Star Trek Retro Review: "Timeless" (VOY) | Alternate Timelines

[@littlsuprstr]

It's funny that the alternate timeliness of Voyager involve character development and the goal of the heroes is to keep things the same.

[@breach005]

Harry Kim is probably a legendary, near mythical intergalactic superhero in every timeline but the one we watch where our boy can't even get a damn promotion from Ensign, on a ship where people are killed by random space shit regularly.

[@DefinatelyNotAI]

I don't know, this episode has all of Voyager's greatest hits. Harry endangering the crew to try and get home. Chakotay suddenly dating someone he has no chemistry with. Tom being an expert in something he has no business being an expert in. Harry failing hard. Janeway making a decision based entirely on it being needed for there to be a plot (She gets to be both the crazy admiral and reasonable captain this episode). 7 of 9 as a Macguffin. The Doctor being bullied into violating his morals. Harry moping.

[@Gabriel-ci7db]

You’re just missing a meaningless encounter with the not so scary borg (extra point awarded for the queen appearing)

[@douglaswolfen7820]

​@@Gabriel-ci7db maybe we can count the temporal communicator, which came from a borg ship. Whatever encounter led to that was so incredibly meaningless that it didn't even make it into the episode

[@Hugh_I]

also: a quite decent episode that actually does some character development for a change - just to end on none of it actually having happened for the respective characters in the show.

[@edwardphilibin3151]

​@@Hugh_IThat's what was missing from the list of "Greatest Hits", hitting Ye Olde Reset Buttonne in the final act.

[@rafale1981]

Good times. Good times.

[@batstream42]

Also, I will agree that Chakotay's presence on the Delta Flyer is fairly pointless, but Harry's is not. Harry is the one character throughout the show who is consistently the most eager to get home, risks be damned. That his eagerness gets the whole crew killed, and his obsessiveness to bring them home nearly blinds him to the ultimate solution, I think is some of the best character work he ever got to do.

[@Maxdoll-v1q]

That's just what I was going to say. And seeing the young innocent ensign become this bitter person is much more striking than if it'd been another character.

[@NihlusKryik]

It’s amusing that the other time Harry gets home (Non Sequitur), he’s equally eager to get back to Voyager

[@Kartissa]

Chakotay had long been established as an expert pilot, second only to Paris. If anybody is going to pilot the Delta Flyer during the test flight of an experimental drive, it will be one of those two. Presumably Paris was kept on Voyager because it's a bigger ship, and would require the better pilot in case things went wrong.

[@jercoxthealmighty]

I agree. While any of a number of characters would have worked in this episode, Harry was definitely the best pick for exactly that reason. As for Chakotay, I can imagine whichever of the producers looking over the planned episodes for the season and thinking "Well... Beltran keeps asking us to give him more money, we should put him in things. What do we have him being a main character in? Hrm, that Species 8472 one where they're impersonating humans... that's probably gonna be bad... that one with the boxing and the weird aliens? Lord, why did we even greenlight that one? Well, I guess in that 100th episode one with the crashed Voyager future and depressed Ensign Kim we were gonna put Tom in the pilot seat since it's the delta flyer, but eeeeeeh let's give it to Chakotay instead. Pretty sure he was a good pilot too. All the first officers are good pilots. Spock did the fuel thing when him and some other crew were trying to get rescued from that planet, Riker did the thing to detect the Cardassians in the torture episode. Did I forget a series? Ah whatever. Lunch time!" Cannot confirm any of this, but y'know. I wouldn't be surprised.

[@Confessor1917]

The Quantum Slipstream Drive is in Hope and Fear. B'Elanna and Harry must have found a way to make it work. When Arturo has it on the Dauntless, Janeway makes it clear that she wants one built on Voyager - thats how Voyager catches up to the Dauntless. I appreciate that its not well defined but I believe this one deserves a bit more of a pass than Steve gives it. I think its reasonable to go from Hope and Fear to this without seeing them find the work around. Off topic - as a trans person myself: FUCK TRUMP

[@StormsparkPegasus]

It doesn't though...in both cases it was built OFF SCREEN and handwaved with meaningless technobabble. When it had been stated that the "Dauntless" was beyond their technology level. Voyager had this horrible habit of pulling "fantastic" new tech out of their butt, and it was bad even by Star Trek technobabble standards. But yes, FUCK TRUMP, I agree with you on that 100%.

[@danielkeys8974]

Strongly disagree with your first paragraph. Suppose we'd seen them discuss the possibility of building the drive and getting home at once, over several episodes. (Maybe they could use Borg knowledge, or their knowledge of Kremim time tech if they hadn't erased all of that.) This would have made us viewers uneasy, knowing that they couldn't actually get home that way. We'd be waiting to see what went wrong. Seems like an excellent change, adding to the impact of this gruesome episode. It would also make the crew look kind of stupid for not seeing what we find obvious, but that's true anyway - why did they think a totally new star drive, built by a few non-experts isolated from the Federation, would do anything but blow up in their faces? The problem might actually be reduced if we saw some of the work and/or alien knowledge which made it possible.

