Star Trek: Voyager
"Macrocosm"
Air date: 12/11/1996
Written by Brannon Braga
Directed by Alexander Singer
Review by Jamahl Epsicokhan
"I thought Klingons didn't get nauseated. You have a redundant stomach." — Paris to Torres
Nutshell: Technobabble terror colliding with more action clichés than I can count. Ugh.
I don't like the trend I've been seeing in Voyager the past few weeks. It's starting to show evidence of "season two syndrome." Silly plots and brainless action are taking precedence over real drama and intelligent storytelling. "The Q and the Grey" may have been a misguided clash of ideas, but at least it had ideas. "Macrocosm" is about as brain-dead as Trek can get (or so I hope). Not good, people.
"Macrocosm" (yet another installment pointlessly advertised as "special") is a downright silly episode; yet another mishmash of parts that has no idea what it wants to do aside from supplying a host of action clichés and mundane plot advances.
Returning from a diplomatic mission in a shuttlecraft, Janeway and Neelix rendezvous with a darkened, empty Voyager. Communication with the ship is impossible, because there are no signs of the crew at all. The first half of the episode revolves around Janeway and Neelix's attempts to track down the crew, and they eventually realize there are about 30 human life signs on the upper decks. Crawling through the Jeffries tubes on the powerless ship, Neelix is attacked by an unknown lifeform and apparently hauled away. Janeway now finds herself the sole crew member to save the ship from an apparent alien takeover. The second half of the show explains what's going on, as the Doctor (one of few functional members of the crew) explains to Janeway what has transpired—that of a "macrovirus" that grows until it exists on the visible scale rather than the microscopic scale.
These macroviruses were inadvertently beamed onto the ship and began multiplying "at an exponential rate." After infecting the crew and making everybody extremely ill, they then grow to be huge, until they're big enough to attack you like the aliens in, well, Alien. Basically, this plot boils down to a rip-off of Alien meets Outbreak. Hence Janeway's attitude change to Sigourney Weaver mode (always carrying a big gun and appearing to be in pain) and Doc's line, "Oh no, the macrovirus is airborne!" There's very little in terms of intelligent writing here—it's just a clothesline to hang some lackluster stunts and standard action scenes on.
Watching the first two acts got very old very fast. I got tired of watching Janeway tentatively pointing her phaser around the corner after about the tenth of fifty times. And the presentation of about a million "action" clichés is weak—so poorly disguised that it's very hard to feel anything but cynical from the start. The scene in engineering where Janeway takes off her jacket and takes up arms is, for lack of a better word, poor. It's so false, so pretentious, so much wanting to hammer home the idea, "Look, Janeway can be a badass!" that it falls flat on its face. I like Captain Janeway (sometimes I feel like I'm the sole Janeway fan in a group of unreceptive Voyager viewers), but I don't watch Janeway for potboiler cheesiness like this. I watch Janeway for her dialog, practical leadership and intelligence.
Mulgrew is a good sport through this mess, but she's trapped in a thankless position—if you think about this show for a more than five seconds, it's just a cheap rip-off of clichés. It's really tough to do Alien on the budget of an episode of Voyager.
Then again, Alexander Singer is no Ridley Scott, either. A lot of the shots are frankly dull, and there's just not much atmosphere in the Voyager corridors that lends it to Alien milieu. That's not to say that Singer's direction is completely without merit; I thought some of the macrovirus' point-of-view shots were effective, and Dennis McCarthy's somewhat eerie score was quite good at times, as were some of the CGI macrovirus effects. But those scenes were countered by other thrill-less endeavors like the stale ending where Janeway blows up all the aliens in the holodeck with a laughable "movie bomb," that is, a bomb with a red digital readout that counts down while beeping. And the explosion was terribly unconvincing—in fact, it looked like the fireball from "Basics, Part I" retouched to look green.
The episode is also painfully uneven and filled with tons of—you guessed it—forgettable technobabble. The number one rule in creating suspense, broken here big time, is that you don't interrupt the tension. The whole middle of the episode where Doc explains how the macrovirus got aboard the ship, told using a badly placed flashback device, only further sabotages any hopes for this show to be exciting. For that matter, what in the world was the point of the bizarre alien ship whose captain wanted to exterminate the virus by incinerating Voyager? And what was up with that crazy, quirky captain? He's probably the strangest thing I've seen on this show in quite some time, but I unfortunately mean strange only in the most laughable of senses. The writing itself here seems to be beaming in from the Delta Quadrant.
This story is interested only in cheap thrills, and the thrills are just that—cheap. No logic, no thought, no planning, no brain. Perhaps that would explain why it is Neelix vanishes without a trace but is never found or seen again in the episode. Where did he go? Did a macrovirus carry him off to Never Never Land? Was he ever found again? (I might take comfort in this if he weren't seen in the next new episode, but I know that's just my optimism speaking.) And just where exactly was the rest of the crew if there were only 30 or so people in the mess hall? Where were the other 100 crew members? The episode doesn't care.
