Cast commentary
Actress Jeri Ryan, who plays Seven of Nine, said that "The Killing Game" was one of her favorite episodes along with "Revulsion", "The Raven", "Prey", and "Hunters". [1]
| "The Killing Game" | |
|---|---|
| Star Trek: Voyager episodes | |
| Episode nos. | Season 4 Episodes 18 & 19 |
| Directed by | David Livingston (Part I) and Victor Lobl (Part II) |
| Written by | Brannon Braga Joe Menosky |
| Featured music | David Bell |
| Production code | 186 & 187 |
| Original air date | March 4, 1998 |
| Guest appearances | |
| |
"The Killing Game" is a two-part episode of the science fiction television series Star Trek: Voyager , the 18th and 19th episodes of the fourth season. It is set in the 24th century aboard a starship returning to Earth after having been stranded on the other side of the Galaxy.
This is the third and fourth episodes that continues the Hirogen story arc after the events in "Hunters" and "Prey". The Hirogen have taken over Voyager and conscripted its crew to serve as holodeck prey by controlling their minds using neural interfaces which make them believe they really are their fictional characters. The Hirogen hunt them in holodecks 1 and 2 using different programs.
Voyager has been taken captive by the Hirogen, who repeatedly erase the crew's memories and place them in holodeck programs to be hunted. Captain Kathryn Janeway, having just been "killed" as a female Klingon warrior, is put into a simulation of Nazi-occupied France in September 1944. The Hirogen take on the roles of Nazi officers patrolling the town of St. Clare, with Voyager 's crew as members of the French Resistance.
Janeway is now Katrine, a French restaurateur and leader of the underground plotting against their Nazi occupiers. She works with a bartender (the ship's tactical officer, Tuvok), who is loyal to the resistance movement, and a chanteuse and munitions expert (Seven of Nine). Neelix plays a baker who ferries messages and secret codes to the resistance headquarters; he is eventually wounded and transferred to the Klingon program (that the Hirogen are also running) after his recovery. Chief Engineer B'Elanna is a heavily pregnant French girl named Brigitte whose affair with a Nazi Captain allows her access to enemy areas.
In Sickbay, the Doctor is furious that he must repeatedly save his crewmates from their life-threatening wounds sustained in the simulations. He is also distressed that there has already been one Voyager fatality. Ensign Harry Kim, who is being forced to expand and maintain the holodecks throughout the ship, works covertly with the Doctor to regain control of the ship and its crew from the Hirogen.
The Doctor finds a way to release first Seven and then Janeway from their neural interfaces, and the two plan to break the Hirogen's hold on the rest of the crew. Just then, the Americans storm St. Clare with the help of the French Resistance. Captain Miller (First Officer Chakotay) and Lt. Bobby Davis (helmsman Lt. Tom Paris) arrive to take down the Nazi stronghold in the town, calling in an artillery strike to blow up German headquarters. The explosion overloads the holo-projectors' already strained circuitry and blasts an opening from the holodeck into the rest of the ship. Holograms invade Voyager and the ship's interior becomes a World War II battleground.
Janeway fights off holo-soldiers and Hirogen Nazis to plant explosives in Sickbay. When it blows, the neural interfaces release the Voyager crew and they find themselves immersed in a war, or in the case of Neelix and The Doctor, amidst a group of drunken Klingons. Meanwhile, the leader of the Hirogen captures Janeway and she realizes what he is trying to do. His own culture will never survive with their lifestyle of wandering in scattered hunting parties, and if he could establish holo-programs his people could stay together and experience countless hunts of all kinds. Janeway takes advantage of his wisdom and the two establish a truce.
However, one of the other Hirogen has become inspired by Nazi ideology. He assassinates his leader and aims to conquer Voyager's crew in the spirit of righteous domination. Just in time, Neelix and the Doctor manage to merge the holo-programs, unleashing the murderous Klingons on the Nazis just seconds before they can execute the Voyager crew. Harry overloads the holodecks and the program finally ends.
After days of fighting, a truce is called between Voyager's crew and the Hirogen. The Hirogen agree to leave Voyager in exchange for holodeck technology.
Due to Roxann Dawson's real life pregnancy, her holodeck character had a pregnancy storyline; the rest of the season, this pregnancy was covered up, however.
