As Voyager Boldly Goes?
A lot of standard Voyager bashing here from a fan of the original series, but he does raise some interesting points. I totally agree with him about the Holodock. They need to stop relying on that as a plot device (in the new series, of course):
<< Star Failures
But I could forgive time-travel inconsistencies and logical foul-ups, as they are the norm in science fiction, if they weren't part of a larger problem with all of the modern Treks. Time and again, the producers and actors seemed to conspire to make the show(s) as self-indulgent as possible. Whether it was pet political causes of the cast and crew or a demand from actors to do more "challenging" work, the shows repeatedly subjected the viewers to the silliest of devices.
I am referring of course to the holodeck.
The holodeck more than anything else represents the increasing asininity of Star Trek. Put aside the ludicrous science of the holodeck in which a series of force fields and lighting tricks can so accurately simulate reality that even Geordi LaForge (who sees across the entire electromagnetic spectrum, including ultraviolet, x-ray, and infrared) can't tell holo-humans aren't real (if you look at something with x-ray vision and it looks like a human, it usually is).
As a dramatic device the holodeck is an outrage, seemingly conceived for actors and costume designers to indulge themselves at the audience's expense. Murder mysteries, exotic adventures, intellectual colloquies, and historical period dramas were all played out in the holodeck for no other reason than the fact that the producers knew the fans would tolerate it. Captain Picard as a twentieth-century private dick is not what I signed up for.
Meanwhile the damage done to the internal consistencies ? let alone the pleasure of watching ? the various Treks was enormous. One small example: Didn't it strike anyone as odd that in Star Trek: Next Generation, the android Lt. Cmdr. Data was nobly struggling for a minimal level of emotional fluency and recognition of his sentience, while holo-humans were constantly acting as autonomous, sentient life-forms? How is it that Data, with his tenuously robotic grasp on humanity, could at once be the height of technological accomplishment in the Federation, while a rogue character from a Sherlock Holmes story could achieve self-awareness (and, by the way, the ability to use contractions) because of a blown fuse?
By the end of Next Generation, the holodeck had become the last refuge of an exhausted writer. But by the time Voyager came around, holo-technology had become the crutch of an exhausted series. Whenever Voyager's writers had nothing new or interesting to say they decided to say it ? for forty or fifty minutes ? on the holodeck. (At least in Deep Space 9, the producers offered a nod to the obvious sexual possibilities of the holodeck. But they never answered the burning question of whether sex with a hologram is masturbation or adultery.) >>
A lot of standard Voyager bashing here from a fan of the original series, but he does raise some interesting points. I totally agree with him about the Holodock. They need to stop relying on that as a plot device (in the new series, of course):
<< Star Failures
But I could forgive time-travel inconsistencies and logical foul-ups, as they are the norm in science fiction, if they weren't part of a larger problem with all of the modern Treks. Time and again, the producers and actors seemed to conspire to make the show(s) as self-indulgent as possible. Whether it was pet political causes of the cast and crew or a demand from actors to do more "challenging" work, the shows repeatedly subjected the viewers to the silliest of devices.
I am referring of course to the holodeck.
The holodeck more than anything else represents the increasing asininity of Star Trek. Put aside the ludicrous science of the holodeck in which a series of force fields and lighting tricks can so accurately simulate reality that even Geordi LaForge (who sees across the entire electromagnetic spectrum, including ultraviolet, x-ray, and infrared) can't tell holo-humans aren't real (if you look at something with x-ray vision and it looks like a human, it usually is).
As a dramatic device the holodeck is an outrage, seemingly conceived for actors and costume designers to indulge themselves at the audience's expense. Murder mysteries, exotic adventures, intellectual colloquies, and historical period dramas were all played out in the holodeck for no other reason than the fact that the producers knew the fans would tolerate it. Captain Picard as a twentieth-century private dick is not what I signed up for.
Meanwhile the damage done to the internal consistencies ? let alone the pleasure of watching ? the various Treks was enormous. One small example: Didn't it strike anyone as odd that in Star Trek: Next Generation, the android Lt. Cmdr. Data was nobly struggling for a minimal level of emotional fluency and recognition of his sentience, while holo-humans were constantly acting as autonomous, sentient life-forms? How is it that Data, with his tenuously robotic grasp on humanity, could at once be the height of technological accomplishment in the Federation, while a rogue character from a Sherlock Holmes story could achieve self-awareness (and, by the way, the ability to use contractions) because of a blown fuse?
By the end of Next Generation, the holodeck had become the last refuge of an exhausted writer. But by the time Voyager came around, holo-technology had become the crutch of an exhausted series. Whenever Voyager's writers had nothing new or interesting to say they decided to say it ? for forty or fifty minutes ? on the holodeck. (At least in Deep Space 9, the producers offered a nod to the obvious sexual possibilities of the holodeck. But they never answered the burning question of whether sex with a hologram is masturbation or adultery.) >>
