Yup, I'm going to tackle Threshold with my own take on it. I'm going to review some of the episode and insert my own opinions/analysis rather than the whole thing, simply because others have done it and I cannot hope to top their wit and insight. For an excellent review on the entire episode, I recommend you read Chuck Sonnenburg's take on it.
Anyway, ah, yes, Threshold. Often cited as the worst episode of Voyager and the worst episode of Star Trek, period. Well, I'm going to start this off with this revolutionary assertion:
I disagree.
Oh, sure, Threshold is bad. It's really bad. But at the same time...it's not that bad. In fact, in terms of the quality of both the storytelling and scientific accuracy, it's pretty much just a typical Voyager episode.
Let's start with the most hated aspect of this episode - the science. I'm not going to be defending the atrocious science of this episode, I'm just wondering why this episode is treated so special when 90% of Voyager's science is just as bad. Traveling at speeds of infinity - and over infinity (yes, apparently Braga, Taylor and Biller think this is logical) is only equally about as stupid as "finding a crack in the event horizon" or the constant abuse of such simple terms as "alloy" and "ceramics," and the "evolution" aspect certainly wasn't the first or last time the concept has been misrepresented this badly (TNG's Genesis, anyone?) The point is, Voyager and Berman/Braga-era Star Trek does stupid stuff on a routine basis, pretty much to the point where I've just learned to expect it and drown it out, an especially powerful form of suspension of disbelief - which is just sad when you think about it.
But enough of that, the warp 10 thing was just an idiotic plot device to incur the main idiotic plot device of the episode. Ah, evolution - the sudden and unexplained immediate transformation of one species to a completely different and unrelated species in accordance to a pre-planned path as encoded in ones DNA - right? Yeah.... The bad science aside, this didn't really go anywhere - Paris "evolved," got Janeway to "evolve" and they had salamander children. There wasn't any sense of suspense or wonder or introspection, just...it happened. And they were salamanders. Yeah, I'm beginning to see why this episode is so hated.
Well, examining the science and plot was pretty useless, but what saves this episode from being the worst, is, IMHO, two things, the first being combined performances of McNeill and Picardo, while far from their best, were just spot-on and too good to go to waste in an episode like this - Picardo in particular delivers a great line when Janeway orders the EMH to wake Paris up, and McNeill does a decent job of conveying the uneasy and uncertain impatience with the anticipation of becoming the first person to exceed warp 10.
The second saving grace is, sadly, that there were episodes that, while not as scientifically offensive, managed to be more boring. I can get through watching Threshold. I can't get through watching Tattoo - yeah, that's right, Tattoo, which is typically regarded highly but my ADD tends to drive my attention away when all the episode is about "blah blah blah American natives have aliens to thank for everything and not any sort of self-determination from their own will, blah blah blah regressive racial attitudes masquerading as progress" (more on this later, and once again Chuck has an excellent review of this episode for more information).
So what can we get from this episode, and what can we get from it that's particularly interesting for the Trek vs. Wars debate? Well, interestingly enough, it's one of the few filmed and aired episodes regarded as to have an ambiguous canon status, to which I must protest. Not that it gives Trek an edge by giving Trek the ability of a starship crew to build a shuttle capable of occupying every point in space time (which is so stupid few if any Trek supporters have argued this point anyway) but rather because I think it would be more entertaining to flaunt this episode in Braga's and Taylor's faces - "too late dipshits, you wrote the episode and there's no take-backs, live with it and admit you suck!' Other than that, admittedly not much, since the episode itself pretty much conceded the warp 10 plot device as stupid.
Well...ok, that probably wasn't much of an analysis at all, but maybe I'll add stuff later.
ST: VOY Episode review/analysis: Threshold
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ILikeDeathNote
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Trinoya
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Anyway, ah, yes, Threshold. Often cited as the worst episode of Voyager and the worst episode of Star Trek, period.
*nods nods* I like where this is going...
Excellent! A new fresh way to insult the episode!Well, I'm going to start this off with this revolutionary assertion:
...I disagree.
WITCH!! You're a witch I say! BURN HER! Burn the witch! The episode is a wtich and you're working with a witch. Witches all around. Don't believe me? They turned them into newts!
Jokes aside: I'm all for a review forum. And for shoving this episode into Bragas face.
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2046
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ILikeDeathNote
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Well, the point was that I was trying to defend three points I'm asserting here:
1.) Threshold is not the worst episode in Trek, or even Voyager for that matter
2.) Threshold is at best an average Voyager episode, but at worst it's also just an average Voyager episode.
