"The Curious Affair of B'Elanna Torres' Age"

"THE CURIOUS AFFAIR OF B'ELANNA TORRES' AGE"

Over the years there have been many complaints about the inconsistency regarding characters and stories in STAR TREKseries, "STAR TREK VOYAGER" (1995-2001). I will not deny that the series has been guilty of the occasional inconsistency. To be frank, all of the five TREK series and many of the franchise's movies are guilty of the same.However, I was shocked and surprised to learn that some of the websites that provide information on the entire franchise turned out to be just as inconsistent. 

While perusing the WIKIPEDIA website several years ago, I was surprised to discover a major discrepancy featuring one of the major characters on "VOYAGER", namely that of the Chief Engineer, B’Elanna Torres. According to the site, B’Elanna was born in 2349, the same year as Voyager's Operations Chief, Harry Kim. It also included that B’Elanna had joined Starfleet Academy in 2366, right after her last meeting with her mother, Miral Torres. Two years later in 2368, B’Elanna allegedly resigned from Starfleet Academy and not long afterwards, joined Chakotay’s cell in the Maquis. There is another source that confirms this – namely Jeri Taylor’s 1998 Voyager novel, "Pathways". Personally, I had major problems with this summation.

One, I found it hard to believe that B’Elanna had joined the Maquis sometime between 2368 (the year that Chakotay had resigned from Starfleet and joined the Maquis) and 2369. If this is true, then she would have first met the ship's Chief Pilot, Tom Paris, in the Maquis. But the television series had never hinted that B’Elanna and Tom knew each other before Voyager was hurled into the Delta Quadrant in early 2371. The early Season Two episode, (2.05) "Non-Sequitur" made it clear that Tom had served his full sentence of eighteen months in a Federation prison – in an alternate timeline that Harry Kim found himself in. According to the episode and the stardate, Tom had been released from prison in September 2371. Which means that Tom had been captured and imprisoned by the Federation in March 2370. And another Season Two episode, (2.17) "Dreadnought", made it clear that Voyager’s encounter with Cardassian missile occurred nearly on the second anniversary of B’Elanna’s first encounter with the missile – not long after she had joined Chakotay’s cell. According to the stardate, "Dreadnought" occurred in the summer of 2372, which means that B’Elanna had joined Chakotay’s cell sometime during the late spring of 2370.

Also, it is not possible that B’Elanna had joined Starfleet Academy in 2366, after seeing her mother for the last time. According to the late Season Five episode, (5.26) "The Equinox, Part I", B’Elanna had not seen her old Academy boyfriend, Maxwell Burke, in ten years. "The Equinox" was probably set around the end of 2375 or the beginning of 2366, which means that she and Burke had last seen each other in 2365. I am also convinced that it is possible B’Elanna had last met with her mother after resigning from Starfleet Academy and not before joining it, as was indicated in Taylor's novel. Although there is no episode that claimed B’Elanna had last spoken to her mother after leaving Starfleet, the Season Six episode, (6.03) "Barge of the Dead" certainly did not make it clear that she had joined Starfleet Academy after her last meeting with Miral – despite what Wikipedia and Jeri Taylor had claimed. 

There is one last reason why I found it difficult to accept that B’Elanna was born in 2349. It happened to be the same birth year as her close friend, Harry Kim. If the two friends had been born in the same year, this meant that both had entered Starfleet Academy around the same time. And both would have immediately been placed on the Engineering track. Their chances of meeting for the first time at the Academy would have been pretty good. Yet, the series premiere episode, (1.01-1.02) "Caretaker" made it pretty clear that B’Elanna and Harry had met for the first time, while in the Ocampan settlement in 2371.

It is the series itself that still makes it easy for me to refute the claim that B’Elanna Torres had joined the Maquis in 2368 or that she had been born in 2349. In regard to the first claim, the stardates provided in episodes like "Non-Sequitur" and "Dreadnought" seemed to contradict Wikipedia or Jeri Taylor that B’Elanna had joined the Maquis in 2368. And episodes like "Caretaker", "The Equinox" and "Barge of the Dead" gave enough evidence to refute the claim that B’Elanna had been born in 2349.

About an hour ago, I had examined the Wikipedia page for B'Elanna's character. Changes had been made. The site no longer claimed that B’Elanna had been born in 2349. Instead, it claimed that she had been born in 2346. I do not know if this is true, but it seems a lot more plausible than its earlier claim. But I would not be surprised if these changes were removed by the site’s webmaster. No matter. I am now satisfied.

Excessive Criticism of “STAR TREK VOYAGER”

EXCESSIVE CRITICISM OF "STAR TREK VOYAGER"

For the past two decades, I have never encountered so much criticism of one particular Star Trek show than I have for the 1995-2001 series, "STAR TREK VOYAGER".

Ironically, I used to buy this negative opinion.  Or accept it.  One of the reasons I had ignored "STAR TREK VOYAGER" for so many years, because I had assumed that those fans who had deemed it inferior to the other shows in the franchise were right.  When my sister found out that the rest of our family was ignoring the show, she fervently suggested that we watch it.  This happened when the early Season Five episodes were going through its first run.  Well, we did.  We watched some of those early Season Five shows.  We also watched the previous episodes from Season One to Season Four that were currently in syndication.  And guess what?  My family became fans of the show.

