Star Trek: Voyager (TV Series) Future's End: Part II (1996) User Reviews

An excellent conclusion to an excellent story.

[planktonrules · 9/10 · 17 February 2015]

This is the second part of a two-part time travel episode. Despite the concept of Trek crew going back to 20th century Earth has been overused, the excellent writing, excitement and nice characters make this one worth seeing.

In part one, Voyager is sent back, inadvertently, to 20th century Earth. They soon realize that a megalomaniac named Starling (Ed Begley Jr.) is going to destroy the solar system in the 29th century. When they warn him, Starling seems indifferent--he just cares about himself and becoming rich off stealing future technology.

Part two begins with Starling in custody and the away team looking for Starling's space craft which he intends to use to travel to the future. However, using 29th century technology that he stole, Starling escapes and there is a race to stop this giant butt from destroying everything.

Like the other episode, this one is well made and clever...and well worth seeing.

One of the best Voyager episodes.

[Alex-594-514783 · 9/10 · 21 November 2018]

This two-parter is one of the best Voyager has to offer. It's right up there with Year Of Hell. Sarah Silverman is a riot and the juxtaposition of Tuvok and the rest of the Voyager crew against the 20th century setting is pretty entertaining. I enjoyed Henry Starling's character as well because he seemed to sell the plausibility of his technical prowess quite convincingly. It also helps that he had like 30 years to study the technology so props to the writers for that detail.

There's just one little issue I have with the whole thing. Captain Braxton is a moron. He comes to the 24th century and just straight up tells Voyager his mission is to destroy them and is then surprised when they resist. For a 29th century dude he sure is dim XD

Oh and the dudes that are afraid of "the beast" (meaning the government) were way too over the top. And that's saying something considering they are portraying a stereotype of irrational conspiracy theorists.

Saving the future

[Tweekums · 8/10 · 22 August 2010]

This second part of a two-part story was a lot of fun. As it opened it appeared that Starling had the upper hand; he has the Doctor and a lot of Voyager's computer files and Voyager is still not fully functional. Luckily Tom, Tuvok and Dr.Rain Robinson manage to contact Voyager and hatch a scheme to capture Starling. This works but in the process the shuttle transporting him from the surface is damaged and crashes in Arizona amongst some paranoid individuals who believe Chakotay and B'Elanna are working for the 'evil federal government'. Starling's henchman helps him beam off Voyager so it is up to Tom and Dr. Robinson to prevent him from launching the time ship… assuming the ship is in the lorry they are following and it isn't all a trick so he can launch from his building.

There were plenty of nice touches in this episode; first and foremost the Doctor gets a 29th Century mobile holographic emitter that enables to go where he wants and means that in future episodes he won't be tied to sickbay and the holodecks, we also learn that computer technology and the internet are all based on technology that Starling extracted from the timeship. It was rather a shame in the end that Dr. Robinson didn't get to go up to Voyager and see the rings of Saturn close up but I think this was probably the right thing; it isn't always good to give the audience what they want.

Starling is an egomaniacal jerk.

[txriverotter · 9/10 · 27 June 2022]

This is an excellent two-part storyline from Voyager, even tho it bears out all the usual inconsistencies we know will happen in every episode. For example: Starling uses a 1996 computer to hack into Voyagers computer system and download LOTS of data, then takes over Voyager's systems with same computer. Really implausible, even for Trek. But barring all of those types of things, the story, acting, production quality and all are solid.

Starling is the egomaniacal jerk who stole a crashed 29th century ship, after the pilot transported himself out to safety elsewhere. He had just tried to destroy Voyager and ended up getting caught in a temporal rift, with Voyager dragged along right behind, albeit 30 years later.

So Janeway, Chakotay, Tuvok and Paris all transport to the surface of 1996 Earth, and set about to find the Captain and the Time Ship. They locate the Captain but he has checked out mentally. He's been in the wrong time period for too long, he's been institutionalized and given meds and heaven only knows what else. He gives Janeway and Chakotay some info, but they're not sure it'll help given his condition.

Then Tuvok and Paris head off to SETI, and meet Rain Robinson, played excellently by Sarah Silverman. She works at SETI and discovered Voyager orbiting the earth. They have some good banter back and forth, and arguments, as they work together. All the while Rain's trying to get information out of Tuvok and Paris, but they won't give it up. It's a fun plot.

Janeway and Chakotay head to Starling's headquarters, where they contact Voyager and set them to downloading Starling's database. Then Starling and his evil henchman show up. It's hard to watch anything with Starling, he's just so damn smarmy and evil. Janeway explains what will happen if he tries to take the time ship into the 29th century to steal more tech, and he just doesn't give a care. No more Earth, billions dead, don't mean nuttin' to him. He's a really bad person. And Janeway monologues about how she has a big, bad ship that can blow his building apart, and you wonder why she's saying it because it always backfires. Later, when they have Starling in sick bay (why not the brig?) she monologues some more about how she won and Starling's stock is going down tomorrow, and you know that is gonna backfire on her too. Because of course it is!

The third, small plot about B'Lanna and Chakotay crash-landing their shuttle into the land of some moronic militia men was also good. Another reviewer mentioned that the militia men were too over-the-top to be realistic. Well I live in Texas where we have an abundance of these doofuses, and they are not exaggerating the characters at all.

All in all, I really loved this two-parter. It's well done, the Doctor gets some cool 29th century tech that'll let him leave sick bay and go anywhere, and Starling blew his own butt to pieces in the end.

Voyager follows the Captain back thru the temporal rift after everything righted itself, and Janeway asks if he can help them get home faster, in their own time. Of course, he can't help them, so they set off for home, with a small celebration in the dining room.

I enjoyed it.

