Star Trek: Voyager: Difference between revisions

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{{quote|"''There are three things to remember about being a Starship Captain. Keep your shirt tucked in, [[Going Down with the Ship|go down with the ship]], and [[The Men First|never abandon a member of your crew]].''"|'''Captain Janeway'''}}
{{quote|"''There are three things to remember about being a Starship Captain. Keep your shirt tucked in, [[Going Down with the Ship|go down with the ship]], and [[The Men First|never abandon a member of your crew]].''"|'''Captain Janeway'''}}


The third 'new generation' [[Star Trek]], it ran for seven seasons, from January 1995 through May 2001. In the first episode, the [[Cool Starship|USS Voyager]] was [[The Call Knows Where You Live|pulled across the galaxy by an alien device]]. Janeway destroyed the device during a battle rather than let it be misused, stranding her ship seventy-five years' travel time from home.
The third 'new generation' [[Star Trek]], it ran for seven seasons, from January 1995 through May 2001. In the first episode, the [[Cool Starship|''USS Voyager'']] was [[The Call Knows Where You Live|pulled across the galaxy by an alien device]]. Janeway destroyed the device during a battle rather than let it be misused, stranding her ship seventy-five years' travel time from home.


For the next seven seasons, the Voyager looked for a shortcut [[The Homeward Journey|back to Earth]] while dodging or defeating the assortment of [[Aliens and Monsters]]. They even crossed paths with a pair of Ferengi that had been zapped to the Delta Quadrant back in ''[[Star Trek: The Next Generation|Next Generation]]'', at least one Romulan, and even another Starfleet vessel, also kidnapped by the Caretaker and trying to get back to the Federation.
For the next seven seasons, the Voyager looked for a shortcut [[The Homeward Journey|back to Earth]] while dodging or defeating the assortment of [[Aliens and Monsters]]. They even crossed paths with a pair of Ferengi that had been zapped to the Delta Quadrant back in ''[[Star Trek: The Next Generation|Next Generation]]'', at least one Romulan, and even another Starfleet vessel, also kidnapped by the Caretaker and trying to get back to the Federation.
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The show was a frustrating mix of genuinely good entertainment and "safe" old [[Star Trek]] stand-bys. Part of this was a predominance with episodes of the [[Spotlight-Stealing Squad]] between Seven-Of-Nine and The Doctor. The lackluster response to ''Voyager'' was actually a serious consideration to hold off on further [[Star Trek]] series ([[Executive Meddling|which was demanded anyway]]). But it was also the near-magical power of the technology in this series that made them decide upon a less-evolved [[Prequel]] series in ''[[Enterprise]]''.
The show was a frustrating mix of genuinely good entertainment and "safe" old [[Star Trek]] stand-bys. Part of this was a predominance with episodes of the [[Spotlight-Stealing Squad]] between Seven-Of-Nine and The Doctor. The lackluster response to ''Voyager'' was actually a serious consideration to hold off on further [[Star Trek]] series ([[Executive Meddling|which was demanded anyway]]). But it was also the near-magical power of the technology in this series that made them decide upon a less-evolved [[Prequel]] series in ''[[Enterprise]]''.


That said, ''Voyager'' was notable for taking on stories and subjects that even its very daring sister series, ''Deep Space Nine'', didn't touch—the crew encountered a Starfleet vessel that was willing to totally discard its Federation principles for the sake of getting home, faced the Borg on their home turf, and even tackled the moral and ethical implications of assisting in a suicide.
That said, ''Voyager'' was notable for taking on stories and subjects that even its very daring sister series, ''[[Star Trek: Deep Space Nine|Deep Space Nine]]'', didn't touch—the crew encountered a Starfleet vessel that was willing to totally discard its Federation principles for the sake of getting home, faced the Borg on their home turf, and even tackled the moral and ethical implications of assisting in a suicide.


''Voyager'' is known throughout ''Trek'' fandom as a series that featured an episode so ''incredibly'' sub-par that both the fans ''and the producers'' unofficially struck it from canon after it aired (unless you count an offhand comment in a later episode...which ''[[Canon Discontinuity|officially]]'' strikes it from canon).
''Voyager'' is known throughout ''Trek'' fandom as a series that featured an episode so ''incredibly'' sub-par that both the fans ''and the producers'' unofficially struck it from canon after it aired (unless you count an offhand comment in a later episode...which ''[[Canon Discontinuity|officially]]'' strikes it from canon).
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Revision as of 15:21, 2 April 2017

The original cast (L-R): Neelix, Chakotay, Kim, Kes (above), Janeway, Paris, Tuvok, The Doctor, and Torres.
"There are three things to remember about being a Starship Captain. Keep your shirt tucked in, go down with the ship, and never abandon a member of your crew."
—Captain Janeway

The third 'new generation' Star Trek, it ran for seven seasons, from January 1995 through May 2001. In the first episode, the USS Voyager was pulled across the galaxy by an alien device. Janeway destroyed the device during a battle rather than let it be misused, stranding her ship seventy-five years' travel time from home.

For the next seven seasons, the Voyager looked for a shortcut back to Earth while dodging or defeating the assortment of Aliens and Monsters. They even crossed paths with a pair of Ferengi that had been zapped to the Delta Quadrant back in Next Generation, at least one Romulan, and even another Starfleet vessel, also kidnapped by the Caretaker and trying to get back to the Federation.

Early on even the producers found a certain problem with the premise, in that the series had a singular goal of returning home. That meant while there was plenty of "Strange New Worlds" to discover, they were always looking home, and constantly missing opportunities for shortcuts. Another problem was the use of Infinite Supplies. Early in the series, many fans quickly dubbed Voyager the HMS Reset Button; the conclusion of almost every episode usually resulted in a return to status quo ante.

Interestingly, the show suffered from such inconsistent writing that even the actors complained; Kate Mulgrew mentioned that her character (the ship's captain) was never portrayed the same way from episode to episode (causing Janeway to switch between upholding the Prime Directive 'no matter the cost' in some episodes, and having no problem with breaking it whenever it proves even a minor inconvenience in others), and Robert Beltran's notoriously wooden acting has often been attributed to his contempt for the writing of his character and the plots, which he's expressed in several interviews. At least some of this has been ascribed to Executive Meddling on the part of Paramount, hampering the production team on building a stronger show.

The show was a frustrating mix of genuinely good entertainment and "safe" old Star Trek stand-bys. Part of this was a predominance with episodes of the Spotlight-Stealing Squad between Seven-Of-Nine and The Doctor. The lackluster response to Voyager was actually a serious consideration to hold off on further Star Trek series (which was demanded anyway). But it was also the near-magical power of the technology in this series that made them decide upon a less-evolved Prequel series in Enterprise.

That said, Voyager was notable for taking on stories and subjects that even its very daring sister series, Deep Space Nine, didn't touch—the crew encountered a Starfleet vessel that was willing to totally discard its Federation principles for the sake of getting home, faced the Borg on their home turf, and even tackled the moral and ethical implications of assisting in a suicide.

Voyager is known throughout Trek fandom as a series that featured an episode so incredibly sub-par that both the fans and the producers unofficially struck it from canon after it aired (unless you count an offhand comment in a later episode...which officially strikes it from canon).

However, Voyager is also widely considered to have the most beautiful and evocative theme music the franchise has ever produced (albeit not the most iconic; that honor goes to TOS and TNG). It has been said that Voyager's theme is the music to what the show should have been.

If you want to read something like an Abridged Series or Mystery Science Theater 3000 version, try Five Minute Voyager.

Want reviews of this? No problem, just ask Chuck Sonnenburg at SF Debris!

And see also the Star Trek: Voyager Relaunch for the show's continuation in novel form.

The first game in the Star Trek Elite Force video game series takes place in this show, and the actors from the show provide their voices for their counterparts (except Jeri Ryan as Seven-Of-Nine, until an expansion pack including her was released).

