Why Star Trek: Voyager should never be rebooted

Star Trek: Voyager remains an iconic show.

Star Trek: Voyager broke the glass ceiling of Starfleet by having a woman at the helm of Voyager. Captain Kathryn Janeway, played admirably by Kate Mulgrew, was a strong, dedicated, and determined captain, one who faced down the darkest of odds and left her mark on both her crew members and Starfleet. So much so that she was promoted to Admiral after Voyager returned to Earth.

Since it’s been twenty-one years since Voyager left the air and reboots are all the rage, it’s understandable that people would start thinking about “what if?” like Trekculture does in its latest video casting a potential Voyager reboot. (No such reboot is in production or consideration at the time of this writing.)

Star Trek: Voyager stands alone for a reason.

Voyager had a lot of firsts for a Star Trek television series besides a woman at the helm. An ex-Borg drone becomes a crew member. An emergency medical hologram served as the ship’s doctor. The Maquis and Starfleet officers have to team up to survive their time in the Delta Quadrant. And Captain Janeway takes Lt. Tom Paris from prison to serve aboard the ship because she needs his skills. That’s just four firsts, but there were plenty more, and should Voyager ever be rebooted, those firsts no longer exist. And they were part of what made the series special.

The ship got stranded in the Delta Quadrant, and that first was huge for Star Trek as was when enemies had to join together to meet a common goal. Every Star Trek fan knows Voyager’s story as it wasn’t like The Original Series or The Next Generation that sought out new life and new civilizations. It was a story of survival, hope, and the desire to get home before everyone they loved had died.

Rebooting this series would take all of the firsts away and eliminate all of the surprises. The audience would already know the ship gets home safely, that Tom Paris and B’Elanna Torres get married, and Ensign Harry Kim never gets promoted. We would know about Voyager’s encounters with the Borg and why Kes left. So unless a reboot would be stripping away everything we know and love about the series, there would be nothing unique about it. And changing Voyager that drastically would negate the purpose of bringing it back.

Star Trek: Voyager ran for seven seasons and ended its run with the crew seeing Earth again. Though the ending wasn’t perfect, it was sufficient, and to change that now by introducing a new crew and different adventures would dampen what was achieved during the run of this amazing series. The only way Voyager should ever return to our screens is with the original cast on a different mission.