Nits for Star Trek: Voyager episode
The Fight
1. Chakotay turning his head.
Just a minor nit, but in the boxing match it is never clear that Chakotay turned his head away from his opponent. Chakotay claims he turned towards Boothby who was yelling at him. However, this is inconsistent with what we saw on screen.
Nit Value: 0.25
2. Chakotay's argument with Doc.
This brought forward a couple of interesting nits. First, Chakotay claims the Terellian "never laid a glove" on him. Yet we clearly see the Terellian deliver two punches to Chakotay's face at the beginning of round four.
Chakotay further explains that he turned to face Boothby (and away from his opponent) because Boothby yelled something to him. This is not only stupid (never turn your back on your opponent in a boxing match), inconsistent with the events of round three (where Boothby yelled several times without distracting Chakotay), but also incredulous (the gymnasium was silent aside from Boothby yelling).
No effort is made to explain why Chakotay didn't hear what Boothby yelled, nor why he turned away from his opponent.
Nit Value: 0.50
3. Chakotay, the quick change artist.
Chakotay is ordered to the bridge while he is in Sick Bay. He calls out that he's on the way. He's still wearing his boxing outfit and his hands are still bound with tape.
When he arrives on the bridge in the very next scene he is dressed in Star Fleet uniform and the tape is no longer on his hands.
When he left Sick Bay the ship was shuddering and he'd been ordered to the bridge. Does this really seem like the time to stop, change, remove the tape from his hands, and then proceed to the bridge while the ship continues to shudder? Until he arrives on the bridge Chakotay doesn't have a clue what is happening.
Nit Value: 0.50
4. Tom's initiative.
Tuvok announces the ship is too close and Tom states he's moving the ship, "backing off" from the phenomenon.
No one gave him an order to move the ship. Janeway and Chakotay say nothing about the helmsman's decision.
Nit Value: 0.25
5. A safe distance?
Why is Janeway allowing this phenomenon, two light-years across and jumping about 10,000 kilometres from one position to the next, to get so close to the ship? The last reported distance before it's encountered is 11,000 kilometres. Wouldn't a few million kilometres and the use of a probe be a safer choice?
Nit Value: 0.50
6. Full stop?
Why did Janeway order a full stop once surrounded by the phenomenon? If avoiding it was deemed important to the ship why doesn't Janeway allow the ship to continue with full reverse to get out of the phenomenon?
Nit Value: 0.25
7. Better late than never.
After being enveloped by the phenomenon Seven calls Janeway to Astrometrics. Is this really the time for Janeway to leave the bridge? Is Janeway now reporting to Seven?
Down in Astrometrics we find Janeway, Chakotay, and Tuvok listening to Seven. Is this really the time for the three most senior officers to abandon the bridge? Upon what did they base this decision: the fact that Seven called them to Astrometrics without explanation?
Seven explains to Janeway, Chakotay, and Tuvok that the Borg (and obviously Seven) have been aware of this phenomenon for a number of years. Yet on the bridge none of the bridge crew knew what the phenomenon was. Was Seven waiting for the phenomenon to envelop the ship before telling anyone about it? Seven has been on board since "Scorpion" yet never said "Oh by the way, watch out for these two-light year wide phenomenon that gobbles ships and are nearly undetectable except at close range."
Nit Value: 2.00
8. Why didn't sensors work?
Seven explains that the phenomenon moves randomly and unexpectedly. Why should that prevent sensors from picking it up? Gaseous molecules and plasma do exactly the same thing and sensors have no difficulty picking up even trace amounts of both. This phenomenon is two light years across, and according to the bridge crew it's only moving about ten thousand kilometres each time it moves. From a light year away such a change in location is minuscule.
Nit Value: 0.50
9. Recalibrate the sensors.
Seven explains the Borg have known of this phenomenon for years, that it is massive and can be found throughout the galaxy. Yet apparently the Borg have never perfected a way of detecting the phenomenon with sensors. How likely is that?
Nit Value: 0.25
10. Talking to the computer.
In his quarters Chakotay asks the computer if it said something. The computer claims it did not. Now how did the computer know Chakotay was asking the computer if it said something in his room in the past few seconds/minutes. Isn't the computer talking to other members of the crew in other locations? The computer has certainly said things in the past, but somehow the computer knows this isn't what Chakotay is asking about. How?
Nit Value: 0.25
11. Moving into chaotic space.
Once they get sensor readings within chaotic space Janeway gives the order to move forward one quarter impulse. Forward? Last they knew chaotic space was in front of them and freedom was behind them. Shouldn't the course be "reverse"?
Nit Value: 0.25
12. Transporters and shields.
First rule of transporters and shields: shields must be dropped for a transporter to function between ships. Yet, Seven has made it clear shields are all that is keeping the ship safe from the gravimetric forces of chaotic space. Drop the shields and the ship is destroyed. Do not drop shields and transporters cannot recover the alien captain's body or the alien sensor technology.
