By Drew Dietsch
| Published
With all the negatives of Star Trek News, the fans have been forced to suffer recently, it is important to remember good times.
And the best moment of Star Trek will forever be our favorite decade.
The 90s!
The 1990s were the golden age of Star Trek, with many successful trek films and three different series.
From 1995 to 2001, Star Trek: To travel was the last of these series, and also the last Star Trek television effort to get seven full seasons.
Despite many attempts, no show has done this since.
Over time TravelerThe reputation of only developed to the point where Captain Janeway is a meme of coffee and seven of the nine are a beloved character that fans have put pressure on his own series.
Star trek: travel had its ups and downs, but the largest of the show occurred in a specific episode.
The best episode of Star Trek: travel
“Equinox” is the story of what could have been – a haunting overview of this Traveler could have become if his crew had abandoned their principles.
Broadcast as final of season 5 and first of season 6 in 1999, this cliffhanger in two parts seized the public during the break of the show in the same way Next generation“Best of Worlds leaves 1 and 2” had a decade earlier.
Five years before the events of the episode, the federation vessel Traveler was blocked in a galaxy remote by the goalkeeper, an entity that left them in front of a 70 -year trip.
Determined to maintain the values of Starfleet, TravelerThe crew has established a course for the earth.
Without their knowledge, another ship of the Federation, the Equinoxwas also blocked by the goalkeeper.
A NOVA class scientific ship with a crew of only 78, the Equinox had limited weapons and a top speed of the chain 8, compared to TravelerThe design of the intrepid class, which had 141 crew members, advanced weapons and a maximum speed of Warp 9.975.
Unlike the best equipped TravelerTHE Equinox The crew chose a darker path, but it is not clear at the beginning.
When Traveler Meet him Equinox After five years in a hostile space, they find a ship beaten by mysterious stranger Forces.
These implacable aggressions of nucleogenic extraterrestrials through interdimensional rifles, represented by a revolutionary CGI, consumed an important part of the budget of the episode for their ethereal conception. THE Equinox is a mess, its crew decimated.
The travel team searches the wreck, finding a survivor buried under rubbing rubble: “Tell me if my legs are still there.” This raw line was fully improvised by actor Rick Worthy as a Noah Lesing team.
Another crew member jumps out of debris, wildly pulling over non -existent invaders before collapsing, while other survivors are almost catatonic from trauma.
THE Equinoxdilapidated interior, inspired by underwater war films like The boatstrongly contrasting with TravelerAesthetics of a star star, stressing despair.
Janeway and his crew are delighted to find another federation ship in the Delta quadrant, and they jump with their colleagues from Starfleet, will work to repair their ship and work to develop a defense against their attackers.
THE EquinoxThe captain of Rudolph Ransom (played by John Savage), a formerly respected starfleet officer, says they do not know why they are targeted by these creatures.
The truth is much darker: Ransom’s crew discovered that interdimensional creatures could be killed and converted into super-combustion for propulsion.
Abandoning the rules and morality of Starfleet, they shot the alien To speed up their return trip.
Ransom pleads despair – starvation, death, idiot – but TravelerThe crew, led by Captain Janeway (Kate Mulgrew), reject his apology.
When Janeway tries to stop them, the Equinox The crew escapes, a bodies Traveler And leave them vulnerable to the revenge extraterrestrials.
Janeway fury ignites. During the two parties, she risks the life of her crew to stop the ransom, threatens to kill a Equinox Crew to obtain information and relieves his first officer, Chakotay, of his functions when he disputes his almost walls.
This darker Janeway was at the time a daring gap of its diplomatic standard. Kate Mulgrew takes advantage of it, offering one of her most committed performances, while the casts prosperous on a script that gives everyone a moment.
Mulgrew admitted in the past that his heart was not always in his work to travel. She fought with personal problems throughout the production of the show, and there was a conflict between her and Jeri Ryan, who often exploded in tension on the set.
But for these episodes, she chewed landscapes. Janeway becomes the relentless commander that commanding fans are eager – a revenge merchant who turns the phaser, evoking Captain Kirk With a chip on his shoulder.
The writers Brannon Braga and Joe Menosky deliberately channeled this Original series“Energy, Earth TravelerThe issues.
The most haunting sub-contort of the two partials includes seven of the nine (Jeri Ryan) and the Doctor (Robert Picardo), pupil and teacher, held in captivity on the Equinox.
Ransom rewrites the doctor’s program, transforming the healer into a sadistic scientist. While Doctor Torture seven, digging in his brain in a procedure that could kill her, he manipulates her to sing “My Darlin ‘Clementine” as a sick duo.
Director David Livingston has chosen this folk song for its strange simplicity, a last minute decision that has become emblematic. Resonant deeply in the EquinoxThe ruined intestines, the sounds of seven forced to sing a sweet harmony while being murdered by her best friend, are unforgettable.
At the end of the episode, nothing is unharmed. The partitions explode, the relationships fracture and everything is not forgiven.
He paid. “Equinox” was a critical success and fans, praised for its intense performance, its moral complexity and its cinematographic quality.
A 1999 Television guide The criticism called him “Traveler To his bravest ”, while the polls of fans on the Internet forums of the early 90s as Trekweb ranked it among the best in the series.
His heritage continues, fans still debating Janeway’s ethics and the “Equinox” classification alongside “the year of hell” and “scorpion” as TravelerThe most beautiful hours.
The episode strongly influenced later Hiking shows, with Star Trek: ProdigyWriters citing the exploration of moral gray areas as inspiration for their 2024 season.
Directed by David Livingston, “Equinox” looks like an epic feature film rather than a television episode. And that explains why he continues to work so well, decades later.
But at the time, the domestic network of the show did not want to get there. UPN, who would later interfere with, ruin and cancel Star Trek: Enterpriseinsisted that they preferred autonomous episodes to serial arcs to attract occasional viewers.
However, the previous success of season 4 of season 4 of Star Trek Voyager, “Year of Hell” gave writers and Livingston Levier to negotiate a more ambitious story focused on the characters.
A Hiking Veteran with 62 episodes through the franchise, Livingston also did the trick and obtained a longer filming calendar than usual. He had 10 days to work on each episode, instead of the usual 7 given for the filming of each episode.
Livingston used hand cameras and dark lighting, inspired by The boatFor a feeling of grainy cinema that would work in its budget and its time constraints.
The distribution repeated largely to nail the emotional intensity, with Mulgrew and Savage Bonding on their shared theater history to refine their confrontations.
For Kate Mulgrew, the episode was one of her strong career points. In 2003 Star Trek Commentary to the DVD, she called it “the episode where we all brought our game A”, Livingston classified it among her favorite staging experiences, in her career.
“Equinox” is not only TravelerThe best episode – This is an overview of what the series could have been if it had been authorized to push the limits.
Many quote “Year of Hell” of season 4 as the summit of the series, but “the year of hell” marked the start of Travelerrisk -taking. He reported a desire to break TravelerThe often static formula, a state of mind that culminated with “equinox”.
Equinox Captures Traveler To its daring, exploring what is happening when the ideals of Starfleet collapse under pressure.
