A Look at Equinox Part 1 (Voyager)
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- čas přidán 5. 07. 2024
- Opinionated Voyager Episode Guide kicks off its look at the season 5 cliffhanger. Voyager stumbles across another Starfleet ship taken by the Caretaker while they're being attacked by space leprechauns, but it may be that Captain Ransom has stolen their pot of space gold.
Jumping the gun a little bit, but they should have used the Equinox crew in later episodes. Imagine one of them in Good Shepherd. But, it's Voyager, where potential goes to die.
They were probably used on the lower decks, helping to build the Delta Flyer as well as the seemingly endless supply of plot-convenient shuttles. 🖖😆👍
At the time, i foolishly expected that they would. This was the last time I expected that kind of continuity and use of narrative assets.
I was convinced they would at least show Marla Gilmore once in a while, since she got so much time in both parts. But no, it's like this never happened.
I guess they all died in "accidents" definitly not caused by Janeway giving them dangerous assigments to get rid of them ...
@@Willpower-74205 The idea of a voyager shuttle sweatshop manned by people who've obtained Janeway's ire is great.
Ransom was the very definition of "I'd rather be tried by 12 than carried by 6."
Man, Chuck’s hypothetical scenario where Picard and the Enterprise E are thrown into the Delta Quadrant and gets in conflict with Janeway sounds like it would be amazing.
Court Martial for you! Counseling for you! And an actual deep pore excavation bath for Neelix!
really shows of how much of a hypocrite janeway was. she uses starfleet regs when it benefits her but when someone else uses the same regs, she's like "tough titty!".
No wonder she was made an Admiral.
"Whats it like living life without consequences?" 😂😂😂
Hey, we had the Year of Hell ... at least before the timeline was changed and nobody remembered anything. Didn't that even happen twice? So it counts, right?
Janeway's strict adherence to the "Shoot all holes in space"-Directive was the main reason she got promoted to Admiral before Picard.
They really should've used this episode to get back home, and then have all of the last couple of seasons of Voyager dealing with the consequences of what they did. It would've been interesting to have Janeway be forced to justify her actions, or for the Maquis crew to have to deal with their legal status. And Ransom having a court martial would've been a really interesting way to conclude this story.
To quote another captain who had to make some questionable decisions, "it is easy to be a saint in paradise."
I think Ransom say himself in Janeway, but the version where he had just entered the Delta Quadrant and sees a self righteous Captain who was gonna make the same mistakes he made. He has every expectation that she will march Voyager into an early grave and I don't blame him.
i'll go even further and say that "enterprise" did "voyager" better than "voyager". during the xindi arc, enterprise was sent into hostile space, where weird shit happened and they had no backup from starfleet. by the time the season ended, enterprise was a utter mess, held together by spit, duct tape and hope, and the crew was pushed their physical and mental limits. archer had to steal from a innocent race to get the ship where it needed to go, t'pol was addicted to drugs, malcom was dealing with his own issues with the MACOs, trip was dealing with not having time to mourn for his sister who was killed in the first xindi attack while working with the very man who designed the weapon that killed her and hoshi was kidnapped and tortured into helping the reptiles launch the weapon that would end humanity.
and all that happened in a fraction of the time that voyager spent going home.
"Spit and baling wire"*
😂😂😂
...
You make a good case. A distressingly good one.
The Xindi arc was what they wanted to do in Voyager's forth season with Krenim. The *Year of Hell* was suppose to be season long story arc for the whole forth season, until the execs was against the idea. So they trimmed down to a two parter and recon it to where the Voyager crew have no knowledge about Krenim (from when Kes informed them about in the episode I'm about to mention in the next sentence). The original concept for the *Year of Hell* story arc was to be set up in the episode *Before and After* when Kes was travelling backward through her timeline and learnt how the year of hell event affect the crew.
It's good to know that they didn't scrap the idea for season long story arc that would change the lives of the crew forever, and used to Enterprise's third season.
@@Renegade2786 Calling that double-episode Year of Hell was truly a joke. And then of course ignoring Before and After, even though Janeway ordered Kes to write a report with everything she knew about the Krenim. I guess Janeway decided to delete everything from Kes after she left - or Kes never wrote anything down despite her saying that she wanted to do it right now.
@@lordmontymord8701 that would require long term story telling and actual consequences for actions. Not on voyager. The all mighty reset button fixes all that.
Sweet Azura, Janeway is so selectively forgetful about the Prime Directive it's actually painful. Seriously, did she not remember the episode where she was trading technology with rebels to get...whatever she needed when that old guy thought she was his daughter.