Somehow the crew of Voyager manage to do both at the same time.
Nit Value: 1.00
13. Obtaining alien sensor technology.
This crew is really good. Not only do they somehow get transporters to function through shields, but they manage to identify the components they need through sensors alone. Apparently no one from Voyager beamed over to the ship to examine the now non-functional equipment to figure out which components belong to the alien sensor technology and which components have nothing to do with sensors.
Compare with TNG's "Booby Trap".
Nit Value: 0.50
14. The autopsy.
Amazing stuff this chaotic space. Gravimetric forces and exposure killed the alien crew, yet surprisingly the brain and sensory tissues seem to be preserved to the point where Doc can tell that the protein insulation that is supposed to line the cell walls was stripped away because a gene in the alien was de-activated.
Nit Value: 0.25
15. Doc's theory.
Doc suggests there might be something in chaotic space that reacts with DNA and thus alters it. If true, just how useful are the results of his study of the alien's DNA that told him the gene responsible for producing protein insulation was de-activated? Wouldn't the DNA continue to be altered once the organism is exposed to chaotic space (which is the cause of death, according to Doc)?
Nit Value: 0.50 (I've given it a higher value, as this is an obvious incongruity a computerized doctor wouldn't have made).
16. Doc and the vision quest.
Chakotay suggests a vision quest to help him deal with the hallucinations. Doc thinks it risky, explaining a vision quest accesses the frontal lobe and might make things worse.
Compare with Doc's attitude to Tuvok's mind meld in "Infinite Regress", where Doc describes the mind meld as "Vulcan mumbo-jumbo".
Why does Doc view the mind meld as "mumbo-jumbo", given its long and illustrious history in TOS, while treating a vision quest as scientific fact?
Nit Value: 0.25 (for the inconsistency only -- this is how Doc should have treated the mind meld).
17. Overruling the Doc.
When Chakotay suggests the vision quest Doc gives medical reasons for avoiding it. Chakotay simply counters by stating that the vision quest might help him regain control. No medical reasons are given. Janeway decides in favour of Chakotay and against her chief medical officer's recommendation.
Based on what, exactly?
Nit Value: 0.25
18. A beacon every 200,000 km?
Just how many of these things does Voyager have? To traverse a 2 light year distance and dropping a beacon every 200,000 km they're going to need a lot.
Nit Value: 0.25
19. Those amazing leaps of logic.
Chakotay claims "they" are trying to contact him, trying to communicate. Doc is convinced he's delusional, and they just discovered the cause behind Chakotay's changing DNA that makes a diagnosis of hallucination almost certain.
Yet Janeway starts taking Chakotay seriously. She proposes a species living in chaotic space in some way totally undetectable by normal senses. But that Chakotay's gene, along with the two aliens on the destroyed ship, might be susceptible to being reprogrammed by the aliens so as to communicate. Perhaps the aliens are trying to help.
Say what?
Without any evidence to support Chakotay's claims, and with her chief medical officer testifying that the claims are the result of genetically-based hallucinations, brought on by exposure to a nucleotide activation frequency, all of which are known facts, Janeway decides there must be aliens native to chaotic space trying to communicate and help them out of chaotic space.
And Doc doesn't immediately start checking her for delusions or stress-related fatigue?
Nit Value: 1.00
20. The missing preliminaries.
A minor nit to end the show. In the first holodeck match as well as the vision quest match the two opponents come to the ring to tap gloves together. In the last holodeck match this preliminary is not observed.
Nit Value: 0.25
21. Boothby/Chakotay.
I noticed no reference to Boothby training Chakotay in boxing at the academy in "In the Flesh". At one point Chakotay asks Archer why she takes advice from the groundskeeper (Boothby). Doesn't that seem a strange question when Chakotay himself took advice from Boothby in the boxing ring as a cadet?
And Boothby knew about the flower that the original Boothby gave Janeway when she was a cadet. Yet he doesn't seem to recognize Chakotay at all.
Of course Boothby and Chakotay couldn't have realized they once had a trainer/boxer relationship because the script for "The Fight" hadn't been written yet. But is it so difficult to write around this point so that Chakotay was using someone else's holodeck program, someone who was trained by Boothby?
Nit Value: 0.25
Summary:
--------------
Nit Value for "The Fight": 9.75
Wulf's Nitpicker Rating: 0.25
--------------------------------------
10 - Nit Value = Wulf's Nitpicker Rating
All episode summaries and nits copyright © 1999 Wulf
Site design and graphics copyright © 1999 Holotech Enterprises
All rights reserved
Star TrekTM, VoyagerTM and Deep Space NineTM
are trademarks owned by Paramount Pictures Corporation.
Design and Hosting by
