The Fight

I'm at this point re-watching Voyager and, reading all these negative reviews I tried watching this episode paying more attention, giving it a chance.

My opinion is, if you make the effort, it's not so chaotic, even though it IS a bit chaotic, but there are a lot of TNG episodes that felt this way earlier many years ago when I saw them (a re-watch is scheduled after Voyager).

Anyway, I can see how the writers wanted to tell this story and it can be followed, it's not a bad episode, it's like a longer prog metal song, you need to listen to it a few times to be able to understand and appreciate it.

Especially comparing the experience to the previous episode, which I skipped deliberately because I hate it, it's a waste that the duplicates die and nothing remains, the probe with the data they've gathered over their lifetime is lost, as if they had never existed, like, ever. So it's a waste of time for me to watch it.

This one at least has some depth added to Chakotay's shallow-ish character.

I'll cut straight to the chase--I hated all the mystical American Indian mumbo-jumbo involving Chakotay on "Star Trek: Voyager". Too many of the characters on this show were shallow and needed more depth-- and Chakotay was one of the worst of these. Whenever the show wants to feature his character in an episode, they cart out the 'ol faux American Indian mystical crap. Most American Indians probably cringed whenever they did this one the show and they took SOME genuine cultural beliefs and made them seem like silly clichés.

In this episode, aliens inside 'chaotic space' (that's Voyager-speak for 'we are sitting in the middle of space because we cannot afford to build sets for a new world or make-up for these aliens'). The ship is stuck there and only Chakotay is possibly able to help get them un-stuck. To do this, he goes on a spirit journey and explores his own nutty grandfather, his love of boxing (which NEVER was mentioned before) and his own fears.

This episode has absolutely nothing going for it. You might try watching just so you can see world champion boxer Carlos Palomino in a role as Chakotay's sparring partner, but underneath all that make- up and prosthetics you cannot even tell that it's him. So, if there ever was an episode to skip and pretend that it wasn't made in the first place, my vote would be for this one!

I think these lower budget "filler episodes" were the main thing I disliked about 90s Trek. You can tell they were low on ideas, budget, and had to go with a less than stellar idea for an episode. Now, don't get me wrong, I am actually a fan of Chakotay and I like him as both a character and actor. But seriously, anything with vision quests just... no... they're not good. The sort of Akutchi Moya fake Native Generic American thing never worked. It would have been cooler if Chakotay was Native American and owned that but we never heard pan flutes or had to deal with spiritual stuff.

Star Trek works when there's less spirituality and more science. This kind of episode just doesn't work in most ways.

So Chakotay has his turn as the principle character again. Voyager has entered chaotic space where everything is all bent and distorted. They can't proceed because it is unpredictable and dangerous. Chakotay seems to have some boxing chops and he is quite masculine. He goes on one of his vision quests and tries to figure out how they can get out of their predicament. He hears voices and needs to interpret them to figure out what to do. Mostly it is one oddity after another. Perhaps it should be called "Chaotic Plot."

It's just so DULL. A waste of Ray Walston as the guest star as well.