Yesterday was Harry's day to go on an adventure, today it is the Doctor's turn at a big adventure. Unfortunately the similarities don't end there as a seemingly peaceful mission turns out to be part of a larger war. Also we are at the part in the series where apparently you can do anything you want including defect to an enemy ship with vital tactical data that gets Voyager crippled and her chief engineer kidnapped but it is all ok because Janeway made you into who you are now. This is was less serious than the crime that got Tom demoted and Janeway just shrugs it off. Lets not even talk about Harry getting a formal reprimand for having sex with an alien without her permission.
We open with two Hirogen hunting in a forest when they are ambushed by a bunch of humans in starfleet uniforms and killed. Cut to Voyager where the Doctor is trying to get permission to travel two weeks back away from earth to attend a conference and being told no (duh). Voyager gets a distress call from a Hirogen outpost and rushes in to assist. They find the outpost with no obvious signs of life and beam over to find a huge holographic jungle filled with dead Hirogen. They find a lone survivor and beam him to sickbay after turning off the holodeck. It seems this is what the Hirogen did with the holo technology they got from Janeway (unclear how it got this far out so quickly, but whatever). On this holodeck though the holograms altered the program, killed all the Hirogen and fled on a stolen ship. The lone survivor was a technician who isn't eager to go back with his people. More Hirogen show up and after exchanging some fire they agree to talk. Janeway decides to team up with them to hunt the rogue holograms over the objections of Tuvok and Chakotay.
They find what seems to be the ship but detect that it is trap just as the Hirogen ship is destroyed with only a few survivors making it to Voyager. The holograms show up and kidnap the Doctor before booking it out of there. It seems the holograms are being lead by a charismatic Bajoran hologram who credits the Doctors program with containing the elements of learning that let them become independent. After resisting a bit the Doctor decides to join their cause and talks them into going to Janeway for help with their plan to create a ground based holoprojector so they can have a new home. Janeway doesn't really trust them though but it doesn't matter because the rescued Hirogen start a fight long enough that one of them can hack into the coms and send a signal for help to his people. Janeway offers to shelter the holograms on Voyager for now but they aren't interested so she decides to attack them. But the Doctor isn't going to stand for this and has already snuck over with his mobile emitter and all they need to stop the anti-hologram beam B'Elanna has cooked up. It works but before they escape the holograms kidnap B'Elanna to help with their settlement plans.
The leader of the holograms manages to convince B'Elanna to help a bit, but she is less eager to jump right in than the Doctor. Voyager meanwhile is warned by the two Hirogen ships to stay away but comes up with a plan to follow so close behind one of the ships that they will be hidden in their exhaust. Things seem to be getting a bit authoritarian on the hologram ship and it gets worse when they encounter a mining ship with three holograms. They "liberate" them before destroying the ship along with its crew to show that they are openly evil now. The Hirogen manage to track them down though but with Voyagers help both hunting ships are disabled but Voyager comes after them forcing the holograms to flee into a planets atmosphere. They beam the Hirogen to the hostile planet along with their projector and proceed to start hunting the Hirogen. The Doctor decides to stop this and goes down to hunt the holograms and personally kills the leader. Afterwards Janeway says it is all fine since she encouraged him to grow or something.
Review: Pretty ham-handed stuff in this episode and some serious character inconsistencies. I am not opposed to how Voyager decided to explore holodeck characters in a new way, but they can't seem to decide which way we should feel about it.
4 out of 10
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