[@Confessor1917]

@@danielkeys8974 You don't need all that. It wouldn't hurt, but you don't need it. We have, in one episode, the drive found and put in Voyager. 6 episodes later, we see the same technology working. We know they "can't get home this way" for the same reason we know every time Voyager finds a potential way home, pre-finale isn't...Voyager isn't getting home yet. We already know its going to go wrong, just like we know The Enterprise isn't going to blow up in Cause and Effect, or Sisko isn't going to stay dead in The Visitor. Why would you want the crew to appear stupid? The episode goes out of its way to do the opposite. They realise the drive is not going to work. They find a way around that gives them a better chance. Janeway decides to take the risk. The drive doesn't work. Harry saves the day. Thats far better than wanting the viewers to think the crew is stupid. Who is a "non expert"? The crew is full of highly educated scientists and engineers and they have a base model engine. We don't need to see some technobabble explanation from one crew member to another about how the Zrkyrzx particle synthesiser from the Bodlean race is four mizteximals long instead of twelvty.

[@trekkieraccoon3343]

This is actually one of my fav voyager episodes

[@Sykoze]

“It’s our only chance to do this particular crazy thing, how can you *not* do a crazy thing if it’s your *only chance* to do it?!” He says that sarcastically, but honestly I think it’s an *incredibly* compelling argument.

[@tiberiusrobustus]

So, another interesting deep-nerd tidbit related to the morbidity of the scene with the doctor and the skull. If you recall, during Seven's original joining of the crew, she had no eye on the side with the implant, and there was even a scene of the doctor patting himself on the back about his skill at replicating the exact color of her surviving eye. That eye, is the eye crafted by the doctor himself.

[@CrystalBearer20]

One of the best things I heard about the Geordi cameo is how he orders them to stop, but when they decline, since he was also a main character in a Star Trek show once, he just wishes them luck.

[@WolfRamAndHart]

When Kim basically hits the plunger with a second to spare, and is so happy...it was a really good moment. We all have work deadlines :)

[@CathrineMacNiel]

deadline... quite literally.

[@dingo4530]

In science fiction, when you walk up to a person frozen in a pod, you have to wipe with your hand to see them. This also applies to starships.

[@jordansean18]

8:40 "And you don't have to take what I say at face value", from the classic alternate universe PBS show "Literature Rainbow"

[@veganmonter]

Yet another universe it's: Literature Refraction

[@thing_under_the_stairs]

Book Prismatics

[@Zeropointill]

Book learning optical phenomenon

[@KassFireborn]

Another universe still had the alliteration: Printed Prisms. 🎶 Take a look, in a book, it's printed prisms! 🎶 I think our universe chose better, though ofc I'm biased.

[@Rocketboy1313]

Moth to the open flame My mind can burn brighter Gaze beyond It is written Typeset Spectrum

[@empyu6387]

I actually didn't mind Tessa in this episode. In fact I think the lack of background characters who don't do much is a weakness in a lot of new Trek - where every single line and interaction is in service of the overall plot. And there's no room for small moments where characters can just BS with each other once in a while. I think having unknown characters makes the universe feel bigger and they don't have to be a center of any given ark. As long as they don't get in the way of the main story, it's fine. Tessa is a character who has already bought into the whole scheme. She was supposedly with them Chakotay and Kim came up with the plan, and stayed with them when they became fugitives to execute it. It wouldn't make much sense for her to start backing out now and if she did, I feel that reduces her conviction. From a writing standpoint, she's just there to make the world feel a little bigger than just the characters in the show.

[@boriszakharin3189]

This is one of the best episodes of Voyager. It's one of the few places they let Garret Wang actually act. And he's good! Who knew? Beltran? Yeah, not so much, but it's still a great episode. And, did anyone notice that the timeline works out that the Borg cube they used could be the artifact from Picard season 1?

[@northprime_unlimited]

I really liked how Geordi was portrayed in this episode. He was sympathetic to their cause but stern, he had to do what he had to do. He also looked cool in the command red without the visor. You could see the empathy in his eyes.

[@breach005]

A definite highlight was Captain LaForge and the Challenger, LeVar Burton is always a pleasure.

[@Saiyanprince1114]

Me: Oooh, Timeless. Even Steve can't hate on this epusode too hard. Steve: Hold my bloodwine.

[@philopharynx7910]

I they actually had progression and consequences, I'd love to see the ship change season after season as they patch and jury-rig components from alien planets. Adding a scavenged drive section wouldn't be so jarring if it wasn't something professionally installed like this episode. But something taken from an alien race and installed with jumper cables and duct tape would make sense.

