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Faces (episode)

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Real World article
(written from a Production point of view)
"Faces"
VOY, Episode 1x14
Production number: 114
First aired: 8 May 1995
← 13th of 168 produced in VOY →
← 13th of 168 released in VOY →
  {{{nNthReleasedInSeries_Remastered}}}th of 168 released in VOY Remastered  
← 364th of 727 released in all →
Teleplay By
Kenneth Biller

Story By
Jonathan Glassner and Kenneth Biller

Directed By
Winrich Kolbe
48784.2 (2371)
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The Vidiians capture B'Elanna Torres and split her into two people, one fully Klingon, and one fully human.

Contents

[edit] Summary

"Captain’s log, stardate 48784.2. We have completed our survey of the Avery system and are returning to retrieve Lieutenants Paris, Torres and Durst. By now, they should have concluded their inspection of the magnesite formations on the third planet."

B'Elanna Torres, Peter Durst and Tom Paris are abducted by the Vidiians, the alien race who suffer from the Phage. Durst and Paris are separated from Torres, who – during an experiment by Sulan, a Vidiian scientist in search of a cure for the deadly disease – is split into her two genetic halves: one fully Klingon, the other fully Human. Sulan believes that Klingons may possess an immunity to the phage. In order to test this theory, he infects B'Elanna with the Phage.

In the meantime, Paris and Durst assess their situation and are looking for ways to escape. They meet a Talaxian who has also been captured and who informs them that the Vidiians have captured them not only for organ harvesting but also as slave laborers to dig their tunnels for them. Those who don’t stay strong, says the Talaxian, are taken to organ processing.

B’Elanna, who has been successfully fighting off the phage, is furious over what the Vidiian has done to her. However, the scientist announces that this remarkable breakthrough will finally allow him to begin a series of procedures replicating her genetic code and attempting various methods of integrating her DNA with that of his own people, in order to finally find a cure.

The Human Torres, who is finally returned back to Tom and Durst, is shaken by her experience, feeling weak and sickly. She remembers having been taken to a lab and told that they have completely extracted her Klingon DNA. She feels strange not having the ridges on her forehead anymore and tells Tom how, as a child, she did everything she could to hide those ridges. She remembers that in the colony where she grew up, she and her mother were the only Klingons. They stood out and were different. After her father left them, she was so sad and traumatized that she actually believed that he had left because she looked like a Klingon.

When the Vidiians come to take Paris and Torres to the tunnels for work, she is overcome once again with terrifying fear, paralyzing her and robbing her of her strength. She is returned to the work barracks after a Vidiian guard determines that she is too ill to mine the tunnels with the other captives. Paris tries to get the Vidiians to let her stay, but B’Elanna wants to return, in the hope that she may find a way to contact the Voyager. She begins to work on the security console in the barracks while the guards are distracted.

Meanwhile, the Klingon Torres manages to escape from Sulan's laboratory. She rescues the Human Torres from the guards, who are alerted to her activities on the console. The two escape into the tunnels, where they confront each other about their respective weaknesses. The Human Torres, who is very calm as well as apprehensive and cautious, confronts her other half by stating that she always responds with violence and anger to every obstacle in her way – blaming her for having been thrown out of the Academy. The Klingon B'Elanna believes that she should be eternally grateful for being kicked out of that institution, but the Human Torres is not grateful, for her Klingon temper has gotten her in trouble more times than she can remember. However, she realizes that there is no point to this debate, for they are actually each fighting with themselves.

A plan is finally formulated in which they decide to return to Sulan's lab and use the console there to shut down the security cloak that shields the tunnels from Voyager's sensors. It may not be as exciting as fighting their way out, says the Human Torres, but it stands a much better chance of working. Moreover, she needs her Klingon half, B'Elanna, to follow her back there and cover for her, while she works, for she is unable to do this on her own.

On Voyager, Chakotay is disguised to look like a Vidiian. He transports into the tunnel system and tries to infiltrate the Vidiian base, but will be without contact with Voyager until the Vidiian security cloak is disabled. Chakotay, in disguise, enters the base and finds Paris and convinces a Vidiian officer that he is bringing Paris to an organ harvesting center for processing.

Chakotay and Paris meet up with B'Elanna and Torres in Sulan's lab just as Torres has deactivated the cloak. Sulan returns to his lab and threatens the group with a weapon. As he fires it, the Klingon B'Elanna throws herself in the line of fire and is critically wounded. The four transport to Voyager, where the Klingon B'Elanna dies after telling her other half that she feels it is an honorable death.

In sickbay, Torres is informed that her cells’ ability to synthesize proteins has been severely compromised and that she needs her Klingon genes to survive. She realizes that as a Human she is more at peace with herself than she has ever been before – but she also feels incomplete for she doesn’t feel like herself. She admires her Klingon half's many qualities, such as her strength and bravery, but also realizes that she has to accept the fact that she will spend the rest of her life fighting with her. She touches over her forehead one last time, remembering her other half and thus the person who is such an integral part of her.

[edit] Memorable Quotes

"Why not let your creature out of her harness? Study her in action?"

- Klingon B'Elanna Torres to the Vidiian scientist Sulan


"I'm sorry I can't replicate you a souffle."

- Klingon Torres to Human Torres


"I must point out, that if you take the liberty of changing a time honored recipe, you are hardly presenting a taste of home."

- Tuvok to Neelix


"Nobody ever escapes this place. Those Vidiian leeches can yank the beating heart out of you...in a heartbeat. Heart out of you in a heartbeat! Now that's funny!"
"Hilarious."

- Talaxian prisoner and Peter Durst

[edit] Background Information

  • This episode marks the death of Peter Durst, who had been introduced in the previous episode: "Cathexis". Because of the scene in which Sulan transfers Durst's face onto his own, actor Brian Markinson was used to play both roles.
  • The concept of this story had been previously explored in a non-canon story. Nearly twenty years earlier, the anthology The New Voyages had a story named "Ni Var" where Spock was divided, by an alien machine, into his Human and Vulcan halves.
  • In this episode, Lt Paris is wearing pips for Lt. JG, whereas for all the previous episodes, he was wearing the rank of full Lieutenant. He continues to wear the Lt. JG rank from here on.
  • Among the items from this episode which were sold off on the It's A Wrap! sale and auction on eBay were Vidiian special effects make-up pieces. [1]

[edit] Awards

  • This episode was nominated for an Emmy Award for Outstanding Individual Achievement in Makeup for a Series. DS9: "Distant Voices" won the award.

[edit] Video and DVD releases

[edit] Links and References

[edit] Starring

[edit] Also starring

[edit] Guest stars

[edit] Uncredited co-stars

[edit] Stunt doubles and stand-ins

[edit] References

Avery III; Avery system; corn salad; dermal stimulator; force field; genotron; geological scan; granite; Kessik IV; Klingon; magnesite; peanut butter; peanut butter and jelly sandwich; phage; plomeek soup; petaQ; rodent; subspace transponder; Talaxian; Talaxian ship; tika cat; Vidiian; Vidiian Sodality


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"Cathexis" 		Star Trek: Voyager
Season 1 		Next episode:
"Jetrel"
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