Entertainment
 

Future's End (episode)

From Memory Alpha, the free Star Trek reference

(Redirected from Future's End)
Real World article
(written from a Production point of view)
"Future's End"
VOY, Episode 3x08
Production number: 150
First aired: 6 November 1996
← 49th of 168 produced in VOY →
← 49th of 168 released in VOY →
  {{{nNthReleasedInSeries_Remastered}}}th of 168 released in VOY Remastered  
← 436th of 727 released in all →
Written By
Brannon Braga & Joe Menosky

Directed By
David Livingston
50132.5 (2373/1996/1967)
  Arc: Future's End (1 of 3) →
  Arc: {{{wsArc1Desc}}} ({{{nArc1PartNumber}}} of {{{nArc1PartCount}}})  
  Arc: {{{wsArc2Desc}}} ({{{nArc2PartNumber}}} of {{{nArc2PartCount}}})  
  Arc: {{{wsArc3Desc}}} ({{{nArc3PartNumber}}} of {{{nArc3PartCount}}})  
  Arc: {{{wsArc4Desc}}} ({{{nArc4PartNumber}}} of {{{nArc4PartCount}}})  

After encountering a Federation timeship from the future, Voyager is flung back to 20th century Earth.

Contents

[edit] Summary

USS Voyager encounters an artificially generated graviton disruption, from which the 29th century timeship Aeon emerges, firing on Voyager. The pilot of the timeship, Captain Braxton, claims that Voyager will be responsible for a temporal explosion in the 29th century that will destroy the entire solar system. Captain Janeway responds with force to calm Braxton and eventually Voyager overpowers the timeship, causing Braxton to lose control of it. The graviton field begins to collapse and both ships are pulled in. Voyager finds itself in orbit around Earth, but in the 20th century. Captain Janeway, Chakotay, Tuvok, and Tom Paris transport to the surface, where they have detected some unusual readings near Los Angeles, leaving Harry Kim in charge.

A young woman named Rain Robinson has been hired by Starling to watch for a certain kind of radiation (gamma radiation from Voyager's nacelles, although she doesn't know it). She reports her findings to Starling, but is not to reveal her discovery to anyone else. When she finds the radiation, Voyager received a standard SETI greeting from Rain's Observatory. In response, Tuvok and Tom Paris are sent to find whatever information she has gathered and destroy it. Rain catches them in her office, but all three are then forced to flee the observatory when Starling's assistant, Dunbar, attempts to vaporize them, because Rain did end up telling one of her friends about her discovery.

Janeway and Chakotay continue to follow the homeless man, who turns out to be Captain Braxton, who explains that he was trapped on Earth 30 years ago, when his timeship crashed in the mountains. He was unable to reach the ship in time, and instead it was found by Henry Starling, who began exploiting its 29th-century technology, beginning the microcomputer revolution of the 20th century on Earth.

Janeway and Chakotay break into Starling's office and begin downloading his database, hoping to find where the timeship is being kept, just as Starling walks in. He threatens them and orders Ensign Kim to abort the download. Kim knows the Captain is in trouble, but as transporters were damaged by the rift, he orders the ship into low orbit for emergency transport, rescuing Janeway and Chakotay. As Voyager flies by, they attempt to transport the timeship out as well, but Starling blocks their attempts, and uses their transporter to download over 20% of Voyager's Database, including The Doctor, who appears in Starling's office.

Unfortunately, Voyager is spotted by someone videotaping a backyard barbecue, and the footage is seen by television viewers across the U.S.

TO BE CONTINUED…

[edit] Log Entries

  • Operations Officer's log, supplemental. We've been on full sensor alert, looking for signs that anyone else has detected Voyager. As a precaution, I've also asked Neelix and Kes to monitor all media broadcasts.

[edit] Memorable Quotes

"Far out."

- Henry Starling, after the Aeon crashes in the High Sierras


"Time travel. Ever since my first day in the job as a Starfleet Captain I swore I'd never let myself get caught in one of these god-forsaken paradoxes. The future is the past, the past is the future. It all gives me a headache."

- Janeway to Chakotay at Starling's computer.


