VOY – Caretaker

 

Plot – The show is immediately using elements that were rife and yielding terrific dramatic results in both TNG and DS9, namely the Maquis and their political conflict with the Federation and the Cardassians. As a result, Caretake feels like a logical extension of the two previous shows in its first 20 minutes and offers and enticing view into what Voyager might have been had it stayed in the Alpha Quadrant and played out its stories alongside the two other shows. 

The opening sequence features Federation terrorists under attack, desperate and improvising being snatched from their plight by an unknown creature. At this stage of the game the show is dynamic, exciting and unknowable. What a great start. Also, Voyager being ensnared in the Caretaker’s tetrion beam causes incredible damage and wipes out several apparently key players including the sweet Betazed pilot and the Doctor with a chip on his shoulder. I love a show that is savage with its characters from time to time. Voyager got cold feet after this, but it showed how murderous it could have been.

‘We never asked to be involved, Tuvok. But we are…’ I really like the fact that this isn’t like your usual Trek episode with Kirk or Picard turning up and civilising the society that they meet…instead Voyager is dragged into a situation and a conflict that it has no frame of reference to deal with. As a result, they are constantly improvising, learning and reacting. It’s a great way to tell a drama. This isn’t the Roddenberry arrogance of the humanity looking down on the races in the galaxy but instead sees this crew attempting to understand and to empathise. The final conversation between Janeway and the Caretaker is excellent. She makes a questionable choice to let him die and destroying the array and thus strands the crew in the Delta Quadrant but it is an act of kindness and empathy, which marks her as something quite different from what we have seen before. Had the show kicked off with the new Captain selling out an alien race in order to get her crew home…well she would basically be Ransom from Equinox and we all know how well that worked out.

The coda offers a truly optimistic future for the show. Making an enemy of the Kazon. Trapped trying to get home. Chakotay protecting Paris. The Maquis joining the crew. Janeway’s awesome final speech on the bridge. Watching this, even now, it fills me with confidence for the future of this show. Even knowing what is coming.

Character – I’m not sure what happened to Tom Paris the rogue, who is introduced in Caretaker as something of a dodgy character with a heart of gold and who has a muddy past with Chakotay. He’s walking a fine line between being likable and questionable and that is a really interesting place to leave the character. He’s exactly the sort of morally ambiguous character that DS9 excels in and certainly for the first two seasons of the show that uncertainty would remain. Somewhere along the line he would be indoctrinated into a Federation slave like the rest of them so enjoy him at this point where he has some light and shade. There’s a phenomenal moment during the climax where Chakotay lets Paris rescue him and thus owes a debt to a man who previously let him down. It’s that more complex, darker characterisation that I really enjoy. I wish that had been followed up on.

Tuvok figures out the entire plot in the finale by using his vast knowledge and experience to put a motive behind the caretaker’s behaviour. Without his insights then the crew might not have escaped. Tim Russ is a brilliant actor and is forced to spend much of the next seven seasons holding back his talents and restricting his emotions. When you watch episodes like Meld and Riddles you can see precisely what this man can give as a full bloodied actor. And yet conversely his restraint as Tuvok means that some surprisingly powerful moments slip through. He’s a solid character here, reliable and professional. It’s those moments later where emotion peeps through that he impresses most.

Harry Kim is naive from the off and things really don’t improve much in seven years. Seriously, watch Caretaker and then watch Endgame. Nothing changes in seven years. I wouldn’t even say he looks older (which is entirely to his credit) but he certainly as green at the end of the series as he is at the beginning, despite having expired several times along the way.

Robert Picardo’s Doctor is charismatic and unforgettable from the off. He comes at the point where the Ship is in pieces and the show needs a little levity and commands the screen. There’s early indications that he is going to steal this show, right from the off.

Strangely, given how much she would ultimately give to the show and how I think she gives some of the strongest performances I found Roxan Dawson a little hard to swallow in the pilot. She’s overplaying the Klingon aggression and would learn to very quickly turn it down when the show stops playing out on this kind of operatic scale and becomes confined to the ship. A bit of an ignored relationship on Voyager is that of Torres and Kim, who come from completely different worlds and yet find themselves working together throughout the series trying to get home. Here it is suggested, albeit quietly, that there is an attraction between them but that is instantly dropped in favour of a subtle, but pleasant friendship. He calls her ‘Maquis’ for a while and she calls him ‘Starfleet and I really like that touch.

