may not have been real, Chakotay. But it felt like home.”
It’s an effective wrap-up. It’s an interesting choice to switch protagonists in this way. Chakotay is basically removed from the action halfway through the episode, and the people on Voyager are left stuck in space dealing with the C-list villains, meaning it’s suddenly up to the amnesiac Janeway and Seven and their local allies (and Paris, a bit) to save the day. (Krad has obviously decided to make up for missing Paris thwarting a takeover in “Prophecy” by beefing up his role here: In fact, he’s there for the planning meeting, then apparently just sits the climax out in the bar.) Chakotay’s information to Janeway, along with Tuvok’s struggles against the brainwashing, are the catalyst for it all but others have to pick up the baton for the last act.
It’s nice that, for once, Voyager actually sticks around to help with the clean-up and make sure that all the brainwashed workers are freed, rather than just warping out of there the moment they’ve got their own people back and leaving everyone else behind, as they’re unfortunately wont to do on occasion. It’s still a rushed wrap-up though, with a few characters’ fates left dangling. (Poor Ravoc is last seen strapped to a brainwashing machine.) The episode also doesn’t quite seem to know what to do with the power struggle between Kim and the Doctor, so ends up with a rather awkward “They were both right”.
Again, the episode seems to be trying to make us think Jaffen’s part of the conspiracy, as he’s repeatedly dismissive of Chakotay’s claims, seems well-positioned to have been the one that betrays him and appears to have abandoned Janeway at the plant…until he suddenly comes to her rescue and shows that he’s been telling the truth all along. I didn’t pick up on that first time round and it’s possibly to the episode’s detriment. The ending is trying to be another “Resolutions”, a bittersweet moment of Janeway giving up a life where she was happy and content to resume her hero’s quest (Kate Mulgrew plays her “Not for one second” with a nice amount of ambiguity, as if she might not regret getting her life back but a part of her still wonders what might have been), but we’ve only just received confirmation that her and Jaffen’s love was genuine so the moment doesn’t quite stick. Not perfect by any means, but it has some good character moments and some decent action.
Janeway says it wouldn’t be “appropriate” to be involved with a member of her crew, which isn’t quite the same as it not being allowed (as “Fair Haven” suggested). Chakotay being able to fix his surgical alteration within a few seconds with a dermal regenerator at least explains other quick changebacks. I hope the weapon he shot the two security officers with was set to stun!
@9 / Garreth:
Watching Voyager was often a frustrating viewing experience because I knew it could have been so much more and better. I can’t help but gripe every now and then about it and particular directions they could have gone in.
For me, VOY to this day is best summed up by this de-motivational poster.
@13/Mr. Magic: Hahahahaha! That’s awesome! I can imagine that poster actually being pretty devastating to some kids (and their parents) if it was ever placed in a classroom. Lol
richie @10
There’s the DS9 Upscale Project at Extremetech.com
I don’t know why a billionaire who has more money than he or she would ever need, and who’s also a Star Trek fan, wouldn’t just fund a project to remaster DS9 and/or Voyager by him/herself. If I was, I’d do that for all of y’all. Hello, Mr. Bezos?
Oof, you certainly have a way with words. Describes way too many people I know and my own misspent 20’s. Investment banking/biglaw/other similar jobs are a decent option for those who only do them for a few years– make a million bucks or two, then drop out of the rat race to a lower paying job with more reasonable hours. The lifers, on the other hand, are crazy and it shows.
@12 “Voyager actually sticks around to help with the clean-up and make sure that all the brainwashed workers are freed, rather than just warping out of there the moment they’ve got their own people back and leaving everyone else behind,”
This bothers me the most about The Void. Maybe they just didn’t have the runtime to get into it, but I sure hope they organized some humanitarian aid efforts to send supplies back into the void, so that the people left behind can at least stop killing and raiding each other. Or at least sent messages to the homeworlds of all the ships that were still stuck in the void, so that they can send rescue ships with supplies for their people, or something. There’s a serious humanitarian crisis going on in there.
@19/karey: Good point. At least now we know, thanks to Lower Decks, that Starfleet does have people it sends in to deal with the aftermath and cleanup after the hero ships go off to the next week’s adventure. But there’s no Cerritos following in Voyager‘s wake, so it really should be taking care of the aftermath itself.
It just underlines my belief that this show had the wrong premise. The Starfleet way when flung into an alien quadrant is not just to run for home all by yourself. It’s to make alliances and connections, to make a positive difference no matter where you end up. And it would’ve been less reckless and foolhardy for the crew to make some alliances and establish a solid foundation from which to prepare for seeking a way home, rather than just starting off on a 70-year journey with no plan or preparation.
As for “Workforce Part 2,” I can’t think of a thing to say about it. That’s how little impression it left.