"Macrocosm" was written by who I am, as of today, indulging to label the notoriously two-faced Brannon Braga. Here is a writer who has worked on absolutely stellar character-driven stories like Star Trek: First Contact as well as amusing, witty dialog shows like last season's "Projections." Yet he'll also bring us abysmal technobabble terror like "Cathexis" and "Threshold." "Macrocosm" seems to have come from the latter Braga.
Previous episode: The Q and the Grey
Next episode: Fair Trade
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112 comments on this post
Fri, Apr 11, 2008, 4:23am (UTC -6)
The dark atmosphere on the deserted Voyager, for example, reminded me quite a bit of "Resident Evil 2" (the game, not the movie). Mulgrew was up to the challenge of having to be the *sole* actor on screen for a good part of the story. It was also wise to not include a B-story in this episode, which would have subtracted from the tension. Yes, it's true that the level of tension was a bit reduced during the part where Doc explains how the situation came about (it just was a bit too lengthy), but otherwise I was constantly on the edge of my seat until the resolution.
This may not have been a very brainy episode, but it was different from the standard fare and I thoroughly enjoyed it for what it was.
Sat, May 31, 2008, 2:33pm (UTC -6)
If you rate this episode as a typical Star Trek episode it may be horrible. But if you see this as a venture into another genre, while staying true to the Star Trek universe/formula it does quite a good job.
Its not brilliant (as dirk mentioned, there are some lengths, etc), but not as bad as you claim.
Thu, Jan 8, 2009, 5:07pm (UTC -6)
I ADORE Janeway. :)
Sat, Aug 1, 2009, 2:12pm (UTC -6)
Wed, Nov 11, 2009, 9:50pm (UTC -6)
When Janeway needs to get all the way down to engineering from deck 2, they spend 15 minutes of the episode on this. Why Janeway didn't think to just go to the shuttle bay, and use the transporters on one of the shuttles to beam to engineering..... *shrugs*
Mon, Dec 21, 2009, 3:03pm (UTC -6)
Tue, Feb 9, 2010, 8:10pm (UTC -6)
Fri, Mar 5, 2010, 12:49am (UTC -6)
@ Jake: They struck me as autistic for some reason. That in itself isn't annoying but I couldn't help seeing similarities. As for why... Probably because this wasn't a very good episode. :P
Sat, Jul 3, 2010, 11:43am (UTC -6)
Wed, Jul 14, 2010, 8:59am (UTC -6)
Tue, Sep 28, 2010, 8:36pm (UTC -6)
Sat, Apr 16, 2011, 10:49pm (UTC -6)
Tue, May 3, 2011, 11:19pm (UTC -6)
Fri, Oct 28, 2011, 12:36pm (UTC -6)
Mon, Nov 21, 2011, 5:13pm (UTC -6)
Thu, Mar 15, 2012, 5:17am (UTC -6)
Sat, Mar 24, 2012, 1:56am (UTC -6)
Of course, this is to be expected, given the chronological proximity of the two shows and similarity in setting.
Wed, Mar 28, 2012, 10:15pm (UTC -6)
One nagging question. Once Doc made it to the shuttlebay and managed to hide inside a shuttle, why didn't he just use the shuttle's transporter to get to Engineering? Oh, right. Captain Ripley - I mean Janeway - wasn't done being a badass yet...
Wed, Apr 11, 2012, 8:18pm (UTC -6)
Thu, Jun 21, 2012, 9:16am (UTC -6)
Fri, Jan 4, 2013, 6:18am (UTC -6)
Which is another way of saying it's supposed to suck?
Tue, May 28, 2013, 7:32pm (UTC -6)
"Why are the Tic Tak so annoying?"
Because they don't toe the line.
Sun, Jun 16, 2013, 4:21pm (UTC -6)
Tue, Sep 10, 2013, 8:34am (UTC -6)
And I think this was a bit silly, but fun too...
Fri, Nov 29, 2013, 2:07pm (UTC -6)
Mon, Dec 9, 2013, 1:45am (UTC -6)
I actually liked the flashback scenes, it was more interesting than just having the doctor describe what happened. And it was good to see the doctor expanding his horizons.
Sun, Dec 22, 2013, 2:30am (UTC -6)
As far as the main plot, again, I liked that the alien was so unusual. Yes, it was an implausible explanation, but there is a good likelihood that such things may exist (there are giant single celled organisms right here on Earth, after all) and it was an interesting idea. The story was very "Alien"-esque, but it mostly worked.
I thought that the flashback was too long and involved. It could have been tightened up by focusing only on what the Doctor actually witnessed, dropping the pointless banter and such. The ending felt rushed, again probably because of the flashback eating so much time. But for my vote, I'd say this was a solid 2.5 out of 4 - a little better than average with a few standout moments and some nice ideas.
Fri, Feb 7, 2014, 9:03am (UTC -6)
One faulty criticism of Voyager is that we know the ship won't get home/be destroyed/whatever during each episode. That's true of any weekly show. That was true of Galactica during each Cylon attack on BSG. It's a limitation of the format.
