'Collective'

Stardate: 53753.2
Written By: Andrew Shepard Price and Mark Gaberman
Directed By: Allison Liddi
Rating: ***1/2 (out of 5)

Still the Borg aren't as threatening as they once were, and a note to the writers - makings these Drones children doesn't make the recent Borg sturdiness acceptable!

One thing "Collective" does manage to accomplish is adding some awe into the Borg. By seeing a little more of what happens on the Cube with the baby and the hanger were the Delta Flyer docks, makes you think maybe there is some life left in the Borg.

However the life soon diminshes. "Collective" plays out like a cliched expensive flick. The hostages, the hardy commander that dies in a 'spectacular climax' with some drama added just to make you think the writers know what they're doing. Including some Trek cliches (Borg, Borg individualality, Seven's humanity, a little techno-babble) doesn't help.

The story goes like this; Chakotay, Neelix, Tom and Harry are in the Delta Flyer for some reason playing poker and gambling (wasn't Chakotay against that kind of stuff?) when a Borg Cube appears and takes everyone but Harry who is at the back of the Flyer, hostage. Voyager discovers the cube a little later and the Cube is run by children who are in a state of disorder. The kids demand Voyagers deflector to contact the Borg to re-assimilate them, using the hostages as a tool. And of course Seven is the one who must deal with the kids.

I'd love to know were these kids were going to get a deflector if Voyager wasn't around because it didn't seem they were interested in any defectors until Janeway actually arrived. Anyway, the story goes all over the place as Harry unsuccessfully tries to knock out the Borg's shields and Seven tries her humanity routine on the kids. But after all the dealing and attempts at getting the kids to surrender the hostages, its ultimately a technobabble solution which kills the famed leader and ends the episode. Oh and of course there's a little mutiny! If you ask me, this should've been made more like a 'Village of the Damned' episode because sometimes these kids were creepy, especially the young girl. I think with a little more atmosphere and slightly different story this could've made a great Halloween episode!

I was surprised to see the children so soon out of their Borg gear! Boy, the Doc is getting really good at this stuff. I guess he's also adopted some of Kes's telekinetic abilities too! Suffice to say there should've been more drama in getting the kids out of Borgism.

The goal of the story seems to simply get the children on Voyager anyway possible. If that's the case I hope that the writers have something good in stall for us with these kids, otherwise this is something I didn't need or want to see. There's isn't any real originality here, and no good meaning.

There are some nice SFX around the place, the plot is somewhat normal, the acting is not bad. Seven was surprisingly off here for some reason. Just the way some of her lines were recited. It must've been the writing, can't be certain.

"Collective" succeeds in its goal to get the kids on Voyager, but it leaves behind it a little mess of a story which is enjoyable simply because all flicks are enjoyable. Not meaningful, just enjoyable.