Neelix is really rather fun in his first couple of scenes and you can see precisely the idea that they are going for with this rakish character. He’s part Artful Dodger, part Fagin. Both sweet and innocent looking and sly and cheating. Like Tom Paris, a lot of these darker, edgier qualities would quickly fall away but in those first handful of scenes he manages to amuse and entertain. He’s instantly a thorn in Tuvok’s side, which makes me chuckle because Russ is so stony faced and Phillips is doing everything he can to get him to crack. That’s a relationship that I have a real love/hate thing happening with. Occasionally it is beyond irritating and at other times it can be very satisfying. A bit like life really. When it comes to the bath scene, I would have drowned him rather than let him get out naked in from of me. Tuvok missed a trick there. Neelix is so rougish here. They should have stuck with that.

Of anyone to become the black sheep of the Start Trek family, the last person I would expect that to be is Jennifer Lien. Kes is introduced with great care here, hers is one of the bold new species that we meet in Caretaker and there is an entire subplot of Neelix hoodwinking Janeway in order to rescue her. She seems to come with a great deal of promise; a sweet, alien presence on the ship and whilst it was only touched on in a handful of episodes (Cold Fire, Before and After) her powers actually become a great source of enticement and fear on the ship. Lien herself is understated and can really deliver the goods when needed but her life since leaving the show after three years involvement has become one of those ‘we don’t talk about it’ subjects.

Performance – Kate Mulgrew is the unsung heroine of Star Trek: Voyager. Any issues I might have had with the character of Janeway were mostly due to how inconsistently she was written and not Mulgrew’s performance; which is winning, charismatic, intelligent and every inch the leading lady. There is no doubt about who is in charge on this show. When Mulgrew talks about her experiences in the early days of shooting Voyager and how the suits were there on set every single day waiting for her (as a woman) to slip up or to give them some reason to question why she had been chosen for the part, it makes her commanding performance even more impressive. Other actors would crumbled to have had the weight of an entire show on their shoulders and the expectation of the behind the scenes suits to fail. She’s introduced brilliantly, hands on hips, showing up at an internment facility and essentially arranging a prison break with her authority. It’s fascinating to see what ties Janeway has to her life in the Alpha Quadrant (her boyfriend and puppies) so we can understand what a personal blow being trapped in the Delta Quadrant will be. Throughout she is the most imposing presence in the show; occasionally amusing but more often very to the point, incisive and unapologetic in her approach. I think in our heart of hearts we all want Janeway to chew us out at one point in our lives. I’m so pleased that Janeway’s most dubious decision here involves her entirely dismissing the Prime Directive. I remember punching the air when I first saw this. Odd, given how much she uses the professional weight of the Prime Directive in the future. The crew should mention how she destroyed the array and changed the balance of power in this Quadrant every time she gets out the rulebook.

I have a real issue with how this show abandoned one of its greatest strengths over time – the relationship between Janeway and Tuvok. It is barely touched upon when Seven of Nine joins but as exemplified by the scene where Janeway confides in him in Caretaker at how badly she wants to get her crew home, it is a relationship with weight and substance that really deserved to be nurtured. Each Captain seemed to have a long-term friend as part of their crew. Picard and Beverley danced around each other brilliantly. Sisko and Dax had one of the most touching relationships in all of Star Trek. Kirk and Bones always had each other’s backs whilst digging at each other’s weaknesses. Janeway and Tuvok are unique, a relationship between a male security officer and a female captain. It's the time where she gets to be vulnerable and it is a relationship that throws up some surprises (Prime Factors, Meld). It’s just not given enough love. It could have been one of the greats, instead it is one of the most frustrating. Her ‘I’m going to get you home to your family’ scene is stunningly played by both actors. Go check out the alternative take played by Bujold and you can see how ligneous this might have been.

Great Dialogue – ‘Captain, there’s something out there!’ ‘I need a better description than that, Mr Kim!’
‘It’s a fine crew, and I’ve got to get them home.’

Production – I think Voyager has the best title sequence and music of the four Berman era shows. They have clearly poured some money and time into making this look and sound as impressive as possible. The title music has the same poetry as DS9’s but with an added suggestion mystery and magic that is bolstered by the striking visuals of Voyager passing through nebulas, asteroid fields and ice planets. No wonder people were excited. I remember everybody getting so excited about the design of Voyager at the time and it is sleek and interesting…but that is mostly because from the top it looks like a toilet seat. The Defiant came along at the same time and Voyager didn’t have a hope.

Star Trek is obsessed about introducing beings with incredible powers in its pilot episodes. In Encounter at Farpoint it was the giant space jellyfish that were in love. In Emissary it was the Prophets. Caretaker is named after the being in question and it offers a visually spectacular alternative to the shipbound scenes that Voyager permeates. I’m not sure if the sequences in the sticks of America are particularly intelligently written (in fact I’m certain they are adhering to some appalling cliches) but there is something fresh and stimulating about the sunny location work and how the scenes turn slowly more sinister. It is pushing that ‘into the unknown’ Trek vibe in a highly entertaining way. The sequence of the old man strumming his banjo and talking wistfully about why he brought them from the Alpha Quadrant is both touching and bizarre. And how effective is the dreamlike atmosphere when Torres and Kim wake up in the Ocampan hospital? It’s like we have crossed over into The Twilight Zone.

