Janeway and Chakotay

Story: Resolutions
Written By: Jeri Taylor
Series: Star Trek: Voyager
Year: 1996

This one is okay, but maybe everything just starts looking better after “Threshold”. A disease infects Janeway and Chakotay by a bug bite, if they leave the planet’s surface they will die. So Voyager is forced to abandon them after the Doctor has run out of all available options.
So while the Captain and her first officer set up house on the planet, the ship takes off for home. But it is uneasy on the ship. Most of the crew don’t like abandoning their leaders and want to break their orders and contact the good ol’ Phage monsters (vidiians or something…I can never remember how to spell it.) Tuvok resists for most of the episode then finally decides it is best to pursue it. That’s the problem with this story, for a good chunk of the episode it is just back and forth (we should/we shouldn’t). When they do contact them, they get attacked, until they come up with a cunning plan to get the cure and escape unscathed.

Meanwhile on the planet a far more interesting story is taking place. It is about two people who are stuck together on a planet. It isn’t the usual boring odd couple plotline, but just to people stuck together on a planet. I’d say the romantic tension that builds between the two officers is interesting and I’m glad it was left unexplored. Especially in the final scene back on the ship, when its back to business as usual. It is an interesting little story, but the execution on the passage of time could have been a LOT better. It is totally unclear how long this episode spans, but the writer seemed to indicate it was meant to be like a month or two or something. That would have been interesting had they made it clearer.

Mulgrew is still a pretty odd actress, I mean the way she holds her hand out to the monkey she sees…weird. I think she kind of wants to be eccentric, hoping to get some Shatner-love. I don’t think she pulls off his madness as well.

NEXT TIME: Chakotay’s Baby