Our gang of cadets is under close supervision when they return to Voyager, but they're determined to decode the strange secret message sent to Murf. This proves to be a challenge, as no one can fully understand Murf.
Prodigy usually does a pretty credible job at entertaining the kids at the core of its audience while still being enjoyable for adults. But this episode was an uncommon misstep in this regard. It wasn't that the childlike antics of the young characters were dialed up any higher than normal; rather, it was that the episode basically relied on the ignorance of a young audience when it comes to "basic story structure."
Essentially, I feel like this episode didn't really get us anywhere. At the beginning of the episode, we know that we have to find Chakotay, and that Murf is drawing pictures of spirals. By the end of episode, we've "learned" that the spiral is a galactic map leading to Chakotay. Uh.... yeah, did we not already know that? I feel like the episode comes so close to spelling this out early as to render the rest of the episode quite dull. I suppose it's possible I've just seen too much television (and Star Trek in particular) to be surprised by such a common plot twist; maybe this plays better to a younger audience? In any case, it sort of felt like a waste of an episode to me.
It also didn't feel great to me to put so much focus on the inability of understanding Murf. When you get right down to it, it shouldn't actually be that hard to understand Murf. Setting aside questions of why the standard Macguffin, the universal translator, can't make sense of Murf's language, there's still the fact that Murf is to some extent a shapeshifter. It really seems like "charades" ought to be an easy option here.
Then add in other small disappointments. The younger, more interesting version of "the Diviner" isn't around at all. The Doctor seems especially buffoonish this episode (though Star Trek: Voyager routinely "regressed" his personality whenever it suited the story they wanted to tell, so I guess that's nothing new).
There were at least a few delights to keep the episode from being a total slog. I love that Cetacean Ops, first appearing for comedy on Lower Decks, gets a more serious presentation here. (And speaking of Lower Decks, the reference to the Cerritos was great fun.) Gwyn's sense of personal stakes in all this, as the person who has "failed her people," felt honest and tragic. And it was good to see the cadets actually get a punishment (if only a mild one) for their hijinks thus far this season.
Still, "Observer's Paradox" ultimately felt to me like 30 seconds of plot stretched to 22-or-so minutes. I give it a C. Here's hoping the story gets back on track with the next episode.
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