I feel like this episode was a bit of a missed opportunity. It is nominally about Tuvok having to deal with the training he had a child to repress his emotions butting against the love he feels for a lady in the present. The problem is they don't actually show any of his training and the plot on the planet seemed kinda glossed over. I do appreciate that they made the events on the planet take place over more than a few days which made it easier to accept that maybe Tuvok really had fallen in love, but since so much was cut out it also didn't feel very earned. The same thing with his training, we see him meeting his master and then fighting with him, but we don't go back until after he has completed his training. And from the look on young Tuvok's face it doesn't really seem like it worked back then either.
We open with a young Tuvok being sent to study with a Vulcan master. He resents being there but the master is patient and talks him into staying to study. Cut to a desert planet where we see a woman out hunting spiders until she sees a shuttle come through an anomaly in the sky and crash. Cut to her at the shuttle looking for things to scavenge when Paris returns. She points a gun at him and takes the stuff he was carrying before fleeing. But she doesn't make it far, several other aliens ambush her and try to rob her but Tuvok steps in and beats them all up before taking her back to the shuttle. The woman is named Noss, but they are unable to talk to her. They do manage some basic communication though as more of the hostile aliens show up forcing the three of them to flee to her also crashed ship with some supplies and the Doctors emitter. Her ship has a rudimentary shield keeping them safe there and Tuvok manages to get the mobile emitter working and luckily the Doctor is able to talk to Noss.
We aren't told how much time, but evidently more than a few days pass and they settle in to life on the planet. To keep his emitter working they keep the Doctor powered off most of the time while Paris and Noss hunt spiders. One night after telling Noss about B'Elanna Paris figures out that Noss is in love with Tuvok. After she goes to sleep the two talk about it and Tuvok is deeply offended that Paris would suggest he could love someone other than his wife. Cut to young Tuvok again and he is telling his master about the girl he fell in love with. The master is able to provoke him easily and he lashes out, but also seems to see that he is out control a bit. Back on Voyager they are aware of the shuttles absence, but it doesn't seem like it has been gone very long. While looking for it they find a spacial anomaly with a star system inside. While checking it out another ship locks a tractor beam on. Janeway hails them and they explain they are trying to save Voyager, they have lost many ships to the anomaly and plan to seal it in a few days. They come up with a plan to use a probe to relay a transporter signal through the anomaly.
On the planet two months have passed and Paris returns to the ship with Tuvok, badly injured. The Doctor is able to treat him which relieves Noss. After he recovers a bit she asks Tuvok if he feels for her and he says that he cannot after she kisses him. She gets upset and storms out. Paris argues with Tuvok about what he did so Tuvok tries to explain what happened when he was a child. On the ship they have the relay working but they only have 29 minutes before the aliens seal the rift. They send a message though to stand near the beacon in 30 minutes but there is a time distortion so it will actually be in a few days. They survive one last attack by the hostile aliens and Tuvok has to rescue Noss but they do make it back in time and return to Voyager. They take Noss back to her planet but before dropping her off she and Tuvok mindmeld and she finally seems to understand him. The final shot is of young Tuvok finally accepting the Vulcan way and being returned to the world by his master.
Review: Not bad, but not nearly as good as it seemed like it should have been. This episode does do some exploring of the inherent contradiction of being Vulcan and I am always down with that.
4 out of 10
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