I Don’t Think Michael Piller Recreated His TNG Success With Star Trek: Voyager Season 2’s Finale

Star Trek: Voyager‘s season 2 finale failed to recreate the success of one of Star Trek: The Next Generation‘s best episodes, despite producer Michael Piller’s intentions. Piller began his tenure in the Star Trek franchise as a writer on TNG and worked as executive producer/showrunner on both Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and Voyager. Although Piller departed the franchise after two seasons on Voyager, he is still remembered for his significant contributions to the 1990s-era Star Trek series, having written some of the franchise’s best episodes during that time period.

One of these episodes was the TNG season 3/4 two-parter, “The Best of Both Worlds, Parts 1&2,” which saw Starfleet’s first major conflict with the Borg and Captain Jean-Luc Picard’s (Patrick Stewart) transformation into Locutus. “The Best of Both Words” is widely regarded as TNG‘s best episode of all time and one of the most iconic and important storylines in the franchise. The distinction of having written it is high praise for Piller, which makes it unsurprising that he would want to recreate this success on other Star Trek series, including Voyager.

Michael Piller Wanted To Recreate TNG’s Best Episodes’ Success With Voyager’s Season 2 Finale

Piller wanted “Basics” to be Voyager’s version of “The Best of Both Worlds”

Piller specifically sought to recreate “The Best of Both Worlds'” success in Voyager‘s season 2 finale and season 3 premiere episode, “Basics, Part 1&2.” The episode was the last that Piller wrote for Voyager, and on the surface has several things going for it in terms of an ambitious plot and engaging characters. “Basics” was the culmination of Voyager‘s Kazon storyline, featuring the final showdown between the crew, Maje Culluh (Anthony De Longis), and Seska (Martha Hackett). As a season finale/season premier duo, it also needed to tell an ambitious story to keep audiences engaged.

Given that Piller was leaving Voyager after “Basics,” he likely wanted to leave the show with some good material to explore heading into season 3. Voyager‘s first two seasons were strong enough to get the series continually renewed, but many episodes were hit or miss. The fact that Piller had already contributed some of Star Trek‘s most memorable episodes in previous shows should have set him up for success when crafting “Basics” as his farewell to the franchise.

Why Voyager’s “Basics” Wasn’t As Good As TNG’s “The Best Of Both Worlds”

“Basics” unequivocally did not live up to TNG’s most famous episode

However, despite Piller’s wishes, “Basics” was entirely unsuccessful in recreating the fame of “The Best of Both Worlds” or any of his other popular episodes. “The Best of Both Worlds” succeeded because it fundamentally changed the Star Trek franchise going forward. Introducing the Borg as Starfleet’s most formidable enemy and Picard’s time as Locutus informed Star Trek storylines for decades to come, weaving out a web that left many future series interconnected back to the episode in some way.

In contrast, “Basics” was never going to achieve anything so ambitious. Voyager‘s premise prohibited many of its storylines from influencing the wider franchise, and the main issue with “Basics” was the episode’s villains. Unlike the Borg, the Kazon were almost universally hated at the time “Basics” aired, and the one memorable thing the episode did was end their storyline on Voyager for good. “Basics” wasn’t even Star Trek: Voyager‘s best two-parter, let alone anything close to the level of quality that “The Best of Both Worlds” exemplified.

Star Trek: Voyager and Star Trek: The Next Generation are both available to stream on Paramount+.