[Christopher Halsey]

EPISODE DISCUSSION

Caretaker
Original Air Date: 16 January 1995
Series: Voyager
Episode: 1x01/02

SUMMARY
The newly commissioned Intrepid class starship U.S.S. Voyager travels to the Badlands in search of a missing Maquis raider and is flung into the remote Delta Quadrant by a powerful entity known as The Caretaker.

"We're alone - in an uncharted part of the galaxy. We've already made some friends here... and some enemies. We have no idea of the dangers we're going to face. But one thing is clear: both crews are going to have to work together if we're to survive." - Kathryn Janeway

DISCUSSION
This week we'll be discussing the first episode of Star Trek: Voyager, Caretaker.

Did you watch the episode when it first aired or later? What were your thoughts on there being a new Star Trek show so soon after Deep Space Nine had begun? What were your thoughts on the new cast? What did you think of the Intrepid class? How do you think it rates against the other first episodes?

[Mark Okuda]

Well i did watch Voyager when it first aired. It was the show that launched the UPN network ( which was then merged with The WB ten years later to be come The CW). I had no problem with Voyager running along side DS9, since DS9 also ran along side TNG, The more Trek the merrier. I liked the idea of a female captain and that she had to merge maquis and former starfleet members together with her crew. I really liked The EMH having to be the CMO. The Interpid class was interesting to me. With the nacelles that moved into place to enter warp, bio-neual gel packs. I put it first among my pilot episodes compared to "Farpoint" and "Emissary".

[Christopher Halsey]

I really enjoyed Caretaker myself. I thought the opening third did a good job of introducing several of the key characters and I liked the brief crossover with DS9, Kim and Quark was definitely a highlight here. I do think it was a bit of a surprise and possibly a missed opportunity that Robert Duncan McNeill didn't reprise his role of Nicholas Locarno from The Next Generation. The fact that they introduced the Maquis before Voyager was defintely a good decision.

The rest of the episode was quite nice introducing a few new races although with the exception of the Caretaker none of the aliens seemed particularly alien other than their technology being far inferior to that of the Federation.

I liked the ending with Jane way being forced to chose whether to get her crew home or prevent the Kazon getting their hands on advanced and dangerous technology. It always bugged me that they had the ability to reprogram the array to send them home but apparently couldn't rig an explosive to destroy the array after they had used it.

I quite liked the ship design of Voyager itself but it always kind of bugged me that it didn't quite fit in with the TNG era or TNG movie era ship designs, that makes sense given when it was made but the lack of consistency always made it seem out of place.

For an opening episode it definitely did a good job and it's probably one of the strongest first episodes for a Star Trek show both in terms of entertainment and set up.

[Dark]

The concept was interesting, and I never liked DS9 when the main storyline took off. (I don't watch TV consistently, so having an actual long story-arc meant I could no longer follow what was going on. Same issue with X-Files.) As such, it didn't really conflict with anything for me.

Regardless, Caretaker caught my attention, even if I found the subsequent seasons to be rather variable in quality.

[Three of Seven]

Part of me would have liked to have seen a bit more from the original crew of Voyager, like the CMO and XO, there just wasn't a feeling of loss when members of the crew you only knew for minutes had died. I did like how it tied in with Deep Space 9 and maintained through the series, references were made to events that were going on. Caretaker as an episode was very much in the middle for me, it's hard to have a dramatic opening when you don't care about anyone yet.

[Bridger]

The fact that they introduced the Maquis before Voyager was defintely a good decision.

They created the Maquis in DS9 for Voyager.

[Tain]

They created the Maquis in DS9 for Voyager.

I thought TNG created the Maquis for DS9. The Ro story line in season 7?


As for Voyager, I remember begging my mother to get the UPN channel so I could watch Voyager.

I loved the starfleet story line, but I never liked the addition of the Maquis crew or the addition of Nelix and Kes.

I was also disappointed they couldn't get the rights to the Nicolas Locarno character, and decided to make a carbon copy and call him Tom Paris (even with the same actor!)

[Avenger]

It was a great episode with A poor reason for why the caretaker lobbed ships from all over the galaxy!

[ForTheGamer]

While the concept of Voyager was good, the execution of this episode was quite sour. I will however say it gave us a good new ship in the Intrepid class, it built a fairly nice crew and idea of where it wanted to go.

Basically, the first episode showed exactly how Voyager would be during its entire run. A great concept, but the execution was shoddy.

[rybrarian]

It was pretty good for an extended pilot. It did a feel a little more "we need to fill out two hours" more than TNG or DS9. There are parts that drag- in particular anything involving the array simulation of the farmers/hicks. This episode did sort of promise a dynamic that would be more interesting, with non-Starfleet people on a Starfleet ship... That concept never really paid off, mainly because Chakotay conformed to his First Officer role pretty much immediately after. I also think it's worth watching to hear Janeway say dramatically full impulse power! That happens at one point.

[Bridger]

I thought TNG created the Maquis for DS9. The Ro story line in season 7?

Read the Background information about the Maquis here

[Steamrunner]

I haven't been impressed with any of the modern pilots, from TNG right through to Enterprise. I felt Caretaker did a reasonable job of setting up the Starfleet / Maquis dynamic, though it did seem awfully similar to the Starfleet / Bajoran premise of DS9, which went from "We don't want you on our station" to "You're my bestest friend" waaaay too quickly for my liking. At least Voyager dragged the conflict (between the crews) out a bit longer.

Highlights of the episode for me were the Doctor and MOVING WARP NACELLES! Can't remember how many times I rewound the opening titles just to check that they actually did move. So sad.

Didn't like the Ocampa (specifically Kes), or the Kazon-Nostrils.

[Christopher Halsey]

I felt Caretaker did a reasonable job of setting up the Starfleet / Maquis dynamic, though it did seem awfully similar to the Starfleet / Bajoran premise of DS9, which went from "We don't want you on our station" to "You're my bestest friend" waaaay too quickly for my liking. At least Voyager dragged the conflict (between the crews) out a bit longer.

Personally I found it to be the other way around with DS9 handling the different agendas better than Voyager.

Other than a couple of episodes the only thing that really served to remind you that the Maquis were different is that there was always "an old Maquis trick" for every situation (in the event infinite supplies and torpedoes couldn't resolve a situation). The Maquis were basically always on the same side as the Starfleet crew and the main source of conflict (such as it was) seemed to be the occasional disagreement on how to do something rather than what to do, where as in DS9 you had a larger cast with a wider range of agendas which seemed to conflict much more often, there seemed to be more Bajoran focused episodes in DS9 than there were Maquis-centric episodes than there were in Voyager.