[VOY] Brian the Snorf's Quick Review: "Nemesis"
Brian the Snorf
------(spoilers below)------
[VOY] "Nemesis"
Written by: Kenneth Biller
Directed by: Alexander Singer
No, no, no. BAD writers. Now, go over and sit in the corner for time
out. And think about what you did, and then promise never to do it again
or Papa Snorf will take away your squeaky toys.
If the Voyager writers were big girls and boys, I would also tell them
not to shoot their wad in the first 15 minutes like they did here.
Despite the idiocy of having Chakotay go out alone on a shuttle mission,
and the fact that THEY HAVE NOW LOST 3 F#@KING SHUTTLES IN 4 EPISODES, I
was willing to give them a slap on the wrist. So sue me; I *liked* the
whole Vietnam wannabe atmosphere thing, I was happy that they "aliens"
(though they really looked human) spoke in stupid phrases, and I thought
the machine guns kicked lots of booties (we need more automatic weapons on
Trek...they sound kewl). Heck, I even liked the whole premise...until
Chakotay stumbled into the village.
First off, who the heck hires these child actors? Whoever that girl
was...and forgive me if I'm crude and blunt in this assement...she
sucked! She *redefined* suckiness for child actors/actresses in Trek.
(And I thought Kes' son in "Before and After" was bad...) She really
brought down what was already turning into an extremely shoddy plot. When
the evil Nausican/Predator guys took her away, I couldn't have cared less.
And even forgetting her, this episode really didn't acheive what it was
going for, which I believe was a strong _emotional impact_. I'm sorry,
but it's hard to get much out of a story when it's this bad. After the
quick scene in Voyager where Neelix fools the crew by pretending he knows
about this area of space WHEN HE OBVIOUSLY CANNOT (not if "Fair Trade"
happened), the "action" shifts to the planet, and promptly topples over on
its side (rather like Chakotay does). I've already ranted my butt off
about the incredibly bad acting that was going on, but even the plotting
and directing are bad at this stage. I'm not sure what kind of problems
Alexander Singer was having when he filmed this, but he obviously decided
to take them out on the show, as evidenced by his confusing and disjointed
directing job. The plot follows suit, and we are zipped from one jumbled
plot point to the next with no real sense of continuity. Not good.
And then there's that _ending_. Talk about your double-edged swords
(though, in retrospect, it's easy to see that the writers did more harm
than good). On the one hand...YAY! A semi-creative plot twist! I sorta
saw it coming, but it was still somewhat unexpected. YAY! On the
other...ICK! Now we're supposed to just accept the fact that everything
was fake, and so any real deaths or consequences (besides an extremely
temporary problem for Chakotay) are gone? This really reeks of
desperation to avoid finding a _real_ ending, and basically cheats the
viewers out of one. ICK!
Voting time....the ICKs have it! No surprise there. What was a
surprise was the abscene of 7 of 9 (aka. Barbie, Bimborg, "that new hot
chick on Voyager with the big hooters", etc.) Male hormones everywhere
are crying (though it looks like we'll get a big dose of her next week).
My goodness...I've written way too much. These are supposed to be
*quick* reviews, and I have been babbling on for paragraphs. Well, I
guess the writers wanted this episode to be "thought-provoking", didn't
they?
Rating: 5.1
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The Snorf's rating system:
0.0-3.5 What was that all about? I'm embarrassed to be watching.
3.6-5.0 Yawn. Could have been much, much better.
5.1-6.5 A few good parts, but mostly a snoozer.
6.6-7.5 Watch it. You may like it. Or you may not.
7.6-8.5 Not too shabby.
8.6-9.3 Good episode. A keeper.
9.4-9.9 The best of the bunch. These are the ones you can tell your
friends that don't even like Star trek to watch.
10.0!!! Never happened in my lifetime...but you never know!
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