"What's our Borg Queen want now?" --- B'Elanna Torres
"Some people just don't want to fit it." --- B'Elanna Torres
"I won't abandon a member of this crew." --- Kathryn Janeway
"At least I have a friend." --- William Telfer
"I don't deserve to be a part of your ship, Captain." --- Tal Cellis
Synopsis
The camers pulls back from Voyager and sweeps across the hull. We see phaser arrays, escape pod hatches, and several windows fly by. As the camera begins to slow, we see can see into the Mess Hall. The camera continues to move until it stops at a window next to the bridge. It's Janeway's Ready Room. Finally, we're inside. Chakotay walks in with Seven's ship efficiency report. He tells Janeway about some spatial clusters. She wants to take the Delta Flyer to investigate them. Chakotay leaves and has Harry contact Seven. Seven then hands a PADD to a Bajoran woman who is in Astrometrics with her. Her name is Tal Celles. She leaves with the PADD and enters a turbolift. It takes her to engineering. She hands the PADD to Torres, who gives it to another crewmen. He leaves and heads for Deck 15, which is located at the bottom of the ship. Once there, he hands the PADD to an annoyed Crewman Herron, who makes the proper adjustments listed on the PADD. The delivery officer leaves Herron in his lonely room. In a matter of moments, we've gone from the very top of Voyager to the very bottom.
After Seven complains about the misuse of crewmembers' talents during the ship efficiency meeting, Janeway realizes that she's let three people slip through the cracks on her ship. This depresses her. She feels responsible, and she wants to make things better. When she discovers that Tal Celles, Mortimer Herron, and William Telfer have never ever been on an away mission, she decides to take them with her on the Flyer to study the spatial clusters. Telfer is a hypochondriac, Tal Celles is scared of algorithms, and Herron is anitsocial. Telfer and Celles are best friends. Celles can't seem to understand algorithms, and they driver her crazy. No matter how hard she tries, she just can't seem to figure them out. Telfer helps her, and they often call each other in the middle of the night over the comm and tell each other their problems. They're friendly and nice, but they don't quite fit in with the rest of the crew. Herron, however, seems to like being alone. He couldn't be happier about his Deck 15 posting.
Janeway manages to get them all to the Flyer and they set off. On the way, the Captain tries to bond with her crewmembers. She's mostly successful with Telfer and Celles, but Herron won't allow her to get to know him. While Telfer, Herron, and Celles worry about all the bad things that could happen while they're away from Voyager, Janeway reminds them that Voyager isn't exactly a safe haven. Everybody prepares to eat their lunch in the back of the Flyer except Janeway, who stays in front for a few minutes. Before she leaves, the Flyer shakes. A large piece of the hull is ripped off and the vessel spins through space. Herron proclaims that they've been hit by a dark matter comet. The others don't really agree with him. Celles then informs Janeway that they could use the transporter to beam the ripped off hull piece into the back of the Flyer. They could examine it, and they could determine what actually happened. Janeway's impressed. She tells Celles that part of the reason she picked her for her crew was because she liked her unconventional thinking.
The Flyer shakes again. This time, Telfer is beamed into nowhere. He returns with a dark matter organism inside his body. Herron is stunned and Celles is worried. Janeway has Telfer placed inside a containment field, but he passes through it with the alien's help. Seeing no other option, Janeway grabs and phaser and shoots Telfer. He stumbles, and the alien leaps out of his body and grabs a console. It accesses life support, and a frightened Herron kills it. Janeway spins and yells at him. She ordered him to leave it alone, but he disobeyed her. He was scared.
An entire swarm of dark matter aliens comes after the Flyer to avenge the death of the alien Herron killed. In order to escape and recharge the warp drive, the Captain takes the ship into a radioactive asteroid ring belt, which orbits a gas giant. Janeway tells her team to leave the Flyer in the escape pods. Celles refuses, and Telfer follows her example. Both of them want to stick with their Captain until the end. Herron, however, decides to save himself, and he takes a pod. Before the Flyer can do anything, Herron turns his pod toward the swarm. He plans to create a diversion long enough for the Flyer to escape. Janeway, Telfer, and Celles manage to squeeze more power into thrusters, and they turn back to rescue him. They beam his pod aboard and veer away from the swarm. They fire aft phasers, which ignites one of the radioactive asteroids. A huge shockwave throws the Flyer out of orbit.
Voyager rescues the Flyer, and sends the unconscious crew to sickbay. Janeway is the first to wake up. She smiles, realizing that she managed to be a good shepherd. She went after some lost sheep. On the way she encountered a wolf, but she found her sheep. That's all that matters.
My Thoughts
"Good Shepherd" was wonderful, and it's my favorite episode of the entire season. Every scene was truly a delight, and the opening teaser was no exception. During the teaser, we were treated to several sweeping shots of Voyager, from above and below. I just loved how we went from the very top to the very bottom of the ship in a matter of minutes. Also, we finally got to see Deck 15! The guest characters were very memorable this week. Tal Celles and William Telfer stole all of the scenes they were in. I liked how they woke each other up over the comm in the middle of the night and told each other about their problems. Crewman Mortimer Herron, however, started to grind my nerves after a while. Even so, I was relieved when the Flyer swooped out of nowhere and beamed him to safety. Paul Baillargeon's musical score was magnificent, as usual. He's my favorite Star Trek composer, and I always look forward to his scores. They're fun, refreshing, and light - hearted. His score for "Good Shepherd" is tied with his score for "Blink of an Eye" for the best score of the season. Oh, the special effects were marvelous, barely beating out "Dragon's Teeth" as the best of the season. The shot of the Flyer descending into the asteroid field was beautiful, and all of the other effects were very realistic. We were treated to a nice shot of the Flyer's retracting nacelles, as well as a shot of its aft phaser array in action. We also got to see another CGI alien, which looked really interesting. Well, "Good Shepherd" is the best episode of the season, and in my book it's an instant Voyager classic. My Rating : If you haven't guessed already, it's a very enthusiastic 10.00 out of 10.00! -- NEXT WEEK : Voyager begins a month of reurns.
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