Why do so many people hate Voyager?

[ghettognome]

I actually really liked Voyager. I agree that there were some poorly written things with it. Janeway wasn't really a good captain, or actor for that matter, but I liked a lot of the storylines that came through all the seasons with the doctor, 7, and so on and such. I wasn't watching it from a Trekie point of view, I have been watching Star Trek since I was super little. Have seen all TNG episopes at least 3 times, and even didn't mind DS9, though I found it less appealing than most found Voyager. I think its downfall had more to do with the fact that there were major Treckie fans watching it and analyzing every little thing for consistency and it just couldn't measure up to TNG and the original series.
Now if you want a Star Trek that really sucks is Enterprise. I just kept getting really annoyed with the captian, and the fact that it was supposed to be set pre-original Star Treck time, and it is turning out a lot like early TNG, totally not what it should be. If people need to complain about a Star Trek, that should be the version that people complain about.
I guess I am done talking for now.

 

[Welverin]

6. The show made the Borg dumb.

Wrong. The movie First Contact made the Borg Dumb. Voyager just continued the tradition.

 

[Furn_Darkside]

Wrong. The movie First Contact made the Borg Dumb. Voyager just continued the tradition.

Err.. wrong, TNG made the Borg dumb. First Contact made that a tradition, and Voyager put the final nail in the coffin to them being a joke.

FD

 

[Ranger REG]

Why do I find VOY disappointing?

Two words: Brannon Braga.

Before he took over as the show's executive producer, he was a decent writer. That much I'll give him credit to. In fact, he wrote some pretty decent episodes from TNG (most of them Borg) and the first three seasons of VOY.

But one he took the mantle of leadership from the departing producers Piller and Taylor, everything went downhill from there. He cast Jeri Ryan as a borg crewmember Seven, who eventually formed an intimate relationship following Ms. Ryan's divorce, and started to make VOY into the "Seven of Nine Show."

He blatantly and flagrantly ignores continuity. Stories he wrote tend to be a little longer than an hour, which is why you see a rapid wrap-up of the episode, after the story had its pace set from the beginning to the middle. Stories he wrote tend to be geared toward horny males 14-18.

And what's worse, the character development is so out-of-control and random. You can't really get a handle on each character's persona.

And yeah, the Borg went from mysterious and major threat to a minor nuisance.

Now I see it also happening on ENTERPRISE.

 

[King_Stannis]

the show had some good points, but it just never delivered on it's potential. as several people have stated better than i could have, it just sort of devolved into banality after a while. there was never anything that made me wince in pain, and several times there was nothing that grabbed my attention enough to prevent me from changing channels.

in fact, the show made very little impact on me. given enough time, i'd probably forget that it ever existed.

 

[LightPhoenix]

I'll second everybody on the poor writing reason - the show was just bad. Even the first few seasons weren't anything compared to the writing that, say, DS9 had. In addition, the show obviously became too focused on Jeri Ryan (7 of 9) after she was introduced. Only in the first season or two did the show really have the feel of an ensemble cast, something Voyager sorely needed. After all, there's all these Star Fleet and Maquis trying to get along in a world where their ideals don't matter, where people have never even heard of humans or Bajor or what have you. They needed to rely on each other, and instead it turned into the Janeway/Seven show.

My own personal reason, which I don't think anyone has mentioned yet (if you haven't figured it out), is that Voyager had a metric buttload of potential, and it was squandered. Voyager started out with an interesting premise and some interesting characters and potentials for character growth. For example, imagine if you will:

Janeway as a naive, moralistic captain who believed in following the rules, and who would have to make some tough choices and hopefully learn that following the rules were not all there was to being a captain. Especially in a part of space where there were no rules and no Federation to back them up.

Neelix as a rebellious alien from a planet of people both uninterested and too afraid to search beyond the stars. A man at odds with his people, struggling to understand people who have made a life out of exploring. A man who knows much of the space they are in, but never listened to because he is simple a cook, not a soldier or a pilot or even important.

Tuvok as the consumate Vulcan, acting as the voice of reason and restraint on a ship where everyone will do anything to get home. Straining against the virtues of logic when his family waits for him at home, torn between doing what is right and what is logical (doing whatever is necessary to get home, because they won't have much of an impact in this quadrant).

Chakotay as the leader of the Maquis left on Voyager, wanting to help his people get home, learning that not all of Star Fleet is bad but knowing that things will likely be the same when he gets home.