Sat, Mar 8, 2014, 6:41pm (UTC -6)
Sat, Mar 8, 2014, 6:53pm (UTC -6)
The clue is in the name mate!
Sun, Mar 9, 2014, 11:46pm (UTC -6)
I could have lived without the close up of Chakotay's infected colony ridden neck. *shudders*
Sat, May 3, 2014, 7:11pm (UTC -6)
The clue is in the name mate!
--------
No, it means it isn't a serious and well written show. If it is set in our universe, it has limits on what it can get away with. The clue is in good writing.
Tue, Jun 24, 2014, 9:54am (UTC -6)
I did choke on some of it. How big the macrovirus got inside the force field with nothing to eat except air. Overly lengthy explanation by the Doctor of how they got into such a fine mess. Etc.
re: the Tic Tak: I'm with those who find them annoying. And I felt that the casual way they wipe out the miners, and are on to Voyager next, doesn't speak well of them (at least after the crisis has passed they apologize). But I also felt it was nice to see aliens that were different from the regular humanoid. It must be a really hard job for writers to come up with interesting aliens, not to mention stories, week after week. But I suppose that's their cross to bear.
Tue, Jun 24, 2014, 5:05pm (UTC -6)
I thought it was a fun romp with Janeway getting to play the badass for a change.
I didn't read too much into it.
Loved Kates remarks on this one. "This is my muscles episode" (or something to that effect.)
I'll give it 3 stars because it was fun and I really don't want to think too much about it :-)
Mon, Aug 25, 2014, 6:53am (UTC -6)
The pacing was a mess and the direction laughable in most scenes. I've had a greater sense of tension watching my cat sleep. Taking everything into account including the obligatory plot-holes (Where the hell is Neelix? Is he okay? Where is the rest of the crew? Why not at least attempt using transporters? Every single macro-virus large and small went into the holodeck from other areas of the ship? Like, through doors and bulkheads and such?) there really is almost nothing good about this episode.
Not the worst Voyager or ST has done, but it is pretty god-awful. As I've said, the idea of how the virus exists and evolves is interesting and the flashback with the Doctor was a breath of fresh air.
1 star.
Sun, Sep 28, 2014, 10:42am (UTC -6)
Mon, Oct 20, 2014, 3:45pm (UTC -6)
Tue, Dec 9, 2014, 3:37pm (UTC -6)
Sun, Dec 28, 2014, 8:26am (UTC -6)
They were debuted here and then later seen in the First Contact movie.
Sun, Dec 28, 2014, 11:43am (UTC -6)
Mon, Mar 2, 2015, 8:12pm (UTC -6)
As for the episode itself, it's dumb fun. Not sure much else needs to be said about it.
Tue, Mar 24, 2015, 8:49pm (UTC -6)
Example: Janeway has Doc use the shuttle's sensors and com systems.
How many times have a ship's systems including the transporters been offline and we the viewer says, what about the shuttles? At least in TNG "Power Play" they acknowledged this.
Even in Nemesis when "transporters were down"
I will stop there . . . . . :-)
Tue, May 26, 2015, 10:50am (UTC -6)
Tue, Nov 3, 2015, 1:46am (UTC -6)
Tue, Dec 1, 2015, 10:37pm (UTC -6)
Fri, Dec 25, 2015, 5:19am (UTC -6)
Wed, Jan 27, 2016, 2:29pm (UTC -6)
We move from an Alien knock-off to an Aliens knock-off that at least gives Janeway the chance to get into a sweaty vest and tote a big gun a la Ripley. This isn't actually so bad. But it's the movement into the big exposition flashback section that both slows things and breaks the mood, and as soon as we get into knife fights with poorly CGI's viruses it's all downhill to the end.
The vogueing Tak Tak are really a sight to see though. 1.5 stars.
Thu, Jan 28, 2016, 2:45am (UTC -6)
Fri, Apr 8, 2016, 4:12pm (UTC -6)
Sun, May 22, 2016, 8:00pm (UTC -6)
I agree completely with what you said. And i like to add that an episode of this type would be more preferable as an animated episode of ST where action is more condusive. For those who say that it's a copycat of Alien, I would like to remind you that the Alien storyline is very similar to "It! The Terror From Beyond Space" a film which was made in 1958.
Thu, Aug 4, 2016, 10:05am (UTC -6)
The best part about VOY since "Future's End" has been the portrayal of how well this crew works together: they community effectively over the intercom; they solve problems; they work together seemlessly towards their goals. That's good Star Trek! It feels like the crew has come into its own.
And by the way, I noticed how he tricorders became "modernized" suddenly to the DS9 standard back in season 2. I guess they had upgraded units in storage? Doubly the phaser rifles; in one of the previous episodes ("Warlord") Tom has the old style phaser rifle. The new style was introduced this year in STFC. Ah well, I guess they were in storage also...
