A spatial anomaly warps the ship's structure, leaving the crew trapped in corridors and the holodeck.
Two words that put the fear of God into every Trek fan: Spatial Anomaly. Spatial anomaly is Berman for crazy s#it that's gonna turn the ship upside down for the next 45 minutes minus commercials. An SA can warp the ship, trap characters in alternate realities, bring a ship back in time (as long as it's orbiting Earth) or simply make your replicated chimichanga slightly more spicy. It's become a lazy writer's shorthand for an unexplained occurrence to provide this week's weak plot.
Nowhere is that more evident than in Voyager's "Twisted," wherein an SA appears and warps the ship in on itself, misplacing key stations like engineering and the bridge. The crew wanders around the hallways much longer than necessary before finally deciding there's no way out of this maze, and as the Ring of Weird closes in on their sanctuary of the holodeck, they ultimately decide to stop devising pointless technical stopgaps and accept the onset of Death. This leads to some truly bizarre moments like the one in which Tuvok and Chakotay- who have pretty much never spoken to one another before this moment- apologize and affirm their mutual respect using the stiffest, most formal dialogue in the history of Starfleet. Kleenex anyone?
Not to be outdone, the Doctor informs Kes that in spite of the fact that he despises Neelix he actually misses him and wishes he were here to share the hour of their death. He then HUGS Kes to reassure her- good thing somebody programmed the EMH on how to react when an impending spatial anomaly implodes the ship and the crew is gathered in a holo-recreation of 1930's France to await death by oblivion. Natch!
I was going to give this episode an A+ but there's a strange Spatial Anomaly invading my air ducts...
GRADE: C-
Two words that put the fear of God into every Trek fan: Spatial Anomaly. Spatial anomaly is Berman for crazy s#it that's gonna turn the ship upside down for the next 45 minutes minus commercials. An SA can warp the ship, trap characters in alternate realities, bring a ship back in time (as long as it's orbiting Earth) or simply make your replicated chimichanga slightly more spicy. It's become a lazy writer's shorthand for an unexplained occurrence to provide this week's weak plot.
Nowhere is that more evident than in Voyager's "Twisted," wherein an SA appears and warps the ship in on itself, misplacing key stations like engineering and the bridge. The crew wanders around the hallways much longer than necessary before finally deciding there's no way out of this maze, and as the Ring of Weird closes in on their sanctuary of the holodeck, they ultimately decide to stop devising pointless technical stopgaps and accept the onset of Death. This leads to some truly bizarre moments like the one in which Tuvok and Chakotay- who have pretty much never spoken to one another before this moment- apologize and affirm their mutual respect using the stiffest, most formal dialogue in the history of Starfleet. Kleenex anyone?
Not to be outdone, the Doctor informs Kes that in spite of the fact that he despises Neelix he actually misses him and wishes he were here to share the hour of their death. He then HUGS Kes to reassure her- good thing somebody programmed the EMH on how to react when an impending spatial anomaly implodes the ship and the crew is gathered in a holo-recreation of 1930's France to await death by oblivion. Natch!
I was going to give this episode an A+ but there's a strange Spatial Anomaly invading my air ducts...
GRADE: C-