One thing I did appreciate about the “Workforce” conclusion was that, as far as I can remember, the conspiracy was not planet-wide and government sanctioned. On first viewing, I expected that the whole planet and its government were in on the kidnapping and brainwashing, when it turned out to be just a small faction, and the government was shocked and cooperative upon discovery. Maybe it was just CYA on their part and they were involved, but who knows. Part of my suspicion came from the fact that the Quarren ambassador was played by John Aniston, who was well-known playing a villain on Days of Our Lives, so you almost expect him to be a villain anytime he shows up
I remember reading about the issues with Babylon 5 and getting better versions of that show produced. One of the biggest obstacles is the rights issue. No corporation wants to give up any control over a potentially valuable IP unless there is a significant and immediate benefit to them for doing so (See Sony and Marvel’s deal over Spider-Man as pretty much the only counter example I can think of). So even if a billionaire Star Trek fan wanted to upgrade DS9 and Voyager, getting access to the properties would be a nightmare of legal wrangling and costs which would probably put them off, particularly when the end result would be to the monetary benefit of someone else. Say what you want, but billionaires don’t become billionaires by making other people money.
@22/northman: I get what you’re saying but in my scenario, this hypothetical billionaire isn’t even looking to profit by funding this remastering project. He or she is simply donating the funds to make this project possible as the studio finds it to cost prohibitive to do it on their own. Thus, the company wouldn’t be giving up their IP rights and said billionaire is simply parting with a chunk of his/her money as a true fan of the series being remastered.
@16
Yes, thank you, that was the project I was thinking about.
@22,
One of the biggest obstacles is the rights issue. No corporation wants to give up any control over a potentially valuable IP unless there is a significant and immediate benefit to them for doing so (See Sony and Marvel’s deal over Spider-Man as pretty much the only counter example I can think of).
Yeah, I remember those Tweets.
JMS also stated another core problem with B5 was the WB corporate hierarchy and the grudges and egos from the old guard. They were hellbent on doing nothing with the IP out of spite.
(Actually, WB’s hatred of B5’s always reminded me of Disney’s similar hatred of the Gargoyles IP).
It’s a diffrent case with Trek since it is one of CBS-Viacom’s crown jewels, but I’m sure you’ve got a share of Execs who dislike it or are openly hostile and don’t get it.
@25: But at least now we’ve got Kurtzman in charge of the TV side of all things Trek and he’s a true fan so the franchise seems to be in good hands.
And then on the merchandising side we’re getting the remastering of all the first six films so sometimes the studio gets things right. The 50th anniversary celebration was certainly underwhelming though.
@26/garreth: “But at least now we’ve got Kurtzman in charge of the TV side of all things Trek and he’s a true fan so the franchise seems to be in good hands.”
No, he’s just the outside contractor in charge of making the Trek shows. He’s a level or two below the kind of execs Mr. Magic was talking about, the people responsible for the entire studio and its business rather than the production of just one specific series or franchise.
Voyager tends to fare better in the two parters, when it comes to the second half – TNG usually suffered on their second parts, unable to live up to part one. Workforce part 2 is better paced overall, and it kicks things up to a predictable, but still well done conclusion. Roxann Dawson really delivers a blockbuster-esque final result.
Everything is in motion, but unlike in part 1, the plot heavy approach feels more coherent and meaningful here. Having guest characters like Yerid and Jaffen certainly helps. They’re written with much more nuance than the usual Delta Quadrant alien.
Interestingly enough, I think the whole concept would have played better today than 20 years ago. There’s a much stronger social awareness of toxic workplace environments and substandard working conditions nowadays.
@ChristopherLBennett: Have just purchased your LIVING MEMORY and am thoroughly enjoying it so far (am up to Chapter 16 as I type this so please, NO SPOILERS); I much prefer it to THE HIGHER FRONTIER and am intrigued by your having worked elements of DISCOVERY canon into your TREK timeline (also by your allusion to the Notorious Finnegan being something of a legend long after his graduation – it strikes me that if one were to cook up a LOWER DECKS-style story set in the NCC-1701 era, you could do worse than to make this incorrigible trickster-turned-sleuth one of your leads, at least going by his entry in Memory Beta).
@krad: Please forgive me for employing your thread to contact Mr Bennett, but it was the most recent Star Trek thread and I’m not very well acquainted with other forums through which one might get in touch with that gentleman.
Hopefully you won’t do to me what Mr Darcy occasionally dreams of doing to the odious Wickham …
@29/ED: I don’t recall referring to Finnegan as any kind of “legend”; on the contrary, I think bullying is reprehensible and someone like Finnegan should never have been allowed in Starfleet in the first place. Bullies are abusers and predators, not folk heroes.
For future reference, my online contact info is here: https://christopherlbennett.wordpress.com/about/
Maybe a nice compromise, from the studio’s perspective, would be to only take the time and expense to remaster particularly notable episodes, then release them at a slow trickle. Nobody is likely that interested in seeing, say, DS9’s Rivals in HD, since it’s an episode of lesser renown that’s not effects heavy anyway. Releasing Way of the Warrior, on the other hand? Sounds great. And if they do one a year or one every six months or whatever, gives another incentive for the customers to stay subscribed to Paramount Plus or whatever.
@30. ChristopherLBennett: I don’t disagree with your attitude to bullies in the slightest; I would like to point out that, given his name remains attached to some form of confidence trick/gambit multiple generations of cadets following his own graduation (‘The Finnegan’ which Admiral Kirk is working to stamp out in an early chapter of this particular work), it’s not unfair to describe Finnegan as having become something of a legend in his own time.
