My #StarTrekVoyager rewatch S4E24 “Demon”
It’s nice to see Vorik! And is Roxanne Dawson pregnant? Memory Alpha says “yes.” That explains the uniform and the camera angles.
Voyager needs a gas station. Sounds like a barn burner! Paris: “even at 1/4 impulse we’ll be out of gas within a week.” Traveling at sub-light speeds is stupid! It would take years to travel between solar systems.
On the one hand, it’s not a recycled TNG plot. On the other, it’s already pretty dumb. Griefing Neelix is fun, but he can’t bring a book to temporary quarters? Why? Does Neelix move his lips when he reads? Or insist on reading passages out loud? And let’s shut down the good scanners while we look for fuel. Dumb. At least Seven tells them that’s stupid.
The gas station is on a Demon-class planet. Very unpleasant. At least the Demon isn’t literal.
Hey! Directed by Potsie Webber again!
Harry wants to know why he shouldn’t take the initiative. Because you’re an ensign. He and Tom are still not funny. Using EV Suits in an environment too toxic for the ship is dumb. Splitting up is dumb. Drastic temperature changes on Harry’s suit having no obvious effects is dumb. I’ll stop. But wait! The computer says the suit has a problem, saving the FX budget! It’s too dangerous to orbit the planet, so now we land. Ugh!
The B story, Neelix sleeping in sickbay, is even worse but is mercifully short. Also, the visuals of the shuttle do not match the conditions on the planet. Tom and Harry can now breathe without suits and are oddly out of character. I bet the ship will be poisonous to them now.
Yup. The blatantly predictable thing happens. The concept of bio-forming vs. terraforming is interesting at least. But that’s not what happened. The planet 3-D printed a new Harry and Tom. The originals should be dead but inexplicably they’re not. Still dumb. The planet wants to 3-D print everybody.
None of the characters have figured that out yet. Janeway says “sentience” when she means “sapience.” We casually, off-screen, copy everyone, sidestepping the Tuvix-sized ethical issues. I must never have seen this one when it first ran 24 years ago because I’d still be irritated.
But I don’t blame Potsie.
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