Caretaker (Star Trek: Voyager)
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.
Departing Deep Space Nine, Voyager journeys to the Badlands, where it is scanned by a "coherent tetryon beam" before a displacement wave hits and wreaks havoc on the ship.
Janeway offers to work with Maquis leader Chakotay, a former Starfleet officer, to find missing crew and return to the Alpha Quadrant.
En route, they encounter Neelix, a space trader eager to assist them in exchange for water and rescuing his companion, the Ocampa Kes, from the violent Kazon that inhabit the planet's surface.
Vulcan security chief Tuvok deduces that the Caretaker is dying and is ensuring the Ocampa are kept safe by sealing the underground complex, though eventually their resources will be depleted.
He reveals that he was part of an ancient alien race whose technology accidentally destroyed the Ocampan planet's atmosphere, leaving it lifeless.
His companion having long moved on, he experiments on species from distant galactic sectors hoping to find a compatible match so that he could reproduce and pass the responsibility to his offspring.
Janeway grants Paris a field commission as a Starfleet officer holding the rank of Junior Lieutenant and assigns him as helmsman.
[9][10] Actresses reported as possible replacements for Bujold included Joanna Cassidy, Susan Gibney, Elizabeth Dennehy, Tracy Scoggins, and Lindsay Crouse.
[11] Kate Mulgrew was cast as Captain Kathryn Janeway, from among four actresses recalled from the original round of auditions, and shooting of her scenes began on September 19.
[11][14] The series has similarities to Gene Roddenberry's Andromeda, which also features a hologram, a starship transported by an anomaly into a new alien landscape and the deaths of bridge officers and their replacement with a misfit crew.
[16] The production schedule was packed with other work, but special effect shots for Voyager were needed for the "Caretaker" and also "Parallax" episodes at that time.
[20] Variety found "Caretaker" to be a worthy launch of a Star Trek series, calling it "impressive" and praising the design of the Intrepid-class Voyager spaceship.
[21] While "Caretaker" successfully established the characters and their predicament, contemporaneous reviews included complaints that the integration of the two disparate crews so quickly was unconvincing,[9][22] and too many plot points were left unexplained, such as how Neelix and Kes met[22] and how Kim and Torres were cured.
[23][24] This paid homage to Gene Roddenberry's egalitarian vision of the future, such as when he included the female Number One character as second-in command of the Enterprise in the original 1965 pilot of Star Trek, "The Cage".
[25] The actress that played that character, Majel Barrett (who soon married Roddenberry), also provided the voice for the onboard computer in several Star Trek series, including Voyager.
[27] Alicia Coppola, when asked in 2000 about playing Lieutenant Stadi in the opening segments of the episode, remarked that the role was "a great part".
[29] In 2016, The Hollywood Reporter ranked "Caretaker" among the 100 best episodes in the Star Trek franchise, and noted its similarity to the Next Generation universe, where the Enterprise was often transported to a distant location from which the crew were expected to escape.
[32] In 2017, Den of Geek rated "Caretaker" among top fifty episodes of all Star Trek, noting that it launched a new television series and was a "landmark".
[23] After rewatching the episode in 2019, Den of Geek noted how the premiere had been "captivating" while "[setting] the stage for another great mission to the final frontier".
[34] In 2019, Screen Rant ranked "Caretaker" as one of the top five episodes of Star Trek: Voyager, noting how it introduced characters with an exciting plot and made use of Deep Space Nine by having a stopover there.
[41] This collection included the color version of "The Cage", "Where No Man Has Gone Before", "Encounter at Farpoint", "Emissary" and "Caretaker", with a total runtime of 379 minutes.
[44] The marathon started at 7 am PT/10 am ET and was Live streamed on the YouTube internet video platform, going through each episode chronologically in order of release with "Caretaker" airing between "Emissary" and "Broken Bow".