Tropes used in Star Trek: Voyager include:

Trope-based episodes


Tropes A-G

  • Agent Scully: Played with in "Blink of an Eye", with two scientists trying to discover if there's anyone on board Voyager, which has been in their sky for their civilisation's entire history due to Year Inside, Hour Outside. The Scully doubts there's anyone on board, but when the Mulder asks why he's on the mission in the first place, he adds that he doubts everything - including his own doubts.
  • A God Am I: Invoked by a group of Ferengi who ended up getting stuck in the Delta Quadrant in a similar fashion that Voyager did. They spent no time tricking and manipulating a planet's native race to start following the Rules of Acquisition and making them believe that the Ferengi were gods and prophets to the gods.
  • AI Is a Crapshoot: If the Doctor's programming isn't getting messed with, then it's a sentient Weapon of Mass Destruction or holograms with unsatisfactory employer relations who are causing the problem.
  • All the Myriad Ways, leading to Harry Kim becoming his own Suspiciously Similar Substitute.
  • Alternate Universe
  • Exclusively Evil: The Kazon, quasi-Expies of the Klingons of earlier Trek series (minus the Honor Before Reason).
  • Always Save the Girl: Janeway's willingness to risk everything to save Seven of Nine was to prove fertile ground for J/7 Slash Fic writers.
  • And I Must Scream: In the early episodes, the Doctor couldn't shut off his own program. This annoyed him when people would just leave the room without deactivating him. In one instance, he specifically requests that, should the crew choose to abandon the ship for any reason, they take the time to shut him off before they leave. If they didn't, he'd be stuck in Sickbay until power failed, completely alone.
  • Another Man's Terror: Paris has this forced upon him in "Ex Post Facto".
  • Ascended Extra: Painfully averted by Lt. "Extra-Man" Ayala. Ayala appears in 120 episodes out of 167, in all seven seasons. He speaks in exactly four of those episodes, and is only credited twice, never with a name. The mere act of establishing a name for the actor took some detective work. He's achieved a certain amount of Memetic Badass status among the fandom for simply managing to survive all seven seasons.
  • Attack Pattern Alpha: Played with by the Doctor in "Message in a Bottle", when he needs to tell the computer to execute an attack and 'Attack Pattern Alpha' is the only attack pattern he can think of. (Luckily for him, it does turn out to be a real attack pattern.)
  • Back for the Dead: Poor Joe Carey in the final season. He reappears after a long absence only to be the last crew member killed before Voyager makes it home a few episodes later. Take That, Audience!
  • Babies Ever After: Final episode - Paris and Torres' last-minute baby, Miral.
  • Belligerent Sexual Tension: The romance between Tom Paris and B'Elanna Torres is every inch this trope.
  • Berserk Button:
    • For the love of all things holy, enemies must leave Janeway's crew alone!
    • Any character causing harm to Neelix in front of Kes tends to end up bleeding from the eyeballs.
    • Neelix often acts as this to Tuvok. You can tell its taking every bit of his Vulcan restraint not to strangle him. In fact, in one episode, he actually does so... or seems to anyway, only to then utter the words "Computer, end holodeck program."
  • Beware the Nice Ones: Harry Kim in "The Chute".
    • Neelix in some episodes, particularly "Repentance". He may seem like your average annoying or fun-loving Cloudcuckoolander, but do not mistake him for an idiot.
      • And then consider for a moment that whenever something goes horribly wrong and Tuvok is no longer capable of acting as security chief, it's always Neelix who is promoted to the position. That should tell you something about him.
        • ... which runs into Fridge Brilliance when you remember the episode where Tuvok and Neelix were transporter-accident-melded into one being (Tuvix) -- what's to say Neelix didn't retain some of Tuvok's tactical knowledge?
    • Kes is a very nice, polite young woman. She's also an immensely powerful psychic that can boil your blood by accident, and when someone takes over her body, she messes with him for several minutes of perceived time, only for him to wake up and realize that maybe a second passed.
    • "Fury" takes this to its extreme limit, where a vengeful older-Kes powerwalks down a corridor that explodes from her mere presence.
  • Big Bad: Maje Culluh & Seska for the first two seasons, the Borg Queen for the last few.
  • The Big Race: In one episode, Tom and B'Elanna participate in a race with the Delta Flyer.
  • Bizarre Alien Biology: Kes (nine year lifespan, telepath, gives birth from a sac on her back, and when she reaches sexual maturity you rub her feet until her tongue swells up), Species 8472 (tripedal, five sexes, densely-coded DNA, emits a biogenic field that blocks scanning, and has an immune system that can stop Borg nanoprobes). But nothing tops the cytoplasmic lifeform in "Nothing Human". The Universal Translator can't understand its language, the tricorder can't comprehend its biology, it controls a spaceship via biochemical secretions, can leap through a forcefield in a single bound, and uses B'Elanna Torres as an emergency life-support system.
  • Body Horror: The phage and Paris's transformation in Threshold.
  • Bond One-Liner: Janeway delivers one in "Year of Hell" just before ramming her severely crippled ship into the timeline-altering weapon ship: "Time's up."
  • BLAM Episode: "Threshold".
  • The Blank: In "The Fight", Chakotay fights a being from a region of chaotic space; the being is wearing a boxing hoodie that hides his face, when the alien is finally revealed, he has no face, only a starfield.
  • Brick Joke: Chakotay's bottle of cider in "Shattered."
    • The holgraphic Doctor's final name Joe in Admiral Janeway's perceived Bad Future in "End Game". Averted when Elderly Janeway posthumously made for a Good Future... maybe.
  • Broken Pedestal: A variation occurs with Doctor Zimmerman in "Life-Line". The Federation eventually came to regard the EMH program as a joke due to their poor bedside manner, writing them off in the end and repurposing the entire line into miners (the fact this makes them a slave-race is ignored), leaving Zimmerman bitter and disillusioned that his greatest creation is now serving as manual labour, all sharing his face. Naturally he's not too happy when The Doctor shows up to attempt to treat him.
  • Caffeine Bullet Time: Strangely averted...

Janeway: Coffee: the finest organic suspension ever devised. It's got me through the worst of the last three years. I beat the Borg with it.