I´d love it if someone had brought that up, or maybe the Doctor could have reminded everyone of how they chose to kill one innocent to save two...in Tuvix.
@@SirMarshalHaig I believe Janeway ordered everyone to be quiet and deleted her log entries about anything suspicious, because she didn't want to look bad in front of Ransom ...
@@lordmontymord8701 Well at least in Lower Decks her honest report is available and shocking everyone.
If you squint, I think Janeway’s actions in Part 2 (and to some extent in Part 1) is her actively PRETENDING she’s never broken the Prime Directive because she thinks Ransom is compromised and she wants to make sure SHE stays in charge. But her heavy handiness was foolish - it backed Ransom in a corner (as you said).
They really needed to put that script thru rewrite. It could have been so much better if she HAD just talked the issues over with Chakotay. She may have been appalled by the mass murder, but her thinking was skewed.
Which brings us back to Scorpion and the lasting damage. Because not only does she have to fight Ransom (in her mind) to stay in charge but ultimately Chakotay as well. A cornered Janeway can be pretty unsavory.
I also agree, they should have found a place to hide out and worked to repair the Equinox. There were a lot of missteps in this episode.
Finally, how vast is this aliens’ space? They needed to get to a safe harbor and repair. Not every species in the Delta Quadrant were hostile. Ransom was a pretty bad Captain to begin with if he never stabilized his ship IMO.
Turkey Platter actually made me laugh.
Equinox should have been the entire series! Breaking all the rules just to survive. Voyager is the love boat. Holodeck reservations at 9.
This is why I love your channel. Terrific humour but some deep concepts that are really well presented.
I just found this channel from a thread from a 2011 thread asking if there's trek fans in the forum and was shocked to see this episode I just watched again like a week ago. I'm glad he's still going despite the changing atmosphere for small creators leading to take downs etc
very nice commentary, this is the kind of stuff I love
I mean, that 32nd century mobile emitter is so advanced it completely malfunctions with a casual smack of a clipboard? It's a wonder the Doctor never winked out of existence just because he bumped his shoulder on a door frame...
@@abraxas365 The mobile emitter is just from the 29th century. Looking at Discovery's bridge it might have also had an integrated flamethrower if it was from the 32nd century ...
Equinox is the most complete character assassinations Star Trek has ever seen. I mean, Janeway was already kind of sketchy beforehand, this episode made her downright evil.
I feel like Insurection was more complete, because the TNG crew had further to fall than Janeway did.
This would have been a great episode for the ghost of Tuvix to come knocking at their door.
Lol totally
Finding stranded crew following the same policy as finding lost puppies...but without the benefit of the lost ones being lovable.
It’s so funny, watching the recently released Prodigy Season 2 made me completely forget about how sometimes Janeway could come across as a lousy character in VOY, and this is definitely one of those episodes. I despite Equinox for how Janeway was written and how arrogant and spoiled the Voyager mains came across towards the Equinox crew. This was one of the most infuriating uses of the reset button with how much the characters underwent and changed here, and it was all just swept under the rug.
The argument from Scorpion about doing the Delta Quadrant a favor is so stupid. Like, by definition, if the Borg assimilates 8472 the Borg get to add their skills, tech, and biology AND gain a huge number of drones. It is, at best, a lateral move and at worst means the one thing keeping these two threats preoccupied goes away and a super powered Borg now gets to run roughshod over everyone.
and later on, its shown that 8472 could be reasoned with and a dialogue could be opened. janeway only did that because of one message from kes on how pissed off they were about the borg invading their space.
That scene with Arturis calling out Janeway for basically condemning countless races that banked heavily for the Borg's destruction from 8472 only for Janeway to basically screw them over...Yeah, I just can't disagree with the poor sap.
@@DevilPogoStick And Janeway's reaction was priceless: Well we had to act fast, there was no time for an opinion poll ... while Chakotay strongly disagreed with her, but that of course was not worth mentioning.
Btw: There is an alternate version of the events in one of the Myriad Universes-books: Voyager is so heavily damaged by the attack from Species 8472 in the beginning that they can't go on and have to seek help from others. And Janeway forms an alliance between different species who develop the nanoprobes-weapons, while the Borg get crushed by 8472. So it's a win-win in the end.
I think John Savage does a fantastic job playing Ransom; that speech to Janeway after he's been found out really showed how desperate the character was. And with Janeway I always come back to the fact she is a rookie captain; Voyager is her first command, and I think her actions show it. To her, abandoning the Equinox is logical, to Ransom, it's unthinkable. To Janeway, killing those aliens was abhorrent, for Ransom it was the last option. I think later, especially Part 2, Janeway goes just as of the wall as Ransom did and is an interesting parallel.
