Warp Factor Trek

After finding something new and exciting to give viewers in the Star Trek universe with the series premiere “Caretaker”, Voyager airs its first standalone hour of storytelling. To follow up the first episode of a series, while keeping the momentum going, is always difficult. How does “Parallax” fair in this task?

Summary

Voyager’s Starfleet crew, along with the added Maquis members, are experiencing tension as the two attempt to become a united team. One particular conflict is between Carey and Torres. The latter punched Carey in the nose, sending the officer to sickbay. The pair have come to disagree on solutions in engineering.

The ship runs into a spatial distortion in space. Voyager picks up a distress signal and discovers what appears to be another ship stuck by a quantum singularity. Chakotay asks Torres for her opinion (instead of going to Carey, who is the superior officer), and she comes up with an idea to attempt to pull the ship out of the gravitational force which the singularity has on it. Janeway, to say the least, is annoyed by the breach in command that Chakotay has committed.

Later, Janeway has a meeting with Torres, attempting to get to know the former Starfleet cadet turned Maquis. Janeway says Chakotay believes Torres would make a wonderful chief engineer. Unfortunately, the meeting ends with Torres upset and hurt.

It is finally discovered that the ship they are seeing is a reflection of Voyager. The reason for this is explained as a consequence of “temporal mechanics.” During a meeting with the department heads, Janeway and Torres work together and come up with a solution to escape the singularity. The pair take a shuttlecraft to widen the size of a rupture in the singularity, Torres apologizing for her earlier outburst. It is apparent to Janeway that Torres has self-confidence issues, but the captain reveals to Torres that her professors thought very highly of her. The relationship between the two becomes less strained, and they are successful in increasing the size of the rupture.

Torres is promoted to chief engineer of Voyager and expresses to Carey that she will be reliant on him to provide her feedback as she gets to know the ins and outs of the engine room. They shake hands, signifying their willingness to move forward.

Analysis

“Parallax” has some good moments for an episode to follow a series premiere. While it most certainly tackles the conflict “Caretaker” set up – especially when it comes to the relationship between Janeway and Torres – I felt underwhelmed by the plot with the singularity. It didn’t seem to be enough to support all the conflict.

The strong parts of this episode are the relationship scenes. For example, the reconciliation between Janeway and Torres in the shuttlecraft felt genuine and not forced, despite it being called for. I love seeing a captain who isn’t afraid to be a caring leader of their crew. Furthermore, Torres taking the first step in apologizing to her commanding officer for what she had done speaks volumes about her character. Another scene I enjoyed features The Doctor and Kes. The latter notices that something is wrong with the holographic imaging program, which is causing The Doctor to look shorter and eventually distorted. At one point, Kes calls him a “person”, but The Doctor can’t quite wrap his head around the term, as he sees himself only as a hologram. Examining how The Doctor doesn’t accept being a Human provided me with more reason to love his character (once again, he has the biggest laugh at the end of the episode). I can already see the seeds of a friendship brewing between these two, and I’m definitely ready to see where the writers take it.

What also struck me was the theme of trust between people and within oneself. Some of the Maquis express that, if Chakotay decided to commit mutiny, they would fully back him. Chakotay tells them he does not want to hear that sort of talk ever again. While the commander is loyal to his crew from the Maquis ship, he is also attempting to earn the trust of Captain Janeway to prove the Maquis officers are as capable as anyone who belongs in Starfleet. It was also nice to watch the journey Torres took in finding self-confidence and shaking the belief that she did not have the right stuff to be in Starfleet. Even though this happened relatively quickly over the course of an episode, I think this speaks to her ability to lead in engineering.

As mentioned before, I wasn’t a big fan of the plot involving the spatial distortion in space. While I understand it’s a clothesline (of sorts) to hang all the emotional scenes from and to provide reason for character development, it fell flat. I liked the imagery that Torres conjures up in her explanation of temporal mechanics, but when Paris interjects a question that many viewers might have about why Voyager heard a message way before they saw the reflection of themselves, the answer is dismissive and treated as if it would simply go over the pilot’s head. Plus, when Kim begins to have symptoms comparable to the rest of the crew because of the distortion, I questioned the need for it. I know the scene provided a tiny bit of insight from Kim about the Maquis/Voyager crew tension (and some great acting moments for Garrett Wang), but it felt like a weak attempt – on the writer’s part – at giving Kim something to do other than being a background character.

Ultimately, “Parallax” shines more when it’s focusing on the character moments than on the action and technobabble. Yes, plenty of other episodes focus on those latter two elements, but the pieces here just don’t fit. I believe what saves it from being a terrible episode all together are the interesting characters and the actors delivering their performances with heart.