Kate Mulgrew back as Janeway...

Bick

Bick

Luddite Curmudgeon
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This actually sounds like good news. I always preferred Janeway to the other Star Trek Captains because she was truly a captain and not a pirate in a polite disguise.
 
I have to admit I didn’t take to her at first but by the end of Voyager, she had become a firm favourite of mine. I thought her relationship with Seven really helped her character grow. Ironic then that in real life Mulgrew saw the addition of Ryan as a personal slap in the face at the time (she has since admitted that this was an error on her part, which in itself, Mulgrew deserves credit for).
 
As I said after the announcement for Picard. doubtful, but I'll see what happens.
 
Bick said:
Jean-luc was a pirate? o_O
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Jean-luc was less a pirate than Kirk. What I meant was that Star Trek captains tended to play the role as a swash-buckler, a free-lancer, a
I'll make the decisions around here", kind of character. I saw Janeway as more of a people's captain. She was willing to make the hard decisions if necessary, but loved consensus, and I don't remember getting the feeling that she was a kind of a loose cannon.

(Caveat: I am basing this on the TV series. I've watched few of the theater presentations.)
 
Foxbat said:
Ironic then that in real life Mulgrew saw the addition of Ryan as a personal slap in the face at the time (she has since admitted that this was an error on her part, which in itself, Mulgrew deserves credit for).
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Wow! Didn't know this at all. I've had a look at relevant interviews on line now. Really unpleasant behaviour by Mulgrew.
 
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Parson said:
Jean-luc was less a pirate than Kirk. What I meant was that Star Trek captains tended to play the role as a swash-buckler, a free-lancer, a
I'll make the decisions around here", kind of character.
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There are two different things there. If you are saying that she was a better leader - that she ruled by consensus and took people along with her ideas, then yes, she had to do that because of the Maquis. She listened, weighed up arguments and made a decision that was not 'off-the-cuff'.

However, I disagree about the 'pirate like' 'free-lancing' aspect as that is realistic for a Captain on a 'Voyage of Discovery' like Kirk and the Enterprise were supposedly. They were meant to be at the far ends of known space, 'where no man has gone before', far from home, without supply lines or any back-up. Gene Roddenberry saw it as a 'waggon trail in space'. I equate it more with Captain James Cook and HMS Endeavour. The number one priority must be survival at all costs, whatever Starfleet says is the Prime Directive. (Unfortunately, this idea was confused by having them meet with old Earth colonies almost every week.)

Jean-Luc didn't need to be like that. He was captain of a much larger flagship of Starfleet and all corners of the Alpha and Beta Quadrants were mapped out. They rarely made first contacts missions, it was more rescues and investigations. So, why he still got involved in 'cowboy diplomacy' I couldn't say.

Janeway ought to have been much more like Kirk. She really was completely alone. Every contact ought to have been a first contact. She had no supply lines at all, no back up, no way to return home. So, you may think she behaved more 'captain-like', observed the Prime Directive better and was a better leader, but she should have been more 'pirate-like'. I don't think Janeway should have survived in the Delta Quadrant. They should never have got beyond the 'year of hell'.
 
Dave said:
Janeway ought to have been much more like Kirk. She really was completely alone. Every contact ought to have been a first contact. She had no supply lines at all, no back up, no way to return home. So, you may think she behaved more 'captain-like', observed the Prime Directive better and was a better leader, but she should have been more 'pirate-like'. I don't think Janeway should have survived in the Delta Quadrant. They should never have got beyond the 'year of hell'.
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Not sure I agree with this. If you are in the backend of nowhere without any real possibility of help (or in Janeway's case) even a shot of getting home in years and years. The whole crew has to work together. Everyone has to have a stake. Yes, there needs to be a captain if an immediate critical decision, but the long range decisions and their shared work has to have at least the smell of consensus. If you are an autocrat "cross me and die" sooner or later crew cohesion disappears, anarchy becomes the rule and the chances of actually making a really, really, long range goal goes out the window.
 
Yes, I just said that I agree with you on that aspect, but I think you are conflating two different things. Don't you think 'pirates' have good leaders too? When there are less rules to obey people need to follow charismatic leaders or there is no order. There are studies that show criminal gangs and especially pirates and highwaymen work heavily upon such structures. The Maquis in Star Trek were seen to have charismatic leaders. In order to mix the two crews together, Janeway needed to be more charismatic and a better leader than them. Yes, I agree that she did consult and carry the crew with her, in a stark comparison to Kirk, who tended to make all decisions himself, even being at odds with Spock on occasions.

I may have misunderstood you. Where I don't agree is with not following protocols and arbitrary rules - sometimes it is necessary to bypass chain of command, but also prime directive and first contact procedures, Starfleet directives, the Omega directive. I thought you meant Kirk was wrong to not always strictly follow rules. Maybe I misunderstood what you meant by "swashbuckler" and "freelancer". I thought that by that you meant a more flamboyant attitude to not always choose what Starfleet said was correct. I think Janeway's attitude did change the longer that Voyager was alone.
 
Dave said:
I thought you meant Kirk was wrong to not always strictly follow rules. Maybe I misunderstood what you meant by "swashbuckler" and "freelancer". I thought that by that you meant a more flamboyant attitude to not always choose what Starfleet said was correct.
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Ah, now we come to agreement. :) I did not mean that he was wrong to not always follow what Starfleet said was correct. A good captain/leader must have a sense of when to throw the book at someone and when to throw the book away.

Kirk was always? almost always? right to "bend" the rules. I was indeed pointing to his tendency to make all the decisions by himself. I suppose that was the point of the show. Kirk was the ultimate Captain, on the ultimate ship, with the ultimate First Mate, etc. --- Personally, I like to think that a captain who mostly relies on his/her crew to help make most decisions, will mostly make better decisions.
 
The Prime Directive should have gone completely out of the window with Voyager. Every meeting with another species was a 'first encounter', so none of the rules that Starfleet had in place were applicable to such a situation.

One of my main issues with the series was that the 'universal translator' should have been unable to function given that every species' language should have been unknown to the device, but I guess this a core requisite of belief (along with accepting that 99% of species are bipedal and humanoid in form).

As an interesting aside, if Star Trek was in the Star Wars uniform, who would be Rebels and who Empire? I suspect that - knowing that they like order and conformity - the Federation would be Empire, but would splinter Maquis-like with some prepared to actively challenge the status quo when they knew something was wrong. Even Picard on a number of occasions went against what he thought was right because of orders from above. I
 
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