3.) It's my opinion, so suck it :p (that was a lighthearted joke BTW, not meant to offend, I'll strike it from the post if it does offend someone)
Anyway, to elaborate, the science isn't any more atrocious than what we saw in Twisted, Parallax, The Cloud, I can go on, and the concept of evolution is butchered just as badly almost every time TNG-era Trek deals with it, so I'm honestly puzzled why this episode is held above the wretched rest. There are far more boring episodes in Voyager alone, let alone Enterprise - I already named Tattoo, and One, the aforementioned Twisted, Parallax, and The Cloud, Elogiom, Unimatrix Zero (both parts), and any episode dealing with Seven's attempt at romance will pretty much bore me to tears and I can waste this post just listing such episodes from Enterprise. Threshold wasn't exactly entertaining, but it's tolerable enough to watch especially if nothing else is on, whereas all the other episodes listed make me glad I live within walking distance of a library. At this point, I'm convinced that Jeri Taylor might be right - it's not how evolution's treated in this episode that makes it so horrible (well, at least not above and beyond the amount of contempt that TNG-era Trek creates for their abuse of the concept), but the fact that they decided that salamanders is the ultimate evolutionary end of humanity - which, in of itself, is just pretty ****ing stupid, even moreso than just the whole concept of evolution and "infinite warp" as portrayed in the episode.
Looking back on it, I was trying to do too many things at once without a clear picture on how to do them, and trying to look at it from a basis of trying to add new things when in reality I should've just added my flat-out opinion, so I've decided to do a follow-up post soon.
And as many of you are curious, what do I think is the worst Voyager episode, and the worst episode of all of Trek? Well it just so happens that they're both one in the same - Favorite Son, which in my opinion is hands down, far and away, one of the most atrocious things I have ever seen on television - period. I'd love to go into the number of mindboggling stupidities that rile me up when I think about this episode, but I think I'll save that for its own post :)
1.) Threshold is not the worst episode in Trek, or even Voyager for that matter
2.) Threshold is at best an average Voyager episode, but at worst it's also just an average Voyager episode.
3.) It's my opinion, so suck it :p (that was a lighthearted joke BTW, not meant to offend, I'll strike it from the post if it does offend someone)
Anyway, to elaborate, the science isn't any more atrocious than what we saw in Twisted, Parallax, The Cloud, I can go on, and the concept of evolution is butchered just as badly almost every time TNG-era Trek deals with it, so I'm honestly puzzled why this episode is held above the wretched rest. There are far more boring episodes in Voyager alone, let alone Enterprise - I already named Tattoo, and One, the aforementioned Twisted, Parallax, and The Cloud, Elogiom, Unimatrix Zero (both parts), and any episode dealing with Seven's attempt at romance will pretty much bore me to tears and I can waste this post just listing such episodes from Enterprise. Threshold wasn't exactly entertaining, but it's tolerable enough to watch especially if nothing else is on, whereas all the other episodes listed make me glad I live within walking distance of a library. At this point, I'm convinced that Jeri Taylor might be right - it's not how evolution's treated in this episode that makes it so horrible (well, at least not above and beyond the amount of contempt that TNG-era Trek creates for their abuse of the concept), but the fact that they decided that salamanders is the ultimate evolutionary end of humanity - which, in of itself, is just pretty ****ing stupid, even moreso than just the whole concept of evolution and "infinite warp" as portrayed in the episode.
Looking back on it, I was trying to do too many things at once without a clear picture on how to do them, and trying to look at it from a basis of trying to add new things when in reality I should've just added my flat-out opinion, so I've decided to do a follow-up post soon.
And as many of you are curious, what do I think is the worst Voyager episode, and the worst episode of all of Trek? Well it just so happens that they're both one in the same - Favorite Son, which in my opinion is hands down, far and away, one of the most atrocious things I have ever seen on television - period. I'd love to go into the number of mindboggling stupidities that rile me up when I think about this episode, but I think I'll save that for its own post :)
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Cocytus
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Is he lighter than a duck? If so, burn him.
For me, Threshold is pretty awful, but at least its entertaining. Kudos to the makeup crew for Paris' mutation. The episode of Voyager I watch most infrequently is "The Thaw." Trek at its best is cerebral, Trek at a low point, i.e. Threshold, is poorly conceived but well executed, and thus still entertaining. "The Thaw" is just plain boring. Nothing happens. It's a hamfisted story apparently predicated on FDR's inaugural address, which might have worked better had the writers actually made the episode scary. The little Halloween characters running around and partying are cartoonishly unthreatening.
Trek also butchers evolution in "Genesis" when Crusher unleashes Barclay's Protomorphosis Syndrome, but the episode was still entertaining, another case of poor writing saved by the makeup crew. The Thaw doesn't even have that. It just has poor everything.
For me, Threshold is pretty awful, but at least its entertaining. Kudos to the makeup crew for Paris' mutation. The episode of Voyager I watch most infrequently is "The Thaw." Trek at its best is cerebral, Trek at a low point, i.e. Threshold, is poorly conceived but well executed, and thus still entertaining. "The Thaw" is just plain boring. Nothing happens. It's a hamfisted story apparently predicated on FDR's inaugural address, which might have worked better had the writers actually made the episode scary. The little Halloween characters running around and partying are cartoonishly unthreatening.
Trek also butchers evolution in "Genesis" when Crusher unleashes Barclay's Protomorphosis Syndrome, but the episode was still entertaining, another case of poor writing saved by the makeup crew. The Thaw doesn't even have that. It just has poor everything.