"We could've worn our Starfleet uniforms. I doubt if anyone would've noticed."

- Tuvok on the fashions worn by the late 20th-century inhabitants of Los Angeles.


"Come on, take off your shirt."
"And risk dermal dysplasia? No, thank you."
"Aww, Vulcans. Deep down you're all a bunch of hypochondriacs."

- Paris and Tuvok, discussing the California sunshine


"At first I thought it was a warp core implosion. ... But, then, somehere here stole my time ship."
"And then it started to dawn on me. If someone were to fly my timeship into the future, without re-calibrating the temporal matrix, that could cause the kind of explosion that I witnessed in the 29th century!"

- Captain Braxton, explaining the temporal explosion to Captain Janeway and Chakotay


"Your curves don't look so great."

- Tom Paris, on Rain Robinson's Fourier analysis


"Who are you, and what's that thing in your pants?"
"I beg your pardon?"

- Rain Robinson and Tuvok, referring to a tricorder Rain saw Tuvok hide in his pants.


"Nobody will know the difference!"
"I'll know, Sharon! He's my brother! How can I face him, knowing that our son... is his son?"
"All you need to know, Jack, is that I love you."

- Excerpt from Neelix and Kes' soaps.


"What does it mean, groovy?"

- Tuvok, to Tom Paris


"Stop, or I'll kill your captain."
"Who is this?"
"You've got five seconds!"

- Henry Starling, threatening Harry Kim


"Ensign Kim, you have an impeccable sense of timing. Not bad for your first day in the Big Chair."

- Janeway to Kim after he rescues Janeway and Chakotay from where they are being held hostage


"Captain, I don't understand how, but he's using the transporter beam as a downlink. He's accessing our main computer."
"... we terminated the downlink, Captain, but he got at least 20% of our main computer data files."

- Engisn Kim to Captain Janeway


"USS Voyager, Intrepid Class, much bigger than I expected, and much less advanced."
"Says here your ship was launched in the year... 2371?"
"You're from the 24th century? And here all this time I thought you were from the 29th. Looks like I have the home field advantage."

