Warp Factor Trek

A time travel story will inevitably occur in a Star Trek show, whether it’s early or late in the series. The Voyager producers decided to include one early. Does “Time and Again” deliver some good television?

Summary

Voyager is rocked by a shockwave caused by a massive explosion from a nearby red dwarf solar system. Upon beaming down to a planet where the explosion took place, the landing party confirms that polaric ion energy is the culprit of the explosion and has vaporized all the inhabitants of the planet.

Alone with Neelix, Kes tearfully tries to explain that she saw and felt premonitions of those caught in the explosion. Her partner, Neelix, doubts the stories of her ancestors’ powerful skills.

On the planet, Paris begins to phase in and out of the past and present. Eventually, he and Janeway find themselves before the explosion happens, while the rest of the landing party are in the present. A young boy claims he saw the pair appear out of thin air, like demons, but the pair convince a local official they are from another province on the planet. Paris deduces that they have roughly twenty-four hours before the detonation.

The Doctor grumpily examines Kes, without having a medical file for her. He tells Kes that she is probably developing her abilities from being in space, to go rest, and to “drink fluids.”

Janeway insists that she and Paris follow the Prime Directive and do not speak a word of who they truly are. Confronted by the boy again, Paris tells him that they are, in fact, demons and that he hasn’t had his meal yet, scaring the boy away. The pair of time travellers come upon a protest at a local polaric ion energy plant, where Janeway gets injured in a scuffle between some guards and the protestors.

On Voyager, the crew try to devise a solution to return their captain and helmsman. The goal is to open a fracture in time at the place the missing crew were and pull them through. Kes reports her experiences to Chakotay.

Janeway is treated for her injuries, in the office of the activists. Although they question her about Paris’ and her identity, she denies their accusations.

Kes becomes an integral part of the landing party. She guides them to where Janeway and Paris “were,” in the past.

The boy who Janeway and Paris encountered earlier is discovered eavesdropping and accuses the pair of lying. Kes manages to make brief telepathic contact with Janeway, who fesses up to the activists. With the landing party in the present trying to communicate with the pair, Janeway’s comm badge goes off. The activists take the pair back to the energy plant, planning to sabotage it.

Janeway concedes to Paris about why she revealed their true identity – she’d realized that, by being there, they are the ones who will cause the explosion. Otherwise, the plans to sabotage the plant would not have been moved up, possibly leading to nothing going wrong. The leader of the group tries to coerce Janeway into lying, so as to gain access to the plant, but she doesn’t. This causes a shootout. While saving the boy, Paris is wounded.

Janeway pursues the saboteurs into the plant, and when the landing party from Voyager opens a fracture, she realizes their rescue attempt is the reason the explosion happens. She shoots her phaser at the fracture, causing the explosion, and the timeline is set right again. Voyager passes the planet without any explosion occurring.

Analysis

While time travel stories can be tricky to pull off, “Time and Again” does a decent job. It’s not a perfect episode by any means, but it’s an improvement over the previous episode, “Parallax”. The story is light on its feet and does not get bogged down in too much examination of the finer points of time travel, which is usually the best way to portray this type of narrative.

One of the interesting character developments in the episode is the onset of Kes’ mental powers. Yes, telepathic characters have been used before in Star Trek, but watching Kes develop these abilities – and not use them like they were always there – was fascinating to watch. The crying from actress Jennifer Lien didn’t look forced, only making Kes’ situation even more sympathetic.

There are some humorous moments in this episode, and – similar to its predecessor, “Parallax” – “Time and Again” uses the likes of Paris and The Doctor to produce such moments. When Paris frightens away the boy, the child actor’s face as he flees is great. The Doctor’s casual advice to Kes is another humourous touch. These two moments keep the episode’s levity going and speak to the perfect comedic timing of McNeill and Picardo.

There is a trend I have noticed with the few episodes I’ve watched thus far, which is the show’s focus on a couple of characters at a time. The rest of the characters tend to go about their duties as they are supposed to, while the main ones featured in the episode get to shine. I believe this to be a winning strategy for such a show as Voyager, with nine main players to work with. Unlike how DS9 often attempted to feature and develop all its characters in a single episode, this show understands to focus the core of the episode on one or two (or in this case, three) characters, so as to maximize the growth of each featured character.

If there was anything I would have liked to have learned more about in “Time and Again”, it would’ve been about the use of volatile energy as the main source to run an entire civilization. I was interested in understanding the reason why polaric ion energy was being used in the first place. This could have grounded the obvious messaging that the episode was trying to convey about the real world usage of nuclear power. I agree with  the writer keeping the lighthearted pace going, however, as such exposition could run the risk of slowing the story down.

“Time and Again” does not break any new ground in terms of time travel stories. Again, what does happen here is the story moves along at a good pace by not overthinking the finer points of volatile energy or time travel, which results in an entertaining watch.