Star Trek: Voyager — 2x15 — Threshold

Aired 1996-01-29

SpaceOpera.com rating:0

Average reader rating:1.54

Factoids

This episode is the winner of my "Worst Episode of Voyager Award" and is therefore a candidate for my "Worst Episode Ever Award."

Problems

Warp 10 is not transwarp. It is warp 10. There is a fundamental difference in the two concepts.
Warp 10 is an asymptote on the warp scale. You cannot ever reach the asymptote. You can only approach it into infinity. There is no "threshold" at which you stop approaching the asymptote and you actually hit it. This is why traveling at warp 10 is impossible. And when I say impossible, I mean it. Even for Star Trek. It can't happen.
Sorry, a more pure dilithium just won't take you to warp 10.
I love it when Harry and Tom get their "answer". The ship is being torn from the nacelles, not the nacelles being torn from the ship! Okay, back up here. Exactly what is propelling the ship if the nacelles have been torn off? Magic?
So the crew of Voyager construct the fastest warp engine ever conceived that's so fast that it can take you anywhere in the time it takes you to say "engage" during their off hours in their spare time? So, uh, why hasn't anyone else figured out how to do this yet? No offense, but surely Tom, Harry, and Torres are not the smartest minds in the entire galaxy.
So Voyager gets sensor data on every sector in the entire galaxy thanks to the warp 10 flight. Why do we see stellar cartographers and astrometrics officers then after this episode? Maybe because this episode was so absurd even the writers decided to ignore it?
This episode completely misunderstands the concept of evolution. Evolution is not a process by which a species gets more and more advanced, it is a process by which a species becomes more and more suited to its environment. Are we supposed to believe Paris becoming allergic to water constitutes an appropriate evolution? It almost killed him! Not to mention "evolving" such that he was unable to breathe air and only a toxic gas instead. And all the other things that almost kill him in this "rapid evolution" process...
So Paris takes Janeway for a little joyride at warp 10. He wanted to get away from Voyager with her. He could have gone anywhere in the entire universe he wanted, but instead he takes her to a planet just a few days away from Voyager. Why?
The final transformation in this episode, the most advanced form humans will ever achieve is drum roll please a giant newt!
And if that wasn't enough, the doctor's miracle cure is to treat them with antimatter! Do I really have to explain this one?
And the final blow to this silly episode is why the hell do they never use the warp 10 engine ever again? They could send one person back. They could use it for communication. They could use it for something! Answer: because this episode was so absurd even the writers decided to ignore it.

Synopsis

Paris crosses the transwarp threshold.

Remarkable scenes

The doctor's method of waking up Tom in sickbay. Not a hypospray or a gentle nudge. He screams at him! Hilarious.
The doctor: "Hmm. It looks like he's having an allergic reaction. What did he ingest?" Torres: "Just a cup of Neelix' coffee." The doctor: "It's a miracle he's still alive."
Paris: "I lost my virginity in that room. 17, parents away for the weekend." The doctor: "I'll note that in your medical file."
I like the scene where the traitorous Voyager crewmember sends the warp 10 data to the Kazon. It ridiculously served absolutely no purpose seeing as how the writers will choose to ignore the events of this episode in future episodes. You might say, well doesn't the entire episode? Yes, that's true. But this one serves even less purpose because it does nothing to advance the current plot of the episode; it's supposed to be a tie in to the Kazon arc. But what good is a tie in on a virtually de-canonized episode?
Janeway and Tom discussing having had children as newts.

Review

This episode is my favorite of all the zeros in that it's the one I like to rant about the most. Honestly, this is also one of the most watchable of all the zeros as well. There are many things to redeem this episode. Tom gave a great performance and the doctor's humorous remarks were fantastic. And personally, I see this whole episode as so absurd that it's funny, unlike other zeros. Still though, it is absurd, and I won't go easy on it because of its humor intentional or otherwise. Long story short, this episode drowns in a sea of technical problems. They're so absurd and there are so many of them that there's just no saving this episode. You've got to wonder how this crap gets past editors!

