Nits for Star Trek: Voyager episode
Drone
1. The Maturation Chamber's forcefield.
The show had real difficulties with this forcefield. When we first hear of it the field is blocking sensor readings from detecting any life forms. Yet when Tuvok and Seven investigate they discover Mulchaey outside the field and alive. Why didn't sensors detect him or his comm badge?
Seven enters the field knowing it won't stop her because she is Borg, but after a short commercial break we see Tuvok, Kathryn, and Seven all within the field's area of effect. How did the non-Borg get in?
When Seven is in Astrometrics she states she's re-rigged the sensors to penetrate the forcefield. Why didn't they obtain data from a tricorder or rig a sensor inside the field to continue monitoring the progress?
Nit Value: 1.00
2. Astrometric sensors.
This one troubled me a little. What's the likelihood that the Astrometrics sensors can be used on anything inside the ship? These sensors point out from the ship. Internal sensors might be recalibrated for such a purpose but are not mentioned.
Nit Value: 0.50
3. "I", "we", "I".
Would have been nice if they could have given One a consistent approach to his first person pronoun. I believe he reversed himself twice in earlier scenes before settling down to "I" in the captain's ready room.
Nit Value 0.25
4. Peeping in on the sonic shower and other viewscreen protocols.
Now here's a glaring oversight strictly for the purpose of titillation. Bad enough the viewscreen facing B'Elanna's bed automatically gives the caller a view of her in bed but her bathroom also has a viewscreen that works on the same principle.
Who programmed these things ? Peeping Tom ?
Poor B'Elanna can't even tell the computer to shut them off. She has to throw a towel over the one in her bathroom.
Nit Value: 1.00 and a 0.50 point for so obviously pandering to the lowest common denominator. Not one of Voyager's shining moments.
5. Kathryn's "short-sighted and selfish" decision.
No value for this one. Just another complaint about the captain who indulges in one short-sighted and selfish decision after another. When you stop and consider that the only reason the Borg showed up at all was because Kathryn let the drone live, yet she was hoping to raise him to be their weapon against the Borg should they encounter the Borg again, you can see how once again Kathryn's decision jeopardized all aboard.
And what was she thinking when she justified letting One live? Her explanation was to turn him into a weapon against the Borg. What if he wanted to be a pacifist ? This didn't seem to enter into Kathryn's calculations as she talked about raising him to be an individual yet still do her bidding against the Borg. Very poorly written motive.
Nit Value: 0.00
6. The Benzite Protocol.
Some of you may recall poor Ensign Mendon from TNG's second season episode "A Matter of Honor". There Ensign Mendon detected a strange life form on a Klingon ship but failed to report it. When asked why he explained that according to Benzite Protocol no one would report such an occurrence until they had fully assessed the situation and worked out a way to deal with it. Picard patiently explained to Mendon that Star Fleet protocol called for crew to report such strange occurrences immediately to senior officers who would decide the next step to take. Worf promised Mendon a lesson in ship's etiquette.
Well, apparently Lt. Mulchaey also spent far too much time with the Benzite Protocol as he wanders into a science lab and pulls out a tricorder. Rather than calling in to the bridge from the safety of the hallway he wanders in as if this were all completely safe.
Granted this had to occur if the story was to be told as it was. But this is not only stupidity of a high degree but contrary to standard Star Fleet protocol.
Nit Value: 0.50
7. The Doctor's snapshots.
The shuttle is going on a survey mission and the Doctor brings a camera. Does this suggest that while on survey absolutely no pictures of the phenomena are being taken or that they are unavailable to the Doctor?
Nit Value: 0.25
8. The Doctor's mission.
He states he's going to find out what effects the new radiation has on the away team. Does this suggest they are acting as human guinea pigs for his study? Haven't the safety factors been considered and shields bolstered to take account of the dangers? If not then why isn't Voyager going instead? Or a probe or automated shuttle craft ? Is a survey of a proto-nebula so important it's worth losing your navigator, engineer, Seven, and your only Doctor?
Nit Value: 0.50
9. Borg tubules.
Yet another change to the Borg. Their assimilation process was originally tubule-less. With the coming of Species 8479 (?) the tubules arrived for injecting nanoprobes. Now the tubules also sample tissue as well as download and upload data.
I wish they'd come out with a Borg Tech Manual.
Nit Value: 0.00
10. Seven's tubules.
How did Seven activate her tubules when the Doctor has been busy keeping her Borg technology deactivated?
Nit Value 0.50
11. One's connection to the bridge console.
What morphing material is the console made of that the tubules did not shatter it when they penetrated the console?
Nit Value: 0.25
12. Rescuing One.
At the beginning of the show Mulchaey can't get a clear lock on the away team because of the proto-nebula, despite the fact they have comm badges and are in a shielded shuttle craft.
Yet there is no mention of difficulty extracting One from the same proto-nebula while he has multi-spatial shielding up protecting him from the effects of the proto-nebula. Neat trick.
Nit Value: 0.25
13. Tuvok's security.
Tuvok sends his security force to escort Mulchaey to Sick Bay rather than call upon Sick Bay to pick him up. There is an unknown device of alien origin two metres away yet he dismisses his security force for ambulance duty. And why was he carrying a phaser rifle instead of using it on the Borg technology which he knew was re-routing power to itself while the ship hung near a deadly astronomical phenomena?
Nit Value: 0.50
14. Borg, what Borg?
While the situation is unknown regarding the Borg, Kathryn does not move Voyager away from the proto-nebula. I kept waiting for the Borg to take out propulsion and thus throw the ship into danger a la TNG's "The Naked Now". Didn't happen. But nonetheless wouldn't it be prudent to move the ship away just in case?
Nit Value: 0.00
15. Another amalgamated creature.
Tuvix move over. Now we have One to think about. Talk about unorthodox (read as random decision generator).
Tuvix is killed to restore Tuvok and Neelix because Tuvix wasn't a 'real' person. Yet One is not killed despite the fact he is built from Seven's nanoprobes, the Doctor's holo-emitter, and Mulchaey's DNA. Here Kathryn decides to let the critter live because, as B'Elanna explains it, he looks so helpless. Can we say "Political Correctness"? As in, this is a fetus and not a fully grown Tuvix? That Janeway endangered the ship for no better reason than a hunch that the drone could be assimilated into human culture? That she assigned her least trustworthy crew member, Seven, to the task of assimilating it unsupervised?
Is somehow phasering a fully grown Borg ok but not a Borg fetus?
Would have served them right if One assimilated the collective and then assimilated Voyager's crew. If you ask me this captain makes totally uncalled for decisions without backup plans or escape hatches. She is like Cortes who burned his ships when he arrived at the new world. Kathryn owes the crew more consideration than to indulge in her personal fantasies which, if they go wrong, could kill everyone. She's like a gambler who uses the family's life savings every time she throws the dice on nothing more than a whim and against the expert advice of Seven.
Only the writers pull her fat out of the fire (deus ex machina).
Nit Value: 0.00
Summary:
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Nit Value for "Drone": 6.00
Wulf's Nitpicker Rating: 4.00
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10 - Nit Value = Wulf's Nitpicker Rating
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