  • Calling the Old Man Out: The Doctor does this in "Life-Line" to his creator. Doctor Zimmerman constantly belittles him and dismisses his program as a failed experiment, eventually getting furious and demanding to know why the Doctor is trying to treat his terminal illness. The Doctor furiously counters back that he designed him that way and whether he likes it or not, he is a Doctor and he will treat him.
  • The Cast Showoff: Jeri Ryan (Seven of Nine) sang on the show a couple of times. One episode even featured a duel with the Doctor and Seven singing a duet, in harmony.
  • Canon Discontinuity: The producers have stated that "Threshold" isn't canon...
    • Discontinuity Nod: ...and later on Paris notes that he's never traveled in transwarp. To explicitly say in the show that it isn't considered canon.
    • "Deuterium? You can get that anywhere!" is mentioned in one episode, seasons after the "running out of deuterium" stuff.
  • Captain Ersatz: Originally the writers wanted to include the guest character of "Cadet Nicholas Locarno" from the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "The First Duty" as a regular. To avoid paying royalties to the writers of that episode—and because Locarno was seen as fundamentally unredeemable—a Captain Ersatz in the person of Tom Paris was created. Not only do both characters have a very similar Backstory and personality, both are played by Robert Duncan McNeill as well.
  • Character Development: Limited to Seven, the Doctor, Kes, and a tiny smattering for Neelix and B'Elanna. Everyone else ended the show with pretty much the personality they came in with.
    • Tom Paris started out an angry ex con with a chip on his shoulder and ended the series settled, reliable, and a hero being nurse, ace pilot, shuttle designer and a father with B'Elanna. Though his playfulness and older brother type relationship with Harry were persistent throughout the series.
  • Chekhov's Gun: The neural transciever in "Scorpion". The Borg attempt to use them on Janeway and Tuvok in order to link their thoughts to the hive mind; Chakotay later uses one to link his thoughts with Seven of Nine to distract her.
    • In "Revulsion," on a Serosian starship, the holgram Dejaren is serving Torres a tray of food when he nearly steps on a considerable power cord exposed at one end. Torres had to warn him to "Watch out!" Later, when the hologram turned homicidal and corners Torres, she uses said power cord to destroy him.
  • Clip Show: Averted in "Before & After" (with Kes) and "Shattered" (with Chakotay and a first season Janeway) -- the protagonist visits various time periods during Voyager's journey without any actual footage from the episodes in question.
    • The episode "The Fight" may not be a true clip show, but it at least deserves an honorable mention. The ship is stuck in "chaotic space," the aliens which inhabit it communicate to Chakotay in his mind by splicing together words taken from other crew members from earlier in the episode.
  • Combat Pragmatist: After earlier being outsmarted by the Equinox's EMH, The Doctor wins round two by simply telling the computer to delete it's programme.
  • Communications Officer: Harry Kim got a battlefield promotion to chief communications officer, despite only being (perpetually) an ensign.
  • Converging Stream Weapon: Species 8472 has a weapon consisting of several ships that fire simultaneously to create one of these.
  • Crapsack Quadrant: The Delta Quadrant.
  • Creepy Child: Suspiria in "Cold Fire", the Borg children on their first appearance, Naomi Wildman in a nightmare sequence in "Dark Frontier" and, it was hinted on a couple of occasions, Kes ("Cold Fire", "Warlord" and "Fury").
  • Crossover: Barclay and Troi from "Star Trek: The Next Generation"; Quark from "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine"; Captain Sulu from "Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country". Captain Geordi LaForge in the episode "Timeless"; Riker in "Death Wish".
  • Cute Monster Girl: Denara Pel, and pre-catsuit Seven of Nine.
  • Dance of Romance: Doc and Seven get one in "Someone to Watch Over Me"
  • The Danza: Kate Mulgrew was hired as a last minute replacement for Nicole Janeway (played by Geneviève Bujold) and she asked to have the first name changed to her full first name, Kathryn.
    • Janeway's first name had originally been Katherine (note the different spelling) while the series was in development, but was changed to Nicole when the French-Canadian Bujold was cast in the role. The creators asked Mulgrew which of the two she would prefer, and she opted for a slightly altered version of the originally planned name.
  • Dead Guy, Junior: Final episode "End Game" - Paris and Torres' last-minute baby, Miral, hence: Babies Ever After, after B'Elanna's dead mom.
  • Death Is Cheap: The entire crew was offed twice. Every major character died at least once. The Harry Kim that made it home isn't even the original Harry Kim!
    • To clarify, an anomaly of the week duplicated the ship. Which leads to an even more disturbing alternative - the only "originals" who made it home were Harry, Naomi Wildman, and Seven of Nine. The crew never figured out which of the twin Voyagers was the original ship (if either one was). Harry and Naomi were the only two from the "other" ship who survived, while Seven joined the crew long after this incident.
  • Depending on the Writer: It's arguable that one reason for the Personality Of The Week portrayal of Captain Janeway was that writers were conflicted between making the first female Trek captain 'strong' versus the desire for her to appear 'feminine'. Thus Janeway would veer between Action Girl, Self-Destruct-The-Ship-Crazy, Team Mom, Staunch Leader, Noble Sufferer, Outrageous Flirt, Celibate Heroine, etc, etc, etc, much to actor Kate Mulgrew's irritation.
    • This is frequently contrasted with how Sisko was treated in Deep Space Nine. He wasn't "the black Captain" the way Janeway was "the female Captain", he was just The Captain.
    • Some early interviews and show-related material indicate that the Janeway character was intensely examined, specifically to prevent Janeway from becoming nothing more than an ultra-feminist caricature; at the same time, a balance had to be found so that Janeway could maintain her femininity while in command. Hence, Janeway prefers being addressed as 'Captain' over 'sir' or 'ma'am' (which acknowledges that she is in command, but avoids gender politics entirely).
  • Deprogramming
  • Determinator: Played with throughout the series, not in terms of an individual continuing despite horrific injuries, but with Janeway's let's-get-home-at-all-costs philosophy, which is switched on and off depending on whether it was raining the day the writers started on each script. See "Year of Hell" comparing the first timeline change, and consider how they could have ended up in that situation, to the last scene and the "Thanks, we'll go around" attitude.
    • Also bear in mind this must be a regular bridge conversation. "How long until we get home?" "At current speeds 70 years." "Excellent we'll contin... Oh Shiny" Having just spotted a random celestial phenomena out the window.
  • Did Not Do the Research: Star Trek science is generally pretty shaky, and usually capable of being filed under "Advanced Technology" or Suspension of Disbelief. However, in one instance the ship escapes a black hole by finding a crack in the event horizon. This makes about as much sense as being able to drive 100 MPH down an American highway, and not get arrested, because you found a crack in the speed limit.
  • Ditto Aliens
  • Do Androids Dream?: Quite a few (brilliantly done) episodes revolving around the holographic Doctor, including an episode where the Doctor simultaneously ponders this trope while doing it literally.
  • Do-Anything Robot: Seven's Borg implants served whatever purpose the plot needed them to, and her nanoprobes were like Swiss Army molecules.