I am not going to claim that "VOYAGER" was perfect.  Yes, it had its flaws.  I have even posted a few articles about some of the flaws I had encountered.  But I was also able to pick out both major and minor flaws in the other Trek shows at the time - "STARTREK", "STAR TREK NEXT GENERATION", and "STAR TREK DEEP SPACE NINE"  - while still enjoying them.  I never really became a big fan of "STAR TREK ENTERPRISE", but there were a good number of episodes that I really enjoyed.   

This fervent need to nitpick everything about "STAR TREK VOYAGER" in order to deem it as some kind of pop culture disaster is mind boggling to me.  Every time I access an article on the Internet - especially on a Trek message board - about series, the criticism seemed to strike me as unnecessarily excessive . . . and constant.  And most of the complaints I have come across are either about some ridiculously minor flaw or how Janeway was a terrible star ship captain.  I do not understand this opinion.  Janeway made her mistakes.  So did the other Trek captains.  What made her worse than the others?  Her gender?  Star Trek shows were not allowed to have women as the leads or even worse, in the command position?  

More importantly, these same fans seem very reluctant to point out the flaws - both minor and major - about the other Trek shows.  At least not to this extreme degree. What is going on?  If you are going to state that "VOYAGER" was simply the worst show in the Trek franchise, do not expect  me to buy this opinion anymore.  After seeing the show and the others in the franchise, I really have great difficulty in accepting this view.  So what is it?  What is the real truth?  I guess in the end, these are questions that no one can really answer.  After all, art and entertainment are subjective. 

STAR TREK VOYAGER RETROSPECTIVE: (3.24) "Displaced"

STAR TREK VOYAGER RETROSPECTIVE: (3.24) “Displaced”

I might as well be honest. I wish I could be objective about the ”STAR TREK VOYAGER” Season Three episode,”Displaced”. But I cannot. My feelings for this episode are too strong. Let me explain. 

Lisa Klink wrote the teleplay for this episode about Voyager’s crew members being replaced, one-by-one, with aliens from an unknown race. While arguing over a Klingon workout program that Chief Helmsman Tom Paris had created for the Holodeck, the pilot and Voyager’s Chief Engineer, B’ElannaTorres, are interrupted by a strange alien that has appeared aboard ship from nowhere. This phenomenon occurs over and over again, until both Captain Janeway and Commander Chakotay realizes that this new alien race – called the Nyrians – are bent upon taking control of Voyager . . . but without the use of brute force. Eventually, the entire crew end up as prisoners on a habitat that also contains prisoners from other races whose ships and colonies were also conquered by the Nyrians in a similar manner. 

Amidst the alien takeover of the ship, the continuation of the blossoming relationship between the ship’s Chief Helmsman, Lieutenant Tom Paris and Chief Engineer Lieutenant B’Elanna Torres hits a snag. In a previous episode called ”Distant Origin”, Paris had made a bet with Torres over the reason behind a ship malfunction. The Chief Helmsman won the bet and Torres was forced to participate with him in a Klingon exercise program in the Holodeck. Being inclined to avoid her Klingon heritage as much as possible, Torres resents that Paris is interested in all aspects of her entire self – both Human and Klingon. And later in the episode, both Torres and the Doctor revealed Tom’s own insecurities and his tendency to use jokes to hide them.

Temperatures seemed to have played a major role in ”Displaced”. From Paris and Torres’ heated argument over his Klingon martial arts program to the Nyrians and Torres’ low tolerance of cold temperatures, and to finally the warm reconciliation between the two future lovers inside the Holodeck. It was good to see Voyager’s crew – especially Janeway and Tuvok - work at retaking control of Voyager by utilizing the Nyrians’ teleportation system. I especially found Janeway’s ultimatums for the Nyrian leaders inside their habitat rather satisfying.

But what really made this episode rocked – at least for me – was the continuation of Paris and Torres’ courtship that began when the Chief Pilot made his first overture in ”The Swarm”, earlier in the season. By the time ”Displaced” had aired – some twenty episodes later – Paris has been in earnest pursuit of Torres. Lisa Klink had wonderfully brought out Paris’ determination to reveal to Torres, his interest in everything about her – and that included both her Human and Klingon sides – despite how she may have felt about the latter. Klink also did an excellent job of revealing the pair’s insecurities, which ended up providing many roadblocks to their romance and eventual marriage over three years later. Late Season Three and early Season Four had featured some of the best moments in the Paris/Torres relationship. At least until Season Seven. And among those gems included scenes from this episode.

