Halloween 7: Star Trek: Voyager – “Threshold”

In this latest installment of our countdown to Halloween looking at weird shit, we will look at a concept that comes up on occasion in scary stories around Halloween: body horror, the terror of our bodies becoming something terrible, deadly, inhuman. 

Werewolves born in the silver glare of a full moon, mad scientists who transform themselves into human flies, the sheer terror of feeling your body die in bits and pieces as you become an undead zombie.

For today's look at body horror, we're not turning to books of Stephen King or the films of George Romero. Now, our attention turns to the sleek and slick vision of the future we know as Star Trek.

In this post, we will examine the horror of someone being transformed into a salamander.

And then another person being transformed into a salamander.  

Then those two salamanders fucking each other.

No, I'm not making this up. 

I'm So Glad My Suffering Amuses You presents...

Star Trek: Voyager

Threshold

Before we get to the salamanders, we need to establish some important information. 

Space is big

Space is really, really big. 

Space is really just too damn big. 

You just can’t decide on a whim here on Earth to visit Uranus.

You have to make plans. Pack clothes, shampoo, something to read, some snacks.

Of course, be sure to pack some quality toilet paper when visiting Uranus, am I right?

Then you go on Expedia to book a ride to Uranus except you can’t do that. Why?

You can’t get there. Space is too big.

What does this have to do with salamanders fucking?

Be patient. We will get there. 

As much fun as it is to watch science fiction shows and movies where people zip off to distant worlds,  space is too big to travel across to go from one world to another.

Even science fiction has to accept this limitation: space is too big. So this is why science fictions tells space to get bent.

Welcome to the world of WARP!!!!

Yes, going to warp. Warp solves all those pesky problems with planets being too damn far apart.

How does warp work?

Well, instead of covering every dreadful light year between worlds, you just… don’t.

Engage warp drive and your ship does…. Something. It goes outside space? Beyond space? Sub space? I don’t know! It just works!

But even in the fanciful world of science fiction, if made up shit like “warp” has to have rules.

In Star Trek, there are levels of warp with Warp Factor 10 set as an unattainable maximum; reaching or exceeding Warp 10 requires an infinite amount of energy. The Star Trek Technical Manual calls this "Eugene's limit", named after creator Gene Roddenberry.  Warp 9.99 is the maximum level of warp under established warp drive capabilities. 

Are we any closer to the fucking salamanders? 

We’re getting there. 

So let’s bring us to Star Trek: Voyager.

At the start of the series, Voyager gets hurled across the void to a sector of space known as the Delta Quadrant, a sector of space that is 70,000 light years away from the Federation. Even at maximum warp, it will take Voyager 70 years to get home. And they can’t run flat out at maximum warp all the time so yeah, they’re screwed.

Nonetheless, they set a course for home. Maybe they’ll get lucky, find a short cut or technobabble the bejesus out of some improvements to the warp drive.

SALAMANDERS!!!! NOW!!!!!!

OK, OK, OK! Settle down, pilgrim!

So Lt. Tom Paris begins working with a modified shuttle to experiment with breaking the Warp 10 barrier.

And betcha by golly wow, Tom does it! YAY!

But breaking the Warp 10 barrier turns Tom into a salamander. 

Yes, there are some more details involved but all you need to know is:

• Tom Paris goes faster than Warp 10.
• Returns to Voyager.
• Begins turning into a salamander. 

Then whatever zapped Paris also gets to Captain Janeway.

She turns into a salamander.

Stuff happens and eventually Tom Paris Salamander and Capt. Janeway Salamander wind up on a swamp planet.

Anyway….

Some Voyager crew beam down to the swamp planet where they find Tom Paris Salamander and Capt. Janeway Salamander and some baby salamanders.

Yes, I will spell this out for you.

*  Tom Paris Salamander had sex with Capt. Janeway Salamander.

*  Capt. Janeway Salamander got pregnant and gave birth to baby salamanders.

The baby salamanders slither into a pool, happy and self sufficient. Tom Paris Salamander and Capt. Janeway Salamander are beamed back to Voyager where they’re DNA gets rebooted so Tom Paris and  Capt. Janeway are humans again.

Who recall being salamanders. And fucking.

Tom Paris worries that this might make things weird.

Janeway says it won’t make things weird because they will never speak of it ever again. 

And they didn’t.

Which was perfectly fine with the fans. And the actors, writers and producing crew of Star Trek: Voyager all agreed it was best to forget this ever happened.

You know who didn't forget? The freaking  Academy of Television Arts & Sciences awarded this episode the 1996 Emmy for Outstanding Individual Achievement in Makeup for a Series.

Not bad for an episode many regard as the worst episode of Star Trek Voyager. As series writer and producer

Jeri Taylor noted, "The fact that we were turning people into salamanders was offensive to a lot of people and just stupid to others."