  • Does This Remind You of Anything?: At the beginning of the episode "Coda", Janeway and Neelix are speaking in ambiguous terms about some sort of group event Neelix organized the previous night. With lines like "You were really good last night" and "It's been a long time for me" going back and forth between them, it seems like they're talking about an orgy. It's not until the next scene that it's revealed they were talking about a talent show.
  • Don't Explain the Joke In "Workforce" This is played straight from a brainwashed Tuvok.
  • Downer Ending: In "Course: Oblivion", the crew appears to start dying mysteriously one by one. It's quickly determind the "crew" is actually the copies from the episode "Demon". When they realize what they are, they make a beeline back to the Demon Planet. They didn't make it. To add insult to injury, the real Voyager passes through their vaporized remains without a clue.
  • Early Installment Weirdness: The "water is really rare in the Delta Quadrant" thing. Basically only shows up in the pilot... obviously intended to enhance the "lost in a wasteland" feel of the series, but someone apparently figured out almost immediately that it would make Voyager's trip relatively effortless if they could just go around trading a few thousand gallons of replicated water for whatever they needed.
  • Electronic Speech Impediment: The computer on occasions. Also 'Satan's Robot' from "The Adventures of Captain Proton!"
  • Emotional Maturity Is Physical Maturity: The Doctor, and the Ocampa.
  • Enemy Mine: Voyager teams up with the Kazon Nistrum sect, the Borg Collective, the Hirogen and several other Villains of the Week, not always successfully. Was supposed to be the original concept of the series, but the Starfleet/Maquis conflict was watered down so much that later episodes based on this schism appear ridiculous.
  • Enemy Within: In one episode the Doctor tries to expand his program by incorporating personality aspects of various historical figures who possessed great minds. He failed to realize that he would also incorporate the darker sides of their psyches, and develops an evil Split Personality who takes Kes hostage.
  • Evil Versus Evil: The Borg vs. Species 8472
  • Evil Plan: Seska, a Big Bad fond of Railroading, is usually doing this.
  • Evolutionary Levels: The justification
  • Exactly What It Says on the Tin: Just have a look at the episode titles.
  • Executive Meddling:
    • Several scenes in the pilot had to be reshot because the studio vetoed Kate Mulgrew's hairstyle.
    • The divisions between the Starfleet and Maquis officers were originally going to be more pronounced, but after the pilot, the network asked for this to be changed. The divisions were made more minor in Season 1 and largely ignored afterwards.
  • Expanded Universe
  • Expositron 9000: The ship's computer.
  • Failsafe Failure
  • Failure Is the Only Option: There were several times the crew could have gotten back to the Alpha Quadrant but didn't, "False Profits" probably being the most egregious. The pilot is not actually a case of this, given that they would have needed several hours to bring the Array back online, which, given that they were under attack by Scary Dogmatic Aliens with a damaged ship and a sizable reduction in crew, probably made using the Array less than tenable (note what Tuvok says here: around 9:21). However, given the way a lot of characters acted in later episodes, either she didn't divulge this bit of information or the crew got disillusioned and rejected that excuse.
    • Averted in later seasons; while Voyager never gets back to Earth ( until the Grand Finale), it does get progressively closer to the alpha quadrant, with most of the crew's attempts to cut a few years off of the journey succeeding.
  • Fallen Hero: Captain Ransom of the "Equinox"
  • Fan Service Pack: Getting Captain Janeway to let her hair down.
  • Faster-Than-Light Travel: Voyager sought various means of getting home faster besides its already top-of-the-line warp drive, including transwarp, quantum slipstream technology, subspace corridors, and a graviton catapult which can catapult a vessel across space in the time it takes to say "catapult a vessel across space."
  • Feminist Fantasy: The only Star Trek series with a female captain, 3 other female regulars (Torres, Kes, Seven) and a female Big Bad (the Borg Queen).
    • With the caveat that only 2 of the other 3 female regulars were usually there at the same time, since Seven wasn't a regular until Kes left the ship.
    • Though Seven of Nine practically counts as two characters with all the focus she got during her time. Though its not really fair, plenty of fans have complained or at least joked that her years could be called "The Seven of Nine Show."
  • Final Solution: The Borg and "Species 8472" are trying to do this to each other. It's a war, but their goal is to exterminate each other's populations rather than achieving some kind of victory where the enemy's people still exists.
  • First Episode Spoiler
  • Foreshadowing: Many of the events depicted in "Year of Hell" are foreshadowed in "Before & After". This despite the fact that the character used to foreshadow the events (Kes) isn't there when they eventually happen.
  • Forgotten Phlebotinum
  • For Happiness: As the self-appointed "Morale Officer", the character Neelix is constantly trying to live up to this trope.
  • Four Lines, All Waiting: Primarily in season 1.
  • Full-Name Basis: Seven with Naomi Wildman.
    • Even funnier when Seven addresses her as "Naomi Wildman, subunit of Ensign Samantha Wildman."
      • Seven often introduces herself, especially early-on, by her full Borg designation: Seven of Nine, Tertiary Adjunct of Unimatrix 01.
  • Funny Background Event: In the early episode "The Cloud", The Doctor is on a viewscreen in the background giving information about a nebula, and then starts ranting about how the ship's presence is affecting it. Janeway "mutes" the viewscreen, then she and the other officers continue discussing about the nebula. At first, The Doctor continues ranting about the nebula, until he realizes he's on "mute". He gets annoyed and starts pacing around his office for a good minute and a half before Tom Paris informs Janeway that The Doctor is still on viewscreen. Janeway finally "un-mutes" him.
    • The same episode. Janeway hunts in the background for coffee while other main characters give exposition.
  • Future Imperfect: Despite Paris being the most knowledgeable crew member of Earth's 20th century history, when Voyager is sent back in time to Earth circa 1996, even he gets a few cultural references, phrases, and mannerisms wrong.
  • Gender Is No Object: Starfleet is supposed to be purely integrated with gender no hindrance to attaining any position. The other series didn't quite meet this lofty principle. It wasn't until this series that a leading female character was Captain (although female captains and admirals did appear in minor, one-shot background roles from The Next Generation onward.
    • Admiral Nechayev had a fair amount of screen time in 4 episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation and 1 of Deep Space Nine.
    • An unnamed woman was seen to be the captain of the USS Saratoga as of 1986's Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home.
    • Deep Space Nine was a step forward from the previous series with Kira and Dax being major strong that were also competent and Kai Winn becoming more prominent in later seasons (about the normal ratio of cast, but a lot more useful and dynamic than the female regulars of previous series).
  • Good-Looking Privates: Even after seven years in the Delta Quadrant, we still see plenty of crewmembers played by extras who are clearly in their early twenties.
  • G-Rated Drug: Janeway's coffee addiction is a Running Gag.

