OVEG: Resistance

Forward: There's a certain significance to this episode, though I'm sure you might be surprised. It's not exactly one that is spoken of much; it's not a great episode or a bad one, nothing especially impressive in either sense. It is, however, of personal significance. If you check the dates between this one and Prototype, there's a six week gap before Voyager came back. I didn't join them. If you've followed the reviews in order you've no doubt noticed the downward spiral they've taken with this season offering serving after serving of bad television, bad science fiction, and just plain bad Star Trek. I watched Homefront and Paradise Lost for Deep Space Nine, but even with no Trek that week, I couldn't tune back in to Voyager after that. That was the point we had reached - Star Trek: Blank Screen was now better than Star Trek: Voyager.

The reason for this was a single issue that fell equal parts to the creators of Voyager and the network, and that has to do with disappointment. After TNG went off the air we awaited Voyager with anticipation. Despite allegations from my harsher critics and would-be assassins, I thought a female captain was actually long overdue for Trek; Lt. Van Buren had been knocking our socks off for years over on Law & Order, there was no reason for Janeway to be any different. But Voyager failed to live up; we tuned in weekly hoping it'd get better... Lord knows the first season of TNG was pretty godawful itself, but it just wasn't happening. And this was compounded by UPN, or whoever exactly was making the promos for the next episode, their gnarled hands twisting the footage into their own hellish mutations. The results were promos for episodes that would never be; I've been particularly vocal about the one for Retrospect, which is edited to imply that the episode is about Seven being raped. The actual episodes are nothing even close to what UPN ever says... it's like it was someone's weekly fanfilm or something. Take a look at the preview for this episode. Is this an episode about an alien race that subjects the crew of Voyager to inhuman tortures? Nope... Tuvok issues some off-screen screams in the episode. And as you can see from the film, they've really gone all out... I think that half this trailer is from the episode in question, the rest have been selected from all over the place. So when you show up expecting an example of the indomitable human spirit and get a man with a melon on his head instead, well, you try finding the motivation to come back for more. I will say this, though: at least my departure now meant I didn't have to watch the promo for Unity, which is cut solely to make you think it's about the return of the Borg, when it ain't. You people may hate me, but I've never lied to you to get you to come here. The page is called the Opinionated Voyager Episode Guide, not Praising Neelix, Janeway, And Braga.

Description: The episode begins with Neelix sauntering through a marketplace towards Janeway, Torres, and Tuvok. The four are undercover, and for once aren't dressed in the standard Starfleet outfit of earthtone squalor, which is good. However, they're all gathered around a fruit stand in a way that shouts to the world "Don't look at me, I'm undercover!" Neelix passes Janeway a vial of orange pulp; this handoff is about as subtle as Genghis Khan. She sends him back, telling him they can't afford to haggle over price right now. However, almost immediately Tuvok is worried because a group of men wearing black outfits and motorcycle helmets appear, which means trouble in all post-apocalyptic stories. Your standard Trek fight scene breaks out, complete with the finishing move palm-strike-to-the-face that knocks the bad guy out. Yes, you had read that right earlier - they're wearing helmets, but this still works. You've seriously got to wonder what good those things are if they can't even protect you from Janeway's fist.

However, no matter how many glass jaws there are, there are always more bad guys. One pulls out a gun and shoots Janeway in the neck. As you can imagine, an energy discharge right alongside the carotid artery has serious effects - she's definitely got a big sore now and is mildly stunned. One of the biker's comes and takes away her commbadge, knowing that for Janeway this is like cutting Samson's hair. However, before he can do anything more than that, a little guy charges at him, and cut to the opening credits.

And we're on Voyager, watching the warp core for a while. It's making some sickly noises that usually means it's time to dump some transmission cleaner in and get over to the dealership to trade it in while it can still drive. Since that's not an option here, Chakotay does the next best thing, and stares at it morosely. He comes to check up on Harry, the poor dope, whose job is to spout all the technobabble Torres is too busy to say. Turns out that the antimatter reaction rate is at 12% and if it drops below 9%, then the plasma injectors will lock up and they'll never be able to reinitialize the nacelles. Now, I don't make any claims towards a degree in Starfleet Bullshit Physics, but it seems to me that if you eject the warp core, your antimatter reaction rate is going to be around 0%, so this seems a pretty weird problem given that Voyager has ejected their warp core and picked up again just fine (and if you're wondering, the plasma injectors are in the nacelles, not in the warp core, so it's not as if the warp core was self-contained and the problem didn't happen). Fortunately this unusual problem can be solved by an item that appears solely in this episode - and if you haven't already figured out its Neelix's orange pulp, shame on you.

Harry and Chakotay banter for a bit until Harry convinces him to lower the shields to help preserve power, since even life support's at minimum. As an aside, how come when life support's "at minimum" everything stays a nice room temperature? When I think of powering down to minimum to preserve what little power is left, I think of Apollo 13, with its crew floating in darkness, shivering and miserable; I don't think of Voyager, where I doubt most people would even notice. Is it really that it can't go down any further (being what "minimum" is) or that it's as low as possible without, you know, demanding that we put on a sweater or something equally primitive.[Edit: I admit, I hadn't taken into account differences in surface area to volume, which would be relevant, so it's reasonable that it wouldn't be cold at all this far into the ship. That leaves the halftime score of OVEG 427 to Voyager's 1]. Anyway, Neelix makes it back with the orange pulp and naturally -since this is an important Engineering matter- it's quickly handed off to Harry to take care of instead of one of the actual Engineers.