[@breach005]

The biggest lost opportunity of Voyager was not leaning into it being Star Trek: Galactica basically. The first 2 episodes deal heavily with "do we keep being Starfleet officers? Does it matter now?". Well, Janeway resolves that by Episode 3 declaring them the Unbreakable Bastions of Peace and Justice Forever, and the ship is basically just fine and dandy at the end of every episode. We never got episodes where Janeway was on the cusp of actual mutiny because there wasn't any damn food testing her high and mighty Starfleet values. The whole show should have been The Year of Hell or basically The Equinox from Ransom's POV. They pussed out and just aped TNG for 7 years.

[@Confessor1917]

Fair play though, in a show where Seven, Janeway then The Doctor are the leads, the anniversary focuses on the Eternal Ensign, Chakotay and The Doctor. They really could have just made it "The Seven Special".

[@breach005]

Sometimes Voyager felt like they might as well have just fired everyone but Jeri Ryan and had her prance around in the catsuit for 45 minutes. (no offense to Jeri Ryan/Seven, good actor and character that does a lot to save the show in later seasons actually). I actually laugh when I re-watch on Seven's first reveal post-Borg, in space high-heels and all lol

[@littlsuprstr]

You know what, I kind of want to see a remake of "Quantum Leap" where a guy keeps leaping back to keep things mediocre and to make boring what once was interesting.

[@kevinbaird6705]

1:23 The _Superman Family Adventures_ comic series calls this concept the "Future future." Works for me.

[@StoneyBrownTV]

How come the Department of Temporal Investigations never shows up even though they know about all these occurances?

[@philopharynx7910]

Because these temporal incursions are on the Sacred Timeline, of course.

[@Gabriel-ci7db]

Lucsley and Dulmer were vacationing on Risa that week

[@keeperofnecronomicon]

Within StarTerk lore there a timeline that leads to the final defeat of the Borg. And Voyager is part of that timeline. Voyager has to return home for that event to happen.

[@douglaswolfen7820]

I suspect Steve would say that they're just not part of this story, and that we should engage with this story on its own terms. It's not a bad story just because some other story contradicts it On the other hand… it is fun to speculate, so let's make some theories 👍

[@douglaswolfen7820]

Let's decide that Voyager was never _supposed_ to crash in the first place, and it only crashed because some other time traveler messed things up. That means that Harry and Chakotay were only setting things back the way they were always supposed to be So where was temporal investigations? Well, who do you think helped them steal the temporal communicator in the first place?

[@allanolley4874]

I feel like in each season they get another 10 year jump closer to home. Since they are what 70 years from home this makes it seem plausible that they would get home in a 7 year run of the series thanks to such a series of leaps. The fact that every once and awhile they find some way of getting home only to have it snatched away from them by the end of the episode always reminded me of Gilligan's island, where you could be sure that any scheme to get off the island would fail. Such rigid snapping back to the status quo definitely hurts the dramatic tension of Voyager.

[@buckocean7616]

I could sure use an Alternate Timeline ™ right about now!

[@plasmaburndeath]

One thing I never understood is why they couldn't purposely turn on the slipstream enter a few minutes, wait for errors, use the magic get out of Icey planet jail card, rinse repeat only need to do this like 6 or 7 times and Bingo you are home.

[@TexasCat99]

Good idea. But the unobtanium was expiring. And there are more episodes to make.

[@breach005]

Well they had 2 seasons left to torture Harry :D

[@TexasCat99]

@breach005 they likely wish they had many many more.

[@KerbyKlay]

Loved the Reading Rainbow joke. 👩‍🍳

[@admanios]

Tessa was necessary because Chakotay needed someone that wasn't Harry to have a dialogue with on the bridge.

[@CAP198462]

Voyager always delivered the VFX shots. Water planet, Voyager landing, voyager crashing, etc.

[@frazerx01]

The problem with Star Trek's time travel is that it's never consistent. There are several ways to make time travel happen and this one boils down to (ironically) exactly what prime Harry says to Janeway at the end. This message came from an alternate timeline. It helps "our" timeline but the timeline where the message came from doesn't get erased like they all think over there. Geordie is still on the Challenger, blew up the Delta Flyer and the moment he forgets the pips and the engineer's brain kicks in, he will have to come to the conclusion that "he" killed them for nothing, because what they did, doesn't influence this timeline. And here comes the headache again, thanks for reading.

[@boriszakharin3189]

They talk about it in Star Trek: Prodigy. Apparently, it all makes sense in-universe once you take Temporal Mechanics 101.

[@stink1701]

Good review as usual. One of my favorite "Voy" episodes. BTW, I like that coffee cup in the background.

