Series: Star Trek: Voyager
Season 3, Episode 2
Original Air Date: September 11, 1996
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| via Memory Alpha |
Tuvok has a mental breakdown on the bridge accompanied by flashbacks to letting go of a girl before she fell from a precipice, an incident he doesn't remember. Janeway mind-melds with him in order to help probe the past. We go back to his days on the USS Excelsior where he served under none other than Captain Hikaru Sulu.
"Flashback" pushes hard on the nostalgia button. We get both Sulu and Janice Rand in Undiscovered Country-era uniforms. We get Kang. It was all in honor of Star Trek's 30th anniversary and the homage was effective.
But that's really it. What else is there here? "Flashback" gets a lot of love on best-of lists but I don't see it. The memory anomaly is all explained away with technobabble. It was just a gimmick, a device to get to Sulu with no real value of its own. The acting's good. The background development for Tuvok is good. It's fun without being meaningful. I want meaningful.
Acting Notes
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| via Memory Alpha |
Jeremy Roberts played the role of Lt. Cmdr. Dmitri Valtane, the same character he played in Undiscovered Country. "Flashback" was his third and final Trek appearance. He was born Jeremy Thompson in Birmingham, Alabama, September 18, 1954. Other television appearances include CSI: Miami, Xena: Princess Warrior and Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Other films include Sister Act and Blackout.
What annoys me about it is the ending with hearing/seeing all the people experiencing the end of the bad guy. There’s no good way to describe it. It was a bad ending. But an otherwise fun episode. I happen to think Undiscovered Country is one of the best Star Trek movies, so it’s fun to revisit.
ReplyDeleteIt’s also a fun callback to the 25th anniversary, which 1991 was. And throwing a bone to all the fans who yearned for a Captain Sulu series. Which was never going to happen, and shouldn’t’ve. But worth a nod.
DeleteA third comment:
DeleteI actually ended up rewatching it that night. It’s a great anniversary tribute on its own, just when Janeway is giving her assessment of that generation. (Though probably the same fans who crapped over her as an admiral in Nemesis practiced their conniptions listening here.) But she’s essentially correct. It’s also the difference between Spock and Tuvok. Tuvok and Janeway’s relationship never became nearly as integral to the show as it seemed set up to be. “Flashback” is arguably its high point. Tuvok maintained what many fans interpreted to be the Vulcan template. What made Spock so charismatic was how often he allowed his friendship with Kirk to step away from it. Very tellingly, Spock had a totally different vibe with Bones than Tuvok and Neelix, too.
Anyway, a good episode to feel the differences.
And a fourth comment! A lot of fans interpret Voyager as failing its own premise, or being too similar to Next Generation to be worth much on its own. But its premise made a huge difference, just in how much the crew adhered to Starfleet ideals. That’s what pushed the Maquis integration. They needed to be able to depend on each other. The second season emphasized this repeatedly, between Seska, Jonas, Suder, even Tuvix. I mention this because Tuvok’s character was absolutely influenced by this. Be maintained a strict professionalism, as did Janeway. He was as affected by it as Chakotay, Paris, Torres…Part of what set Neelix, the Doctor, Seven, Kes so far apart was that they were the outsiders. Previously this role was fulfilled by Spock, by Data, by Worf, all conventional, by most standards, members of Starfleet.
DeleteAnyway, this is why you don’t get me started. It bothered you in the political stuff, I know. But I can do it with Star Trek, with Voyager.
I'm with you on the depth this episode adds for Tuvok. My issues have to do with the clumsiness of the storytelling itself. The resolution of the memory issue - it's hard to even care by that point. I watched DS9's "The Ship" not long afterward and the contrast in quality is stunning. Yes, the older series was a well-oiled machine by Season 5. As Echevarria said, eventually, dialogue between the principals practically wrote itself. Voyager never got to that point. It was the awkward younger brother to the end.
DeleteFailing its own premise... They took 172 episodes over seven years to get home. That's a lot of hours to fill. By the mid-'90s, the Trek machine was producing 50ish episodes a year, plus movies. Yes, the two series had different head-creatives and separate principal casts. But the two shared, and exhausted, all of the resources beyond that: tech staff, guest actors and, most importantly, writers. The stronger show was getting the better material and would continue to do so for the next (from this point) three seasons.
Yes, I know there will be high points and goodness knows Seven of Nine is gonna breathe new life into the whole franchise when she gets here. I don't know Voyager's last four seasons so well. I'm looking forward to them.
A thought I've had: the Voyager concept might work better now in the age of streaming. With 10 episodes a season rather than 25ish, the story could have been simplified and the stronger material concentrated. But maybe not. I'd say Discovery was kind of a mess by the end, too. And Picard was certainly uneven from one season to the next.
A fascinating medium, television.
Oh, Discovery pretty much demonstrated exactly what Voyager would look like today.
DeleteAt this point, I seriously doubt I'll make it all the way to the streaming series so we might as well start talking about them now...
DeleteIt's been interesting to see which ones have worked and which ones haven't. Now, obviously, COVID played a role but Discovery and Picard were both inconsistent to put in kindly. Lower Decks was absolutely brilliant - a self-parody series being long overdue, honestly. Strange New Worlds has been solid so far. I know "Subspace Rhapsody" has gotten mixed reactions but I have to say I felt like my whole life had been preparing me for the Klingon song and dance break.
Which leads us to Prodigy. It's really good. Such a shame it was cancelled - at least so far and resurrecting it would take a lot. A sequel to Voyager if ever we've had one and in many ways more satisfying than the original.
It is also the closest to Star Wars that Trek has ever gotten and I'm not sure how I feel about that. Both SW and Marvel have clearly had an impact on Trek's streaming era and I wish the Trek creators could simply trust their product on its own merits. I realize influence is inevitable over the long term. But Trek is different from other franchises in beautiful ways. I want that to continue for future generations.