Given that kind of studio nonsense, I'm frankly surprised the VOY crew didn't update their uniforms with the STFC/DS9 standard this year (1996). Thank goodness! I can imagine a studio exec saying, "These Voyager you guys ain't got the new uniforms. Hey, somebody get these guys the new uniforms, right away!" And then a meek little writer comes up to him and says, "Sir, we can't do that; the Voyager crew is 70,000 light years away from Star Fleet and has not been in contact for almost three years. They wouldn't even know about th change." The neanderthal-like exec would furrow his heavy brow and scratch his tiny head trying to ponder the internal logic of a show he never even watches. He protests, "But the average viewer don't care nothin' about that! We have two different Star Treks with different uniforms. It's confusin'!" After winning the obvious uniforms battle, the meek writer compromises on the tricorders and the phaser rifles.
Thu, Aug 4, 2016, 10:13am (UTC -6)
Oh, and the final mano a mano with the macrovirus is also laugh out loud funny. Plus the digital liquid crystal display?! Sheesh. That's like someone today sticking a pocket watch onto a sophisticated bomb.
Fri, Aug 12, 2016, 3:09pm (UTC -6)
PS - IIRC the logic gaps/errors amounted to something like a hundred; in other words, more than one per minute. I found that kind of impressive.
Thu, Aug 18, 2016, 5:20pm (UTC -6)
And let's not even get into the whole issue of conservation of mass, or the ridiculous idea of a virus absorbing a hormone. Or how rubbish Voyager's quarantine protocols are - they can detect alien viruses during transport buy they don't automatically kill them?! Or how a virus moves from the transporter buffer to A TOTALLY DIFFERENT PART OF THE SHIP (I thought stuff in the buffer was dematerialised, but apparently not). Or how, apparently, a bio-containment field doesn't actually, you know, contain biological organisms.
So, yeah - very silly episode. Captain Janeway is not Ellen Ripley. An "antigen" does not create a massive green fireball. A phaser rifle has no recoil, so doesn't need bracing against the shoulder. And none of those things would matter if the script kept up the tension, but it doesn't, so you end up noticing all the stupid little things that are wrong. And that's where this episode fails.
Mon, Aug 22, 2016, 11:02pm (UTC -6)
Wed, Aug 24, 2016, 3:10am (UTC -6)
Sun, Nov 13, 2016, 11:00am (UTC -6)
Otherwise, yeah, a silly rehash of Genesis, which was a pretty bad TNG episode too. Lots of dark corridors though.
Thu, Jan 5, 2017, 1:23am (UTC -6)
Sun, Jan 22, 2017, 9:06pm (UTC -6)
Jammer needs to lighten up or get psychiatric assistance.
Sun, Mar 5, 2017, 6:55pm (UTC -6)
Wed, Mar 15, 2017, 1:57pm (UTC -6)
Wed, Mar 22, 2017, 2:21pm (UTC -6)
Thu, Apr 13, 2017, 11:27am (UTC -6)
Fri, Jun 2, 2017, 10:20pm (UTC -6)
Maybe a bit too much time spent early on with Janeway/Neelix searching through the ship and I don't know why Janeway has to get the massive gun when a phaser set on kill mode should do the trick. I also didn't get why she turned into GI Janeway - she could have kept her uniform - for that the show deserves criticism.
I think Jammer is far too cynical here - this is suspenseful action - the writing isn't the issue (it is what it needs to be).
The other alien who Neelix/Janeway just met and then who comes and fires on Voyageur is a needless silliness (with his stupid mannerisms).
The other thing I liked is how Janeway displays thorough knowledge of the ship, its systems, thinks on her feet (get all the viruses to the holodeck after her ship is attacked). It also gave the Doctor some good scenes and we see a bit more of his personality.
I have no qualms giving this 3 stars out of 4 - a better episode than I was expecting after the 1st 15-20 mins.
Thu, Sep 28, 2017, 11:04pm (UTC -6)
Wed, Nov 1, 2017, 5:30am (UTC -6)
The transporter biofilter detected and contained the virus, but doesn't the biofilter just stop the transport of something abnormal? It doesn't still transport it and then mysteriously contain it in some way that could later mysteriously be purged. That would sort of defeat the purpose of a biofilter I would think. If it was actually transported and materialized in some sort of physical place, then how did it migrate into the transporter buffer? And if it was still just computer code of some kind, then how did it migrate from there to a gel pack in the mess hall and physicaly infect it? It all makes no sense.
That pot roast thing bothered me too. It was 12 kg. That's over 26 lbs of pot roast. That's one giant pot roast. Yet Paris was just waving it around on a fork.
1 1/2 stars
Mon, Mar 26, 2018, 7:22pm (UTC -6)
Mon, Apr 23, 2018, 9:14am (UTC -6)
Thu, Aug 16, 2018, 3:54pm (UTC -6)
I believe Jammer, like most critics & reviewers, has altered his perceptions unavoidably.
Meaning: when you watch 100s and 100s of episodes and films, thinking "what can I say about this on a scene by scene critical overview level ?", it's gonna' change your focus just a wee bit and give you a case of criticitis !
