"Fury" | |
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Star Trek: Voyager episode | |
Episode no. | Season 6 Episode 23 |
Directed by | John Bruno |
Story by | Rick Berman Brannon Braga |
Teleplay by | Bryan Fuller Michael Taylor |
Featured music | Jay Chattaway |
Production code | 241 |
Original air date | May 3, 2000 |
Guest appearances | |
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"Fury" is the 143rd episode of Star Trek: Voyager , the 23rd episode of the sixth season. It saw the return, for this episode only, of former regular cast member Jennifer Lien as her character Kes. As with her final regular appearances in the first two episodes of the fourth season of the show, Lien is given an "Also Starring" credit, after the opening title sequence and before the Guest Stars are listed.
Kes was last included in the episode "The Gift", which aired September 10, 1997 (S4E2).
Voyager receives a distress call from a small ship. When they make a lifescan of the vessel, they are surprised that the occupant is an Ocampa. They make contact with it, and the bridge crew is shocked to see Kes on the viewscreen, almost three years after she left the ship and was not heard from again. Now here she is, looking elderly, tired, and desperate. She begs permission to come aboard, which Captain Janeway eagerly grants. Instead of docking her ship, Kes accelerates, ramming Voyager hard enough to breach the hull. Before the impact she had beamed herself aboard, and has begun stalking deck eleven of the ship, blowing out bulkheads with neurogenic energy and the force of uncharacteristic anger.
Blowing past security Kes enters Engineering. She connects herself physically to the warp core and begins to absorb power from it. When B'Elanna tries to intervene, Kes blasts her with energy, killing her instantly. Kes then disappears in a flash.
She materializes in an earlier time (2371). It is Voyager's first year in the Delta Quadrant and Kes transforms her appearance to the way she looked back then to blend in. She goes to the aeroponics bay, where she stuns and hides her younger self. Barely disguising her anger and hostility, she interacts with the crew when she must. She boards a shuttle in one of the cargo bays, taps into its communications system and plots a course for her home world, Ocampa.
Tuvok, who has psionic abilities similar to those of Kes, senses something amiss with her. He begins having strange hallucinations. He remembers the Delta Flyer three years before it was even built, and he has a vision of five-year-old Naomi Wildman, who has not yet been born. He follows the little girl into a cargo bay where he discovers Seven of Nine in a Borg regeneration alcove. He snaps back into his own time, puzzled.
Meanwhile, Kes makes a covert transmission to the Vidiians, who are currently in conflict with Voyager's crew. They seek the crew, hoping to capture them and harvest their organs and tissues. Kes promises to hand them over in exchange for passage back to Ocampa. She has no affection for her former crewmates, who she believes abandoned her.
Tuvok has more intense hallucinations and collapses. At the same moment the Doctor and Janeway detect a burst of tachyon particles in Tuvok's vicinity, indicating temporal disturbances. His visions may actually be glimpses of the future.
Thanks to Kes' information, the Vidiians locate Voyager and attack. Janeway tracks down Kes' transmissions and goes after her. She finds Kes and her angry future counterpart, who lashes out at her. She cries that her life has been miserable since Janeway and crew encouraged her to develop her mental abilities. She feels she was not ready to leave the ship and wander the galaxy alone. For this she blames the Voyager crew and is determined to hurt them and rescue her younger, innocent self. She attacks Janeway, who is forced to kill her in self-defense. Voyager fights off the Vidiians, albeit with significant damage to the ship. The younger Kes, who has no idea what is going on, revives and assists Janeway and Tuvok.
Five years later, Janeway and Tuvok remember the earlier encounter with Kes. When Kes appears and aims her ship at Voyager they prevent the collision, and then rush to Engineering, which has been safely evacuated. The furious elderly Kes has just been stopped in her tracks by a holographic recording of herself made five years earlier. The younger Kes gives her angry older self a message, imploring her to remember the real past and to leave Voyager alone. When Janeway and Tuvok arrive, she remembers having left that message for herself and they talk her safely back to her undamaged ship, easing her anger, and wishing her well on her journey home.