Love's Much Lovelier, the Second Time Around

[Hitchcoc · 10/10 · 24 August 2018]

I enjoyed this so much years ago. i may have enjoyed it even more this time. There is a great set of characters. Ed Begley, Jr. is a formidable foe. Paris finds the woman he never thought he'd meet and is victimized by the time/space continuum. The crew must infiltrate Los Angeles in the late 20th Century to put a stop to the launch of a time traveling ship. The action, suspense, and the cleverness of the plot all come together. There is something intriguing about people trying to cope in a world with which they have little experience. The Doctor is again engaged in the plot and I especially liked his encounter with the survivalists.

Beware Of Egg Begley, Jr.

[Bolesroor · 10/10 · 2 February 2011]

(Please Note: This is my review for both parts of the two-part episode "Future's End.")

Future's End is a beautiful time-travel episode which involves the crew of Voyager traveling to present-day Earth in order to stop a time-traveler from destroying their ship. If Voyager ever made a major motion picture, this is the script on which it should have been based.

Packed with story, fast-moving, and genuinely funny, this is Star Trek at its best. Sure, human cancer Sarah Silverman guest-starred as the astronomer, and yes, Egg Begley, Jr's role as evil technocrat was rushed and slightly under-developed, but there's so much here to love: A time ship from century 29 set to destroy Voyager for the good of mankind... Tuvok dressed like a brother from the hood... Kes and Neelix watching soap operas...

Okay, so Voyager should be better protected against a 1996 IBM desktop and the Doc's mobile emitter was the first step in the over-use and eventual abuse of the Doctor character, but this is too fun to nitpick.

GRADE: A

Freedom for The Doctor

[snoozejonc · 7/10 · 24 December 2022]

The Voyager crew continue their tech battle with Starling.

This is an entertaining conclusion to the story.

There's nothing particularly unexpected in how it finishes, but it is nonetheless quite enjoyable. It goes the only way it could to maintain the Voyager premise of being stranded in the Delta Quadrant.

I think my favourite aspect is the mobile hologram emitter as this is something that gives The Doctor character more opportunities to be involved in future episodes.

Ed Begley Jr and Sarah Silverman continue where they left off as memorable guest stars and the regular cast are all on good form too. Starling is one of the stronger baddies portrayed in Voyager, although his motivations behind various nefarious acts are not exactly logical.

Stupid Story. Horrible Plot. Horrible Execution.

[nytehawq · 1/10 · 9 September 2020]

HORRIBLE STORY. Trying to figure out how anyone can buy into story about a 20th century person (Starling) figuring out how to use 29 century technology to use against 24th century technology using a keyboard. The premise is ludicrous. That's like saying someone 800-900 years in our past using today's modern day tech against someone in the 16th century. We are supposed to believe the Starling knows how to use this 29th century technology well enough to download gigabytes of data from Voyager using Voyager's transporter beam? Really? He knows how to give the holographic doctor feelings? Really? He figures out how to let the holographic doctor move about without "holo emitters" Give me a break. Stupid plot for suckers. If Starling could do all of that, why the hell then did he need to go to the future for more technology? If he knew how to use 29th century tech so well why didn't he introduce the rest of this tech? He had not even exploited a tenth of the technology he had in his hands. Like I said, stupid, stupid plot. Another stupid scene. the holographic doctor is in a fight getting hit and later in the show the holographic doctor could let shotgun blasts pass through him? Wtf? The other thing that drives me crazy. B'Elanna can reconfigure warp cores, dilithium chambers, deflector shields in minutes or hours, yet she couldn't repair the transporter in 2 days? Voyager can re-route EPS conduits, plasma flows, ship controls to various consoles, but Janeway had to fire torpedoes manually at the torpedo tube? What was the rest of the crew doing this whole time? Probably still trying to fix the transporters. Ugh.

Plus what I hate about Voyager the most. Whatever they need at the most crucial times is guaranteed to be offline. Engage the tractor beam. Tractor beam off-line. Engage warp engines, get us out of here. Warp engines off-line. Transport them out of there, transporter are off-line. Fire photon torpedoes, torpedo controls are off-line. See the pattern? Every episode. Watching Voyager kills brain cells.

When Star Trek murdered reason and logic

[JamesB-Rodgers · 1/10 · 17 June 2023]

Part 2 has all the promise and problems of Part 1, but on steroids. They weren't quite satisfied with the collective IQ points they obliterated with a storyline centered where human is able to control all technology and physics because - well, he's smart or found an alien ship or something. Essentially, the plot requires so you to set aside logic and basic cognitive abilities.

But all the problems of Part 1 persist... This should be a standard Star Trek time travel episode. And instead, the writers said, "how about we create a villain who knows everything, can anticipate anything, and do literally anything" How can we do all this? Unexplained reasons! How does he MASTER technology that's literally hundreds of years beyond his comprehension? More unexplained reasons! Does the villain even operate consistently or use mild logic with his seemingly endless magical powers? ROFL Nope! He's gotta do things that drive the plot so things can happen! I could never fathom a way in which my intelligence could be more insulted...

The other reviews are correct.

[robertjbailey-02302 · 3/10 · 1 May 2024]

Many reviewers have observed that often the writers introduce convenient technology failures to support plots. In this case, the ship's transporters are not functioning properly except from very low orbit.

However Voyager possesses a number of shuttlecraft and in many previous episodes the crew have used the transporters aboard these smaller craft successfully from high orbit.

In one episode Paris even remotely transported a bunch of Talaxians to Voyager to recapture it from the Kason. So why couldn't they transport from shuttlecraft?

I won't even bother commenting on the ridiculous idea that a hippy from the sixties could understand technology from 900 years in the future. So that would be like a person from the year 1096 understanding computers made in the 1990s. Really?