12 reader comments

YES! Everything I was going to come in here and rant about was covered in your problems section. This is a zero epsiode if I've ever seen one. You hit the asymptote thing right on the head. That's EXACTLY what warp 10 is. You can never reach it. The evolution thing is also EXACTLY right. They obviously don't know what the fuck evolution is. AND humans will probably evolve in thousands of different ways in the Star Trek future, assuming they will spread to different parts of the galaxy and encounter different environments. So to say that there is one 'universal' evolution for humans is extremely absurd. Oh and is the universal evolution some kind of being with advanced brain capacity and lots of adaptations? No. It's some sort of a lizard that probably could have been found on Earth 2 billion years ago. What an absurd episode.
It doesn't only suffer from technical problems though. It also has lots of cheap cliches. The Deux Ex Machina antiproton beam at the end was a cheap way to end the manufactured danger of Tom and Janeaway's 'evolution'. Now we know that the Voyager writers aren't credible when they want us to think someone is in mortal danger. Also, this episode was another "Voyager might get back home in season 2". Gay.
I was hoping for this episode to be a really interesting way of explaining the impossibility of reaching warp 10 after the opening scene. Boy was I wrong. Apparently you can reach warp 10 by making a duranium shuttle and putting some really badass dilithium in the warp engines. HA! Sometimes I wonder why they don't just go to a convention and find someone to be their Star Trek continuity expert, and have that person watch their asses to make sure thy don't make a ridiculous episode like this.
by Pete Miller | 08/04/2006 at 11:18 pm

I like the id number of this page. "404 - this horrendous episode cannot be found."
by Remco | 01/26/2009 at 3:52 pm

I just want to mention something else that I've noticed about this whole warp 10 nonsense. In an episode of the original series, something about a babel conference or something, an enemy ship was flying at then and eventually self-destructed. They said it was flying at warp 10. And while it was very fast it was not infinity speed. So, this episode not only illogical it didn't adhere to former canon.
by Colleen | 05/23/2009 at 11:36 pm

Colleen, that is not a continuity error. Post TOS Star Trek uses an entirely different warp scale. In TOS, warp factors are multiples of the speed of light. In post TOS, warp factors are points on an asymptotical graph where warp 10 as is described in this episode is in fact infinite speed. The problem with that as stated in my review is infinite speed is impossible as it's merely an asymptote on the warp scale, not an actual achievable speed.
by Eric Newport | 05/24/2009 at 7:36 am

When I saw that this one got a zero I didn't think it could be that bad, boy was I wrong.
by Psycroptic | 08/10/2012 at 1:21 am

I don't think anyone is truly a Trekkie unless they can launch into a long rant about how awful this episode is on a moment's notice.
by Soli | 05/24/2013 at 10:50 am

You guys are missing the whole point of this episode - Paris "did" Janeway. He rubbed his little lizard wee-wee all over her hot little Irish lizard ass. Go Paris, go! He got some…huh-huh mmmm huh-huh mmmm huh-huh. Paris rules!
by thaibites | 10/31/2013 at 1:06 am

Before this terrible episode, I think nobody had put a limit to warp speed. I find it annoying that the 25th century captains will have to say "warp factor 9.9999999" because of it. Can't we just forget it ever existed?
by Edward | 04/04/2014 at 5:12 pm

Hmm…so in the final episode of TNG, when they pick up ambassador worf, and the Pasteur then goes at warp 13….how does that exactly fit with the posts here?
by C.Ros | 11/05/2015 at 11:51 am

Edward and C. Ros,
The solution is simple and answers your questions… all they need to do is rescale like has been done before. So warp 13 is probably equivalent to warp 9.999 something.
by Rick | 04/25/2017 at 12:04 pm

Yeah, but that scene where the doctor wakes up Paris is pure gold.
by Jm | 04/03/2020 at 12:20 am

Ironically, this was the first ever episode of any star trek i watched. and i liked it. it got me into star trek, and because of that, ill always rank it highly.
by Mathalamus | 02/12/2022 at 1:54 pm