[@slayerstenis]

🎶Harry just wanna go home, 🎶 He's tired and wanna go to sleep, 🎶He had a little misshap an hour ago and got right to his crying...

[@sethlogee]

Funny Voyager slams into a ICE PLANET with NO major structural destruction, every one is just lying peacefully intact on the floor dead 😂😂

[@Zeke_O3773]

Did anyone notice how massive the main crew’s quarters are? There are members of the crew bunking up… for 70 years… and they don’t think to ever change that… you might’ve had to sleep next to a snorer for 7 damn years! I get why Ensign Suder snapped!

[@docweidner]

Imagine if they had built toward the quantum slipstream drive all season long, and the season finale was the crash. Or Voyager is heading towards the crash. The season premiere could have basically been this episode.

[@breach005]

Would have been a better and more bittersweet ending to have used the drive at the end, they built it but know its probably suicide to use it, then are forced to as a hail mary escape from the Borg or something. It actually works but the ship is basically torn apart kind of like Year of Hell and not everyone makes it. I actually really do hate the ending of Voyager, more lazy timetravel+Borg crap that is so played out by then already.

[@TexasCat99]

Yep. It's a cool idea. But it doesn't work within Star Trek episodic syndication format. When TV stations will play whatever tape Bob feels like loading that day. Other than Paramount streaming, there are stations and baby streamers playing whatever episode. This is why the generally better Babylon 5 doesn't get played much anywhere. Each season is an arc that had the ending planned for 5 seasons when Jay started. Randomizing those episodes, especially mixed up seasons would confuse the viewers. The character development was excellent. Unlike Trek, they handled sex, sexuality and romance far more mature than typical Trek. In first episode, when Gkar ask a human woman with psyche powers if they could mate... To make a psyche alien. It was tastefully funny and amusing. The show was on a much smaller budget than Trek, shot on video and using Amiga computers for the CGI... It's horrible to watch on an HDTV. Great stories.

[@Relius70]

I always felt that the fact they'd cut 10 years off their journey at the end of the episode was also a cop out. In theory there should be a major shift in the kinds of adventures they can have in this entirely new section of space, but I never really felt it.

[@indianastones6032]

Green boots???? Was that a reference to the Indian rescue mountainer bloke whom died on Mt Everest and you can whom he is as you climb up the mountain before you get to the Hillary Step.....which itself has collapsed, i believe??

[@thing_under_the_stairs]

And there's another "landmark" body up there nicknamed Sleeping Beauty, which is what he called Seven. Dark humour, Shives, very dark. I like it. (And yes, I'm pretty sure that at least part of the Hillary Step has collapsed.)

[@indianastones6032]

@thing_under_the_stairs didn't she have the Canadian flag covering and wrapped around her body by her Sherpas to give her some dignity???

[@reyperry2605]

Maybe the show would have more stakes if you put some money on it...

[@PaulMcElligott]

Welcome to the U.S.S. Voyager, where the only character development you get takes place in alternate timelines that don’t actually happen (unless you’re Seven of Nine).

[@renatocorvaro6924]

Destroying Voyager at least twice is, I think, grounds for someone to never be promoted past Ensign.

[@kevinbaird6705]

21:20 "Her character has no arc, no meaningful payoff." Yeah, she's on _Voyager_.

[@sinswhisper9588]

when i heard them say quantum slipstream drive in Voyager all i could think of was 'gene did this already in his Kevin Sorbo led series Andromeda'

[@FreihEitner]

Don't allow perfect to be the enemy of good -- a great (I won't say perfect :-)) viewpoint.

[@patrickdodds7162]

The beginning of this video offers an interesting challenge: could you consider making a video of the FOR REAL memorable moments of Star Trek: Voyager. Could you face the potential five-minute video challenge? (Or what actually works in Voyager--it could be the same video!)

[@thecynicaloptimist1884]

Given Tessa's role is just to (theoretically) give conflict to Chakotay's decision, it's a shame Tessa didn't end up in the crashed Voyager at the end, so then she could _literally_ be fridged.

[@air1fire]

I would watch this from the perspective of the crew of the Challenger. These people want to MURDER TRILLIONS! Stopping them is literally THE MOST IMPORTANT THING EVER, PERIOD! Imagine a scene of children leaving school on Earth, happy for the first day of summer break. Then suddenly they slowly start vanishing, while their parents watch in horror. Then the parents start forgetting they had any children in the first place, and then they begin to vanish themselves. And then we stay at an empty lot, and cut to credits, no music.

[@chapablo]

That sounds like the two-parter Steve covered last week. It follows a crew trying to stop a man attempting to change history in order to bring back his family.

[@userasdf]

While i get it, youre assuming chakotay are actually important to the alpha quadrant :p.

