Star Trek Voyager Reviews Written by Someone Who Actually LIKES the Show! -- Investigations

Pssst! Over here. Did anybody follow you? You're sure? What's the password? "'Take that cheese to Sickbay?'" What the heck kind of password is that?

Hmmmm, I admit it, I'm no spy, but just about everyone on Voyager seems to be, from Tuvok to Seska, to Jonas, and now Paris, so I thought I'd join in. It's just one big Spy Fest!

And so here's my spoiler-filled review of Star Trek Voyager's episode, "Investigations," which is expressly intended for the enjoyment of Voyager fans and moles everywhere. If learning about the fine art of infiltrating the Kazon just isn't your bag, why don't you go where the big boys play?

Namely, The Central Intelligence Museum!

Not interested? They really were planning to spread some gunk on Castro's shoes to make his beard fall out, you know. By comparison, acting like a jerk for two months so you can be kidnapped off a Talaxian convoy looks like genius.

INTIAL VIEWER EXPERIENCE
Aha! I knew it!

PLOT
We seem to be watching through a (mercifully steady) camcorder as Neelix tells us to keep our boots polished and stay tuned for gossip and pep talks and juggling from Ensign Bateheart. The only thing missing is Kathy Lee and a studio audience. This "A Briefing With Neelix" program (which looks to be a recurrent feature) is the morale officer's attempt to spread love and joy and all that junk on the good ship Lolli-Voyager.

Love him or hate him, but you just can't ignore him...no matter what.

On a roll after his first broadcast, Neelix tries to get the Doctor to agree to appear on the next show, and as you'd expect it's not much of a challenge. But then Neelix gets greedy in the turbo-lift and wants Kim to praise his journalism skills. Kim tells him about his own glory days as an authority-defying campus journalist (yeah, I'm sure he was the Original Rebel) at Starfleet Academy, and Neelix realizes he needs to do more than just fluff pieces.

Ah, Regis. Never satisfied.

In his quarters, Neelix gets a message from his old friend, Laxeth, who's getting ready to welcome a Voyager crewperson into his convoy. Neelix doesn't understand how someone could be leaving the ship when he's getting ready to serve up his latest culinary delight, Lizard Gut Helper, but Laxeth insists someone on the ship wants to come work for the Talaxians.

Neelix tells Janeway all about it, and she calls Tuvok into her ready room before telling Neelix that Paris has asked to be put off the ship.

Neelix can't believe it, and goes to see Paris, who is dressed in beige and brown civilian clothes and packing more beige sweaters into a bag, [Star Trek Wardrobe Guy: Think bluuuuuuuuue shirts!] Neelix asks Paris why in the world he's leaving Voyager after finding a home on the ship, but Paris says he's never fit in here, he's a drifter at heart, and Starfleet's just too much of a drag, man. Time to get out of here while there are still some people who actually have a good opinion of him.

"I'm one of them, Tom," Neelix says, and then gives Paris a hug. Paris looks a little overwhelmed, and I can't help wondering when he got his last friendly hug, and he then hugs Neelix back.

The next morning, Neelix tells the Doctor he won't be talking about "how to keep your nostrils happy" on "A Briefing" today after all, then starts up his show with a sip of coffee and an homage to Paris. He talks about having mistaken Paris' friendliness and loyalty and courage for hormonal craftiness, and we see various people on Voyager listening and thinking deep thoughts: Chakotay, Torres, Jonas, and so on. While Neelix is wishing Paris well, hoping he finds what he's looking for, we see Paris saying goodbye to the only friends he seems to have left on the ship: Kes, who stares at him with her Kes eyes, Neelix, who looks very sad, and Kim, who looks ready to cry and eschews a handshake for his own friendly hug. Paris hands Kim his combadge and gets on the transporter pad, looking extremely unhappy, then beams off.

In conference, Janeway asks Torres about problems they're having with the warp drive (problems we know are being caused by that rat-faced Jonas -- well, actually he's more hamster-faced). Chakotay and Janeway consider Bateheart or Hamilton as Paris' replacement, and Kim objects that Paris might change his mind and come back. Janeway lightly puts Paris out of her mind and says they've got to move on.

Hamster-face Jonas calls in to report a problem with the engines and Neelix goes with Torres in the hope of getting a scoop for "A Briefing." I am suddenly assaulted with visions of some strange Martha Stewart-inspired warp core design with gold spray-painted lima beans and a surprise visit from Richard Simmons.

But maybe that's just me.

Hamster-face fakes his way through the actual engine shut-down very well, even managing to get himself hurt from one of those panel-explosions, and looks like a hero. Neelix goes to Sickbay to interview Jonas until Janeway calls him to the bridge. They need some material or other to repair the damage, and he suggests going to Hemekek 4 (remember that name?) to purchase it.

The Talaxian convoy calls in and says they've been attacked by the Kazon, who only wanted one thing: Paris. Voyager's bridge crew has a contest to see who can look the most concerned yet enigmatic.

We find Paris standing in a poorly-lit room before a pregnant Seska enters with a couple of Kazon goons. She says she never liked Paris, but she could use him now, both as a pilot and for his information on Voyager. Paris strikes a cool pose and doesn't commit himself one way or the other. She leaves him to think about it, asking him where he wants to be when the Kazon seize Voyager and take control of the sector.

He's alone a bare second before he leaps to the room's control console, pulling out a little device he's literally got hidden up his sleeve and attaching it to the console. The little viewscreen shows snow and buzzes.

See? Told you I was right about him.

