When Voyager visits an alien planet, the local population is stunned to learn of the existence of music -- and infatuated with the one who introduces it to them, The Doctor. As his celebrity grows, the Doctor considers leaving Voyager to become a global superstar... and Janeway considers limiting his autonomy by forbidding him to go.
There's an interesting story here in the Doctor's evolution from "unfeeling program" to "person in all but flesh and blood." But there are two big problems with the timing of it. As with another (better) Doctor episode earlier in the season, we're simply past all this. Voyager is in its sixth season, the Doctor has long since been fully accepted as an individual by the crew, and to craft a story at this point that pretends otherwise requires rolling his character development back a year or four.
More specifically, this episode comes immediately after "Blink of an Eye," in the course of which the Doctor spent three years (by his reckoning) living on an alien planet, establishing a family, and having another life. Now this episode turns largely on the idea that the Doctor is being offered something here he has never had before. True, time will be passing for Voyager if the Doctor leaves now, and that's a new element. But the Doctor has now already lived a life on another world, has already found love (it seems) and fathered a child (somehow; adoption?). So yeah, while the Doctor here is meant to be tantalized by celebrity (while also being infatuated with one woman in particular), it feels hard to believe these things would appeal to him quite this much when he was literally just telling us last episode how glad he was to be back on Voyager after years.
Part of the friction here is that to the writers, this doesn't seem to be a story about the Doctor as much a story about fame generally. That's why we get details like signing autographs, fan mail overstuffing the ship's communication systems, aliens going bald to imitate their idol. It's a story that could have happened to anybody, perhaps, though the Doctor certainly has the right naivete about the subject to cast him as the protagonist.
But it's not like the Doctor is the only one behaving strangely. It's unclear why Voyager stays at this planet for so long. They're not "stocking up" on any vital resources; why are they delaying their trip so long for all this? Why do the alien Qomar, so formal and calculating, lock in the Doctor and only the Doctor as the conduit for music in their society?
Yet there are a few good scenes, especially late in the episode. Seven of Nine's embittered reaction to being abandoned by her friend rings true. The Doctor's heartbreak when he is ultimately replaced feels real (even if part of you feels like he deserves to be taken town a rung after his behavior). B'Elanna's counsel against changing a core part of yourself is just plain good advice. Janeway being moved to tears by a final song that leaves the aliens bored is just the right final (ahem) note for the episode.
Other observations:
- If this episode had been made today, there's no way the Doctor would sing "I've Been Working on the Railroad." Now the writers would pause to think about the original likely context of that tune.
- The Doctor also sings "That Old Black Magic." This is the second time Voyager has used this song.
- The Doctor's final performance is the one time in the entire series where the character's singing isn't recorded by Robert Picardo himself. And while I get the urge to go for a trained opera singer for the moment, they should have at least tried to get a recording that actually sounds like it exists in the environment depicted. (It's obvious Picardo is lip-syncing.)
- The final song we hear, written by one of the aliens, is a fun bit of composition, weirdly dissonant, full of unusually long notes, and generally like the rock aria from The Fifth Element on steroids.
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