You're beyond "taking it in" and now you're making notes.
And ? . . in the case of the old school published reviewers, they ended -up striving for a pithy blurb that might make the ads.
Whether it's finding the faults or proclaiming the glories, it's a different brain in use . . and with 4 billion sites with comment sections these days ? . . we're ALL digital critics !!
Mon, Sep 3, 2018, 2:59pm (UTC -6)
Mon, Sep 3, 2018, 4:14pm (UTC -6)
Tue, Sep 4, 2018, 10:09pm (UTC -6)
Fun and exciting.
Thu, Sep 27, 2018, 12:37am (UTC -6)
Ok, but with this episode-the CGI was great (for the time) and the sound of flies was chilling (and I actually like insects).
My nitpicks are that there should be some kind of encasement for the Doctor's portable holoemitter so it can't be easily hit. This would make him FAR less susceptible to such attacks.
Also, the anti-virus bomb seemed stupid to me. They should have found a way to flush it to the vents or to lure them all somewhere (like the holodeck) That's what Luke Skywalker and Mara did in the book (now "Legends", but I think the old book continuity is FAR better then the new Disney movies any day, but that's another story) Survivor's Quest. It's a bit obscure, but suffice it to say that the baddie organisms were lured to their doom by bait. As apparently the humaniods once bitten weren't a lure for the viruses (the Doctor once said that he and Janeway were the only infra-red organisms the viruses are after on the ship), they could have met in the holodeck, turned on the other programs (which they did) and had ALL the viruses attack there and have the anti-virus mist turned on.
Either way, a great episode!
Fri, Feb 1, 2019, 2:07pm (UTC -6)
I've been a Trekkie since watching TNG when it aired, and now going back to watch VOY, since I really didn't enjoy it at the time it aired. This time around, there are enough episodes that I love and appreciate, especially episodes that focus on the Dr., Kes, Chakotay, and the Qs.
Anyway, this episode is terribly stupid, both the story and the production. I was bored five minutes after the credits, and it never reeled me back in. Several times I thought to just skip it, but I wanted it to get better, and I didn't want an unwatched episode in my queue. Tbh, watching baby Paris-Janeway salamanders was better than this.
Tue, Jun 18, 2019, 11:40am (UTC -6)
My thoughts:
I'm a huge fan of 90's b-action movies, especially if it takes place in a sci-fi setting. Some of them I actually consider to be personal film favorites of all time (Project Shadowchaser, Trancers, Dark Side of the Moon to name a couple).
Naturally, there also exist a bunch of them which quite frankly stink, and when I watch "Macrocosm" I see the exact same elements which cause those movies to suck: repetitive environments, boring enemies, lame action scenes ... all this in a cliché deluxe package, including techno-babble and Neelix.
I'm tempted to bust out the zero, but alas, how could I give anything, which features Janeway in a tank top blasting alien scum, anything less than 1 star?
Tue, Jun 25, 2019, 12:17pm (UTC -6)
Sun, Jul 14, 2019, 11:41am (UTC -6)
0 stars
Mon, Jul 15, 2019, 5:57am (UTC -6)
This IS science FICTION you know...
Tue, Jul 23, 2019, 11:38am (UTC -6)
It is very difficult to suspend my belief when the characters starts saying unintelligible technobabble and completely wrong terms, especially because this is suppose to be science-fiction.
I understand using this device to solve some type of problem on the plot (although it was becomig a crutch for the writers at this point), but on this episode the whole premise is based on erroneous science.
Tue, Jul 23, 2019, 11:44am (UTC -6)
I do hold "science fiction" to a certain standard. Otherwise it's space opera or Buck Rogers or something.
Tue, Jul 23, 2019, 6:36pm (UTC -6)
It really didn't bother me because I didn't know all that stuff Yusef was speaking about.
With all the trek-no-magic we accept, I don't think this is all that bad or that big a deal.
Thu, Oct 24, 2019, 3:31pm (UTC -6)
Mon, Apr 13, 2020, 9:12pm (UTC -6)
Wed, Apr 15, 2020, 10:36am (UTC -6)
Fri, Apr 24, 2020, 9:26pm (UTC -6)
This is mid-level action "Trek." A more interesting hour of diversion in the era of coronavirus.
Mon, Aug 10, 2020, 5:17am (UTC -6)
But while the end of the episode recalls the past, the beginning of the episode foreshadows the future. It is the first time that Janeway suggests Neelix as ambassador. This, like his security practice mentioned in "Warlord" and the breakup with Kes there that deprives him of his emotional grounding, contributes to his arc heading into "Fair Trade". He really has nothing. They are at the end of his usefulness. He is hoping to extend it in some way. Security? Diplomacy? What is he? Who is Neelix to others? And does he know it and can he accept it?
I'm beginning to wonder if season 3 was actually rather subtle on character development and some of us missed it at the time. I seem to have missed some of the interesting cues.