Janeway: "Coffee. Black."
Neelix: "But Captain, the replicators are-"
Janeway: "Neelix, listen to me VERY carefully, because I am only going to say this once: Coffee. Black."
Neelix: (serves coffee) "Now that I have your attention..."
Janeway: "Coffee first." (Gigantic Gulp)

    • Admiral Janeway questions why she ever gave it up in the final episode.
  • The Guards Must Be Crazy: With the exception of Tuvok, the only function of Voyager's security personnel is to stand in the formal 'at ease' position, waiting for the person they're guarding to stun them senseless.
    • Starfleet also has problems with doors. They still use a forcefield on the Brig, despite the many times we see it fail if the ship is under attack. This also doesn't excuse the fact that the one door they do have, the entrance doesn't even lock.

Tropes H-M

  • Half-Human Hybrid: B'Elanna Torres, Naomi Wildman. Neelix is also 1/8th Mylean, but this only crops up in one episode.
    • An argument could also be made for Seven, as she retains Borg implants even after being reclaimed from the collective.
  • Heroic Sociopath / Redemption Equals Death: Ensign Lon Suder (Brad Dourif) murders a coworker, and is locked in his quarters ("Meld"). During a siege of the ship ("Basics, Part 1 and 2"), he uses his murder skills to fight off the invaders, before finishing with a Heroic Sacrifice.
  • His Code Name Was Marty Stu: The Doctor wrote some horrifically painful holonovels where he saves the day over and over again. And lets not forget what happens when he tries to cultivate his own ability to daydream!
  • History Marches On: Used in-universe in "Living Witness". A society has ended up with an incredibly biased account of history when Voyager traversed their system hundreds of years before, depicting the crew as a gang of sadistic thugs and genocidal monsters. When a copy of the Doctor is encountered among some of the artifacts, he eventually manages to set the record straight, and influence the planet's two respective cultures to live in harmony.
  • The Homeward Journey
  • Humanity Ensues:
    • Seven of Nine started out as human, became a Borg as a kid, and was forcibly brought back down to human (more or less) by the crew of Voyager. While initially not happy about it (to say the least), Captain Janeway guided her through the process of rediscovering her humanity through time, patience, and care.
    • Also, it was impossible to communicate with Species 8472 before they started taking on human form, and afterwards we never saw them in their tripedal, purple-skinned, cross-pupilled Eyes of Gold form again.
  • Humans Are Morons: The episode "Virtuoso" introducedus to the Qomar, a Rubber Forehead Alien species highly dedicated to mathematics and sciences and far more advanced than the Federation, which the Qomar looks down upon in contempt. When the Doctor provides medical treatment for one of them, the Qomarian sarcastically asks if the process involves bloodletting. Even in an idealized future where humanity has overcome a good number of its flaws to become one of the most dominant space-fairing races, we're still finding aliens who think we're dumb and primitive.
  • Humans Are White: Averted; though there are no black humans among the main characters, there is a Native American human (played by a Latino actor who claims mestizo—part NA—ancestry), a human of Asian origins (actor Asian-American), B'Elanna's actress is Hispanic (and the character canonically has a Hispanic dad), and Tuvok is a black Vulcan.
    • Tuvok also marks the beginning of a wider aversion to this trope when it comes to Vulcans; apparently the writers realized that a sunny, arid planet would favor people with a lot of melanin (Well, melanin with some forehead wrinkles). After Tuvok's debut, every Vulcan depicted on screen was at least "bronzed" in appearance.
  • Hypochondria: A characteristic of Harry's Expy in "Author, Author".
  • Infant Immortality: Only in parallel-yet-simultaneous realities. Voyager is copied due to some strange phenomenon; newly-born Naomi Wildman dies and is replaced by the surviving copy from the doomed version of the ship.
  • Inferred Holocaust: See Terminally Dependent Society for possible implications of the fate of the Ocampans after the death of the Caretaker.
  • Infinite Supplies: Sometimes played infamously straight, sometimes completely ignored... Sometimes one in one episode and the other in another. Voyager is one of the worst offenders for this trope.
    • Actually done by the website Ex Astris Scientia in their Voyager episode guide; Voyager lost at between 10 and 17 shuttlecraft and one Delta Flyer, and used at least 93 photon torpedoes when an early episode explicitly states that they can hold a maximum of 40 and have no way to replace them. However, they routinely take on supplies - either by jerry-rigged self-purifying raw materials or buying them at friendly space stations ("Fair Trade" "Survival Instinct") - it isn't that hard to assume that SOMEONE in the delta quadrant can manufacture photon torpedoes or supply the equipment and parts necessary, with the same going for shuttlecraft.
    • How about the infinite Johnny Nobody crewmembers? The original crew compliment was 141 at the beginning of "Caretaker". "The 37's" gives the combined Maquis/Starfleet crew count as 152. And yet we see so many different background filling extras (in the canteen ALONE, besides anywhere else) that one has to wonder whether it was deliberate...
    • Well give them a break. They're not going to use the same hundred-odd background actors over a seven year series.
      • There were however consistent with Lt. "Extra-Man" Ayala who appeared in over 120 of the 168 episodes and all seven series as a former-Maquis tactical/security officer. Lt Carey also often appeared as a recurring extra in engineering before they killed him off.
  • Insane Troll Logic: Used by Seven of Nine in The Voyager Conspiracy, leading her to come to a different conclusion every time she looked over the same data.
  • Just Screw Q: At one point, Q hints that Voyager would get home a lot quicker if its captain formed a baby with him. As a feminist icon, Janeway rightly refuses to use her body as a bargaining chip. But in later episodes, so much emphasis was placed on how much she's willing to sacrifice to get her crew home that fans couldn't help but wonder why she didn't just boff the jerk.
    • Just screwing Q is one thing, and if was just that, Janeway would have likely done it, but having a child with him this way is something else entirely. Even Sci Fi Debris points this out, and this is the guy who consistently goes out of his way to paint Janeway as a Villain Protagonist.
  • Knight, Knave, and Squire: This type of relationship is present between Janeway, Paris and Kim with Squire Kim as the wet-behind-the-ears Ensign Newbie, Knave Paris as the pragmatist who's trying to influence Kim and Knight Janeway as the moral beacon for Kim and the rest of the crew.
  • Last-Minute Hookup: Seven and Chakotay. Regarded as a Crack Pairing by some fans as there had been no previous UST between the two (except in a holodeck fantasy); in fact the producers had even rejected the suggestion that this happen when Seven and Chakotay were stranded on a planet together only a couple of episodes before they hooked up in "Endgame".
  • Letting Her Hair Down: Janeway and Kes
    • Seven also does this on a few occasions.
  • Living Ship: Voyager has Neural Gel Packs, which were probably intended to act like organic brains or at least small computers. Supposedly they were cutting-edge tech, as Voyager was an advanced ship when it was completed.
    • Of course, they were used several times as a plot complication generator by having them "get an infection." Janeway eventually ordered Torres to replace them with conventional circuits, but the ship never seemed to be any less cutting-edge afterward.
      • The Gel Packs got fixed in that exact same episode.
    • Species 8472 were introduced in Voyager, and they had completely organic living ships. Not even the Borg could stand up against one of those babies.
  • Longest Pregnancy Ever: Ensign Wildman - already pregnant in the pilot episode, gives birth mid-Season 2.
    • The Doctor comments on this in the episode "Fury", mentioning that members of Ensign Wildman's husband's species have a gestation that is twice as long as that of a human.
    • And even more ironic, considering that Naomi had a 15 month gestation, then seemed to age 3–4 years between series 4 and 5.
      • When Naomi's born, The Doctor mentions that her teeth will begin appearing within a month. Given this relatively accelerated growth rate, it is not unreasonable to assume that she may age at a naturally slightly accelerated rate.
    • Averted in the episode "Drone", a 29th-century Borg drone goes from tissue sample to fetus to full-grown adult in a day.
  • Long Title: In-universe, Naomi's essay about "The weird planet where time moved very fast and so did the people who lived there". Seven helps her condense it.
  • Lost Technology: In both "Message In A Bottle" and "Hunters," Voyager comes across a vast abandoned network of ancient relay stations (each powered by its own black hole!), enabling them to make contact with Starfleet on the other side of the galaxy. One little mistake and the entire network shut down.
  • Ludicrous Speed: Going past the speed limit in "Threshold" makes you go crazy, spit out your tongue, and eventually mutate into a large salamander.
  • The Main Characters Do Everything: A Star Trek staple, really, but Voyager really takes it to the next level. Don't be surprised if Janeway decides to fly off the ship with her first officer on routine patrol duty, leaving the impulsive and unreliable Half-Klingon rebel in command.
  • Mate or Die: Yup, this returns with a twist in "Blood Fever" when young background Vulcan officer Vorik tries to force himself on B'Elanna Torres during his pon farr, leading her to suffer the blood fever as well. This is the episode that launched millions of Torres/Paris shippers.
    • Subverted in a later episode where Tuvok shrugs off the pon farr like a bad head cold, even though all efforts to 'resolve' the situation (short of having sex) had failed.
      • He does have a little help from the holodeck, courtesy of Tom Paris (who makes the case that technically if the hologram is of your wife, it's not cheating).
      • It's also the case that he's over 100 years old, so he probably has a lot more control and experience than any other Vulcan we've seen experiencing the pon farr.
  • Mauve Shirt:
    • Ensign Samantha Wildman, Naomi's mother and a member of the science department.
    • Lieutenant Joseph Carey, the Number Two engineer to B'Elanna Torres, until he got killed off near the end of the series.
    • Lieutenant Ayala, though he never quite got to be an Ascended Extra.
  • Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane: features prominently in a great many episodes, but especially in "Coda" in which Janeway has one of those near-death experiences known to some of us. Is Captain Janeway's experience really just another first contact with a strange alien species (which was detectable on a medical tricorder scan of her cortex), or (far from the first) contact with someone from the afterlife? The story reports, you decide.
    • Just to make things more interesting, one of those unstable time loops we've seen in other Star Trek series' episodes is also suggested early on, and if the "magic" explanation is true, "Admiral Janeway" would actually be a demon come to drag Captain Janeway to Hell. The flames seen coming from what he calls his matrix would certainly support this, and Janeway herself tells him "Go back to Hell, coward!"
  • Mind Rape: Janeway is revealed to have done this to the Doctor in "Latent Image" after he suffered a breakdown. Janeway even justifies her actions because technically the Doctor isn't human, so she was just fixing him. It takes What the Hell, Hero? speeches before she sees why the Doctor is so horrified by her actions.
    • It becomes Harsher in Hindsight that the third episode, "Time and Again" had Janeway mention she was considering reprogramming the Doctor just because he was... annoying
    • "Memorial" where an alien device Mind Rapes crew members into experiencing a massacre (in actual fact, a more effective war memorial). At the end of the episode Janeway orders the device refuelled so it can go on to Mind Rape many more people for at least 300 years. She does however also leave a beacon some distance away to warn people about what is about to happen to them.
  • The Mole: Seska, a Bajoran who turns out to be a Cardassian spy infiltrating the Maquis.
    • There was another ex-Maquis who routinely reported to the Kazon-Nistrim sect, passing vital information about Voyager's goings-on to Seska.
    • And of course, Tuvok begins the series as a Starfleet officer secretly infiltrating the Maquis. As Chakotay put it, "Was anyone on that ship working for me?"
  • Morally-Ambiguous Doctorate: Crell Moset.
  • Mortality Ensues: Q does it to q at one point; it's also a result of suppressing Seven's Borg nanotech.
  • MST3K Mantra: Invoked in "Timeless"—Harry Kim tries to make sense of how the future version of himself could have sent the present-day Seven of Nine instructions on how to save the ship, since the future Harry's timeline was erased and he will not exist to send the instructions, resulting in an apparent Grandfather Paradox. Janeway just tells him not to bother trying to work it out, since he'll likely only succeed in giving himself a headache.
    • "Deadlock" gives us this gem:

Janeway: "We're Starfleet officers, Harry. Weird is part of the job."

Kim: "'Vien'ke debala, Jhet'leya.' I taught myself to say a few words in Kobali."
Ensign Lyndsay Ballard: "That's very sweet of you, but you just told me the comets are tiresome."

    • Janeway's body language nearly causes a diplomatic incident at one stage.
  • My Sensors Indicate You Want to Tap That: Several examples:
    • The Doctor makes very effective use of the sickbay sensors with Tom Paris.
    • Seven of Nine's Borg implants may not be so precise, but she's very observant and can tell when Harry Kim is putting the moves on her.
    • Subverted with Icheb, who's not as observant as Seven, and whose sensors give him a false reading from B'Elanna Torres.