[@StevenJBen]

This is one of the few episodes I actually like. Your complaints are all valid, but at the end of the day I found it interesting. it kept my attention all the way through, and it had a solid emotional heart with Harry.

[@CreedStonegate]

Timeless is by far my favorite episode of Voyager! I like when the show leans harder into big scifi like this, especially time travel. I think for me Tessa opened up the scope just a bit. She's a piece of this future world that I think helped it more than just regular cast being involved would've. She didn't do really anything but she helped make this future it own place a bit more for me. We know someone from that future who's just not an altered version of somebody we know already.

[@FordLancer]

I was watching time travel episodes of all the Star Trek shows with some friends a while back and one thing my friend Cole said about chakotay and tessa when they were on the ship. “They probably did it either on janeway’s desk or her bed.” Much to our laughter 😂. Seriously though, I felt the last scene with the message from future harry was great. He’s telling himself what happened, it’s their fault that they died, he’s angry at himself for his mistake and you can feel that. When it ends and you see Harry’s face you see how much emotion is building up inside. The only problem is the next episode it’s never talked about again. Just like the fact harry is from a different universe and his crew is dead but all we see is the same old forever ensign harry kim. It’s such a wasted opportunity for his growth he had so many things he had to deal with and he never really changes. Almost like he’s stuck in the past.

[@Cmdr1962]

Well, here's your problem. Somehow, confetti got into the Quantum Slipstream Drive and fouled it all up.

[@RadioJosiah]

😂😂😂😂😂 Stop, stop, you're killing me. It makes too much sense. Random blotches of chaos in the matrix. Harry's calculations could never account for it. 😂😂😂😂😂

[@dnotive]

In my mind I kind of feel like in the initial drafting stages for this episode they probably always meant for it to be Tom Paris who goes with Harry on the flyer, given that it's Harry and Tom who discover the fatal flaw of the drive together, and it's Harry and Tom who are shown to have a genuine friendship and appetite for misadventures together. It's VERY easy to imagine a Tom Paris of the future going rogue and stealing a ship to help his best friend (can you imagine Tom Paris with 15 years of character development?? or maybe a Harry and Tom who are at odds with each other because Tom has had 15 years of "I told you so's" and now they're only doing this mission together because it's the right thing o do?) ... but then someone at the 11th hour went "wait a minute... didn't we already do a show in season 2 where an alternate timeline Harry Kim and Tom Paris steal a ship together to change history...? Shit. We better make it Chakotay for this one." (I'm half joking here, because as a youngster I always loved this episode.)

[@lindleya]

Honestly, the reason the Challenger is a Galaxy class ship is probably because they had the Galaxy model lying around from TNG. Also I love that Geordi wishes Chakotay "Good luck"

[@Walrus1701D]

What are you talking about? This is the classic episode in which Seven gets drunk! 15 seconds of gold.

[@FailSonOfAnarchy]

0:13 Salamander Janeway and Paris!

[@cantantenoel]

I actually like this episode a lot, but I agree about Tessa. she was so superfluous to the story that I'd actually forgotten about her until I watched this.

[@chipmckenzie]

Steve, your sum up of what Voyager was is exactly how I feel about Enterprise.

[@KyuuTomoyaki]

I absolutely LOVE this episode! One of the best Voyager episodes by far!!! ^_^

[@TheQuinnr]

You are seriously my better bearded, more sarcastic twin. Except go Blue Jays. You rock, Steve.

[@davidpumpkinsjr.5108]

Every time someone starts a circular discussion about the inconsistencies of time travel, I picture Austin Powers saying "Oh no, I've gone cross-eyed."

[@SeventhSwell]

Wonder if Harry quit before he got a promotion.

[@PaulMcElligott]

Right before, because Harry Kim.

[@ryanposey3464]

Thanks! In the grand sum total of Voyager this episode better than a most.

[@robertpolityka8464]

I wonder what type of Starfleet jobs, Chakotay and Harry did after returning to the Alpha Quadrant. (For the sake of advancing the plotline for a one hour show, it doesn't matter. But, another Voyager episode with another alternative-universe, Harry Kim tried to prevent Janeway from going to the past. In that alternate timeline, Harry was Captain of the Rhode Island.)

[@jasonkeith2832]

Janeway had to go back; Harry can't ever have a canon promotion from ensign.

[@TanyaLairdCivil]

Maybe the reason we never see any long-term consequences in Voyager episodes is because they're the single most temporally-altered ship in Starfleet history. We only see two of the deliberate timeline altering events. But in reality, there were thousands of them! Every minor mistake has been corrected by temporal interference by the friends of various dead crew members.

