VOY: “False Profits”

Date: October 12, 2020

Season 3, Episode 5

Musical Accompaniment: YouTube wasn’t working, so iTunes it is

Interstellar News: Happy 12th Day of Halloween!

I’m dedicating this post to my step-Uncle who passed away on Sunday. He suffered from MS but always had a positive attitude, especially when it came to a good party and good food. He always said his wheelchair gave him wings.

“False Profits” in TL;DR: Voyager finds evidence of a wormhole and a replicator on Takar, along with two Ferengi from the TNG episode “The Price“. Arridor and Kol have taken on the role of the Sages from the epic poem “Song of the Sages”, but they have taken advantage of the local population for their own personal profit. Janeway reasons that since the Federation was host when the mishap occurred it’s their duty to fix it, so they send in Neelix disguised as the Grand Proxy after their first meeting doesn’t go so well. Neelix is eventually found out, but it turns out there’s an end to the poem where the Sages depart. Just before the townspeople burn the three Ferengi, they’re beamed back to Voyager. The Ferengi escape, however, and are pulled through the wormhole which promptly disappears.

Favorite Quote:

Tuvok: Captain, I must remind you that the Ferengi are not members of the Federation. They are not bound by the Prime Directive. Nor would it seem that the Prime Directive would allow us to interfere with the internal affairs of this society, as much as we may disapprove of what the Ferengi are doing.

Janeway: The Federation did host the negotiations. And if it weren’t for those negotiations, the Ferengi wouldn’t be here. So one could say, without being unreasonable I think, that the Federation is partially responsible for what’s happened, and therefore duty bound to correct the situation.

Tuvok: That is a most logical interpretation, Captain.

Also, the Nagus can’t share in some of the Ferengi profits and they can’t pay their taxes or whatever… so maybe they are wanted back.

“Options? There are none.”: I knew this episode was eventually going to happen once I knew that Voyager took place in the DQ. It would have been a big missed opportunity to have these two stranded and not see what happened to them. I was, however, a bit shocked and disappointed at several things. The women in the temple were clothed, though just barely, which is very un-Ferengi (I’m super kidding on this one, folks). Aside from Neelix being the shortest and closest to Ferengi height, why did they choose someone who wasn’t warned about the Ferengi at the Academey? I guess the biggest downer here is that they could have gone through and gone home, but they had to play the heroes. Yeah I get that’s what heroes do, but then you have to stop pretending getting home is your number one goal. It’s more like a long term goal where you can explore as much as possible until you find the “right time” to go home. I was also not really buying the villagers just now feeling like they could overthrow their gods, but I also don’t know how else they would make wings of fire. I think there was just too much technobabble in this episode for me, especially since there wasn’t really a compelling reason for why they couldn’t go back after it other then Kim saying so. 4 pieces of dried pineapple for Howie.

TA Out!