Voyager cruises to Hemekek 4 while Neelix wonders how the Kazon knew to attack the Talaxian convoy so quickly. How did they know Paris was there? Kes offers some suggestions along the lines of "maybe they just took one look at him on the ship and grabbed him like anyone would," but Neelix is suspicious and goes down to engineering. Torres is busy fixing those engines, but helps him access the communications logs. Hamster-face, of course, hears all about it, and asks Neelix what he's up to. Neelix explains to the "hero" that he's looking for "something anomalous" in the logs because he thinks there might be some secret subspace transmissions or something going on. Neelix notes a number of gaps in the logs, but Jonas assures him it's nothing while he starts to come after Neelix with an engineering tool. (Has he been melding with Tuvok again?)

The Doctor unwittingly saves Neelix by calling in to engineering with complains about not being on "A Briefing." He's ready to go next time, however, on the topic "The Klingon Glottus, Friend or Foe?" Neelix assures him that this is absolutely fascinating and leaves as quickly as he can.

Neelix tells Tuvok about what he's found, but the Vulcan seems even more disinterested and unimpressed than usual. Neelix insists that this sounds like the work of a Kazon spy, and Tuvok says he will pursue the matter...alone.

Naturally, Neelix has no intention of following orders, and returns to engineering. Torres fobs him off on Hogan this time, and they discover signs of deleted logs. Hogan traces it all to some part of the ship, and Neelix leaves to track it down to a specific site on foot. He ends up in Paris' quarters.

Neelix starts his "Briefing" the next day with disturbing news. He's got evidence now that the Kazon spy is none other than Paris. People listen in surprise, but Janeway's expression is like ice as she orders Tuvok to go get the little Talaxian busybody and bring him before her in chains.

In her ready room, ice still firmly in place, Janeway asks Neelix about this tracing of signals business, and he explains what's happened. Tuvok says that the first time he looked through the logs, the evidence of deleted logs wasn't there.

The first time? Chakotay asks. Hey, what's going on?

Janeway explains that she and Tuvok have known that there's been a spy aboard Voyager for some time, and that Paris has been acting like a jerk only to root out the spy. Chakotay looks a lot less upset than I would be as he demands to know whether Paris' insulting behavior, gambling, etc., have all been a part of this plot and why the hell wasn't he let in on it. Tuvok and Janeway say they didn't want to pit Chakotay against one of his own Maquis, and that they needed an act out of him.

And that's it! Chakotay doesn't call her names or throw things or storm out to his trailer to phone his agent or anything!

Anyway, Janeway tells Neelix that his finger-pointing at Paris is going to make the spy too comfortable. She wants whoever it is to feel tense, so he is to keep digging, and let people know Paris is no longer the prime suspect. It will be risky, but Neelix says he'll do anything to help the ship and get Paris back.

On Seska's ship (Culluh is blessedly absent, doubtlessly flexing his biceps in front of the bathroom mirror.), Paris gets the viewscreen to reveal Hamster-face. Seska bursts in with her goons, and Paris touches the little device he affixed to the console before backing away. In the great tradition of all villains when they think they've achieved the upper hand, Seska tells Paris they've got troops and ships waiting to take Voyager at Hemekek. In the middle of her gloating, Paris' little device blows up and he gets a rifle from one of the goons. Why he doesn't just shoot Seska then is beyond me (some sort of Federation morality thing), but he doesn't. He does run out of the room with the goons on his heels. He shoots and dodges and wrestles with one of the Kazon until he finally gets to a shuttle and flies away with the Kazon ship in pursuit.

In engineering, Neelix tells Jonas and Hogan about Paris' probable innocence and says he's going to keep looking. Jonas sends Hogan off on some errand before the power goes down. Turns out the transporters need extra juice for a long-range transport.

Paris rocks and rolls in his shuttle as he tells Janeway not to take the ship to Hemekek. She says first they have to get Paris out of there, and he says (big surprise!) that she should forget about him and get the ship out of danger.

You know, one of these days, Janeway's going to get tired of that sentiment and take him up on it.

But not today.

Anyway, Paris gets thrown from his chair and bumps his head, while over in engineering Neelix can tell that Jonas is not transferring power to the transporters like he's supposed to. He then can't help but notice that Jonas has put a forcefield in front of the door. Paris then awakens in his shuttle and gasps out that Jonas is the traitor. Janeway sends Tuvok down to engineering while Neelix realizes that Jonas is disabling the ship's weapon systems. Neelix tries to interfere, but Hamster-face cold-cocks him and removes both their combadges. Jonas moves off to do more damage to the ship, and Neelix comes to and grabs a wrench.

Voyager manages to transport the unconscious Paris off his shuttle right before it goes boom, and the Kazon fire on the ship. Tuvok finds he can't get into engineering, and the transporters are able to beam out only Jonas' detached combadge. Without its weapons, Voyager dodges the Kazon's attack best it can.

Neelix uses his wrench to fight Jonas, but a handy plasma eruption through the deck is needed for the Talaxian to finish him off. With Hamster-face a puff of plasma gas, Neelix gets the weapons back on-line, and Voyager gets rid of the Kazon.

Tuvok and company get through the door in time for Neelix to strut around a bit. (Though, to be fair, it's deserved for a change.)

Then we're back watching "A Briefing" with Neelix and Paris explaining to everyone about the plot and Neelix calling Paris the hero of the day. Paris adds an apology to everyone, especially Chakotay, without really looking all that apologetic. Neelix promises that the Doctor will be on tomorrow with news of the Bolian digestive system.