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 - Fourth SeasonIn this season the Borg start to make their presence felt. The Borg have started a war with a species called 8472 from fluid space. They can't handle the species 8472 because none of them have been assimilated due in part to their complex DNA. Kes telepathically recieves messages form 8472 saying that they must kill everything in this Galaxy. Janeway takes them for a more powerful threat than the Borg. Through assualt on Harrry Kim by 8472 after they baord a crippled Borg vessal a sample of Dna from 8472 is used to create a weapon against 8472. Janeway convinces the Borg to let her go through Borg space as they develope the weapon against 8472. This decision does sort of come back to haunt her later on. The Borg aboard Voyager take over the ship when weapon is finished and go to fluid space and Voyager destroys some of 8472's ships and the war between them and the Borg is over for now. Janeway manages to jettison all of the Borg except seven of nine( a human but asilmated at an early age). Seven has great diffculty going back to being a human because assimilation was at such an early stage.She progresses slowly throughout this season. Another speces that is very hostile is th Hirogeon(Hunters) and they appear in three episodes and take over Voyager for a while and take over the holo decks....they are the Nazis in WW2 theme.....the ship does fall back to Vyagers crew. I suppose the year of hell s good but has to do with the cremin ship trying alterate the timeline trying to bring thierselves back to power. It is a two part series and it ends up with Janeway being the only one left on the ship when she decides to ram the cremin ship...both ships are destroyed but it ends up being back to before they encountered the cremin and everything is normal again. Rating:  - 7 of 9---lookin' mighty fine!Jeri Ryan (7 of 9) beams onto Voyager to heat things up. SHE'S MINE! Rating: - Seven of NineThis is hands down my favorite season, but others have questioned this - mostly targeting Seven's involvement in the series. Well, watch the special features, and you'll find out why. Thus far season 3 has been my least favorite (I only own season 3 through 7 right now) and 4 my favorite, with the series smoothing out between 4 and 7. But why was the season focused on Seven so completely? Well, as explained by those who worked on the show, the show needed a boost of popularity. Of course Seven worked to be the T&A but Jeri Ryan was quite effective in her role, bringing a unique reading that others didn't have. Why was she the focal point? Because she was new, and the writers had a fresh character to explore. They essentially could do anything with the new character - in polls Seven was the most popular and Kes the least, so logically, Seven ++ Kes --. Personally I liked the resolution as a part of the series, especially with the tie-ins to Before and After in Season 3. Some regard this as the beginning of the end of Star Trek Voyager...but on the same token they should consider the Klingons the end to the original series. The Borg are to Voyager what the Klingons are to the original series, and so Voyager exemplifies that trait, mostly through Seven of Nine. The stories focused on her because the writers and the public wanted that; some say this is hypocritical to an original show, but a show written freely and against the public opinion wouldn't work as Trek anyway. If they had, Voyager would have remained in the Delta Quadrant in the final episode, something that would've been an interesting trait to swim through the Trek Community. It was considered for a month or two, as well (See commentary in Season 7). As a single season and in retrospect, yes, this season did seem to fantastically focus on Seven and Janeway. Why? Janeway's one of the most popular characters on Voyager, and as Captain is largely the focal point. Why? Because Seven was three seasons behind in character development, and needed a little catchup. Why? Because the Borg are what fuel the series, affording an almost Good vs. Evil look to the trek universe. And Season 4 uses the look well, seperately, though, in that it introduces the road between Good and Evil, continuing what Season 3 left in Scorpion. In my opinion Season Four is the best season Voyager has to offer, though not best in the typical sense; Voyager's two two-part episodes afford the series a nice boost in popularity, but in many ways this season defines the rest of the show. No, it does not focus solely on the Borg and Seven - See: Chakotay's particular episodes, the Doctor's development, and Paris and Torres's back-story. There's more to an episode than the pillar concept; this season sets up the pattern of between two and three stories/sides to the story in a single episode the lives throughout the last seasons. Season Four defines what the last three seasons, largely regarded as the best seasons of Voyager, became. It is the pivotal point in which the Voyager universe is defined, and is undeniably linked to the rest of the Trek environment. Voyager was thrown into the Delta Quadrant in Season One. They wandered around a little in Season's Two and Three, exploring a little bit of their psychological stories and spending a vast amount of time fighting the Kazon, an unfamiliar race to the rest of Trek. Season Four, they fight the universal scourge, the Borg,. Season Four, their journey begins. For three years Voyager travelled gradually losing hope of getting home. Season Four rekindled that hope (Message in a Bottle), and Season Four: They truly begin, truly dedicate themselves to the journey. Rating: - The best of a Wonderful seriesI am a huge fan of Voyager. (I think it is the best of the Star Treks.) Season Four is the best of the series. When I received this set, I immediately started watching it (as I have all the previous seasons) and became completely obsessed. The relational dynamics are interesting,but the plots are inspired! I'm not sure 5 stars is enough. Rating:  - The wrong directionI hoped I would be able to say that this season was better than season three. Unfortunately, this is not the case. But at the same time it was not much worse just the complaints are different. There are some good things in the season but also some bad things, unfortunately bad thing although fewer, concern a more important aspects of the show. Lets start with the good parts. There are a lot of very good episodes. The Killing game