When Q's adolescent son becomes a handful, Q decides a visit with his godparent, Captain Janeway, might be the fix. Q Junior has one week -- without his powers -- to prove his worthiness to the Q Continuum, or he'll be cast out and turned into an amoeba. While various crewmembers try to impress moral lessons upon Junior, the one person who might get through to him is his newfound friend, Icheb.
As you might have guessed from my introduction, I didn't really see Q as something that needed wrapping up on Star Trek: Voyager. He was a Next Generation invention and always fit better there. But between the fact that Kate Mulgrew and John de Lancie knew one another, and the fact that everyone knew by this point that a prequel show was coming up next (and with it, no logical opportunities to feature Q), I guess the character needed his final curtain call.
The problem is, every aspect of this story was already explored on The Next Generation. That series already gave us the story of someone young having to prove their worth to the continuum in "True Q," and it also gave us a story about Q being stripped of powers and having to learn morality in "Deja Q" (the best Q episode). There's simply not much here that feels original, and you really have to look to find it.
There is some novelty in the fact that Q Junior is played by Keegan de Lancie, real-life son of John. While the casting is clear nepotism, Keegan had done a little bit of acting (guesting in an episode of Ally McBeal shortly before this), and he isn't bad in the episode. Still... acting turned out not to be his thing. In fact, this Voyager episode was his last role; he went on to pursue a career in diplomacy, and became a US Foreign Service Officer.
Also intriguing: I believe this is the only Q episode (in this era, at least) that was directed by one of Star Trek's actor-turned-directors. LeVar Burton helms this episode, and I do think this leads to the comedy being more relaxed and natural than in some Q episodes.
But there's so much here that runs from "not great" (the fact that they didn't bring Suzie Plakson back as the female Q to include her in this story about parenting) to "cringe" (Junior using his powers to strip Seven of Nine naked). And this late in the game for Voyager, it's disappointing how little this story involves the series regulars. Janeway isn't actually in it that much, and the only other character featured in the story is recurring guest Icheb.
The writing doesn't feel particularly sharp either. It's possible they intended for some of Junior's behavior and motivations to be "unclear," but they read to me as ill-defined and unearned. He makes his turn from incorrigible brat to earnest try-hard basically in the span of a commercial break, so quickly that you're left to wonder if he's now working some angle. (He then regresses just as quickly at the first sign of adversity, leaving you to wonder if the turn was ever actually sincere.) Equally rushed are the minutes between the Continuum judging against Junior and then Q reappearing to say that (off-screen) he's resolved the whole problem.
Other observations:
- For all its flaws, this episode does shut up Neelix in the ultimate way for a few moments -- Junior removes his mouth and vocal cords. (In what's really a ghastly, not comedic, idea if you think about it.)
- There are lots of extras in Junior's "sexy dance party" in Engineering, and some unusual-for-Voyager music to accompany it. Feels like they blew half the budget on this one scene.
- There's a fun in-camera trick of Q "teleporting" from one place to another. After he appears in one place and the camera pans away, John de Lancie runs around the back of the set to appear somewhere else in the same camera shot.
If you like Q (and some don't), then you probably are glad to see him one last time (until decades later, with Star Trek: Picard). But this story feels unoriginal, rushed, and not the place to be spending time in Voyager's precious last few episodes. I give it a C+.
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