Bon Voyage, Voyager: It's goodbye to 'Star Trek' spinoff after seven seasons lost in space
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Some payoffs are seven years in the making. That's what we told ourselves when we heard the news that this season of UPN's "Star Trek: Voyager" would be its last.
The lost Voyager and crew have weathered near-mutinies, a shipjacking, holodeck technology gone wacko, a galaxy of nasty alien life forms, parallel universes and at least a couple of annihilations. Each time Capt. Kathryn Janeway (Kate Mulgrew) and her compatriots survived - but still tens of thousands of light years away from Federation Space.
Asked to put my emotions about the occasionally glorious, usually mundane series into words, I can only say it was the "Gilligan's Island" of "Star Trek."
Tomorrow night, when the final two-hour episode airs at 8 o'clock on KSTW-TV, is an exception. Tomorrow, we get the payoff. Tomorrow, we'll finally see them make it home. Or wander the far-flung Delta Quadrant for years longer.
You'll have to tune in to see how it turns out, and we suspect many more people than usual will do just that. "Star Trek" writers create particularly exciting premieres and finales, with scripts enticing enough to command both the average TV viewer and the hardcore sci-fi fan's attention. "Voyager's" spine-tingling premiere hurled the ship 75,000 light years off course and killed most of the crew. Janeway established her taskmistress style when she stalked around her burned-out hazard of a deck, pinned her mussed-up tresses back into a severe twist and demanded a damage report.
The UPN network launched on "Voyager's" helm, making TV history. Her final flight brings back "First Contact's" Alice Krige as the Borg Queen. All in all, the finale provides a pleasant send-off.
It's the episodes in between that malfunctioned.
The weakest link
Let's be honest. In terms of quality and appeal among the original "Star Trek's" three spinoffs, "Voyager" is a distant third behind "Deep Space Nine," which was itself a far cry from "Star Trek: The Next Generation," a syndication success. Only a sand-grain-sized core of faithful viewers watch "Voyager" religiously, partly due to UPN's limited national market penetration, mostly because of weak scripts that borrowed heavily from "TNG's" best story lines.
Others who begrudgingly admit to keeping up with it are more likely to have caught it on the syndication rebound. Even then, it was because we wanted to see what the fuss was about when Seven of Nine (Jeri Ryan), the bombshell Borg in a skintight catsuit, joined the crew.
We wanted to love "Star Trek: Voyager." We really, really did, particularly because of Mulgrew. For seven seasons, she played Capt. Janeway as an iron rose. Eyes flashing with emotion, thin lips in a resolute straight line. Capt. Jean-Luc Picard's signature command was the memorable, "Make it so." Janeway had a special way of glaring at a threatening vessel and saying "Fire." It was firm and ladylike. You've gotta love that.
Still, she wasn't an exciting captain even after losing the ridiculous schoolmarm bun. Maybe they didn't give her a chance to be.
Classic Trek archetypes were firmly in place: First officer Chakotay (Robert Beltran) was the trustworthy skeptic, Lt. Paris (Robert Duncan McNeill) played the horny troublemaker with Ensign Harry Kim (Garrett Wang) as his naïve sidekick.
"Voyager" also had the usual suspects - a moody Klingon, B'Elanna Torres (Roxann Dawson); a Vulcan, security officer Tuvok (Tim Russ); and Neelix (Ethan Phillips), the comic relief. Kes, the ship's space elf (Jennifer Lien) degenerated into a ball of pure energy to make way for Seven. The EM-4 medical hologram (Robert Picardo) filled the synthetic-who-wants-to-be-a-real-boy slot.
It followed the formula, so what kept "Voyager" from earning the stellar praise its brethren enjoyed? It didn't add enough of its own moxie and flavor. That, and its association with UPN's not-so-gleaming lineup. And "Star Trek" cultural overload. And an underlying frigidity: "TNG's" Jean-Luc Picard and "DS9's" Sisko both dabbled in romance. "Voyager's" Janeway toyed with a crush on Chakotay, but eventually shuffled into the sexless matriarch role.
A good goodbye
The finale fails to rectify those problems, though it does deliver a satisfying coda to a wobbly seven seasons. We see a white-haired future version of Janeway as an indomitable admiral. Torres finally gives birth, Chakotay and Seven explore their relationship and luckless Ensign Kim gets a lady of his own, in a sense.
"Voyager's" chapter is closing, but another launches in the fall, as "Quantum Leap" star Scott Bakula steers the fourth "Star Trek" spinoff, "Enterprise," on UPN. Set in the 22nd century, "Enterprise" is "Star Trek's" Wild West equivalent, predating Capt. James T. Kirk's mission by 150 years.
Give "Voyager" credit for putting a different spin on things. Every other "Star Trek" was about pushing outward; "Voyager" spent seven years trying to go home.
In that sense, only the crew of "Voyager" can truly say that it has boldly gone where no one has gone before. I, for one, say bon voyage.
Melanie McFarland: 206-464-2256 or mmcfarland@seattletimes.com.