VOY - Displaced

[drewder]

I can't picture the remaining episodes so I don't know if this is possible but the last episode should be a 10/10 episode. An episode that shows why Voyager is worth watching in the first place.

[Jonathan101]

I always thought a load bearing villain was a bad guy whose lair is destroyed when they're defeated.

I probably would have made the name a reference to the surrender bells from game of thrones, or maybe something like "Atlas, we will have our revenge."

Yeah, "Load Bearing Villain" (or load bearing boss) is already a trope. Sorry Chuck.

[clearspira]

I always thought a load bearing villain was a bad guy whose lair is destroyed when they're defeated.

I probably would have made the name a reference to the surrender bells from game of thrones, or maybe something like "Atlas, we will have our revenge."

Yeah, "Load Bearing Villain" (or load bearing boss) is already a trope. Sorry Chuck.

Meh. TVTropes is not gospel. Just because they say a word is something doesn't mean Chuck cannot change it.

[Rocketboy1313]

Chuck makes a good argument for why this episode was better as a Voyager story than a modern trek story. One and done, and outta there; without any need for a "big bad" of a wangstfest ongoing slog. Voyager was doing one thing right, even if it did a lot of things wrong.

I kind of agree with the idea of a one and done idea, and if it were TNG fine, but that era of "very little continuity" Television was already on the way out when Voyager was getting started. People want bigger ongoing stories that discuss their implications and the impact they have on the characters.

The idea of this episode is big enough for a whole movie or even a three part adventure, with hints at even Bigger stuff down the line. That would be great.

Act 1: Slow takeover mystery ending with all the crew captured
Act 2: Exploration of facility and escape attempt with the revelation that they are on a massive ship and that they are to be alien zoo exhibits
Act 3: Revelation of what is really running the show, some vast intelligence that doesn't want to capture people, but to preserve them. This is a seed ship that plans to leave the galaxy because of some oncoming catastrophe that needs escaping or as Chuck suggested, these are a desperate people whose world and colonies winked out of existence.

This is a story that lends itself to a bigger thing going on and it is a shame that it is squished into this little space. It is cool to have ongoing narratives.

There are other revelations that could have been made, for instance, the swap technology could be based on the Caretaker's ship snatching technology. It has a shorter range and requires a swap of roughly equal matter to work, but it thwarts shields. This sets up that the villains are related to Kes' people and tied into Voyager being in the Delta quadrant to begin with.

[MightyDavidson]

The thing that gets me about this one is that the ice habitat is stated to be -20°C. That's -4°F! Forget the cold-sensitive aliens, there's no way Tom and B'Elanna, or anyone else, should have been able to last there for long with no winter gear, especially when they kept touching the walls like that.

Similarly, the temperature they adjusted Voyager's climate to for the aliens' benefit was 45°C. That's 113°F. The crew should have been sweating bullets.

Heck, the moment the alien appeared on the ship prior to them adjusting the temperature to suit him, he ought to be shivering like crazy at the very least. Plus if they're a people that prefers low light environments, as implied when they turned down the lights for the first alien in the beginning, would they even be able to see properly in the regular light of the ship?

[Asvarduil]

While I agree with Chuck that this episode is completely forgettable and totally run-of-the-mill for Voyager...

I would like to support Chuck in creating his new "Load-Bearing Villain" category. Something I see so often that it's painful in fiction, is the load-bearing villain. "If we just defeat the head honcho, everything else will just snap into place!" is ridiculously common, and in my opinion, lazy writing.

It's as you said. Load-bearing villains are an exercise in "...'cuz" story telling. That's not good enough, though. Villains oppose the protagonists because there's something they want and are trying to achieve. It's the rare villain that can work by opposing the heroes on principle, unless the protagonists are asshole anti-heroes, or outright villain protagonists.

In this story, these aliens use replacement as how they wage war. Okay, let's go with that for the sake of discussion. War is what happens when politics spills out of structured governance, when one side is going to use force to make someone else do things their way. What war are these aliens fighting? Why did they decide attacking Voyager was a good idea (besides the fact that Janeway is Chaotic Evil and always planning something, like total galactic conquest)? Why did they settle upon these sorts of replacement schemes, as opposed to outright warfare? There's so many questions that - even in the format of a 45-minute episode - could've been asked, that these aliens could've been fleshed out into a coherent, and even somewhat menacing threat.

Instead they look like pissed-off Memnonites who partook in the Hats-R-Us bargain basement sale.