With that out of the way, Neelix starts filling Chakotay in on what happened. Turns out the bad biker gang was the Mokra, and they probably learned of it through surveilance of a resistance movement used to get the orange pulp. Chakotay decides to contact them, so they fly out from their hiding place behind the moon and talk with Augris. Because this is a television show, Augris will be the face of these people in all situations, whether communicating to offworld aliens, performing interrogations, or searching the streets for criminals. What a micromanager. Anyway, the expected dialogue takes place, and with that out of the way, he says he'll check and see if the missing crewmen are being detained.

Cut to Tuvok and Torres in a dark holding cell. Torres, being a Klingon, is pissed off, and Tuvok, being a Vulcan, is calm and logical. I'm sure those facts surprised you as much as they did me. Torres fumes, saying that for all they know Janeway's dead in the street. Tuvok says it's possible, but that it's possible she's still alive, that there's insufficient evidence to dismiss either conclusion. I don't know, I'd think seeing someone get shot in the neck is pretty good evidence. But, of course, turns out Tuvok's right, because Janeway is alive and hanging out with Jame Gumb, standing in the corner mumbling to himself. Janeway stirs, and faster than you can say "It puts the lotion on its skin" he comes rushing over. He gets really into her personal space, putting his hands all over her face and gibbering like an idiot. So, it seems, this guy was able to outmuscle one of Augris' stormtroopers to get Janeway away? Has he got an army of Emo Philips clones or something? The guy starts fussing over her, and it turns out that he thinks Janeway's his daughter... that's a new kind of weird.

Well, Janeway gets up and goes to leave, trying to set him straight on who she really is, but he thinks she's just telling a neat story to him. She asks for communication equipment, but it turns out it's illegal to have that stuff (why am I flashing back to Citizens Raging Against Phones?). She tries asking him about the others, but apparently the gnomes still haven't returned his brain from wherever they've hidden it because he goes off on another bizarre rant, complete with an imitation of Janeway's fighting techniques. Finally he says that Tuvok and Torres were taken to prison, so Janeway decides she's going to have to go there to rescue them. With no communications and no weapons. Then again, I suppose it beats hanging out here waiting for this guy to turn his pockets inside out, open his fly, and show his impression of an elephant.

Well, turns out the goof wants to join in the rescue mission. Janeway refuses, but he's adamant that they'll do it together once she eats her soup. He thinks Janeway's going in their to rescue her mother, i.e., his wife, who's been trapped there for a long time. Cue touching music, cut to standard Voyager flying over a planet shot. Turns out Augris is up there talking to Chakotay about the situation. It's amusing to note that the actor playing him has appeared in two other Trek roles, both as Romulans, because you could substitute a Romulan in for him and the whole thing would be pretty much the same, except the bad guys would have shoulder pads instead of biker helmets. Things are grim, so grim that Chakotay finally turns to Neelix to try to solve this. Except for Under Siege, I don't think there are too many instances when the villains were foiled by the ship's cook.

And the next scene Augris is in Tuvok and Torres' holding cell, grilling them for information about the resistance. Finally he orders that Tuvok be taken, and Torres resists. Tuvok speaks up, stopping her in mid-elbow (along with the palm, one of the standard Trek fight scene techniques; we just need the back of the fist to complete the set), and he's dragged off by the bad guys. Soon we hear his off screen screams... and that begins and ends the torture plot. No wonder the promo had to take bits from other episodes, the torture scene was shorter than the trailer was.

Oh, and back to Peewee's Playhouse, where our goofball friend is informing Janeway that the soldiers are searching from house to house. They make plans to leave, and the doofus starts gathering things to bring for his wife. He pulls out a necklace and puts it on Janeway; I guess she should be glad it's not macaroni on a string. She starts asking for information about the prison from him... you know, this is just me talking, but if some crazy old fart was telling me I was his kid when I'm clearly not even the same species, I wouldn't treat him as a very reliable source of military intelligence. To further demonstrate his sanity, he pulls out a shoebox full of letters he's been writing to her, intent on bringing them along to give to her in the prison. Come to think of it, it's probably a safer bet bringing them along, since odds are good they'll be locked up too anyway, and it'll be easier to give them to her.

Well, the soldiers -as they so often do- come pounding, so they slip out the secret exit (a piece of cloth that is pushed aside covering a hole in the side of the building. The baddies bash the door down and come running in, but because they have IQ's that match their fighting prowess, they notice nothing amiss. They slip into the crowd and win the nonchalant walk award with how hard they're trying to blend in. It's the kind of thing where people should stop, turn, and applaud because they noticed how hard these two are trying not to be noticed. Janeway tries very lightly tapping on the shop window of their contact here, but then Augris shows up, walking the streets with his lackeys looking for Janeway. The loony goes ballistic and nearly attacks him in the street, but Janeway drags him off out of sight. Turns out Augris is the one who took his wife, but then, you're not really surprised by that, are you? The man does everything here.

