When Seven of Nine identifies three underperforming crew members aboard Voyager, Janeway realizes that none of them have ever been on an away mission, and resolves to lead them on one herself. But the stakes of the mission ratchet up during an alien encounter that critically damages the Delta Flyer.
Between the different personalities of the three "lower deckers" and the way Janeway is inserted into the story when she makes their redemption her personal mission, this does feel to me like a sufficiently different episode from The Next Generation's original take on "Lower Decks." To me, the problem is that Voyager itself had basically already done this episode, back in the first season. "Learning Curve" wasn't exactly a strong hour, but it was grounded in something unique to the series: the presence of Maquis crew members on the ship, struggling to fit in with a Starfleet way of doing things. "Good Shepherd" comes out of the gate feeling like the watered-down version of that, in focusing on people who likely would have washed out of Starfleet had they stayed in the Alpha Quadrant.
However, one nice improvement over "Learning Curve" is that these three "screw-ups" are more interesting characters than the Maquis of that early episode. Telfer may just be an amplification of the hypochondriac parts of Reginald Barclay, but he cares for his friend in a way that makes him more sympathetic. Harren is one of the few sociopaths on television who isn't either a punch line or a serial killer, and that alone makes his scientific obsessions feel like something different. And the Bajoran Tal Celes feels the most genuine of them all -- she's simply out of her league, not the "best of the best" as basically every Star Trek main character we've ever seen is.
Yet a clear step down from "Learning Curve" is how Janeway is written into the story. Ever since season six began with her bloodthirsty quest for vengeance, the writing of her character has been increasingly irrational. Here, she decides without evidence that they're dealing with benevolent aliens (before it's even clear that it's aliens of any disposition), and from there she's willing to put her ship and crew at risk "just because." She's furious with Harren for what she sees as a murder of an alien... and then just lets him off the hook because the episode needs a happy ending. Her strange behavior is infectious too: Telfer stops being a hypochondriac when a something actually does happen to him; Harren suddenly feels a need to self-sacrifice in atonement when he's never cared about how others perceive him before; Tal gets over six years of mounting self-doubt for no particular reason whatsoever.
But at least there are neat moments along the way. The series is using CG more and more, and in effective ways: two especially rugged moments include seeing the hull get peeled off the Delta Flyer, and seeing the Alien-like emergence of the creature from inside Telfer. There are nice little character beats as well, like Seven of Nine's harsh scoring of all her fellow crew members, and Paris' attempt to be nice to Harren backfiring spectacularly.
Other observations:
- Tom Morello, guitarist of Rage Against the Machine and huge Star Trek fan, gets an extended cameo as the junction operator Janeway interacts with on the way to find Harren.
- If you were just the right age, actor Jay Underwood (who plays Harren) might actually have seemed at the time to be a "big celebrity get" for Star Trek: Voyager. Underwood's starring roles in the often-replayed-on-cable movies The Boy Who Could Fly and Not Quite Human made him a very familiar face to sci-fi loving 80s kids.
- The opening teaser is kind of ridiculous. The reason this PADD is being carried around is so we can see it pass through the hands of all the minor characters who will take center stage in this episode. But it's like hand-delivering a letter than could have been an e-mail.
Perhaps this episode would have struck me better if we hadn't already gotten "Learning Curve." But it is still a bit more enjoyable than "Learning Curve," so I'll give "Good Shepherd" a B-.
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