Especially given the salient fact that becoming a Legend is not necessarily a good thing – consider the Fall of Troy, for instance (and any number of characters who’ve entered legend only as villains).
@32/ED: I believe I described “the Finnegan” as a form of hazing, not a “confidence trick.” It’s presumably just some crude, cruel, and stupid form of bullying. Please don’t romanticize it.
p.s. Given that the older Finnegan from Star Trek Annual (DC) volume 2 #2 is a Commander in Starfleet Security, the young Finnegan almost certainly served as a redshirt during THE ORIGINAL SERIES era – I’m not sure that denying him a career in the service would have been less of a punishment than sending him out into the black with the Brigade of Extras…
AHEM. It has just struck me that since we’re discussing StarFLEET that should probably be the Corps of Extras.
I hate stories like this one. I always find them predictable and formulaic.
But I was very curious to know what life on this planet was like for the Wildmans. I assume Ensign Wildman was brainwashed and put to work, but was Naomi also, despite her age? Was she sent to a boarding school or orphanage, or did she remain with her mom as a latchkey kid?
There probably wasn’t time to tell that story, but I wanted to know it
I’m not sure why you come down as so judgmental of people who prefer work to other things. If you want to decorate your living space or have more than minimal furniture, that’s great for you, but I don’t value either of those things, and many don’t. Jobs aren’t solely about making money — I suspect that your jobs don’t fit into that category. If that’s what people want to do with their time, why judge them?
A score of 9 is something of a surprise I found this two parter almost the dictionary definition of “beige”
It’s not bad, it’s not good it’s just all very meh!
And I don’t buy the conspiracy either that this organisation would get way with the mass introduction of a work force without someone raising a few questions.
@38/chadefallstar: Corruption doesn’t always get caught. If a career money launderer and tax evader could get elected President of the United States, then it’s no less plausible that a government strapped for labor would turn a blind eye to a kidnapping conspiracy.
#1 – it would have been interesting to explore more of who she was when she was just “Kathryn who pushes the buttons at the factory” instead of “Captain Janeway of the Starship Voyager.” Kind of like how “Family” lets us see Picard outside of his role as Captain of the Enterprise.
That would have been an entirely different kind of episode. “Family” focused almost entirely on the personality of Picard and used the Crusher and Rozhenko subplots to support it. It shone further light on the BOBW two-parter and picked up some threads from previous episodes for the subplots. It was far more sophisticated than anything Voyager attempted. The Voyager episode was an ensemble plot, which alone made it unusual for that series, but there were no particular callbacks to previous episodes and we didn’t really learn anything new or deeper about any of the characters. In fact it’s hard for me to imagine what we could have found out about them, as they’ve all been written so flatly and/or inconsistently that it’s hard to imagine them as real people.
Okay, my prejudice against the writing on Voyager is showing, isn’t it?
I loved Part 2. Part 1 was entertaining enough, but Part 2 felt emotionally true. There were scenes in Part 2 that could have come across wooden or stagey or 2 dimensional if played for laughs or executed more mechanically. But Dawson directed them, it would seem, to do such rare things as speak quietly and intensely, or really use the space and the objects in it. Being able to take a little more time for each beat worked in favor of it, too. So many tasteful breaths and pauses.
I do wish we had some explanation for what each of them thought their backstory was. Were they given a complete life history or just some kind of evasive hand-wave? It would have helped me if they came across more missing parts of their own memories they couldn’t explain. “Annika” not remembering her hospital stay was a step in that direction.
I also really loved the ensemble heist. It felt like All The President’s Men, or something. The more they looked, the more they found people who might help. Even the guy shooting at Chakotay seemed like he knew he was in over his head. They could have said “Be a dumb security guard” but instead they made him a kind of nervous real person for that one brief moment.
I would’ve enjoyed this as a 3 parter or something, tbh.
Looks like we’re in big agreement here, KRad. I was afraid this would fall apart as many second parts do, but overall I felt it held together nicely (tho I think act II bogs a bit). It continues to develop the existential themes of part I and has a good amount of emotional weight. Sure, it’s nothing new to interrogate the “would you be happy if you were someone else and didn’t know the truth” question, but it’s well handled. And for me it deserves to be asked again and again.
And maybe that’s what I liked most about this episode. While there are big-issue ideas, it’s really very personal and human.
I too thought this and the last were very good-looking episodes. The city is beautifully put together with all that ancient (by our standards) CGI. And the space battles were rather thrilling and kinetic, with fewer of the long gaps filled by conversation, where you’d swear they were manually charging the phaser banks and loading the torpedoes.
I saw a comment about the fault of not having Janeaway’s beau stay on Voyager. I’m not sure the relationship would have worked. The Janeaway on Quarre was a different person, in a lot of ways more fun and not concerned with the demands of commanding a starship. Meanwhile, her love interest has been conditioned to just be happy working and have an ok life — which she had been conditioned to. But the Voyager Janeaway wants to explore things and risk her neck, while generally not revealing a lot of who she is.