Mon, Aug 10, 2020, 5:36am (UTC -6)
Given what we learned from that Ronald Moore interview concerning the state of Voyager's writing department and showrunners at this time, I would say anything is possible but I really really doubt it. It is safe to say that Voyager's writers were as lost and adrift as surely as the good ship herself.
Mon, Aug 10, 2020, 6:19am (UTC -6)
Ron Moore joined very briefly in Season 6. Not only is this three years later, but a completely different showrunner was in charge in Season 3 (Jeri Taylor, not Brannon Braga). It's quite possible for both to be true.
Mon, Aug 10, 2020, 7:15am (UTC -6)
That said it is hard to imagine how Moore's critique was less valid in season 3 versus 6. All the things he attributed to a misguided and slapdash approach to writing (the story's lack of consistency, poor continuity, total squandering and rejection of its central premise, disrespect for its characters, etc...) were true in Season 3 as surely as Season 6. If the back office wasn't in disarray in earlier seasons it sure didn't impact the quality appreciably.
I will concede, mind you, that I am not as familiar with Voyager as I am with TNG or DS9 although I have watched every episode of the series at one time or another, either at the time of original airing or in syndication.
Mon, Aug 10, 2020, 7:43am (UTC -6)
I used to think this too (and it may indeed be true of later seasons which I haven't re-watched recently!), but the specific examples that I pointed out in early S3 are actually running threads of continuity. My whole point is that I'm surprised at what was actually there and what I missed.
Thu, Aug 20, 2020, 3:00pm (UTC -6)
Neelix and an alien are performing the world's worst pantomime of Dragonball Z known to man while Captain Janeway watches with a mixture of bemusement, horror, gratitude and disdain. Our heroes discuss whatever it is we just saw (which I should add was brief enough to be fairly amusing) on their shuttle ride back to the Voyager. The alien was from a race called the TikTok. Ah that explains why they're so annoying; they're a specious made entirely of Teen Influencers. Janeway thanks Neelix for his apparent instinct in mimicking the absurd gestures that accompany the TikToks' language. Well, it took five years, but we finally found a species more irritating than the Waadi from “Move Along Home.”
JANEWAY: It's a good thing you were there, Mister Neelix. I might have been shot at dawn.
Twice in as many weeks. For his ability to discern superstitious dance moves, Janeway “officially” promotes Neelix to the post of Ambassador. Considering the Voyager isn't likely to circle back to chat with most of the species it happens across, this is less insane than it sounds.
Anyway, just like in “Timescape,” the shuttle arrives at rendezvous coordinates only to find that the mother ship is adrift a lightyear away. They're unable to make contact with her, the escape pods are in place and, just like in “Genesis,” there's a bioelectric field in place blocking their scans. So Janeway tells Neelix to arm himself as they prepare dock. This teaser relies almost entirely on the ease of the dialogue and rapport of the characters which, considering one of them is Neelix, works quite well.
Act 1 : *.5, 17%
A quick review of ship's systems reveals some main programmes offline and a ruptured gel pack in the Mess Hall. Remember the gel packs? That computer circuitry that can catch a cold? The pair continue to wander about the ship in search of clues and crews. They stop by Sam and Naomi Wildman's quarters to see that Neelix' YouTube cooking variety show from “Investigations” is running on the monitor. They piece together that the mysterious catastrophe happened about eleven hours prior and then are distracted by what sounds like a giant wasp buzzing through the corridor. They follow this to the transporter room and find a hole with green goop dripping from the edges. Alien snot...
You know, I'm finding that I don't have anything to add to the observations about all the clichéd plot elements. I saw “Alien” once as a kid and don't really remember it. While I find the production, acting and music adequate for this milieu, mindless action of any sort does very little for me. I'm going to streamline a little to avoid the tedium.
While Neelix prattles on about his summers on Rinax, Janeway stares at her tricorder for absolutely no reason and barely tries to make conversation. I found that hilarious.
Neelix reminds Janeway that he only has one Ocampan lung. It's like continuity happy theatre day.
Act 2 : *.5, 17%
The crew keep a supply of big guns and bombs in a locker next the warp core. What could go wrong?
I actually think Mulgrew's choices in the action scenes are smart for the character. Janeway is being a badass because she has to, but she looks extremely awkward in the effort. She's a scientist first and her constant, by-the-books procedural pointing of her big ass gun showcase a real discomfort that help give a little insight into Janeway's frame of mind. Like Picard dealing with brats in “Disaster” or Sisko learning to perform Bajoran weddings, here we see the lead clumsily adopting new skills to cope with their circumstances.
Why to the macroviruses (er, spoiler I guess) buzz like insects? Do they have wings?
The mosquito-sized viruses emerging from the wound on Chakotay's neck was effectively disgusting.
The CGI for the beachball sized viruses in embarrassingly bad.
Act 3 : *.5, 17%
The Doctor's narrated flashback includes establishing shots of the Voyager over the alien planet. Amazing.
Robert Picardo manages to make the Magic Schoolbus Science seem almost plausible with his excited, childlike performance.
CHAKOTAY: Compassion is nothing to be sorry about, Doctor. It won't be the last time you're faced with a moral dilemma in the field.