This is one of the few episodes where Jeri Ryan showed off her vocal range - this time as a singer in the bar.
Actress Jeri Ryan, who plays Seven of Nine, said that "The Killing Game" was one of her favorite episodes along with "Revulsion", "The Raven", "Prey", and "Hunters". [1]
Io9 placed "The Killing Game" as the 91st best in their list of the top 100 Star Trek episodes of all series to-date, out of over 700 episodes. [2] CBR ranked this the 16th best holodeck-themed episode of all Star Trek franchise episodes up to that time. [3]
Den of Geek listed this as an honorable mention for their ranking of the top ten episodes of Star Trek: Voyager. [4]
ScreenRant ranked the Hirogen as the 10th most bizarre of all Star Trek aliens. [5]
SyFy recommend "The Killing Game" for their Seven of Nine binge-watching guide. [6]
In 2017, the complete Star Trek: Voyager television series was released in a DVD box set with special features. [7] [8]
The Doctor, an Emergency Medical Hologram (EMH), is a fictional character portrayed by actor Robert Picardo in the television series Star Trek: Voyager, first aired on UPN between 1995 and 2001. He is an artificial intelligence manifest as a holographic projection, and designed to be a short-term adjunct to medical staff in emergency situations. However, when the USS Voyager is stranded on the far side of the galaxy without medical personnel, he is forced to act as the starship's permanent chief medical officer. In an example of the Star Trek franchise's exploration of artificial intelligence, a rudimentary algorithm becomes a major character in the show.
B'Elanna Torres is a main character in Star Trek: Voyager played by Roxann Dawson. She is portrayed as a half-human half-Klingon born in 2346 on the Federation colony Kessik IV.
Lieutenant Thomas Eugene "Tom" Paris is a fictional character in the American science fiction television series Star Trek: Voyager and is portrayed by Robert Duncan McNeill. Paris is the chief helmsman, as well as a temporary auxiliary medic, of the USS Voyager, a Starfleet ship that was stranded in the Delta Quadrant by an alien entity known as the Caretaker.
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.
Seven of Nine is a fictional character introduced in the American science fiction television series Star Trek: Voyager. Portrayed by Jeri Ryan, she is a former Borg drone who joins the crew of the Federation starship Voyager. Her full Borg designation was Seven of Nine, Tertiary Adjunct of Unimatrix Zero One. While her birth name became known to her crewmates, after joining the Voyager crew she chose to continue to be called Seven of Nine, though she allowed "Seven" to be used informally.
"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.
"Shattered" is the 157th episode of the American science fiction television series Star Trek: Voyager, aired on the UPN network. It is the 10th episode of the seventh season.
"Projections" is the 19th episode of the American science fiction television program Star Trek: Voyager. Originally slated for the first season, the episode originally aired on UPN on September 11, 1995, and tells the story of the ship's holographic doctor suffering an identity crisis on the holodeck regarding whether he or the world around him is the illusion.
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"Twisted" is the 22nd episode of Star Trek: Voyager, the sixth episode in the second season. Set in the 24th century, the Starfleet ship U.S.S. Voyager is stranded in the Delta Quadrant on the opposite side of the Galaxy from Earth in the Alpha Quadrant. In this episode, a spacial anomaly distorts the ship and the crew must work through their relationships amidst difficult and constantly changing surroundings.
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"Prey" is the 84th episode of the science fiction television series Star Trek: Voyager, the 16th episode of the fourth season, and the second episode of the Hirogen story arc. The episode centers upon a member of Species 8472, who escapes capture by the Hirogen, and boards Voyager. This results not only in an uneasy alliance between the Voyager crew and the Hirogen hunting the alien, but tension between Janeway and Seven, who harbor different ideas about how to resolve the situation.
"Nothing Human" is the 102nd episode of Star Trek: Voyager, the eighth episode of the fifth season. It was the final episode written by series co-creator Jeri Taylor.
"Fair Haven" is the eleventh episode from the sixth season of the science fiction television series Star Trek: Voyager, 131st episode overall. The crew of starship USS Voyager explore a holodeck program crafted by Tom Paris, set in Ireland; meanwhile Voyager encounters a space storm. The show focuses on the experiences of Captain Janeway during this time.
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