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Seven Hopes for Seventh Season

"Sometimes you have to look back, in order to move forward."
                   - Janeway to Seven, "Hope and Fear"

comments? LZClotho@aol.com or Our message board

The voyage is coming to an end. One way or another at the end of May 2001, Star Trek: Voyager is going to slip from warp speed and enter the annals of television history.

Whatever you think of the preceding six seasons (see retrospective articles in this issue ) every fan has hopes about what they want to see or not see (Seven Fears for Seventh Season) in the last 22 episodes.

'Shippers of all stripe want to see an acknowledgement of "their" pairing.
B/7ers want to see B'Elanna and Seven bury the hatchet; J/7ers want Janeway and Seven to stop dancing and start kissing. J/Cers want Chakotay to finally bristle with enough manliness to claim Janeway. Whatever the pairing you advocate, the acknowledgement of the Paramount folks in favor of it would send hundreds of happiness waves through fandom.

Die hard Trekkers want loose ends tied up neatly and Trek-tributable episodes to round out their collections. All fans want stories that hang together and entertain.

Surveying fandom produced the top seven most hoped for moments to appear in a seventh season episode:

7)  Tom and B'Elanna break up. Surprisingly on the list, it was most stated
that the relationship as aired wasn't working onscreen. So most fans just
want to see it ended.

6)  A sense of their families back home. With contact being more frequent,
why haven't we seen Janeway, or Tom, or Harry relating something from their latest letter from family?

5)  Action in the tension department about whether or not Starfleet is ready for, or lying in wait for, exactly what it means to have Voyager back in the Alpha quadrant. A lot of fans were saying it would be great to get a sense of what the crew might face if they come home now.

4)  Loose ends tied up. The various species that Voyager has met but hasn't vanquished. The Borg baby that vanished! And the cliffhanger from UZ resolved cleanly.

3)  Someone in a real relationship. As mentioned before, a lot of people saw Tom/B'Elanna as a dead relationship. So someone needs to take their place This was where all the 'shippers came in, voting for their pairing to really start some action:

Of the M/F pairings, there was a large contingent suggesting Doc/7 would be useful.  Of the M/M pairings dozens thought Paris and Chakotay were key. But the pairing widest advocated was Janeway/Seven. One fan going so far as to request it this way:

"Seven coming out of the closet. She was meant to be out of it in the
first place, now with the last season she should come out. Sure it's
gimmicky, but she's the only one who hasn't been in a het relationship
during the series (and indeed, all attempts to establish her in such
have failed quite dismally) Hell, ther's going to be an 18 odd month hiatus
between the end of Voyager and the 5th series starting up, so it's not like
they'd be doing themselves any immediate damage with all their bigotted
affiliates." - Jon, FF_Startrek@egroups.com

2)  "I'd like to see some well written stories for Harry, Tuvok,
and Chakotay and Belanna.  They don't get the screen time they deserve.
I'd like some more character developement for them and everybody else if it's entertaining.  I hate the "reset button" that happens with characters." Kathy O'Connor, kathy_seven@hotmail.com  Kathy said it all with this quote. In six seasons (yes, only 3 with Seven), the characters still feel greatly UNfilled in... So where are those deep stories, TPTB???

And the number one requested plotline, to which everyone had varying advice on how to handle it:

1)  Voyager gets home. Whether in the middle of the season or the finale, the greatest wish is that Voyager does, finally, return to the Alpha Quadrant. There were advocates for Janeway and Picard teaming against a corrupt Starfleet. There were advocates for seeing the Delta quadrant natives settling into their new homes. There were advocates for episodes dealing with the breakup of the crew. And there were advocates for court martials, exonerations, and parades, honor receptions, you name it.

Rumor suggests that we may at least see this. As for the rest, we can only hang on... and hope.

"Inertial dampers to maximum! Everybody hang on!"

article submitted by: LZClotho@aol.com