I like the moral dilemma that's posed. As Ransom says; the crew were starving, the ship was basically dead in the water and then this miracle drops into their lap. Ransom got his Koybashi Maru moment; there was no way out.
Equinox Pt1 & 2 are among my absolute favourite Voyager episodes, although it does frustrate because it shows the Writers did have good quality stories in them.
I hated these episodes because, aside from being horribly written, it just emphasized just how moronic Janeway is. She committed "mass murder" by helping the Borg. And that wasn't even to save their own lives. She just wanted to cut a few months off their trip. Yet she demonizes Savage for doing far less. It's a wonder Voyager hasn't shattered from Janeway throwing all those stones from her glass house...
No no she helped the borg because she thought *they* were being genocided....until she found out they attacked first, and just continued to help them.
Nevermind the fact that between what Arturis said and Species 8472 provably being neutral towards anything that wasn't the Borg, Janeway never self-reflects on the fact that she messed up big time.
She _assumed_ 8472 was a galactic threat because they were belligerent. In a war zone. That the Voyager barged in on. And rather than step back she decided to believe *THE BORG* and ally with them.
I'm not saying she shouldn't make that mistake mind you. But the fact that she's never written to acknowledge that mistake and instead acts sanctimonious towards Ransom when with what she did she's responsible for the deaths and assimilation of potentially billions, and that includes every member of Species 8472 that she helped kill while they were fighting to defend themselves.
@@zephyr8072 8472 actually wasn't neutral towards others: When Kes was in contact with them she said that they plan to wipe out every lifeform in the galaxy they saw as below them, now that they know about others outside of their pocket-dimension thanks to the Borg (which would mean every species since they are "the perfect lifeform").
It always looked like a pretty cheap way to justify Janeway's actions: Of course 8472 plans on destroying everything, so Janeway is once again right.
It's easy to forget that little fact since we later got In the Flesh, where 8472 is suddenly no longer into genocide and only wants to protect themselves. But that was because the writers either also forgot or didn't care about the established facts ...
@@lordmontymord8701 Here's the thing, in the greater context that was Kes contacting one member of the species.
They're individuals, and they're angry. So yeah some of them are going to have dark thoughts.
It's like if you dove into the thoughts of a US soldier right after 9/11. They're probably going to have some horrific thoughts going through them at that moment that aren't reflective of reality.
Plus this is assuming that Kes interpreted their thoughts correctly and given her lack of experience and the fact that they are more alien than anything encountered before that isn't certain.
I know that was all the writers being lazy and making it easy for Janeway to cozy up with the Borg but even in that context it makes her look bad and her decisions irrational because why didn't she leave Borg space and poke around a bit?
She would've then encountered other civilisations who would tell her that yeah they've been watching the whole thing and Species 8472 have done nothing to them as long as they stay away.
The fact that they don't later at least have Janeway reflect on this as her most terrible mistake and write an episode like Equinox is what's really the problem here.
Every so often I’ll start thinking I was too hard on Voyager, then I’m reminded of episodes like this. It’s not episodes like Threshold that really put me off, it’s episodes like this, where Janeway conveniently forgets all the bullshit she has pulled in order to be a sanctimonious asshole. Sisko may have done some truly fucked up things during In the Pale Moonlight, but he (and more importantly the show) never tries to pretend it’s anything other than what it is.
@@Matrim42 When things like the events of In the Pale Moonlight are never brought up again it makes sense too, because nobody is supposed to know what happened and nobody except Sisko, Garak and some unnamed Admirals does know about it.
When Janeway forgets then everybody else also forgets, so no one can call her out ...
"You look out the window at Starfleet Headquarters and you see paradise. Well, it's easy to be a saint in paradise."
- Captain Sisko
They put Lessing with Seven because they know a Borg and a Cylon would get on well.
These two parts are a great example of why Janeway should have been court martialed for all she did and not promoted. There is a Trek based quiz show on YT I watch where we occasionally have a #Janewaydidnothingwrong vs #Janewaydideverythingwrong good natured arguments
You're going to ignore how the mobile emitter can be disabled by mildly whacking it with a pad? We've seen this thing get semi-fried, banged around, even assimilated by the Borg, and keep working. But heaven forbid someone knocks something against it.
Anti plot armor
This made me despise Insaneway all the more. She can break rules to her hearts content. And if a crew member questions her SHE KILLS THEM. But God forbid another captain does the same thing.
4:00 Or: "To help you keep calm, I'm leaving you with a very attractive blonde, just ignore her odd piercings."
This is really the most believable reaction when seeing Neelix: SHOOT THAT THING!!!