Below are what I consider highlights from ”Displaced”:

*Paris and Torres’ quarrel over the Klingon martial arts program
*Tuvok’s revelation to Chakotay about his survival training experience on Vulcan
*Chakotay’s attempts to defend the ship from the Nyrians, reliving his old role as a Maquis captain
*The Doctor’s exposure of both Paris and Torres’ insecurities inside the Nyrian habitat
*Torres’ ”I’m not hostile” conversation with Harry Kim and his fearful reaction to her tone
*Paris and Torres’ frozen adventures inside another Nyrian habitat
*Janeway and Tuvok’s efforts to gain control of the Nyrians’ teleportation system
*Janeway’s confrontation with the Nyrian leaders

As I had earlier stated, I wish I could be objective about this episode. But how can I? Even after eleven years, I still love it. Lisa Klink’s teleplay seemed to feature everything – adventure, romance, humor, intrigue and rich characterization. It is easy to see why I consider ”Displaced” to be one of the best ”VOYAGER” episodes.

"The Curious Affair of B'Elanna Torres' Age"

"THE CURIOUS AFFAIR OF B'ELANNA TORRES' AGE"

Over the years there have been many complaints about the inconsistency regarding characters and stories in TREK series,"sSTAR TREK VOYAGER" (1995-2001). I will not deny that the series has been guilty of the occasional inconsistency.To be frank, all of the five TREK series and many of its movies are guilty of the same. However, I was shocked and surprised to learn that some of the websites that provide information on the entire franchise turned out to be just as inconsistent. 

While perusing the Wikipedia website, I was surprised to discover a major discrepancy featuring one of the major characters on "STAR TREK VOYAGER", namely that of the Chief Engineer, B’Elanna Torres. According to this site, B’Elanna was born in 2349, the same year as Operations Chief, Harry Kim. It also included that B’Elanna had joined Starfleet Academy in 2366, right after her last meeting with her mother, Miral Torres. Two years later in 2368, B’Elanna allegedly resigned from Starfleet Academy and not long afterwards, joined Chakotay’s cell in the Maquis. There is another source that confirms this – namely Jeri Taylor’s Voyager novel, "Pathways". Personally, I had major problems with this summation.

One, I find it hard to believe that B’Elanna had joined the Maquis sometime between 2368 (the year that Chakotay had resigned from Starfleet and joined the Maquis) and 2369. If this is true, then she would have first met Tom Paris, in the Maquis. But the television series had never hinted that B’Elanna and Tom knew each other before Voyager was hurled into the Delta Quadrant in early 2371. The early Season 2 episode, "Non-Sequitur" made it clear that Tom had served his full sentence in a Federation prison – eighteen months in an alternate timeline that Harry Kim found himself in. According to the episode and the stardate, Tom had been released from prison in September 2371. Which means that Tom had been captured and imprisoned by the Federation in March 2370. And the Season 2 episode, "Dreadnought", made it clear that Voyager’s encounter with Cardassian missile occurred nearly on the second anniversary of B’Elanna’s first encounter with the missile – not long after she had joined Chakotay’s cell. According to the stardate, "Dreadnought" occurred in the summer of 2372, which means that B’Elanna had joined Chakotay’s cell sometime during the late spring of 2370.

Also, it is not possible that B’Elanna had joined Starfleet Academy in 2366, after seeing her mother for the last time. According to the late Season 5 episode, "The Equinox", B’Elanna had not seen her old Academy boyfriend, Maxwell Burke, in ten years. "The Equinox" was probably set near the end of 2375, which means that she and Burke had last seen each other in 2365. This also leads me to believe that B’Elanna had already been in Starfleet Academy by 2366. I am also convinced that it is possible that B’Elanna had last met with her mother after resigning from Starfleet Academy and not before joining it. Although there is no episode that claimed that B’Elanna had last spoken to her mother after leaving Starfleet, the Season 6 episode, "Barge of the Dead" certainly did not make it clear that she had joined Starfleet Academy after her last meeting with Miral – despite what Wikipedia and Jeri Taylor have claimed. 

There is one last reason why I find it difficult to accept that B’Elanna was born in 2349. It happens to be the same birth year as her close friend, Harry Kim. If the two friends had been born in the same year, this meant that both had entered Starfleet around the same time. And both would have immediately been placed on the Engineering track. Their chances of meeting for the first time at the Academy would have been pretty good. Yet, the premiere episode, "Caretaker" makes it pretty clear that B’Elanna and Harry met for the first time, while in the Ocampan settlement.

It is the series itself that makes it easy for me to refute the claim that B’Elanna Torres had joined the Maquis in 2368 or that she had been born in 2349. In regard to the first claim, the stardates provided in episodes like "Non-Sequitur" and"Dreadnought" seemed to contradict Wikipedia or Jeri Taylor that B’Elanna had joined the Maquis in 2368. And episodes like "Caretaker", "The Equinox" and "Barge of the Dead" gives enough evidence to refute the claim that B’Elanna had been born in 2349.

About an hour ago, I had examined the Wikipedia. Changes had been made. It no longer claimed that B’Elanna had been born in 2349. Instead, it claimed that she had been born in 2346. I do not know if this is true, but it seems a lot more plausible than its earlier claim. But I would not be surprised if these changes were removed by the site’s webmaster. No matter. I know what I believe.