Tropes N-S

  • Negative Space Wedgie: These served as the Monster of the Week for many Voyager episodes.
  • Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: One of their worst offenses (if not the first) was inadvertently destroying the alien relay station that put them back in communication with the Alpha Quadrant while trying to fight off some bad guys. Fortunately, they found others that didn't get destroyed as they continued their journey.
  • Nothing Is the Same Anymore: Reginald Barclay on Earth found a way to establish regular contact with Voyager in the final seasons, thus allowing the ship to have tactical and emotional support from home that was not possible before.
  • Not Rare Over There: Early in the series, they're in an area of space where water is the go-to commodity. Our heroes can make all they want (within reason) and find themselves a common target because of it.
  • Not So Different: After meeting Doc Zimmerman, Troi says she can see where the Doctor got his ego from.
  • Odd Friendship: Seven and Naomi...Seven and the Doctor...Seven and anyone...
    • Subverted with Neelix and Tuvok. Neelix tries so, so, so hard to be "Mr. Vulcan's" friend, but Tuvok's response is barely concealed contempt and sarcasm. And honestly, this is Neelix we're talking about here, can you blame him?
      • When Tuvok is afraid he's lost his self-control and is testing his restraint in the holodeck, guess which crewmember he simulates on the grounds that he's most likely to push him to breaking point! To make matters worse, he did not have to program the holographic version of Nelix to be any different than normal. This implies that if it weren't for the intense logical training all Vulcans go through, he would have murdered Nelix a long time ago.
      • In Neelix's defense, Tuvok had just mind-melded with a Serial Killer.
      • Also, later episodes show that Tuvok does, in fact, consider Neelix a friend... especially after the episode where Tuvok suffered a brain injury that left him (temporarily) mentally handicapped, and Neelix did an amazing job of helping him and making him feel normal and accepted again. It would appear that this enduring distaste for Neelix is... illogical.
  • Official Couple: Neelix and Kes, then Tom Paris and B'Elanna Torres.
  • Once For Yes, Twice For No: A nebula alien, that learns to communicate only through the set phrases of the ship's computer.
  • Only Sane Man: Often this is either Tom Paris, or the Doctor.
    • In the latter's case, when as the Emergency Command Hologram in the episode "Workforce", the Doctor's first response to being told that Voyager will be boarded and forcibly seized, is to immediately open fire and cripple the enemy ship. In comparison, Janeway and Chakotay usually only return fire when the shields are down to 24% and several consoles have exploded.
    • The Doctor's reaction in "Time and Again" when he realises no-one told informed him that Voyager was now carrying two alien passengers, Neelix and Kes. Oh and 80 Maquis now serve as part of the new crew. And he can't contact Captain Janeway because she's down on the planet below. Oh... and she is currently missing.

Doctor: It seems I've found myself on the voyage of the damned.

  • Organ Theft: Neelix has his lungs stolen via teleporters, forcing the Doctor to create temporary Hard Light substitutes. The Vidiians actively engaged in this as it was the only way for them to survive the Phage that afflicted their entire race... That is until a Think Tank later gave them a permanent cure for the right price.
  • Orwellian Editor: Janeway in "Latent Image" repeatedly attempts to delete the Doctor's memories and even ordered all evidence of Ensign Jetal to be erased from existence.
  • Other Me Annoys Me: As SF Debris noted about whenever Janeway met various dopplegangers;

SF Debris: Whenever we get two Janeways in the same room, they will always argue with one another.

  • Out-Gambitted: Kashyk in "Counterpoint". He thinks he's tricked Janeway into revealing the refugees she was hiding, but she sent them somewhere else.
  • Outgrown Such Silly Superstitions: Often averted with Chakotay's Native American spirituality and some explorations of other odd species' religions. The episode "False Profits" parodied this trope to Hell and back, however, with a Bronze Age civilization venerating two Ferengi refugees as their sages (sort of ersatz deities) because their crash-landing's appearance was a lot like something prophesied in one of their sacred poems. All efforts to remove the Ferengi failed until the Voyager's crew realized the same poem ended with the appearance of certain easily-arranged celestial signs and the ascension of the sages back into the heavens, all of which could be arranged using some futuristic flares and transporter technology. Since technically this means every one of the prophecies came true, there was arguably nothing to outgrow about these people's "silly superstitions" at all!
    • To add to the humor, this also parodied Burn the Witch as the joyous townspeople, spurred by the mention of their sages being taken up on "wings of flame" in the prophecy, enthusiastically rush to honor their sages by bundling them all together with some firewood and lighting the fire. Since they're beamed out before they can be burned, they truly do ascend into the heavens.
    • It's implied that while many do still believe in mythology, it may not be the truth, as seen in the episode 'Mortal Coil' where Neelix dies (he gets better) and is upset he didn't experience an afterlife.
    • Played straight in "Blink of an Eye" where Voyager is trapped in orbit over a planet where time moves rapidly, becoming worshiped as a deity by the inhabitants called "the Groundshaker" after their attempt to leave causes violent earthquakes. As we see time on the planet progress, the people invent telescopes and come to dub Voyager as "The Skyship", which by the time they've entered the Space Age, is no longer believed to be the home of their Gods, but merely an advanced spacecraft that houses alien beings.
  • Planet of Hats: Kazon (Gang-Bangers IN SPACE!), Vidiians (diseased organ pirates), Malon (galactic garbage dumpers), Hirogen (a culture based on hunting sentient species), the Swarm (a nameless xenophobic...swarm), and the Devore Imperium (xenophobic, telepath-hating militarists, though in this case their uniformity is used to highlight the individual charm of Inspector Kashyk).
  • Plank Gag: In the episode "Suvival Instinct", Chakotay tried to lug a huge piece of alien sports equipment across the bridge and nearly whacked a visiting alien with it.
  • Plausible Deniability: Eugenics Wars? What are they?
    • It probably doesn't help that the Eugenics Wars were supposedly occurring at the same time the series aired in real life.
  • Premature Eulogy: Of the Narmy kind. One glaring example is in the episode Coda where Janeway receives four whole minutes of this while floating between life and death, watching it play out. It's to be expected in a show where people die and come back to life every week.
  • Prim and Proper Bun:
    • Captain Janeway had this style for most of the first season. which was known as The Bun of Steel
    • The emotionless and formal Seven of Nine used a French pleat for her first 3 seasons on the show.
  • Principles Zealot: While Janeway has her moments, Seven Of Nine is surely the local queen of this trope. The Doctor also tries to do this once or twice.
  • Prophetic Name: The Intrepid-class USS Voyager herself. Because the Cowardly-class USS Stayathome just wouldn't have had the same ring to it.
  • Psychic Powers: Kes, sometimes Tuvok.
  • Quietly Performing Sister Show: As mentioned in the bit at the top, the fans and critics weren't too pleased with the show, but it got good ratings.
  • Ramming Always Works: From "Year in Hell": "Time's up."
    • From "Parallax": "Sometimes you just have to punch your way through."
  • Real Life Relative: Q's "teenage" son was played by John DeLancie's actual son Keegan DeLancie. This was apparently somewhat of an accident; Keegan happened to be among the actors being considered for the role and the producers made it clear they didn't want him cast just for the joke. As it turned out Keegan won them over on the part and the existing Father/Son dynamic only made the episode better.
  • Red Shirt: Averted in the early seasons by giving some screen time to crewmembers who were slated for death in later episodes (i.e. Hogan, Jonas, Carey). But eventually they reverted to bumping off anonymous ensigns by the shuttleload. A notable subversion however occurs in "Latent Image" where the Doctor is guilt-ridden over his choice to save Harry Kim as opposed to the expendable crewmember.
    • Joe Carey might be considered a subversion as well. Despite disappearing for years at a time except for flashbacks, the character makes it all the way to the final season before he's killed on an away mission. He is in fact the last casualty before Voyager makes it back home. Most redshirts don't last for the entirety of a series run.
  • Religious Robot: "Flesh and Blood" is about sentient holograms (also known as photonic lifeforms) rising up against their creators. Their leader believes in the Bajoran faith and spends his free time praying to the prophets.
  • Reset Button: Many, many times.
    • The reset featured in "Year of Hell" is one of the few fans of the show won't groan at, simply because it was too damn awesome.
  • The Revolution Will Not Be Vilified: Averted in "Resistance", but somehow there's never any mention of the Maquis' terrorist origins. Except for Suder of course.
  • A Riddle Wrapped in a Mystery Inside An Enigma: In the episode "Riddles," The Doctor refers to the Vulcan brain as "a puzzle wrapped inside an enigma housed inside a cranium."
  • Robosexual: The EMH apparently gets around, especially in one of his Time Skip episodes.
  • Running Gag: Every single pot roast mentioned on the series was burnt to hell.
  • Scenery Porn: The opening title sequence is gorgeous.
  • Serkis Folk: Species 8472, and the aliens in "Equinox".
  • Sci-Fi Writers Have No Sense of Scale: Think about how large the Voyager would have to be to cast that reflection on the rings of the planet in the opening titles...
  • Sexy Discretion Shot: An episode involving one of the Doctor's romances had one that was so discreet that even Robert Picardo didn't know about it until a much later episode referenced his having had sex and he asked the writers about it.
  • Shiny-Looking Spaceships: USS Voyager
  • Shown Their Work: In "Meld," the death of Ensign Darwin is proven as a murder using real forensic science rather than made-up technobabble, which is frankly a rarity on the later Star Trek shows.
    • On the other hand the Doctor says "The DNA doesn't lie." This has never stopped defence attorneys.
      • Though it does help that Federation forensics technology is demonstrably better than ours is.
  • Show Within a Show: In several episodes Janeway enters a holodeck program that was apparently going to turn out to be a ghost story, but this got dropped (it didn't help that it was being told slowly over the teasers for several episodes, and had nothing to do with the episode itself). A more successful example was The Adventures of Captain Proton!, a homage to 1930s sci-fi adventures like Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers.
    • An Alien version of this occurs, showing an evil version of the Voyager crew as propaganda between two races of aliens, until a copy of The Doctor sets the record straight... and then the entire show-within-a-show is shown to, itself be a show within a show within a show.
  • Space Clouds: In "Year of Hell", a crippled Voyager hides inside a nebula so dense that it produces a visible fog inside the ship's corridors. Captain Janeway even orders the hull breaches sealed to avoid having an "indoor nebula."
  • Space Is an Ocean: In the episode "Day of Honor," Paris and Torres put on spacesuits and abandon their doomed shuttlecraft. As they drift in space awaiting rescue, they bob up and down as if floating in an ocean.
  • Space Is Noisy
  • Spike Shooter: There's a species of sentient technology-dependent hadrosaur descendants that shoot sedative-laced barbs from their fingers.
  • Spinoff Sendoff: The pilot, "Caretaker", starts with Voyager docked at Deep Space Nine, with Quark trying to con Harry Kim.
  • Status Quo Is God: One of the, if not the biggest complaints leveled against the show.