I remember laughing very hard when i saw the episode for the first time and Crazy Jane told Ransom she never broke the Prime Directive ... yeah, you can lie to him, he doesn't know any better. Hope you deleted your logs.
Btw.: So if it takes 45 seconds to fully reload the shields and that's on the Equinox, the damaged and inferior ship - so why was there never the idea that the Equinox expands it's shields around Voyager until their shields are reloaded? Then these 14 hours to install their anti-portal-shields on both ships would mean nothing ... Oh, i forgot: We needed Janeway's idea to give up the Equinox.
Not that surprising: She also decided that dismanteling the Dreadnaught was way better than keeping it around as an automated defense-system.
15:52 that sets a bad precedent though. Because who decides what is justified? You can’t stop criticizing Janeway for her actions the entire series, but she feels justified. But when Ransom does it it’s criminal! If they had help then maybe the courts could decide. But they don’t so each captain has to decide for themselves out there in the middle of nowhere!
20:37 go back and watch _I Borg_ I think it was because Picard got in serious trouble with Starfleet over that very thing when he wouldn’t commit genocide against the Borg even though he was ordered to!
This is one of my favourite 2 parters in voyager. However I wish the writers had the voyager crew be sympathetic to the equinox crew and have random get put in the brig, chakote given command of the equinox and the two ships start working in tandem to fight their way back home. That would have opened up for a mutiny episode where the equinox crew wanted their captain released and they do a prison break and run off in the now pristine equinox and a fight breaks out between the ships. Voyager could win, ransom could either die or keep command of the equinox and then they could begrudgingly keep working together. They could do some technobabble and slap something they stole from another race to make the equinox keep pace with voyager. There was so much wasted potential with this episode.
That sounds awfully like something clever or intelligent, and we're talking about Voyager. Get that out of here, you know the writers never allow that kinda writing here!
when chuck is gone will there be an ai in place that just keeps reuploading and remastering?
Maybe he'll end up like Dagoth Ur and keep going because years of Voyager, Enterprise, and whenever he gets back to Picard and Discovery have made him believe that all of reality is actually his dream, allowing him to keep doing this forever.
Hypocrisy, thy name is Voyager
They'd write a cliffhanger part 1 without considering part 2!? WTF!? No! Really! What were they smoking!?
Huh… Ransom might be the Modern Marvels guy…
I mean, the premise of the show is a ship lost in space so coming home should be the end of the story. If Voyager came home 2 seasons early, how different would this show be to Next Generation or DS9 where they need to now fit into continuity with what's going on, especially with the Dominion War going on.
Wrath of Insaneway, Part 1 .
Equinox is better made in BSG
Both 78's The Living Legend two-parter, & 05's Pegasus & Resurrection Ship 1+2 outclassed Equinox.
Imagine the changes for the better if Ransom outranked Janeway as Cain did Adama.
@@MegaAchilles23 I think if Ransom outranked her she would have simply said "Computer, delete Ransom.".
@@lordmontymord8701 Funny thing is, going my Memory Alpha, he had seniority in Rank. So if she didn't deem it a combat situation and have the ability to back it up with the superior ship, he would have had command on Seniority.
I wonder if Rudolph Ransom is related to Jack Ransom.
I was thinking the same thing. I was actually they could have touched on that in the Lower Decks episode "Twovix".
Voyager had the potential to be a stand-out series like DS9. We should've seen them utilize alien tech & salvage operations. In the episode with the klingons, what if instead of the Klingons destroying the ship, it's badly damaged so Voyager takes what they can, including the cloak. Maybe not give them a full cloak because DS9, but it's modified & gives them a form of stealth to get through dangerous situations like Borg space. Or take this episode, what if they take the modified warpcore & adapt it to use without murdering aliens & it increases their warp capabilities. I don't even agree with putting the Maquis in Starfleet uniforms. Let them be apart of the crew but not Starfleet because they don't have a prime directive & can do things Starfleet officer can't. So much potential & it was sacrificed at the altar of the reset button.
Isnt it the high peak of irony that this guy makes review of scifi show about future made decades ago while there is AI behind his shoulder with one hand in the tip jar at all times.
Those two arguing about starfleet regulations dont know how easy they have it. Just wait till Google starts making spaceship software.
22:22
Voyager a missed chance to do something new. Ah well they will get it right next time... oh wait no they didn't. OKAY Picard s3 was good. Man whos in charge of Trek these days?!
Ahem. Lower Decks? Prodigy? Especially given how the latter's 2nd season released to critical acclaim?
@@myriadmediamusings nope, nope nope.
Ransom was the very definition of "I'd rather be tried by 12 than carried by 6."