"Fury" featured the return of Jennifer Lien as Kes, a character who had been a series regular for the first three seasons. She said on her return that "It just feels like [I've been gone] a day. It doesn't feel like any time has passed, whereas in my own personal life, time has passed and I can definitely feel that." [1] During her time away, she had appeared in films such as American History X , and lent her voice to The Lion King II: Simba's Pride and Men in Black: The Series . She hadn't seen any of the Voyager cast members since the previous October when she attended a charity event organized by Robert Beltran. [1] When Kate Mulgrew later talked about the episode, she didn't know why Lien returned, saying that "She seemed really sensitive about coming back... she seemed a bit startled... to find herself back in a creative reality that was, shall we say, so quixotic from the get-go." [2]
Bryan Fuller and Michael Taylor wrote the screenplay for the episode, and made some changes after Lien was consulted. The actress had sought for the character to be changed from how she was portrayed at the start of season four, and she enjoyed the opening scene, saying "It's pretty cool how I make my entrance. I make a lot of noise!" [1] For the scenes that required both Old Kes and Young Kes to appear on screen at the same time, Lien played the older version while the younger one was portrayed by Amy Kate Connolly. Lien was required to wear additional make-up to age her for the part and she praised the team led by Michael Westmore saying that they were "incredibly gifted". [1]
She was pleased that the episode kept open the possibility of future appearances, and that it contained a growth arc for the character. When asked about the possibility of returning for the final episode of the series, in a similar manner to Denise Crosby as Tasha Yar in Star Trek: The Next Generation , she said that "I never know where I'll be or what I'm going to be doing at that point in time, however I do know that the show will grow. The show is going to grow without the character that I portrayed on it. So wherever it happens to be toward the culmination of the show, it will be at a point where [my character] may not be necessary or required. In that case the character won't be an important part of the story and therefore will not be needed. So yes, I could see not doing it. I could see not being asked back. I could also see that maybe there's a potential. Who knows?" [1]
In 2018, CBR included this episode on a ranking of episodes of Star Trek, they stated were "So Bad They Must Be Seen". [3]
In 2020, Screen Rant said this was one of the top ten worst episodes of Star Trek:Voyager, with an IMDb rating of 6.3 out of 10. [4]
The Digital Fix said this episode had wooden acting and terrible writing, and was only surpassed by the even worse "Fair Haven" and "Spirit Folk" as the worst episodes in season 6. [5]
Actress Jennifer Lien, who played Kes, said she was not proud of this episode and said she made some bad acting choices. She was grateful to come back and act again, but preferred the earlier episode "The Gift" as her exit episode. [6]
In 2016, Den of Geek ranked it the 11th best Star Trek episode that Bryan Fuller wrote for, and said it was a "compelling character study" [7]
Chakotay is a fictional character who appears in each of the seven seasons of the American science fiction television series Star Trek: Voyager. Portrayed by Robert Beltran, he was First Officer aboard the Starfleet starship USS Voyager, and later promoted to Captain in command of the USS Protostar in Star Trek: Prodigy. The character was suggested at an early stage of the development of the series. He is the first Native American main character in the Star Trek franchise. This was a deliberate move by the producers of the series, who sought to provide an inspiration as with Uhura in Star Trek: The Original Series for African Americans. To develop the character, the producers sought the assistance of Jamake Highwater who falsely claimed to be Native American. Despite first being named by producers as a Sioux, and later a Hopi, Chakotay was given no tribal affiliation at the start of the series, and eventually was assigned ancestry with a fictional tribe in the episode "Tattoo”. It wasn’t until his appearance in Star Trek: Prodigy that he was formally identified as a descendant of the Nicarao people of Central America.
Kes is a fictional character played by Jennifer Lien on the American science fiction television show Star Trek: Voyager. The series follows the crew of the starship USS Voyager, stranded far from home and struggling to get back to Earth. Kes joins the crew in the pilot episode "Caretaker", opening an aeroponics garden and working as the medical assistant to the artificial intelligence known as the Doctor. She is a member of a telepathic alien species known as the Ocampa who have latent psychic abilities and a life span of only nine years. Her storylines focus on encouraging the Doctor to develop his humanity and dealing with her Talaxian boyfriend Neelix's jealousy. She also seeks to expand upon her mental capabilities, leaving in the fourth season after her powers threaten to destroy the ship. She reappears in a season six episode and features in Star Trek: Voyager novels and short stories.
Star Trek: Voyager is an American science fiction series created by Rick Berman, Michael Piller and Jeri Taylor. It aired from January 16, 1995, to May 23, 2001, on UPN, with 172 episodes over seven seasons. The fifth series in the Star Trek franchise, it served as the fourth after Star Trek: The Original Series. Set in the 24th century, when Earth is part of a United Federation of Planets, it follows the adventures of the Starfleet vessel USS Voyager as it attempts to return home to the Alpha Quadrant after being stranded in the Delta Quadrant on the far side of the galaxy.
Tuvok is a fictional character in the Star Trek media franchise and a main character in the television series Star Trek: Voyager. Tuvok is a Vulcan who serves as the ship's second officer, Chief of Security, and Chief Tactical Officer. He was portrayed by Tim Russ throughout the show's run from 1995 to 2001, as well as in subsequent portrayals.
"Caretaker" is the series premiere of the American science fiction television series Star Trek: Voyager. It was first broadcast as a double-length episode on January 16, 1995, as the first telecast of the fledgling United Paramount Network (UPN). It was later split into two parts for syndication, but released in its original one-episode format on DVD and streaming services. Set in the 24th century, the series follows the adventures of the Starfleet and Maquis crew of the starship USS Voyager after they are stranded in the Delta Quadrant far from the rest of the Federation.
