OVEG: Author, Author

Description: Barclay has made a new breakthrough thanks to Seven and Harry and now they can use a quantum singularity (tech: black hole) to speak for eleven minutes a day over live video. Neelix, in his usual self-important mode, passes out comm chips to decide who gets to use it when. The Doctor gets to go first and boy is he excited, 'cause he just wrote a novel. Photons Be Free, and it's every bit as overblown as it sounds. It's the story of an EMH on the Starship Vortex who must overcome the prejudice of his evil crewmates: Lt. Marsi, Capt. Jenkins, Torry, Kimbal, and Tuloc. Tom is convinced it's terrible and everyone who sees it pretty much agrees because it portrays the crew in a very, very negative light (Captain Janeway, I mean Jenkins, guns down a wounded crewman, to give an example).

The Doctor is emphatic that nothing is wrong with the story so Paris redoes it. This time it's set on the Starship Voyeur and is about how you have to assist a cranky holographic doctor with a lousy bedside manner. The Doctor drugs Two of Three (one of three triplets, heh heh heh) with an aphrodisiac and they have fun. The Doc is really, really pissed. Anyway, after a while the Doctor decides to rework the program, but the publisher already distributed it. The Doctor demands a recall (apparently in the future writers gain virtually godlike powers; as a writer, I find this one of the few perks of being in the Star Trek future, along with holodecks and buxom cyborgs). The publisher refuses the recall on the grounds that the Doctor has no rights. An arbiter steps in and of course says that he does in the end because we are good, and therefore must prevail. All is therefore wrapped up in a neat little package.

Comments: Annoyingly preachy at times, but overall very well done. Apparently the Mirror Universe version of Brannon Braga took over, because almost every character got some screen time for a little good character development (only Chakotay is really left out, since you actually need to have a personality for it to be developed). Harry talking to his parents was hilarious, and I don't know how many of my fellow Generation Xers have been in his boat (having one of your parents call your boss). Unfortunately Harry's time runs short and he's pissed. Seven points out he'll have another chance in two months, and he makes a rude remark about how if she had family back home she'd understand. "Gee, I'm sorry my parents were killed and I was assimilated by the Borg. What an asshole I must be."

The ending shot as the camera pans and we see about a dozen Robert Picardos toiling in the mine is absolutely wonderful, and I think, all kidding aside, possibly the best single shot in Voyager's history. Kudos to director David Livingston.

Rating: 8

Best Moment: A tie, the opening of the episode with the Doctor's appearance, and the closing of the episode with the dilithium mine and all the enslaved holograms.

Seven of Nine Moment: Three of Eight, the hotty redhead. Woohoo!

Stupid Neelix Moment: Neelix relays an old Telaxian proverb: "When the road before you splits in two, take the third path." Wouldn't the third path be the one you just came from? You know, every quote from Telaxia Neelix provides paints a deeper and more vivid portrait of a race of completely dope-addled f*ck-ups, or like a race of overly optimistic Mr. Rogers-ish hari krishnas. Let me say once again that I approve of the Telaxian genocide.

Continuity Question: Advanced futuristic technology, and the Doctor is mining dilithium with a rock hammer? Besides, hasn't the Federation seen Shawshank Redemption?

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