Torres as a woman trapped between the Human and Klingon worlds, mistrusted because of what her people did so long ago. Mistrusted for her passion and her impatience, but shockingly brilliant among a savage people, struggling to reconcile the two halves of her heritage.

Kim as a lowly crew member, learning to be more than his bumbling self, learning to be confident and losing some of his innocence along the way.

Paris as the charismatic hotshot pilot who realizes that his actions have consequences for himself and for others, learning to use his charisma and skills not to impress but to lead people to victory.

Do you see where I'm going with this? I'm hoping you can at least see the potential for good storytelling - a potential which was wasted, thrown away by poor writers. That's why I don't like this show.

Oh, and I never liked the Doctor character - though Picardo was often times IMO the saving grace of the show. He is a great actor, and I love catching him in other stuff.

 

[madriel]

I'm yet another person who thought Voyager had an interesting premise and great character concepts, yet wasted both. It had a lot of potential but it got bogged down with inconsistent writing. It was painful to watch sometimes because you could see the cool ideas so clearly, but they were just not developed. It felt like the writers weren't sure what direction to take the show.

 

[Chun-tzu]

I agree with a lot of what's been said already. Good premise, tons of potential, very little of it tapped. There were some ok episodes, but none of them come to me off-hand (unlike TNG and DS9). There were a number of episodes that I *hated*. There was one with aliens that aged just like humans, only backwards, which is SO unbelievably and ridiculously unsound that I found it insulted my intelligence (and the plot did not justify such a lame concept). And the year-in-hell storyline was one thing, but the one where you find out at the end of the episode that we've been following the adventures of copies of the crew for who-knows how long, and so who knows which episodes were really them and which weren't? God, that's horrible story-telling.

The characters:
1) I don't think Janeway was that terrible, and don't have any major problems with her (or Kate Mulgrew).
2) 7 of 9 is really hot, sure, and I'd say she's the second hottest Star Trek babe (Jadzia is far sexier), but she had NO personality. It didn't bother me much at first, but it bugs me now. The character is quite bland, despite all the airtime she got. And the monotone voice irks me. It's fine for androids and vulcans, but just didn't work for me on her.
3) Yes, Voyager ruined the Borg and Q, 2 of the greatest nemeses on TNG.
4) Poor Harry Kim was more often an embarrassment to the uniform than a credit. As an Asian male, that ticks me off.
5) I liked the Doctor, but thought he was SO anthropomorphized. The Doctor is NOT Data, and IMHO should not have been another human-wannabe. A condescending, arrogant, I'm-better-than-you-are EMH would have been fine in my book. I also don't like the way he identified himself as a hologram. He's not, he's an artificial intelligence. The best analogy you could make is that the hologram is his body, but the true doctor was the computer program.
6) As has been stated already, the return of Kes was an extremely poor way of treating a character who had been part of the Voyager family.
7) They shouldn't have killed Ensign Sudor (the Betazoid murderer). He could have been Voyager's Garak! They really shouldn't have killed him.

Actually, the premise was pretty good, but has a flaw. You know from the beginning that they're not making it home until the end. A premise like that works even better when you have a writer who's willing to totally twist things around on you, when the cast itself is changing every season, and the show is not afraid to change or evolve. It would be interesting to have seen Joss Whedon at the helm. Or, if not that, at least do the epic story arcs, like DS9 and B5. The return home should have been an epic story arc, not that 2-hour finale that was so unsatisfying.

All that said, Voyager is okay. I watch it in reruns (only because I've seen all the TNG episodes often enough, and there are no TV stations in Chicago that show DS9).

 

[orbitalfreak]

The worst thing about Voyager?

So many missed opportunities. The premise of the show was great, but the execution was far below par.

However, some amazing episodes emerged from the show. Scorpion, and Year of Hell were both awesome. I enjoyed the character of The Doctor (Robert Picardo) very much, though I agree Janeway patted his back too much. And Barclay! My favorite character, seeing him was just *ahem*KEWL!

DS9, though, remains my favorite series; however, I hope that Enterprise stays as good as it is, and especially hope that it improves in the future. After all, it has only been out for one season. Not to mention, the song is just sweet.

"Its been a long road..."

 

[Ranger REG]

The only good thing about ENTERPRISE is the song.

I am still skeptical whenever Braga is running the show, and he is running ENTERPRISE. To the cast, I feel sorry for them.