Tropes T-Z

  • Take That: The episode "The Voyager Conspiracy" is very easily interpreted as a mockery of all the fans who tend to go to any lengths to reinterpret the protagonists' actions as immoral.
  • Techno Babble: Probably the worst offender of all Star Trek series. There's a scene where the Universal Translator is having difficulty with an alien language, so Janeway tells Harry to 'remodulate the translator'. As SF Debris points out, this means about the same thing as hitting it.
  • Terminally Dependent Society: The Ocampan dependence on the Caretaker array. How dependant? We later learn that an Ocampan can only ever have a single child. Assuming that this is one child per Ocampa, male or female, every early death or miscarriage permanently reduces the Ocampan population.
    • The Caretaker gave them 5 years worth of power for the city before his death. Given how dependent on him the Ocampans were, its doubtful they could figure out for themselves a different power-source. The forcefield protecting them from outsiders will most likely fail as the power dwindles and they'll eventually have to leave for the surface... where the Kazon are. This is probably why Kes is so pissed off in "Fury".
  • They Still Belong to Us Lecture: The Borg Queen delivers a number of these lectures about Seven.
  • Thoughtcrime: There was an episode where they came across a people who were extremely telepathic, so sensitive that any extreme emotions would incite them to act out on those feelings; having violent thoughts was a crime in and of itself. Torres was put under trial for having a brief violent thought when someone bumped into her, and Tuvok's investigation into the planet's culture found a sort of "violent thoughts" Black Market. Of course it examined the nature that when something was so taboo it meant their own people were unable to handle it when confronted with the situation.
  • Third Person Person:

'Dreadnought: "False information has been entered into Dreadnoughts navigational sensor array."
Paris: "When a bomb starts talking about itself in the third person, I get worried."

  • Tim Taylor Technology
  • Touche: In "Counterpoint", Kashyk admits this when he sees he's been tricked.
  • Transformation Sequence: Overlaps with What Do You Mean It's Not Awesome? in "Tinkor, Tailor, Doctor, Spy". The Doctor's transformation into the ECH is accompanied by a dramatic zoom on the Doctor's lapel as the pips appear one by one.
  • 2-D Space: Like all Star Trek, though the large holographic Astrometrics display did avert this somewhat.
  • Two Roads Before You
  • Understatement: In "Scientific Method," Janeway decides to fly Voyager between two stars, hoping to destroy the ships of some aliens who have been experimenting on the crew in the process, despite Tuvok's warning that the odds of their survival are "one in twenty, at best." Tuvok tells her that it's a far more reckless course of action than he's come to expect from her. After they manage to get away, Janeway comments to Tuvok that she never knew he thought of her as "reckless." Tuvok says that it was a poor choice of words: "It was clearly an understatement."
    • She had an excuse in this case—Janeway herself makes it clear that the aliens' experiments to push her to her limits through prolonged stress had driven her, well, crazy. If you thought she was bad before...
  • Unit Confusion
  • Un Paused: The Doctor, when Seven switches him off in the middle of a sentence.
  • UST: Plenty of this between Janeway and Chakotay, but more so in early seasons.
    • Mostly due to the influence of Jeri Taylor, who wrote the majority of the episodes where this is prevalent. After she took a backseat as a writer, this promptly vanished.
  • Vision Quest: Chakotay consults his spirit guide about once a season, or helps someone else do so.
  • We Are as Mayflies: Kes and the other Ocampa have an average lifespan of less than a decade in length.
  • What Happened to the Mouse?: A Borg baby is brought on board along with several Borg children. Icheb stays while the other children are returned to their parents in a later episode, but there's never any mention of what happened to the baby.
    • Whatever happened to Suspiria, the Female Caretaker? She never reappeared in the series following her second season episode, but the Star Trek: String Theory novel trilogy provides (non-canon) answers.
  • What Measure Is a Non-Human?: With a holographic Doctor, they question of whether a projection of Hard Light and a "soul" of algorithms arises a few times. This includes encountering a race of photonic creatures in a different plane, and another which considers holographic programs to be insurgents. Even what rights the Doctor has on the ship has been explored, with him even trying to resign in one episode.
  • What the Hell, Hero?: Seven calls Janeway on this when she and the crew intend to delete memories causing the Doctor to almost literally BSOD instead of trying to work through his problems psychologically. She wasn't around to object the first time they did it.
    • Also in "Hope and Fear" with the alien blaming Janeway's decision to back the Borg against Species 8472. As the latter were forced to retreat, the Borg were able to go on and assimilate his world.
    • Remember back in the TNG episode "A Measure of a Man" where Picard chewed out Starfleet who were planning to disassemble Data so they could build Androids to serve on Federation vessels, arguing that it was tantamount to them actively perpetuating a Slave-Race? Well apparently Starfleet doesn't, as its revealed in "Lifeline" that they reprogrammed every single EMH Mk I in the Alpha Quadrant to mine Dilithium asteroids.
      • By that logic we need to stop using flashlights to create enslaved beams of light immediately.
  • Writers Cannot Do Math: The character biographies, the shuttlecraft complement, the number of torpedoes, the crewmembers...
  • Wrote the Book: In the finale, a future Starfleet instructor introduces Admiral Janeway as "the person who, literally, wrote the book on the Borg."
  • Yellow Brick Road: Though when keeping to the path is the only way to progress and Status Quo Is God...
  • You Can't Go Home Again: This is especially true for Neelix, whose homeworld was destroyed, and Icheb, whose parents want only to use him as a weapon.
  • You Keep Using That Word: Various crewmembers describe things from the 19th and 20th century as being "Ancient", which is like saying that Roman Chariots and Nuclear Weapons are relatively close historically. Even more egregious considering that they are only 400 years downwind from the things they are describing.
  • You Look Familiar
  • You Never Did That for Me: Janeway, upon learning that her best friend Tuvok used to make tea for then-Captain Sulu, complains in a mock-annoyed fashion that he never made her tea! In the novelization of that episode, he notes, quite reasonably, that she prefers coffee.
  • Youtube Poop: Growing in popularity.