[@KayleighBourquin]

Everytime I see a review, analysis, or discussion that even just mentions the massive potential of Voyager's wasted premise, I feel the urge to write some fan fic to "do it right"

[@JanRademan]

They used exactly the same premise for the Series finale. (Voyager crew member returns from the future using illegal tech to prevent the death of Voyager crew member(s) using Borg tech sacrificing themselves in the process and giving their younger self a lesson from the future.)

[@ElicBehexan]

I love time travel. I didn't know really about it until I saw it on Star Trek: the Original. I don't like Next Gen or DS9 but I didn't think Voyager sucked. However, I can tell you exactly why Tessa is there. Harry can talk to the Doctor, but Chakotay doesn't have anyone to talk to. It makes it hard to do the exposition from Chakotay if he doesn't have anyone to talk to. It makes a kind of tension when Chakotay tell Tessa they would have never met. I mean, sure, they are adding some 'drama' to the show. But Tessa is there to have Chakotay talk about events from a different POV than guilty Harry. It also pads the script to make it a full episode. Fun.

[@athane8358]

They should have made Tessa into Samantha Wildman. Having Kim and Wildman desperate to save voyager, Kim over the guilt of getting them killed and Wildman desperate to save her daughters life. That could have added some interesting tension, and give some screen time to an established crewman. Heck, even Remove Chakotay from the crew or have him be the Captain of the Challenger. Chakotay trying trying to convince the two of them to move on and let go. If you are going to erase everything anyways, why not have more fun with the concept.

[@jhonbus]

It might have been nice if Chakotay had just got out of prison before the start of this episode, since I presume without the word of Captain Janeway, he'd be turning up as a wanted Maquis terrorist who'd been in hiding for the last four years. That'd give him some strong motivation to change the timeline, and his girlfriend could be someone he'd met in prison, known him for over a decade, and would have real tangibly mixed feelings because she'd have an intimate understanding of just how important it was for Chakotay to clear his name as well as save the Voyager crew.

[@Liopleurodon]

22:25 My only complaint would be: I dont remember if its mentioned in this episode, but to my knowledge it was established that Chakotay is also a good pilot, basically the best after Tom, so it would make sense to have one of them to steer the Flyer, while the other follows in Voyager, basically a 50-50 decision. I even think Harry would be challenged more as the "Science Guy"... could have also been Seven, B'Elanna or even Tuvok... but I guess neither of them was so much in need for a promotion in case of a success ;p

[@Kartissa]

Harry was an expert in quantum mechanics, having aced that portion of the Academy entrance exam. Seven may have been a better choice, but of course the plot required her to be at the Operations station on Voyager. B'Elanna was needed to monitor the quantum slipstream drive in Engineering. Tuvok is a security and tactical officer, so he may not have had the precise scientific expertise required for this mission. (Yes, he was a junior science officer on Sulu's Excelsior, but he resigned after that tour and shifted to security when he re-joined Starfleet. And he hadn't want to join in the first place, only doing so to fulfil the expectations of his parents.)

[@OakCityGamers]

Isn’t this basically the plot for the last episodes?

[@donaldwert7137]

Here's a twist. Harry sends back the second correction, which also contains an error. Instead of it dissipating the slipstream or resulting in Voyager crashing, though, Voyager comes forward in time, preserving the timeline where Harry and Chakotay live, with or without the explosion of the Delta Flyer.

[@briantyndall3541]

Steve! What you said about Rick Berman and Brannon Braga writing this episode as if it were an episode of a different show IS EXACTLY WHAT THEY DID TO ENTERPRISE in the series finale!!! HOLY SHIT!!! Also, what do you think about this: mandatory voter registration just like the draft, and if you don't vote your drivers license is suspended. Sacrifice one privilege by not exercising the other. Just a thought...

[@ProgressiveRoxx]

I can believe they built a whole new engine inbetween episodes, since apparently they saved time by NEVER TESTING THE DAMN THING!

[@WaitTryFail]

Best part of the episode: Harry's Jacket. If they find an alien repair satellite like on enterprise. It has fabrication technology that can build anything but in exchange they have to give their cultural database or something. The voyager theme should've been the line from bohemian rhapsody on loop... Nothing really matters to me

[@AaronCataract]

0:03 what a wonderful opportunity to stop-- I thought we were going to see your outro screen right then

[@robertbrown6566]

Ah thank you Steve.

[@MWB_FoolsParadisePictures]

Finally an episode of Voyager that I actually bothered to watch when I was 14 lol. I remember thinking the concept was cool and the episode itself was...decent enough. Like when you go to your least favorite gas station with a hot cashier and a shitty food selection, and the hot cashier is in the freezer while some guys you kinda know from high school are working the counter... but you discover off-brand strawberry cheesecake, and it's freezer-burned but still not too bad.

[@xoberonx]

Geordi joining the long list of characters that have killed Harry Kim.

