Voyager: 11:59

[PerrySimm]

Voyager: "11:59"
SFDebris score: No Score

Compares with:
Carbon Creek (Score: 5)
Family (No Score)

***

Going back to the present for Future's End wasn't enough for you? Try storytime Janeway on for size!

Another episode that resonates with 11:59 is One Small Step, which also dabbles in the retro-history of space exploration.

[Fuzzy Necromancer]

It is a shame she didn't end up with the son. I would have liked to see Cougar Mulgrew.

[Riedquat]

Yay, build a totally out of place, out of character, oversized bit of bland, souless modern mall. No wonder I've completely gone off progress, my sympathies were entirely with the old guy. Those who accuse people of viewing the past through rose-tinted spectacles usually appear to be looking at the present and future with them.

[FaxModem1]

I quite like this episode, and really felt for Shannon, as being in that place where you're in-between jobs, locations, and people, and you just feel like you're outside of the world. It's something a lot of us have gone through.

Regarding the Millennium Gate, I think in addition to being a shopping mall, it was supposed to be an example of a completely self sustaining colony as a proof of concept to interest governments for Martian habitation. Sort of like a closed environment system. Imagine the dream of Walt Disney's Epcot mixed with Biosphere 2.

However, unless they're locking the town in there, I'm not sure how it proves that it works or not.

[bronnt]

Unfortunately, the comparison to "Family" does this episode no great service. That was an episode where the plot was entirely focused on the main characters (through their interactions with their families) that fostered character growth. It taught us a great deal about specifically two of our characters that would remain relevant later in the series. And the episode itself referenced the ongoing continuity of the show. It's fantastic.

This episode is essentially a non-sequitor that provides an answer to a question that was never asked. None of the information provided in this episode is ever going to be relevant again and the main thrust of the story is about a character who disappears when the episode ends. At least it does, tangentially, give us Janeway character moments, but since Janeway essentially defies any attempts at character development during the course of the series, it's fairly meaningless. Even if this is pleasing in its execution, it's not in service to anything we care about.

[Riedquat]

Regarding the Millennium Gate, I think in addition to being a shopping mall, it was supposed to be an example of a completely self sustaining colony as a proof of concept to interest governments for Martian habitation. Sort of like a closed environment system. Imagine the dream of Walt Disney's Epcot mixed with Biosphere 2.

However, unless they're locking the town in there, I'm not sure how it proves that it works or not.

Makes a bit more sense then, although being locked up in such a place sounds like hell.

[clearspira]

Yay, build a totally out of place, out of character, oversized bit of bland, souless modern mall. No wonder I've completely gone off progress, my sympathies were entirely with the old guy. Those who accuse people of viewing the past through rose-tinted spectacles usually appear to be looking at the present and future with them.

I don't understand the fascination people have with old buildings and I never will. Give me something modern, bright, clean and multi-functional over a run-down dirty old bookshop in a dirty run-down street any day. And BTW i'm not talking about landmarks or truly historic buildings here, i'm talking about this strange attachment people have to things past their use-by date just because they're old.

And on the topic of rose-tinted spectacles, 99% of the past was, for the most part, absolutely God-awful for anyone that wasn't rich and powerful. If you were poor, it didn't matter what race or sex you were despite what people seem to think today; you were living in freezing cramped buildings, with mouldy food on the table that could not be refrigerated, horrible medical conditions because painkillers and antibiotics had yet to be invented, little to no education, and almost no prospects for getting out of your situation. These people would have traded their left arms to live inside a modern mall. So, yeah; the present and future is better in every way that counts to the past and the sooner we leave it all behind the better.

[Zoinksberg]

Yay, build a totally out of place, out of character, oversized bit of bland, souless modern mall.

I see it's already been mentioned, but since I take too long to type out my reply I will still share it. It's an arcology. A self sustained city that would help to perfect technologies that would be used in space colonies as well as create living space in areas where such thing is at a premium. I assume the intention of this being built in the middle of nowhere is that it is the prototype. Prove the concept and work out the kinks before dropping one in the middle of Shenzhen.

As far as the episode, I think it is fine. I rather liked the Y2K prediction. Really all the 1999 scenes were pretty good, while the Voyager scenes just felt like they were getting in the way of the real story. It must have been difficult to pick a Stupid Nelix Moment. The winner was probably correct but I think the scene of him pestering Seven about having children was a solid contender for it.

[clearspira]

Taken from Memory Alpha (because I was too lazy to type the explanation out myself).

''When Neelix suggests that the Great Wall of China is visible from space, he takes a popular Earth myth as fact and Janeway, a capable science officer, does not correct him. Under optimal conditions the path of the Great Wall is visible but the wall itself is not. Man-made objects visible from space include the Great Pyramids of Giza, collections of cities, man-made geographical features (like Lake Mead in Nevada, Kennecott Copper Mine [an open pit mine] in Utah, and Flevoland in the Netherlands), and wakes of large ships at sea.''

In other words, Neelix's wiki binge failed to check the citations.

[Trinary]

Taken from Memory Alpha (because I was too lazy to type the explanation out myself).

''When Neelix suggests that the Great Wall of China is visible from space, he takes a popular Earth myth as fact and Janeway, a capable science officer, does not correct him. Under optimal conditions the path of the Great Wall is visible but the wall itself is not. Man-made objects visible from space include the Great Pyramids of Giza, collections of cities, man-made geographical features (like Lake Mead in Nevada, Kennecott Copper Mine [an open pit mine] in Utah, and Flevoland in the Netherlands), and wakes of large ships at sea.''

In other words, Neelix's wiki binge failed to check the citations.

I was amused by this, as for once, it seems that Neelix was even dumber than SF gave him credit for. Or the writers.

You know that I found really disturbing rewatching this episode? Kevin Tighe, who plays Henry Janeway. I know him better from an episode or two of Law and Order SVU. In his premier episode, Tighe ("Gregory Searle") played a predator who owned a bookstore and, obsessed with a young girl he had stalked in his past, kidnapped a woman whose videogame avatar reminded him of her.

On Voyager, Tighe played a man ... who owned a bookstore. Is obsessed with the past ... and is interested in a woman significantly younger than him.

...Is this just a thing with Tighe?