By Chris Snellgrove
| Revealed
Even if you happen to don’t love Star Trek: Voyager, it’s onerous to not smile whereas watching “The 37’s,” the present’s Season 2 premiere episode. This was an episode that featured every part from Voyager touchdown on a planet to Captain Janeway rubbing elbows with Amelia Earhart, making it one of many franchise’s most memorable adventures. It was an journey that obtained utterly modified, although, as this was initially meant to be the Season 1 finale, and one main producer fought to make this standalone story right into a two-part episode.
The concept Star Trek: Voyager’s Season 2 premiere was practically its Season 1 finale could seem unusual till you take into account that this spinoff’s first season solely had 16 episodes. This was as a result of Voyager was broadcast on UPN and community executives intentionally held some episodes again so the present’s second season may premiere two or three weeks sooner than most different reveals. In consequence, “The 37’s” ended up kicking off the second season when it was meant to finish Season 1 (which as an alternative ended with “Studying Curve,” a lame episode about Tuvok coaching disgruntled former Maquis.
Whereas this Voyager episode actually did make for a memorable Season 2 premiere, it’s simple to see the way it was initially written to be a season finale. Having the ship land on a planet was a giant deal…the truth is, Gene Roddenberry needed to have the ability to do that with Star Trek: The Unique Collection, however the excessive manufacturing prices of doing so is what led to the invention of the transporter. Moreover, Janeway assembly Amelia Earhart was a giant deal, and the entire concept of the crew working into people from the twentieth century matched the vibe of the TNG Season 1 finale “The Impartial Zone.”
The community’s determination to make “The 37’s” the Season 2 premiere moderately than the Season 1 finale aggravated Jeri Taylor and Brannon Braga, two of Voyager’s producers. Taylor famous how this episode “labored higher as a season-ender than as an opener” and that its plot concerning the crew banding collectively, reaffirming their mutual dedication, and heading residence “would have been a pleasant solution to conclude the primary season.” Braga, in the meantime, was upset that the present couldn’t finish Season 1 with this “very high-concept, action-adventure episode,” however he was comfortable that the Voyager episode made for such an explosive Season 2 premiere.
Braga was much less comfortable about the truth that this wasn’t a two-parter episode. He later stated that he was the one one on the present who needed “The 37’s” to be a two-parter however that no one else actually needed to finish Season 1 on a cliffhanger. As for Braga, he thought there was loads of crunchy narrative materials on this formidable episode that might have merited a second hour of storytelling.
As soon as upon a time, “The 37’s” was virtually very totally different: not solely was it practically a two-parter, nevertheless it was initially designed as a Season 1 finale. Nonetheless, we will’t assist however desire this Voyager episode as a Season 2 premiere…certain, “Studying Curve” was a lame S1 finale, however “The ‘37s” helped show simply how good this present might be when it was firing on all cylinders. And, frankly, nothing will get us to stay round for a brand new season of a present greater than this type of killer premiere.