[@Ritchian]

Timeless feels like one of the less annoying of Voyager's "Slam the reset button" episodes because it was built to be one, unlike something like Year of Hell, which was a big waste of potential. I can even give Timeless a slight pass on the slipstream drive. Oh, they absolutely should have set things up over at least a few prior episodes. But it's one of the few moments that Voyager actually pulls out one of the bits of tech they've picked up out of their junk drawer and tries to pretend they really are trying anything they can to get home. I think Harry was the perfect choice for the guilt-ridden one. We've seen his reaction in a previous episode of being home when the rest of the crew aren't (In yet another alternate timeline episode). So adding on to that him feeling as though he got everyone killed made for a good plot line for him, even if his development is, as ever, lost to the gods of the status quo. Chakotay... Meh. That did feel like tossing darts at a board to decide who to tag along who would be peachy keen with rewriting history. It's not the best episode, but the parts of it that worked were really good. And it does once again show the potential of the setting while immediately discarding that potential. Voyager, by the time it gets home, ought to be practically a patchwork of alien tech. All those new toys they've picked up along the way and forgotten about by the next episode ought to pile up season after season to the point where Voyager should be a far different ship than the one that got dragged to the Delta Quadrant. But as with everything else, the slipstream drive gets tossed in a box and forgotten about for the rest of the series. The status quo must reign. And I guess new ship models are expensive.

[@katanasteel]

Maybe that's why I like 'blink of an eye' nothing changes for Voyager but they affect a whole planet... even though it's never heard of again after that.

[@jasonstephens6109]

Simply do something like in the season 4 episode Vis a Vis, haveSvens's ship use unique but similar technilogy to the slip stream that way we can play on Tom's experience with it. then, in the episode "Hope and Fear" have Belana snag as much data on the technology and telemetry from the computer of the Dauntless as she can, but it be fragmented. Later in the episode "Counterpoint" when they encounter the wormhole at the end, hsvr Belana shoe a lot of interest in the sensor readings of thr wormhole followed by a cliffhanger epilog where Belana is seen comparing sensor readings of the wormhole and an "inverted warp bubble that we could recognize from "Hope and Fear," as the show ends with Belana calling Tom to engineering. In the next episode, show Tom and Belana talking about it in passing while looking at the same censoring readings. Tom then notices another similarity with Svens space folding drive (i forget the name). He calls up the data he has recorded from Svens ship and applies an algorithm to the two sensor readings which combines the wormhole diagram and the inverted warp field making it look like a tube that doubles back on itself. The realization is that a slipstream is just a micro-subspace wormhole fragment inverted within a quantum spacial fold. Brining in Harry and Seven they work out a way to build the engine, but the dilithuum crystals aren't pure enough to run it. Finally, they find what they need in Demon. They running on low power, they hit the jackpot with a form of liquid dilithium. Finally, we move to the beginning of "Timeless." But the flashbacks part. We see them clue in the captain and senior staff to their drive idea. Spend the episode watching them build it. Mix it with the episode where they build the Delta Flier, the reason to finally build it being a culmination of all their new technologies in a single prototype shuttle topped off with the slipstream drive. Don't have the subplot of Belana being angry about the Maquis dying here. End it with a successful short range test and moving onto the building of the engine for Voyager. Add in, really deepening Tom and Belanas relationship as they finally are sharing a common interest. Now let's get a "Timeless, Part 2." Confuse the audience a little. Start like we did. Make it look like Voyager made it back but we are only seeing Harry and Chakotay until we learn about the fate of Voyager. From there, play out the future part the same. Later, in another episode on which we staty by seeing Tom and Belana get married. Start playing out the events of the Episode, "Oblivion," except this time, don't make it be the fake crew. Make it so that the crew survived the Slipstream as before but much later we are learning that it had some negative affects on the crews molecular structure. In the end, they manage to figure out how to save themselves, but not before it causes a lot of damage to Voyager. From here, the Delta Flier should have a successful slipstream drive but it only works in short bursts.

[@KayleighBourquin]

It's kind of amazing that if not for the message from future Harry, this episode would have had absolutely no consequences whatsoever, just like Year of Hell. Though the consequences, as is Voyager's wont, are not at all lasting, and are never referenced again.

[@jeffreyjay2899]

Someone explained that Voyager kept getting different writers and one to the next would contradict each other, so some would portray Janeway one way while others would write a completely different character. Reportedly the actors gave up on consistency, especially for Janeway and Chakotay, and just acted out whatever was in the script. The characters over time can seem schizophrenic. Each writer and director seemingly went in whatever direction they felt like.

