Star Trek: Voyager — 5x24 — Relativity

Aired 1999-05-12

SpaceOpera.com rating:9

Average reader rating:6.93

Synopsis

Voyager's future depends on Seven.

Remarkable scenes

The sight of the Utopia Planitia shipyards.
Seven of Nine wandering around in Voyager's past.
Carey appearance.
The sight of the Federation timeship Relativity.
Braxton: "Tempus fugit." (Latin for "time flies.")
The doctor: "The next time your human physiology fails you, don't consult the database. Just call me." Seven: "You are the database."
The ping pong ball freezing in mid air. Harry to Tom: "What do you call that shot?" When the ping pong bull unfroze, I like how Neelix gave Tom his point for scoring. :)
The doctor: "An injection a day keeps space sickness away!"
Temporal paradoxes beginning to occur throughout the ship.
Seven of Nine discussing temporal paradoxes aboard the Relativity.
Braxton bitching about "the Janeway factor" referencing events from Voy: Future's End.
Seven: "I can't answer your questions." Braxton, listening on the Relativity: "Good." Janeway: "Why not?" Seven: "It would be a violation of the Temporal Prime Directive." Janeway: "You're from another time?" Seven: "Yes." Braxton: "No!"
The hunt for the future Braxton.
Ducane explaining all the temporal paradoxes and cleaning up the timeline.
Janeway: "Let me get this straight. I'm going back in time to stop Braxton. But you already have him?" Ducane: "And there's a third one in our brig. I arrested him earlier today. But don't worry. They'll all be reintegrated in time for the trial." Janeway: "And Seven?" Ducane: "Oh, I assure you, when all this is over there'll only be one Seven of Nine." Janeway: "All right, let's get started before my headache gets any worse."
Janeway traveling back in time, interacting briefly with Torres, seeing herself walk down a corridor, then apprehending Braxton.
Janeway: "See you in the 24th century." Seven: "I look forward to it. Or should I say backward?"

Review

A very complicated, but extremely fun episode. It's nice to see a bit more of that odd 29th century. A Federation "timeship" denotes a whole fleet of starships with high time travel capabilities in the 29th century Federation. It also tells us that the Federation will still be around in the 29th century. Kind of a spoiler for those of us following the Dominion war, perhaps. Perhaps not. ;) You've got to wonder about the whole plausibility of this episode. I wonder how much work there actually is in repairing the timeline from anomalous influences, or exactly how the physics of it all works. A detailed analysis of the various causes and effects of certain types of time travel technologies would be warranted, though I think with careful planning it might be possible to base a Star Trek series in the 29th century. They could even take the name often used as a parody, "Time Trek", for many fans have complained about frequent time travel episodes. Overall, I found the return of Braxton, the complex approach toward time travel, and the Voyager crew's (especially Janeway's) reaction to the time travel most entertaining. This episode is among Voyager's best.

7 reader comments

In this episode, Braxton cites his time in the 20h century as a reason to try to eliminate Voyager from the timeline. However, if I recall correctly, after the events of Future's End, Braxton says he never experienced that timeline. This is only a minor problem in a very entertaining episode.
by Vincent | 10/10/2011 at 2:58 am

Isn't it a problem that Seven went to Voyager in dry dock in the beginning and the weapon was already placed, yet it was already placed? Then, she went into the FUTURE (to the battle with the Kazon) not into the PAST to find when the device was placed. What!? You go into the future to find the guy placing the device who actually placed the device in the past. That's a real temporal paradox--one that seems like it was more of a major problem that the writers chose to look over to include Utopia Planetia in this episode and something familiar to us (the Kazon battle).
by Wes Thompson | 03/02/2012 at 2:29 pm

I like how the "present" 29th century Braxton is arrested for something he might do in the future. That particular "future" Braxton did commit time crimes, but as we know from episodes like Parallels, STXI, etc, there are infinite possible futures.
Therefore, arresting "present" Braxton and merging him with that particular "future" Braxton seems kinda like punishing "present" Braxton for a thought-crime…or maybe a possible future thought-crime.
Anyway, I liked seeing Dutch from The Shield. It's interesting how certain actors get typecast. He was sort of a detective here, and will be again in at least two shows I recall.
by JR | 07/11/2012 at 5:49 am

I found Carey's chat with Seven in engineering somewhat amusing, considering he's married with children!
by Mitch89 | 03/24/2013 at 10:30 pm

I’m with JR; it’s highly disturbing that Braxton would be arrested for a crime he has not yet committed nor even has the present intent to commit! For all the federation’s claims of enlightenment, this is the kind of draconian future they have to look forward to? And no one in-universe is troubled by this?
by Jadzia Guinan Smith | 06/29/2015 at 8:50 pm

I don't mind a good time travel episode--really, I don't--but I wish I din't always have to turn off the part of my brain that processing things intelligently and logically in order to enjoy it. Seriously, every Star Trek time travel episode always seems to have one character who is grappling sophomorically with the whole thing, trying to spell it out simply for the folks at home, and someone usually tells that character something to the effect of, "It's best if you just don't think too hard on it." This episode was FULL of "just don't think too hard about it" moments. This episode was just a mess. Probably one of the weakest time travel episodes I've seen, honestly.
by Dstyle | 07/16/2015 at 7:55 pm

If you want to "intelligently and logically" in enjoy anything to do with time-travel you MUST BEST JUST "don't think too hard on it."
This is the point; these are the facts. Even with the slightest bit of intelligent logic, time-travel is always going to be caught in a "mess" of paradox.
This is the joke. This is the fun. This is the funny. This is why this is a really great Voyager episode. Because Janeway, of all characters, of all time(!), is especially aware of and attuned to this and here we have her dropped right slipstream of what a might be the most convoluted such and such… of all time!
Honestly!
Excellent Episode.
by QuasiGiani | 09/02/2017 at 3:21 pm