[Jonathan101]

I always thought a load bearing villain was a bad guy whose lair is destroyed when they're defeated.

I probably would have made the name a reference to the surrender bells from game of thrones, or maybe something like "Atlas, we will have our revenge."

Yeah, "Load Bearing Villain" (or load bearing boss) is already a trope. Sorry Chuck.

Meh. TVTropes is not gospel. Just because they say a word is something doesn't mean Chuck cannot change it.

Doesn't mean he can or should either.

Generally speaking, inventing new terms is a bad idea, because odds are the term you are trying to use AND the term you are looking for already exist. Coming up with new terms for things that already exist just because you don't know what they are called usually just causes confusion.

In this case, I think the terms he is looking for are "flat villain", "Villain of the Week" or "Generic Doomsday Villain" is what he is referring to, although in reality it's more about not explaining things fully (I would also add that it is far from unrealistic - there are always people who attack others for petty or unexplained reason- I do think that "stealing Voyager" is a decent one since Voyager is often established as one of the more advanced ships in the Quadrant).

[Ixthos]

I think Night might be an interesting choice as its one that demonstrates both of the show's potential and its failure to live up to it. Janeway's guilt and self imposed isolation is limited to largely this episode rather than being a recurring element spread through the season or series, the real issues about waste disposal are reduced to the Malon character being someone straight out of Captain Planet, and the genuine strain and anxiety of Voyager's stressful predicament get highlighted... and wholly resolved at the end.

Given that its the story that introduced Captain Proton, there is something fitting that its also an episode that showed the series often unwilling or unable to be much more than the same kind of base sci-fi concepts it was affectionately parodying.

That would be a great way to close the reviews out! Good points!

I can't picture the remaining episodes so I don't know if this is possible but the last episode should be a 10/10 episode. An episode that shows why Voyager is worth watching in the first place.

That would be nice, and the most positive way Chuck could do it. I don't suppose we could ask Chuck if he thinks any of them are 10/10 material, or of those 16 which ones he likes the most?

[Riedquat]

While I agree with Chuck that this episode is completely forgettable and totally run-of-the-mill for Voyager...

I would like to support Chuck in creating his new "Load-Bearing Villain" category. Something I see so often that it's painful in fiction, is the load-bearing villain. "If we just defeat the head honcho, everything else will just snap into place!" is ridiculously common, and in my opinion, lazy writing.

It's as you said. Load-bearing villains are an exercise in "...'cuz" story telling. That's not good enough, though. Villains oppose the protagonists because there's something they want and are trying to achieve. It's the rare villain that can work by opposing the heroes on principle, unless the protagonists are asshole anti-heroes, or outright villain protagonists.

One reason they exist so often in fiction is because it wraps up a story neatly, instead of the ongoing real-world slog that's more realistic in most cases, at least for anything even vaguely large-scale. It's useful for the dramatic final conflict. That's only ever likely to really work if the story is about a personal conflict.

It's slightly easier to justify if it's a load-bearing McGuffin but too many of those starts to be formulaic.

[Jonathan101]

While I agree with Chuck that this episode is completely forgettable and totally run-of-the-mill for Voyager...

I would like to support Chuck in creating his new "Load-Bearing Villain" category. Something I see so often that it's painful in fiction, is the load-bearing villain. "If we just defeat the head honcho, everything else will just snap into place!" is ridiculously common, and in my opinion, lazy writing.

It's as you said. Load-bearing villains are an exercise in "...'cuz" story telling. That's not good enough, though. Villains oppose the protagonists because there's something they want and are trying to achieve. It's the rare villain that can work by opposing the heroes on principle, unless the protagonists are asshole anti-heroes, or outright villain protagonists.

One reason they exist so often in fiction is because it wraps up a story neatly, instead of the ongoing real-world slog that's more realistic in most cases, at least for anything even vaguely large-scale. It's useful for the dramatic final conflict. That's only ever likely to really work if the story is about a personal conflict.

It's slightly easier to justify if it's a load-bearing McGuffin but too many of those starts to be formulaic.

I don't know if it is more "realistic". Lots of people can be robbed, kidnapped, assaulted or worse without ever learning or caring about the complex psychological, cultural, political, philosophical or religious motivations of their attackers.

Even stories WITH complex antagonists, there are often lots of minor villains who are just as one-dimensional- not because they can't or don't have deeper motives, but because it would distract from the story to get into them.

I think the problem with something like Voyager is less that "this happens" and more "this happens again and again and again and again".