Kes is back, and she’s mad as hell.
This entire episode is predicated on the assumption that:
* A: Kes’s personality can change so dramatically in just a year or two that she wants to kill the Voyager crew; but
* B: She hasn’t changed so much that she can’t be talked out of it with a quick speech from her old self.
That’s a pretty narrow plausibility window, which this episode misses. The ‘new Kes’ just isn’t established clearly enough in terms of motivation. There’s enough shown to make it clear that it’s plausible, but it isn’t made concrete enough. We needed to be told not just about the new mindset, but the experiences that bought her to it. I also didn’t feel that the actors got back into the ‘Season 1’ mindset – B’Elanna wasn’t angry enough, for instance.
608 down, 129 to go.