File that one away.
The Doctor's flashback includes a flirtatious squabble between Torres and Paris. I'm calling it a draw because Beltran and Dawson have good chemistry.
Why exactly is Tom the backup cafeteria chef, anyway?
Act 4 : .5 stars, 17%
The macroviruses are driven by instinct. Of course they are.
I wonder if any of the Maquis crewmembers would be “I'm not wearing a mask, you pussy liberal cucks!” types. I can see that Bajoran kid from “Learning Curve” fitting the bill.
Act 5 : .5 stars, 17%
EMH: ...then I crawl through access port nine, go past three airlocks and then two decks down. Environmental Control's at the end of the hall. Now I remember. Who designed this ship anyway?
JANEWAY: Good luck.
If there had been any dramatic tension to speak of during this action climax, the arrival of the TikTok captain with his jazz hands completely vaporised it.
In this instalment of continuity happy theatre day, we are reminded that the holodecks have an independent power source from the rest of the ship.
An antigen bomb. I can't say more than that.
It wasn't earned, but I kind of liked the light jazz outro while Janeway did some painting. This is a little callback to “Sacred Ground,” where she lamented that it was her sister who was the artist in the family. In the wake of her little workout, she's taken up the hobby.
Episode as Functionary : *, 10%
The only parts of this episode that work are the inoffensive interstitial bits which could have (and should have) gone into any other episode. The production design elements fluctuated between adequate and laughably silly. The laborious action plot is poorly thought-out and pointless. I'm giving a single star instead of .5 (reserved for episodes that are so bad they're good; this one's too boring to qualify) or zero stars (reserved for episodes like “Tattoo” and “Let He Who is Without Sin” which actively damage the series or its characters). This one took itself a little more seriously than “Genesis,” which is to its detriment as there is something redeeming in the kitschiness of Deanna the Frog and all of that. Definitely skip “Macrocosm.”
Final Score : *
Fri, Aug 21, 2020, 12:52am (UTC -6)
Along with Profit and Lace, and all of ST: Discovery, this is the worst episode in all of Trek for me.
Fri, Aug 21, 2020, 5:38am (UTC -6)
But I would have given an extra half star. I kind of like the macroscopic virus concept.
Fri, Aug 21, 2020, 9:00am (UTC -6)
I'm certainly not going to defend this episode, but it's pretty harmless, regardless of intent. That's why it gets the score it gets from me. It's brainless, pointless, boring fluff.
@Jason R
The Episode as Functionary is--forgive me--the macroscopic view. If I make a blanket judgement of the whole episode in terms of what I gather the intended *function* to be (a farce, a serious commentary, a world-building story, a character piece, etc) and how well it succeeded at this aim. The act by act scores assess my enjoyment of the episode as it's happening. Sometimes I enjoy an episode far more or less than it "deserves" based on its overall success and that can affect the final score. There might be a great scene somewhere or a memorable performance that helps a bad episode or a pitiful production or cringey scene or bad characterisation that hurts a good episode. I hope that helps.
Fri, Aug 21, 2020, 9:10am (UTC -6)
The whole thing about Voyager's lesbian appeal (or was it just gay generally?) took me completely by surprise but is very cool anyway. It never occurred to me that there were subcultures out there seeing things in that show completely invisible to me. Voyager of all shows was the last thing I would have expected to have any kind of subtext. I always presumed that what we saw with that show was (depressingly) it. But I will have to keep your comments in mind the next time I watch it. Maybe it,'s even time for a complete rewatch rather than my usual cherry picking of 3-4 favourite episodes.
Fri, Aug 21, 2020, 10:56am (UTC -6)
I was curious about what the patterns were regarding EAF scores and final grades. So far, the vast majority of the reviews I've done (4 1/3 seasons of DS9, 2 1/3 seasons of Voyager and 2 films) would have seen *lower* grades if not for the act-by-act execution. The exceptions to that rule (where the execution actually hurt the final score of an episode) are
DS9 1: "Emissary," "The Nagus," & "The Forsaken"
DS9 2: "The Homecoming," "The Siege," "The Alternate," "The Wire," & "Crossover"
DS9 3: "The Die is Cast," "Family Business," & "The Adversary"
DS9 4: "Indiscretion," "Bar Association," "Hard Time," & "The Muse"
DS9 5 (so far): "Trials and Tribble-ations," & "The Ascent"
VOY 1: "Caretaker," "Prime Factors," "Jetrel," & "Projections"
VOY 2: "Initiations," "Cold Fire," "Alliances," "Lifesigns," & "Tuvix"
VOY 3 (so far): "Remember," "Sacred Ground," & "Future's End II"
ST FC is also in this category.
So, out of 160 episodes and films, only 30 episodes were hurt in the act-by-act, whereas 61 of those would have received lower scores without the play-by-play.
Alright, I had better stop procrastinating on "Rapture" and rip off that bandaid already.