[@gregorymcavoy758]

This episode should have been a two parter. First episode is the leading up to and eventual crash of Voyager. This would have given the time to have why Chakotay and Kim were on board. Maybe even explain why this issue was brought up after the slipstream engine was constructed and not before. Then the second episode can deal with the whys and hows why saving Voyager is important. Plus explains Tessa. Oh and when you make a point to bash fan service in a cartoon like Lower Decks, you will have to explain why Geordi of all people is hunting down the Voyager crew. Could have been anyone else you know.

[@Spielkalb-von-Sparta]

Is this the 100rd review of Voyager episodes? That'd be funny!

[@Chris-tf7gi]

"Nice going Harry!" :)

[@Marcsharp82]

One of my favourite things about Timeless.....is that every episode after this takes place in an alternate Timeline. Voyager was supposed to face plant the planet and kill everyone. Harry altered it and so created a new timeline. So for everyone who thinks "NuTrek" doesn't count because they think it takes place in an alternate universe or Timeline or whatever reason they come up with, By their logic neither does Voyager after Timeless.

[@OscarPlymouth]

It's one of my favourite episodes.

[@leothesilent4789]

Any plans for the 100 retro review Steve?

[@jeffreyjay2899]

Shows that develop Harry Kim or Tom Paris are often good. I think we got a little bit too much of them together and with Tom's eventual wife. I understand they wanted to gradually develop their relationships but they somehow fell into shallow stereotypes too much when they played off each other. I think we had a similar problem with Chakotay and Seven, particularly for Chakotay. He just seems one note, while Seven develops.

[@DeadDancers]

Time paradoxes that involve the brain don’t seem like any kind of problem. That thing is constantly hallucinating. It’s probably a safety valve of some kind, so every time reality changes we shrug it off as a dream or intuition.

[@carlamarinacosta4855]

Voyager is my favorite of all Star Trek series

[@seanhillman1016]

Does it make it better if we view it as a prequel to the series finale?

[@paulwalker3758]

In the “missing the point” side of things, they actually laid the groundwork for this. When the Delta Flyer crashed before, it was into an asteroid made of Benamite - the crystals used in this. 🤦‍♂️ So massively missing the point of the set-up. Not an easter egg to see later, but a point of intrigue.

[@mikek2617]

The main problem I have with the new quantum slipstream drive is that it apparently got as far as being fully built and ready to go without running it through simulations that could catch serious flaws. And can we call out the incredibly bad makeup job this episode did trying to convince us that Chakotay and Harry are 15 years older?

[@userasdf]

Harry and tom would have been a better match for this harry because he always wanted to get home the most and turning him from a bright eyed ensign (that always messes up) to a bitter old star fleet flunky (who also messes up but does redeem himself in the end) is pretty good. Tom js the only other character we get any significant connection to back home with his dad. (Janeway has mark but he moved on and was never brought up again). Tom risking never seeing his dad again could have been some real drama. Would assume tom has proven himself as not a screw up in the years he was back home and probably did lots of important things and made his dad proud. And he throws it all away for a timeline where his dads last memory of him was as a criminal. Imaging some sort of “are you going to throw away everything you’ve accomplished, everything youve become for a snowballs chance in hell of getting that ship home?” “I wouldnt be the man i am today if it wasnt for the people on that ship”. Or something better written than that.

[@jeffreyjay2899]

Now that you mention it, Voyager suffers from too much exposition, which most Star Trek shows also have, but Voyager has it noticeably more than the other shows. They say things that we really should see, interesting things that could have great visuals, far too much for my taste.

[@alissapyrich1891]

My first thought after that great opening was "oh no, not another one of *these* episodes". Then I turned off the TV.

[@Darbobski]

Steve usually hates when Voyager's actions have zero impact, but in this case they did make sure to let the crew know that they would have failed if not for a future Harry Kim. His actions mattered and were remembered, even if not fully known. This is not to defend the series, but I do think Steve should be consistent in his reviews...other than disliking Voyager anyway. He is consistent in that way.

[@Tolly7249]

One of Voyager's better episodes... to damn with faint praise. I like future Chakotay and Harry, they have some more personality than the show usually lets them have, and the Doctor reminding Harry that Perfect is the enemy of Done is a great scene. But in the end it's just another episode of Voyager with a big red reset button at the end.

[@steveng.clinard1766]

Wait, what?

[@air1fire]

Exactly.

[@mikerhodes8454]

It's been a while since I saw this, but did they ever mention Harry getting a promotion upon returning to earth?

[@Rybe33]

I can't help comparing this episode to the finale (obviously) and I have to say the motives in this episode are so much better/more sympathetic. Like yeah what they're doing is a similar degree of shitty, but it feels driven out of the crippling survivors guilt as opposed to. I don't know...being a perfectionist? Honestly a version of this episode where they DID manage to fix time and get Voyager home, only probably swapping Janeway into the Delta Flier would have made a way better last episode than what we got. Not that I think that would be a better ending for THIS episode just...god i hate the last episode lol