There are also several shows Shows Within a Show. They contain examples of

The Adventures of Captain Proton!

Kim: We didn't burst into flame in the last chapter! Why are these recaps so inaccurate?
Paris: Well they brought people back to the theaters.
Kim: Cliffhangers!
Paris: The lost art of hyperbole.

Chaotica: But I saw you fall into the fiery mouth of that volcano!
Proton: It takes more than a little lava to stop Captain Proton.

  • Killer Robot: Parodied in the clunky mechanical form of Satan's Robot. Supposedly terrifying but actually slow-moving, easily disabled, and rather pathetic.
  • Large Ham: Frankly, the whole point of playing the program. Chaotica is the king of this, but also seen with the Doctor and Captain Janeway whose initial reaction is either contempt or amusement, but who end up playing their roles with gusto. Hilariously subverted though by Seven of Nine in "Night" (see Off the Rails, below.)
  • Love Is in the Air: While Tied To a Pillar Janeway uses Arachnia's vial of "irresistable pheromones" to make Dr Chaotica release her. Unfortunately Chaotica moves out of sniffing range, leaving her to get slobbered over by his ugly henchman Lonzak instead.
  • The Magnificent: Captain Proton: Spaceman First Class, protector of Earth, scourge of intergalactic evil...at your service.
  • Mooks: Chaotica's 'Army of Evil', plus his bumbling henchman Lonzak.
  • Off the Rails: In "Night" Tom Paris ropes in Seven to play the Damsel in Distress. Upon being menaced by the Killer Robot, Seven calmly responds:

Seven: I am Borg. (yanks out robot's wiring, disabling it) The robot has been neutralized. May I leave now?

"Surprised? You thought I had perished in that den of crocodiles. I SURVIVED! CLINGING to the thought that I would ONE DAY__Arrrrgh!"

Insurrection Alpha

Paris: I could add a steamy love scene between the Starfleet conn officer and the Maquis engineer.
Torres: Oh, that's realistic!

  • Holodeck Malfunction
  • Hypocritical Humor: After Paris tells Tuvok that he's going to have Janeway execute the mutineers, Tuvok complains that this is against Janeway's established personality and that characters should not deviate so tremendously. Neelix walks over and insists that he would never betray the captain like he did in the holonovel. Paris makes fun of Tuvok over this point. Paris is being a bit unfair though. Tuvok hadn't touched the program in years, and in fact tried to delete the program because he got so much wrong.
  • Killer Game Master
  • No Ending: Or so Tuvok thought.
  • Off the Rails
  • Oh Crap
  • Out of Character: First, Tuvok got Neelix's character completely wrong. Then Tom Paris wants to have Janeway execute all the mutineers. And when Seska got at the character profiles...
  • Railroading: Seska programmed the holodeck to do this when Tuvok and Paris were on the verge of getting the upper hand.
  • The Reveal: Everyone assumes that Insurrection Alpha is an action-adventure holonovel with some Take That jabs at Janeway's command decisions. It turns out to be a program created by Tuvok to train his security officers against a Maquis mutiny.
  • The Revolution Will Not Be Civilized: Once Seska gets a hold of the story.
  • Self-Fulfilling Prophecy: When the Maquis and Starfleet crewmembers end up working well together, Tuvok realises his program could itself create tensions between the two groups and deletes it. Or so he thinks. Tuvok's expectations are subverted when they find it and enjoy it.
  • Who Writes This Crap?: Paris's comment the first time he runs the program when the holographic Tuvok in the brig suggests that they might need to spend as long as a week observing their captors for weaknesses. "A week?! Who wrote this stuff?"
  • Writer on Board: Neelix's Heel Face Turn in the original program is undoubtedly due to Tuvok's dislike of the Alien Scrappy, as well as his initial mistrust. As Tuvok had just been complaining about Tom's Out of Character revisions, Tom doesn't hesitate to call him on it. That being said, Tuvok abandoned and tried to delete the program over two years prior when his predictions failed to manifest.

The Voyager Encounter

  • Alternate Reality Episode: This was clearly meant to be Star Trek Voyager's version of an Evil Twin Mirror Universe episode, though unfortunately it lacks the Bare Your Midriff uniforms and blatant Ho Yay.
  • Badass Crew: Taken to its most terrifying extreme, the warship Voyager's crew are clearly insane. Even Neelix manages to get in an awesome line in a putdown to Paris.
  • Brick Joke: Also leading to a Call Back that in "Worst Case Scenario", Tom Paris suggests that a holographic Janeway execute some mutineers. We see this version of a holographic Janeway do just that to hostages.
  • Call Back
  • Cool Starship: It has to be said, the alternate Voyager armed to the teeth with guns isn't a bad sight.
  • Depending on the Writer: The curator's initial idea when he finds the Doctor is to use him to help him alter the program to make it a more accurate simulation. He admits that over the years they've had to extrapolate certain things to fill in the gaps.
  • Even Evil Has Standards: The biased depiction of the Vaskan leader has him going to war with the Kyrians simply to steal their land. He contracts Voyager as mercenaries to accomplish this, but even he objects on moral grounds and tries to cancel the deal when Janeway decides to effect massive genocide of the Kyrians as the best solution.
  • Final Solution: Evil Janeway's genocide of the Kyrians, which apparently kills at least 900,000 people.
  • Future Imperfect: The historian's interpretation of the event is... misguided, to say the least. This is due to the fact that he barely has any data to work with and a heavy bias against the Vaskans. The crew wear fascist uniforms and are portrayed as violent sociopaths. The Doctor is an android. Seven of Nine is still a Borg leading a contingent of captured drones. Even Voyager herself has become a darkly-lit ship, armed to the teeth and referred to as a warship.
  • Hand of Death: The evil Voyager crew all wear black gloves.
  • Historical Badass Upgrade: See Badass Crew and Cool Starship above.
  • Historical Hero Upgrade: The Kyrians, Tetran in particular.
  • Historical Villain Upgrade: The Voyager crew and the Vaskans.
  • My Friends and Zoidberg: The Doctor points out that the way his colleagues have been depicted in the historical recreation has morphed them into violent thugs, but he actually finds Paris to be pretty well portrayed (who from what we've seen admittedly is not depicted so much as a bloodthirsty villain rather than just cocky and prone to skirt-chasing).

These weren't the people I knew! They didn't behave like this! [[[Beat]]] Well, except for Mr. Paris.

  • Politically-Correct History: The Kyrian recreation portrays Tedran as a martyr for the Kyrians who was executed by Janeway while trying to stop an alliance between the Vaskans and Voyager. Later averted when it's revealed that Voyager was merely trading with the Vaskans when Tedran attacked unprovoked, tried to loot the ship, and then was killed by the Vaskan ambassador without warning.
  • Really Seven Hundred Years Old: The Doctor himself in this episode, or rather his backup copy, which is reactivated 700 years later.
  • Show Within a Show: The reveal that the Doctor setting the events of the Voyager recreation straight were in turn themselves another recreation at the same museum, many years later.
  • Torture Technician: The Doctor is portrayed as this, much to his horror.
  • Writer on Board: Also subverted; the original recreation was this, while the Doctor and the curator are seen this way by the historical council when they try to correct it.
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