While Augris is questioning some bum the contact comes walking by. He outdoes even Janeway and company with his blending in so that Augris can't help but notice this guy trying so damn hard to blend in. He's also not the best revolutionary I've ever seen - when Augris says he's looking for a woman the guy practically bursts out that he hasn't seen a woman, even though there are two women right over Augris' shoulder. Oops! Augris is ready to cart him away to the gulag! This looks like a job for Stupid-Man! Before Janeway can stop him the loon goes running out and battles the villains with the one and only thing that no evil force, no matter how powerful, can hope to overcome: vaudeville! He gads about, making faces and speaking in a stupid voice.... well, I guess I should clarify that these are even more bizarre faces and an even stupider voice. He polishes Augris' boot for him and keeps asking about his hat while the contact slips away, safe in the protective embrace of narrative law. Augris finally, in a not unkind fashion, sticks a donut in his mouth to shut him up, and puts half a melon on his head to replace his hat. He heads on his way, leaving everyone to laugh at the poor dumb bastard.

Neelix then shows up on Voyager and says that his sources have info on the prison. Turns out the entire facility is equipped with metaphasic shields. Wow, you know what that means? It means they can fly the prison into the corona of a star. I can see that having all kinds of uses. They can't just beam everyone out of the prison, so a rescue team will have to go in to get them out, and it's left to poor, pathetic Harry to try to figure out how to do that without them being detected. On the ground, Janeway, the contact, and the lunatic are discussing the prison. The contact, for some strange reason, thinks that bringing a gibbering nutjob ready to spontaneously break out into "Who's on first?" is dangerous, but Janeway disagrees. But she needs weapons, so they have to trade the necklace for them. The dude is supposed to come by in three hours, so it's time to play the waiting game. It takes even longer, however, and when he does show up, Janeway sees his polished military boots... I again ask how this group of incompetents manages to stay in power with these kind of lax standards.

Back in the cell, Tuvok gets tossed back in on his Vulcan ass. Torres and Tuvok discuss how Vulcans feel pain for a little while (kinda makes you wonder how that Vulcan Love Slave program everyone goes on about works), then we see that the contact has been nabbed and is thrown into another cell, but Janeway has a plan. She slips in around the back entrance disguised as a prostitute, so that the guards will lower their defenses. The coolest part of this scene: the man she's seducing is none other than Secret Service Agent Aaron Pierce of 24. She leads him aside by giving a special offer on a david palmer, only to get cold-cocked by the crazy guy. She grabs his gun and shoots down the other guard, then tries to break in while her ally takes the big knife. Yeah, a crazy man at your back with a knife sounds like a real good plan. Janeway, however, has the good sense to lock him out of the prison to stop him from following her, and goes to rescue her people. Incidentally, this may be the first rescue operation performed in high heels.

Back on Voyager, Harry offers his technobabble way of beaming in, trying to keep the advanced orbital sensor network from knowing where exactly the rescue team will beam in. Paris is standing by to lead the rescue team... wait, what? So he flies the ship, the most important shuttle missions, is the field medic/assistant to the Doctor, devises new warp technologies, has 24th century lockpicking ability, and he's a commando? Crimeny, he's got nearly as many abilities as Superman. Anyway, Harry tries his plan, and immediately the Mokra fire an energy beam at the dish that knocks it offline. Augris -speaking of micromanagers- appears on the screen, telling Voyager they've got two minutes to get the hell out of their space or get blasted. Janeway's doing a hell of a lot better with just her hooker pumps; she overloads the shields for all the cells, and Tuvok and Torres grab weapons from a guard and head on their way, though the alarm is sounding. When Voyager detects it, Tom tells Chakotay that nows the time -in his expert opinion as a commando team leader- to head in and get their people out.

Back in the cells, the alarm has stopped for some reason and there's really no sign of guards running about, both facts that naturally shouldn't make the prisoners suspicious in the least. As if that's not bad enough, the crazy guy shows up again. While Voyager is getting its ass kicked, Janeway meets up with Tuvok and Torres, meaning now's got to be the time when the master villain appears. Wait for it, wait for it... Boom! Money in the bank! He reveals that the crazy guy tries breaking in all the time to rescue his wife who's been dead for twelve years, and that the real daughter perished trying to do the same thing. Oopsie! The nut flies into a rage again, and the crew take advantage, attacking the guards- Yes! Tuvok uses the back of the fist! Yahtzee! The crazy guy is shot, but not before he stabs Augris with the stolen knife. Because a knife to the abdomen is so much more dangerous than multiple energy blasts to the chest, Augris perishes almost instantly, while the crazy guy has time for the long-drawn out death scene. The scene is unfortunately short-circuited when the rescue team shows up, consisting of Paris and Neelix, which was so bizarre it prompted laughter. I'll assume all the rest are standing out of sight for some reason... even an expert commando and a ship's cook needs some kind of backup.

Rating: 6

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