Jennifer Anne Lien is an American former actress known for playing the alien Kes on the television series Star Trek: Voyager.
The Vidiians are a fictional alien race in the Star Trek franchise. Developed by Star Trek: Voyager series' co-creators Rick Berman, Michael Piller, and Jeri Taylor, they serve as recurring antagonists during the show's first two seasons. They are represented as a nomadic species suffering from a pandemic known as the Phage, which destroys their tissue. A society with highly developed medical technology, the Vidiians harvest organs from corpses and living beings to stall the progression of the Phage, and experiment on other alien species in an attempt to develop a cure. Vidiian storylines frequently revolve around the aliens' attempts to take Voyager crew members' organs, though a Vidiian scientist named Danara Pel serves as a love interest for The Doctor. The alien species have made minor appearances in the show's subsequent seasons, and have been included in novels set in the Star Trek universe.
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"State of Flux" is the eleventh episode of Star Trek: Voyager, which was a science fiction television show that ran from 1995-2001. Recurring Voyager characters Seska and Lt. Carey star, along with the show's main cast, in an episode that sees the return of the Kazon aliens previously introduced in "Caretaker".
"Cathexis" is the thirteenth episode of Star Trek: Voyager, a science fiction television show that ran from 1995–2001. Part of the Star Trek franchise, it features a starship from the United Federation of Planets stranded on the other side of the Galaxy that must make its way home as it encounters aliens and various phenomena. On board a mixture of Federation, Maquis, and alien crew members live and work.
"Cold Fire" is the 26th episode of Star Trek: Voyager, the tenth episode in the second season. The episode aired on UPN on November 13, 1995. It is a direct sequel to the series premiere "Caretaker" and explores the existence of another entity belonging to the Caretaker alien's species. This is also the first episode since "Caretaker" to depict members of the Ocampa species other than Kes.
"Basics" comprises the 42nd and 43rd episodes of the science fiction television Star Trek: Voyager, the cliffhanger between the second season and the third season.
"Elogium" is the fourth episode of the second season of the American science fiction television series Star Trek: Voyager, the 20th episode overall. The episode first aired on the UPN network on September 18, 1995. The story was written by freelancers Jimmy Diggs and Steve J. Kay, based on Diggs' experience while serving in the United States Navy. It was rewritten by executive producer Jeri Taylor and guest writer Kenneth Biller.
"Alter Ego" is the 56th episode of the science fiction television series Star Trek: Voyager, the 14th episode of the third season. It was directed by cast member Robert Picardo.
"The Gift" is the second episode of the fourth season of the American science fiction television series Star Trek: Voyager, the 70th episode overall. The episode marks the transition of Kes, played by Jennifer Lien, out of the main cast of the series, and integrates her replacement, Seven of Nine, played by Jeri Ryan, into the ensemble.
"Before and After" is the 63rd episode of the science-fiction television series Star Trek: Voyager, and the 21st episode of the third season. It foreshadows events seen in a later episode, "Year of Hell". The episode debuted on UPN on April 9, 1997. This episode is focused on the alien and crew member Kes, played by actress Jennifer Lien, in a plot involving a complicated time travel paradox with the USS Voyager. In this science fiction show, the USS Voyager is a 24th century star ship stranded on the other side of the Galaxy as Earth, and must make its way back over what may be decades with motley collection of Starfleet, Maquis, and aliens as crew.
"Resolutions" is the 41st episode of the science fiction television program Star Trek: Voyager. The episode originally aired on May 13, 1996. The series follows the adventures of the Federation starship Voyager during its journey home to Earth, having been stranded tens of thousands of light-years away. This episode focuses on the relationship between Captain Janeway and First Officer Chakotay, who have been left on a planet after contracting a virus, and the rest of the crew search for a cure under Tuvok's command.
"Warlord" is the 52nd episode of Star Trek: Voyager, the tenth episode of the third season. This is a science fiction television episode, part of the Star Trek franchise, that aired on UPN on November 20, 1996. This is the story of USS Voyager, a Federation starship stranded in the Delta Quadrant with a motley crew of Star Trek aliens, Maquis, and Starfleet. In this chapter the crew encounters the Ilari aliens, which commandeer Kes's body during political struggles on their homeworld. The crew works with factions of the aliens as Kes struggles to maintain control of her mind.
The fourth season of the American science fiction television series Star Trek: Voyager commenced airing on UPN in the United States on September 3, 1997, and concluded on May 20, 1998, after airing 26 episodes. Set in the 24th century, the series followed the adventures of the Starfleet and Maquis crew of the starship USS Voyager after they were stranded in the Delta Quadrant, far from the rest of the Federation. Season Four featured the debut of new main cast member Jeri Ryan as Seven of Nine, nicknamed Seven, and the departure of Jennifer Lien, who portrayed Kes during the first three seasons of the show. At the end of the season, co-creator and executive producer Jeri Taylor retired.