This Week's Episode: "Tinker, Tenor, Doctor, Spy"
Summary: A species of Overlooking aliens begins to spy on Voyager, while trying to determine if they have anything of value to steal. While tapping into Voyager's systems, the Overlookers accidently mistake the Doctor's new fantasies as reality. Their infiltration of the Doctor's program causes his new daydream subroutines to malfunction, thus causing the Doctor to daydream when he does not want to. The Doctor must then save the day when Voyager's safety is threatened by these aliens.
Rating: 9.5
Best Scene: There are way too many to mention...to name a few: The Briefing Room scandal, the nude painting sessions with Seven of Nine, and the transformation of the EMH into the ECH.
Worst Scene: Are you kidding?! In this episode, not one!
Best acting award goes to: Hands down: Robert Picardo as the Doctor.
Best Line: Again, way too many to pick from...however, Majel Barrett (the computer) had some rather humourous lines in this one: "Warning! Warp Core Breach a lot sooner that you think!" and "Warning! Last chance to be a hero Doctor, get going!"
Impressions: First of all, let me state that I'm biased towards Doctor episodes and Star Trek humour episodes. So automatically, this episode will do well in my books ;) And it does quite well.
The past three episodes have dealt with some pretty heavy stuff...B'Elanna and her Klingon side, Seven of Nine's past, etc... So, it is nice to have an episode that incorporates a little humour. And this episode does that, and does it very well. Over the years, Star Trek has had successful bouts at humour, and some not so successful attempts at humour ("It's time to take out the garbage"...*shudder*). So why does this episode succeed so well? First of all, the acting talents of Robert Picardo and ensemble cast certainly help. Does it help to have an Academy award winner director, probably not. What also makes this episode successful is that it was able to incorporate a plausible storyline with it.
It's pretty hard to analyze this episode to death, since it is such light fare. However, it is just another step in the Doctor's voyager into the exploration of humanity. His need to fantasize, as well as his need to go beyond his programming and find new challenges. That is the human spirit: broadening our horizons, exploring new territory, and discovering new ways to be useful. In a way, the Doctor's voyager parallels Data's in TNG, however, I believe that the Doctor has certainly surpassed Data in terms of becoming more human (perhaps as the Doctor has emotional subroutines from the get-go). The question is, will the Doc ever get a name? I don't think so. Several seasons back, that seemed very important to the characters development. But at this point in the Doc's development, I really don't think it is necessary. I would just be as content to have them end the series with him still as "The Doc".
I really have to commend Robert Picardo's range of acting abilities. He has come a long way since the premiere; the other day, I watched the Star Trek :Voyager special which aired just prior to the series premiere five years ago, which was hosted by Robert Picardo. I still remember after watching it, thinking that Robert Picardo was a really bad actor...watch it again for yourself. The scene where they zoom up to his face and he loads the hypospray is truly frightening. However, Robert Picardo is probably the finest actor on Voyager, and one of the finest in Star Trek lore. Over the years he has been able to effectively show a broad range of emotions for the Doctor: happiness, love, fear, anger, humour, etc... Voyager just wouldn't be the same without him.
This episode had me chuckling throughout: from the opening musical number, to the "soft porn" music playing in the briefing room scene, to the ECH scenes, to the sketching of a nude Seven of Nine, to the computer getting in on the fun (ie: "Warning! Warp core breach a lot sooner than you think!" -- obviously making fun of the fact that the computer always knows exactly how many seconds until the warp core breaches). And none of the humour made me cringe or roll my eyes...it was all very well written, and really was funny. And it is certainly an episode that you can watch over and over, and the episode still remains funny and fresh. It is one of those episodes of Star Trek which you can show to a non-Trekkie, and they will still enjoy it.
So, good writing, good acting, good directing, good humour makes for an excellent episode of Voyager. I really have to commend the writers of this one (Joe Menosky for the teleplay and Bill Vallely for the story itself) for making us all realize why the Doctor is one of our favourite Voyager characters. I have to give it a 9.5 out of 10 for it's amazing ability to make me laugh. Yes, it was light fare, but I can't remember the last time I had this much fun watching an episode of Star Trek!