I’m not sure it marries up at all with the film work but I absolutely adore the mid 90s matte paintings that TNG, DS9 and Voyager would touch up with effects work. It looks so much more artful and impressive than CGI. The Ocampan underground base looks magical.

Money. Money. Money. How stylish do the sequences where we meet the Kazon look? The production team are going all out to give this a cinematic look and so we head out into the desert and fill it full of extras in sub-Klingon makeup and add a bronze lens to tart it up. It stresses the heat, which ties into the lack of water in this region of space but more importantly it looks unlike anything we have ever seen in Trek before.

It's worth noting that at this point in the game that both Robert Beltran and Garrett Wang are absolutely beautiful. That is all. So is Chakotay’s Maquis aide who beams onto Voyager with him but we never see him again, unfortunately.

Best moment – The scene where Chakotay finds out that Tuvok is a traitor opens out some real tension between the two of them and the Chakotay and Paris too. The former is basically ignored but the latter is given some consideration in season two.

Chakotay’s kamikaze mission to destroy the Kazon ship. Genuinely his greatest moment in the entire run. I love a man with balls.

Worst moment – Sometimes I wonder if I am invested in the wrong show because I honestly couldn’t have given a damn about Voyager’s bio-neural circuitry that seemed to be on everybody’s lips. Technobabble really doesn’t rev my engine and it is probably a good thing that I didn’t get too het up about it because the only really memorable thing that happens to the gel packs is the when it gets attacked by a load of stinky cheese in a particularly mundane episode.

I wish they hadn’t done that – Had Voyager not pursued the Maquis ship into the Badlands there is a strong possibility that Tuvok might have had to remain undercover as a terrorist for quite some time. Imagine that because it is exactly the sort of twist that Discovery likes to play about with. A character introduced as one thing (say a Starfleet Captain) and is later revealed to be something quite different (say a mirror universe counterpart). Had the season played out differently and there had been scenes on Maquis ship in the Delta Quadrant and Voyager in the Alpha Quadrant attempting to get them home…then halfway through the first season once they have been pulled across space the rug could have been pulled out from underneath the audience with the twists that Tuvok has been a Federation spy all along. Instead the show wastes that twist quite early on into its first episode, which is a bit of a damp squib. I don’t think Trek was ready to have a show split across two ships even for a brief time into its run so it needed creators with more nuts to go for this approach…but it could have been great.

I really like the initial Doctor who somehow has an even bigger attitude problem than the EMH! I wish he had been able to stick around for a while, in cahoots with the EMH. Then we could have polished him off before the end of the first season and Picardo could have reigned supreme. Like Pulaski, I really love the idea of a crabby Doctor on board.

DS9 opened with a pilot that was full of technobabble, which was entirely unrepresentative of the series ahead. Voyager did too, and it was far more honest about the show it was going to be.

So much of this episode is about setting a mood, creating fresh tension, full of exciting incident…it’s a shame that at the eleventh hour the climax should involve climbing a staircase for ten minutes. Eventually the money runs out.

A reason to watch this episode again – The amount of promise that this episode held was above and beyond that of any other Trek pilot and whether the series managed to live up to that promise depends on how much you think the creators fulfilled the enticing ideas on display. A ship lost in uncharted space. A crew consisting of Starfleet officers and Maquis terrorists. Fresh aliens on board. New races to explore. Supplies and morale on the wane. Regardless of what I think of Voyager as a whole, Caretaker is a superb piece of drama that assembles a compelling cast of characters and traps them all together in a dangerous, unknowable space and watches them improvise. Whoever conjured up this premise deserves plenty of kudos as it is a stunning idea. The first 45 minutes of Caretaker are practically flawless as they introduce one terrific character after another and conjure up an atmosphere of excitement, mystery and adventure. There’s a real attempt to do some daring things like killing off characters that looked set to be regulars and to abandon the Alpha Quadrant for good. The latter half feels more like conventional Trek with the introduction of the Ocampa, Neelix and the Kazon but two of those are handled very well and the other is promising, if not inspiring. Clearly a huge amount of money has been thrown at this production and the visuals are quite breath taking in places and still hold up today whilst at other points it looks endearingly mid-90s. I want to give this full marks for being quite audacious and so dynamic from the start but there are a few niggles that hold it back from perfection (Harry Kim is there, and Neelix is fairly annoying from the off…although I think that is supposed to be the idea!) but as a pilot for a new Trek series it really does hit it out of the park. Here’s to seven more seasons of bold, uncompromising television. Or not. We’ll see.

****1/2 out of *****

Clue for tomorrows episode -