Voyager encounters a colony of Talaxian refugees who are threatened by an alien mining group. Neelix finds kinship with the colonists as he rallies Voyager to their aid.
Here's a decades-old spoiler you'd probably have already guessed from just those few sentences: this is the episode where Neelix departs Voyager. Of course, Neelix was always one of my least favorite characters on the show, almost calibrated by the writers to be maximally annoying -- and so you may well argue that what I might want for the character's farewell is irrelevant. That said, I found this a very unsatisfying send-off for the character.
If you stipulate that the ship is going to find another group of Talaxians, then sure, Neelix choosing to remain with them would seem to make sense. These are his people, and this is a reunion Neelix never could have imagined he'd have. It is, as literally as possible, Neelix going "home," and you're looking for the character to "live happily ever after," this sure feels like that ending.
But if you accept the premise that Neelix is a hero (suspect, I know), then a major part of the hero's journey is that the journey changes you -- that, at least figuratively, you can't go home again. To have Neelix travel across half a galaxy only to have him wind up with his own people is improbable at a minimum. (How did these Talaxians make it this far without the "extra pushes" Voyager got over the years? How did Voyager even happen across this needle in a haystack?) Moreover, Neelix ending up with his own people feels like it undermines any character growth he experienced over seven years.
Neelix rarely ever expressed that he even missed home, and always seemed all-in on helping the Voyager crew reach theirs. Having him tap out before fulfilling that quest feels like a real letdown -- especially coming just in sight of the finish line like this (though, of course, Neelix has no "in-universe" way of knowing they're that close to the finish line). The decision to write Neelix out here deprives us of seeing him really face the consequences of his decision to voyage to Earth with this crew. Does he even like it when he gets there? (Ah, but then, the structure of the actual series finale doesn't leave much room for this sort of thing anyway. Which I'll get to in due course.)
Even if you endorse the idea that Neelix winding up with is own people is the right ending for his character, the way he gets there compromises his character. Neelix is a pacifist. It isn't always presented directly in the dialogue, but he's always deescalating conflict and pushing for diplomatic solutions. And you can easily connect the dots that his pacifism stems from the loss of his family to a weapon of mass destruction. So in this episode, to have Neelix take up arms and become a resistance leader? It may feel like a win for this Talaxian colony, and may even objectively be the right thing -- standing up to a bully. But for Neelix personally, it feels like he's compromised on one of his core values.
And yet, as much as I dislike the narrative of this episode, I must concede that the execution is wonderful. This episode is not just Neelix saying goodbye to Voyager, it's effectively the cast and crew of Voyager saying goodbye to Ethan Phillips. And not only are they saying goodbye to their friend, they're experiencing the onset of reality -- they're all going to be saying goodbye in less than a month of real time, when the series truly ends. It might have been easier for them to overlook that fact in the daily grind of making television, but Neelix/Ethan Phillips leaving puts that in stark relief for everybody.
As a result, all the sentiment in this episode feels quite earnest. The bookends with Tuvok (Neelix wanting him to dance, Tuvok relenting in a minor way at the last moment) is genuinely touching. B'Elanna compliments his food for once (I guess he finally got it right). Kim and Chakotay are real "bros," swinging in to talk up Neelix to the visiting Talaxians. Tuvok pays him a genuine compliment. Naomi Wildman unknowingly gives Neelix the push that makes it "okay" for him to leave. It all feels sweet without becoming too saccharine.
The production also spends a lot of money to make this episode important. We get a big CG crash of the Delta Flyer (though it strains the bounds of what could look credible at the time). There are loads of background actors in Talaxian makeup. For Neelix's farewell, every Starfleet uniform in the costume department is used to dress actual members of the production team to send off their longtime co-worker.
Other observations:
- Without motion picture money, you can't pay for "Ooby Dooby." Thus, the Zefram Cochrane anniversary party features generic rock (I guess?) music.
- LeVar Burton directs this episode, and has some flashy moments within it. A long one take shot at the party is especially cool. And if you think about the logistics, of course the cut happens just before Naomi Wildman appears. Because of limits on how long child actors can work, you really can't put one into a long scene like this when you're trying to keep on a television schedule.
- When Neelix first wakes up in the colony, he finds he's held behind a force field. Later, we learn that he's just in someone's home. So... Dexa has a force field generator in her home?
- If you were going to pick one character to leave the show early like this, I think I would have picked Chakotay. Having him stay behind with the primitive culture of the previous episode, for example, might have been a meaningful cause for his character to find. (And he doesn't have much going for him back on Earth, that we know of.)
On paper, I really don't care for this episode. But I have to concede that the actors really make it work. Put it all together, and I give "Homestead" a B-.
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