parts I and II, Year of Hell parts I and II are good two part episodes with good stories and a lot of special effects. Massage in the bottle is very funny and entertaining. I also like Living witness where doctor is defending the Voyager legacy 700 years in the future. Episodes One and Hope and Fear are very good and I like Scientific Method and Waking moments for their nice stories. Robert Beltran has two good episodes, Nemesis and Unforgettable. In Nemesis his character is a witness of an alien mind control and in Unforgettable he has some tender moments with a new love interest. Beltran delivers good performances in both episodes but later in the show disappears like most of the cast in front of Jerry Ryan and Kate Mulgrew as their relationship slowly becomes the central point of the show. Introduction and exploration of the Hirogen race in Hunters, Pray and The Killing Game is a nice addition to the show. Hirogen race becomes much more complex in The Killing game than it was assumed when they were introduced. Even though Hirogen remind me of Predator from a movie with Arnold Schwarzenegger, they are sufficiently different not to be an exact copy. The race and its heritage is very well written and developed. This is one of the best parts of Season IV. There is a nice story line this season about the contact with the Alpha quadrant. The story line begins in Massage in the Bottle, and continues through Hunters and Prey and is again touched upon in Hope and Fear. It is interesting to see that the show can be very good when there is a story line which actually has something to do with the original premise of trying to get home. There a also the bad parts of the show. Even though Seven of Nine is a good character and deserves a place in Star Trek but, not as much attention as she gets. The development of the character was very and in the space of only three episodes she transforms from a Borg drone into a vision of beauty and Kes is removed to make room for her. During the season writers frequently pay a lot of attention on the development of her character. In episode Revulsion Seven and Kim have their famous conversation about love and sexuality. The following episode The Raven is exclusively devoted to explaining the origins of Seven and her assimilation into Borg collective. In the next episode Seven is a savior of Voyager when her and the doctor stop the aliens who are conducting experiments on the crew. In Massage in the Bottle it was Seven who discovered the alien communications grid and managed to get the massage to Starfleet. In Hunters it was Seven that was kidnapped and brought aboard the Hirogen vessel. In Prey we have a big confrontation between Seven and the Captain and some of her rights are revoked. Following episode, Retrospect, is again focused on Seven of Nine and her struggle with human emotions. In The Killing Game she is again responsible for saving Voyager, and as a bonus we get to see Jerry Ryan sing. In episode The Omega directive the writers again emphasize spirituality and faith as the only way for Seven to become human. Faith implies belief without the need for evidence which, for Borg, should be impossible but the writers ignore that fact and present Omega molecule as god for the Borg. Again moving further away from Star Trek spirit, not to mention ruining continuity with previous ideas about Borg. In the final two episodes Seven is again featured very strongly. In One she is the only hope of Voyager and in the last episode she is the one captured with Janeway. In this episode the relationship between Janeway and Seven begins to form as friendship. The performances of Jerry Ryan are very good and Seven is a good character but, as I said before, she is becoming an overwhelming presence rather than a part of the show. The Year of Hell Part II ends with the image of Annorax creating his weapon again, or for the first time. It is unclear is it in the future or in the past. It must be in the past since it was said that he was on his mission for 200 years. So his changes from, lets say 5 years in the past may have led to the changes in the Voyager timeline, so by ending the episode thus, the writers bring into question all the events in the Delta quadrant and all the previous episodes, contradicting everything. But, this is just a TV show, everything is allowed more so since this is science fiction. Mortal Coil is beautiful episode but it's not science fiction since the same story could be done in any other setting. More and more episodes are focused on characters and much less time is attributed to science fiction and Star Trek. In previous Star Trek series this type of episodes were much rarer and the personal information about characters were much less available. It seems that the American fascination with privacy has penetrated Star Trek in a big way. That is the biggest complaint about this season of Voyager and science fiction series in general. I will count Omega Directive and Concerning flight among the bad parts of the season even though these episodes are interesting. Concerning flight is very interesting and entertaining but has one very big thing against it. It is not consistent with the Starfleet spirit which is particularly visible by Janeway patronizing Leonardo. Leonardo was a genius and that is illustrated by his quick adaptation of his flying machine to new materials which actually make the machines flight possible. This makes Janeway attitude toward him that much more illogical and patronizing. There is the line "Do you accept that there is something that your mind can not comprehend" (not an exact quote) to which the Leonardo replies "Yes." That is as far away from Roddenberrys vision of Starfleet as it can get, never mind the fact that Leonardo would never accept it. Philosophy contained in this episode is exact opposite from the philosophy of ST:The Next Generation which promotes reason as the main weapon of human kind. Besides that all other complaints are minor. Fourth season is behind me and it really provoked mixed feelings. I really wanted to like it but some of the parts of the show really annoyed me. Voyager is turning into a show about Seven of Nine with all the other characters put aside. It is a shame since after the third season it looked like it is going to be a really good show. I'm keeping my expectations of the fifth season much lower. Maybe then it will actually look better than it is.
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