Fri, Aug 21, 2020, 11:30am (UTC -6)
Fri, Aug 21, 2020, 12:02pm (UTC -6)
Fri, Aug 21, 2020, 12:58pm (UTC -6)
I took a look at the average differences by season between the scores and the EAFs:
DS9 1: +.145
DS9 2: +.154
DS9 3: +.270
DS9 4: +.170
VOY 1: +.053
VOY 2: +0
As you can see, DS9 benefits a bit more from the disparity. This is probably because I'm more likely to disagree with a direction or premise on DS9 than I am on Voyager.
@ William B
EAF^2!! Coming to you in the Fall of 2025
Sat, Aug 22, 2020, 5:56pm (UTC -6)
Yes, they are completely absurd, but by the sheer amount of alien cultures a Federation starship gets to see on a regular basis, absurd encounters like this should have been far far more commonplace. And it's a refreshing change from yet another achingly boring human-like race for the hundredth time.
They were a nice touch. The writers could have easily stretched the concept over an entire episode, Darmok style, and thankfully they didn't (though I admit I would have loved seeing Tuvok in a Tak Tak court defending some wrongfully accused crew members while trying to master these peacock gestures).
Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 9:30am (UTC -6)
Tue, Mar 2, 2021, 11:32am (UTC -6)
1) The FX are (understandably) dated. I wish they had found a way to do practical effects effectively when Janeway and the Doc physically interacted with the bugs. It probably would have been impossible to blend the two styles back then though. Oh, well.
2) The episodes climax could have been filmed better. I like the way it was written, but it was just missing some "oomph" in the way it was filmed.
3) They should have ditched the jazz/watercolors/tea epilog. You've done an ok job at turning Janeway into a Ripley clone for 42 minutes, so why ruin it now? We've got seven seasons worth of episodes to see Janeway in "normal" mode.
Positives:
1) It's a fun action show! Nothing wrong with that. If Picard gets to do Die Hard (Starship Mine) why can't Janeway do an Aliens homage?
2) The Doc gets off the ship
3) I thought the scene with the Tak Tak at the beginning was nice. I kind of wish they had used the miner's species as the antagonist at the end of the episode instead of bringing back the Tak Tak though.
4) Ethan Phillips has a knack for comedy. I liked what he did in the opening scene and I also liked Neelix correcting Janeway on the number of lungs he has. Small moments, but I enjoyed them.
Random thought: Neelix looks terrifying when his face is lit from below like in the scene where they first return to Voyager.
Thu, Jul 8, 2021, 11:09am (UTC -6)
Thu, Jul 8, 2021, 11:12am (UTC -6)
Mon, Jul 12, 2021, 3:20pm (UTC -6)
Wed, Aug 18, 2021, 9:28am (UTC -6)
Sun, Oct 10, 2021, 9:05am (UTC -6)
This episode works wonderfully as a near silent action movie. Janeway's alone on a ship filled with what are essentially evil monsters. She has nobody to talk to, rely on, and sets about quietly kicking ass by herself. Very "Die Hard". Very "First Blood". Very "Aliens".
But Brannon Braga seems unable to sustain such a story. What should be a wordless 40 minutes as we watch Janeway scamper about, turns into a long flashback sequence, the introduction of more characters, and then endless technobabble.
All this episode needed was Janeway in a tank-top silently scurrying about for 40 minutes. Braga should have committed to his original idea.
Wed, Feb 22, 2023, 12:57pm (UTC -6)
It's the same with many of the shows I've enjoyed on DVD (Emergency!, The Streets of San Francisco, Have Gun Will Travel, et al.)-- the premises and events may not have matched up exactly to life in any of them point by point, but that's no big thing, so long as I am entertained for a time and can get my mind off my troubles (whether for an hour or a half-hour).
Wed, Feb 22, 2023, 1:08pm (UTC -6)
Sun, Apr 2, 2023, 4:36pm (UTC -6)
But then too much of Trek, and Voyager in particular, is totally unpalatable nonsense that simply insults the intelligence of the audience. Voyager had some decent moments, but it tends to drown in its own self-absorbed indulgences.
Thu, Apr 20, 2023, 10:46am (UTC -6)
-I agree with above commenters that the flashback portion was a mistake, it just disrupted the tension of the episode. Also, the doc would have been my first thought in this situation, surprised it took Janeway so long to contact him.
-speaking of the doc, can’t he make himself pure light at will? I mean, those gun nuts in that time travel episode shot right through him. So can’t he just stroll right through all these virus monsters? I guess the writers needed him to be vulnerable for the sake of the story.
-referring to these things as viruses was also a mistake. I get what they were going for, but the macro versions of these things seemed way too dexterous to be single cell organisms blown up to massive size. Parasites would have been fine.
-nice to see creatures from the delta quadrant being alien, both the monsters and the communication mechanics of the tak taks or whatever.
-pretty clearly derivative of ‘aliens’, right down to janeway’s outfit. I kept half expecting her to start phasering doorways before entering a room. I’ll give voyager a break and call it an hommage.
Sat, May 27, 2023, 2:47am (UTC -6)
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