Lifesigns

It was a wonderfully emotional episode where the Doctor really got into his act. The acting in every episode of Voyager is generally excellent. But in this episode, the Doctor really showed off his acting skills. It was like a movie. The actress was just as good as the Doctor. I wish we saw this level of quality acting in today's series.

Honestly, I thought this would just be the call-response to Death Wish. But damn, the Doctor's dialogue at the end hit like a ton of bricks.

The Doctor falls in love with a patient.

This is a reasonably good episode that owes a lot to Robert Picardo's performance.

As Trek romances go, the concept is not the worst, but like most of the others I never really care whether it succeeds or not. However, I do like the emphasis on the love being about the person and blind to physical appearance.

Two other positives are the performances of the lead actors. Susan Diol makes her character both sympathetic and likeable, plus she has strong chemistry with Picardo, who is excellent as always. He shows superb range as romantic lead and comic performer. His mannerisms are very natural and his verbal delivery makes the dialogue sound good.

The subplot involving the Paris/Chakotay conflict feels forced to me and I do not think it works in the midst of other narratives. Likewise the Kazon infiltration feels rather tiresome. However, there is more to come on this in future episodes which makes sense of it all. (But it's not that great)

After "Faces" robbed the Vidiians of all subtlety and nuance, this one does a good job of giving it back. Denara is an even more sympathetic character than Motura was. It's not entirely clear how she feels about possibly benefiting from her people's organ harvesting practices but she's aware of the lack of compassion some of them demonstrate and manages to charm Torres, who has more reason that most to hate Vidiians, into helping her in a way that the Doctor's matter-of-fact attitude didn't.

References to healthy Vidiians seem a bit strange given that earlier references have suggested the whole species have the phage (certainly all of the ones we encounter appear to), although if they're not born with it, it's understandable they would contract it at different ages. When I watched this in 2020 and heard talk of mass gatherings being banned to prevent the spread of disease, it was a "Welcome to our world" moment...

The main focus is of course the relationship between the Doctor and Denara. After he's been a bit more confident about his new role this season, he suddenly gets thrown a curveball and Kes gets to slip back into her old role of given him pep-talks. It's not quite a hole in one this time, as telling someone as blunt as the Doctor to just tell her how he feels was never going to go well: Kes is clearly thinking "Really?" throughout the whole excruciating conversation, although she gets to redeem herself with a similar pep-talk to Denara later. Nice touch that a holographic body isn't created fully clothed by the way, even if we don't see anything unbroadcastable. (The Doctor handwaves the question of fitting an entire mind into the ship's computer by saying it's got room for his programme and that's more complex than an organic brain.) The final scene is a bit obvious but sweet all the same.

This is the one where Paris' roles in the A- and B-plots really start to conflict. Robbie McNeill does his best to keep Paris' cocky air throughout, but it's very hard to see the guy giving the Doctor romantic advice as the same person as the obnoxious yob from the other plotline. It makes more sense after the next episode but it's odd in context. The Doctor gets another one episode name, although this one gets briefly reprised in "Resolutions". I'm not sure if his comment about Paris' experience of rejection was sarcasm or if he was being serious!

Meanwhile, in the C-plot, someone decides a bit too late in the day to try and give Jonas some character and motivation, as he gets squeamish about going from spy to saboteur. It remains unclear what he's hoping to achieve with all this: Did he think the Nistrim would leave Voyager alone if he fed them information?

Lifesigns is essentially the Holodoc in love story. Voyager transports a disfigured Vidiaan dying from the Phage.

The Doctor manages to revive her with placing her consciousness in a holographic body.

Luckily the Vidiian is Dr Danara Pel, her medical knowledge could prove essential to revive her body.

Only for the Doctor to fall in love with Dr Pel but showing romantic inclination is part of his programming.

That is where Tom Paris comes in, but Paris is having issues with Chakotay over his lateness and insolence.

The romance story works better than expected. Although you sense there will be no happy ever after.

As for Paris and the return of the Kazon spy. You can see how this will be all linked and Paris's impertinence looks clumsy.