- Henry Starling to Captain Janeway

[edit] Background Information

  • Not surprisingly, this episode was a favorite amongst the cast and crew, especially Tim Russ: "I'd have to say that 'Future's End' was the most fun episode to shoot. Those were two great weeks. We were outside the studio. We were in the city. We were running around all over the place, different locations and that's just a blast because shooting inside gets to be kind of boring sometimes. It was a great story. It was a great two-parter and it was just a lot of fun to shoot that episode." (Star Trek: Voyager Companion)
  • Filming for this two-part episode included five days of location shoots around Los Angeles - the Griffith Observatory exteriors being filmed on 14 August 1996. (Star Trek Magazine issue 143)
  • This episode marks the first mention of a future Starfleet that monitors and repairs the timeline. In this case, it is the 29th century Starfleet using a timeship. Timeships exist as part of Starfleet beginning in the 26th century if not sooner, (TNG: "A Matter of Time"), but all previous mentions only concerned Federation historians using the ships to study the past. In addition, as of at least 2373, a unit known as the Department of Temporal Investigations existed as part of the United Federation of Planets for purposes of investigating and reporting on all incidents of time travel involving Federation citizens, (DS9: "Trials and Tribble-ations") and may very well have been the precursor to the 29th century-Starfleet depicted in this episode.
  • This is the first episode when Roxann Dawson removes the "Biggs" part of her name from her acting credit, formally announcing her divorce from Casey Biggs (who was featured on DS9 as Gul Damar).
  • There's a very subtle gag in this episode involving the Communicators. Right after Harry receives the "Greeting from Earth" message from Rain Robinson he proceeds to contact the away team on the surface. As the Captain's Communicator beeps all of the native Angelenos walking past the away team immediately reach for their cellphones to answer them. This was probably a nod to the similarity of modern cellphone design and technology to the "futuristic" flip-top Communicators from the Original Series.
  • Rain Robinson has a Talosian action figure on her desk which was released as part of the Star Trek 30th anniversary line-up from Playmates.
  • When Rain's computer crashes, it displays a Fatal System Error #0047. The phone number for Chronowerx Technical Support is 1-800-ON-HOLD.
  • Janeway refers to late 1990s computer technology as "stone knives and bearskins". In TOS: "The City on the Edge of Forever", Spock makes the same analogy when referring to the technology of the 1930s.
  • Although this two-part story is set in 1996, there is no allusion made to the Eugenics Wars which had already been established as taking place at this time (TOS: "Space Seed"; Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan). Whether this is a deliberate retcon or an error on the part of the production staff is unclear. However the DS9 episode "Doctor Bashir, I Presume" produced soon after this one, mentions the wars as taking place in the 22nd century and not the 20th century which might account for this (although writer Ronald D. Moore himself admitted that was an error on his part).
  • This episode has the only mention of the word teleport anywhere in the Star Trek franchise, when Starling exclaims, "They are trying to teleport the ship!"
  • In this episode, Voyager discovers that they are in the past because they cannot pick up Starfleet signals, but can pick up radio transmissions. The same occurance helped Captain Kirk and his crew. determine that they were in the past in the episode TOS: "Tomorrow is Yesterday".
  • The cockpit of the Aeon would later be reused as the cockpit of Entharan starship in "Retrospect" and as Kes's starship in "Fury".
  • Janeway's hair-bun makes its last appearance in this episode, although her bun will be seen in future episodes when episodes or scenes take place pre-"Future's End." "Worst Case Scenario" has a holographic season 1 Janeway, while "Relativity" (a sequel of sorts to the "Future's End" two-parter) and "Shattered" deals with some temporal version of Janeway as various timelines are explored in both episodes separated by two seasons one focusing on 7 of 9 and the other on Chakotay, respectively of course.
  • Janeway's new regular hairdo, a hair-clipped pony-tail, makes it's first appearance here. This hairdo will remain for a year, until season 4's first two-parter of the season "Year of Hell." For the remainder of the 3rd season, Janeway wears a different style/shape/color hair-clip. While in the 4th season Janeway alternates between previously seen hair-clips, until the appearance of her short hairstyle in the "Year of Hell" two-parter.

[edit] Awards

  • This episode was nominated for an Emmy Award for Outstanding Sound Mixing for a Drama Series.

[edit] Video and DVD releases

[edit] Links and References

[edit] Main Cast

[edit] Guest Stars

[edit] Special Guest Star

[edit] Co-Stars

[edit] Uncredited Co-Stars

[edit] Stunt doubles

[edit] References

Action figure; Aeon (Aeon-type); Arizona; astrophysics; "B" movie; Barstow; Benetton; Blaine; Bride of the Corpse; California; Caltech; Cardassian; champagne; Chateau Coeur; chronometric data; Chronowerx Industries; coffeemaker; computer; DY-100 class; Earth; Edsel; e-mail; E.T.; Fourier spectral analysis; force field; gamma emission; gigabyte; graviton matrix; Griffith Observatory; groovy; Halley's Comet; hard drive; Hermosa Earthquake; high school; High Sierras; Hollywood; Hot Dog on a Stick; Howdy Doody; HyperPro PC; isograted circuit; JPL; Jack; Jessica; KGB; Lada; laser; lava lamp; Los Angeles; Mars; meteorite; moon; motorcycle; Orgy of the Walking Dead; paradox; philanthropist; pinball; pizza; polaron; Punk; RADAR; radio; Santa Cruz; Santa Monica; satellite; Saturn; science fiction; secret agent; SETI; SETI greeting; Sharon; soda; soap opera; Soviet Union; Soviet spy satellite; space-time continuum; Starfleet Academy; stone knives and bearskins; subatomic disruptor; Talosian; taxicab; telephone; telescope; temporal matrix; temporal rift; tennis; thermal radiation; theta band filter; transporter; transtator; tricorder; truck; Turn-of-the-Millennium Technology; Twinlab; 247-Baker; UFO; ultraviolet radiation; Uncle Sam's Psychic Readings; United States of America; USSR; weather balloon


Previous episode:
"Sacred Ground" 		Star Trek: Voyager
Season 3 		Next episode:
"Future's End, Part II"
Retrieved from "http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Future%27s_End_(episode)"