If you've ever wanted to witness what is arguably the most squandered 90 minutes in TV history, watch Voyager's pilot episode. To be fair, the first half hour is actually really solid, but the hour that follows is such a disaster that whatever the Federation's answer to FEMA is should've been called in.

But let's talk about the good, because there is good worth mentioning. The entire first act does a fine job of building both characters and tension. The foreshadowing of a Maquis ship disappearing from the start gives an ominous tone as Captain Janeway assembles the Voyager crew. And speaking of, Kate Mulgrew as Janeway is an absolute jewel. She wasn't the original captain cast, but I can't see how the show would've ever run without her. She injects so much energy and charisma into every scene she's in. Plus, we've got this buddy subplot with plucky Harry Kim and sarcastic rogue, Tom Paris. I came to hate both these characters as the show went on, but here their interplay is pitch perfect and, along with Janeway, they make Voyager immediately feel homey.

Then, the ship gets thrust into the Delta quadrant and everything, literally, explodes. And for a hot minute there, it's great. People die, there's a ton of pathos, the crew has to hit the ground running and try to figure out what just happened. We get the first appearence of the snarky, holographic Doctor who is immediately everything you didn't realize the show was missing so far. It's all going great.

Then the crew gets transported to an interstellar Array, and suddenly we're at a #$%ing hoedown for some reason? It's just all downhill from there.

Here's what the pilot was trying to do -- throw the cast into an uncharted region of space, force the Maquis and the Federation to team up, and introduce new aliens, some of whom would be friends and some of whom would be enemies. That's a pretty simple and effective conceit.

How they try to accomplish those things, however, is just bizarre.

There's a race of child-like aliens called the Ocampa being watched over by an omnipotent Caretaker which is both at fault for the Ocampa's world being a planetary sandtrap and Voyager being in the Delta quadrant at all. You see, the Caretaker is dying, and it's trying to find another species it can procreate with so the Ocampa can have a new Caretaker. So far, though, all the Caretaker has accomplished is make random people like Harry, for example, sick with a deadly disease. Why? Does the Caretaker have the space herp? The episode sure doesn't bother to explain.

There's just way too much happening at once. They get goofy scavanger alien Neelix to help out, but he causes Voyager to get into a conflict with these inept, poor-man's-Klingons called the Kazon. There's all this back and forth over Voyager and the Maquis finding their lost crew. There's so many moving pieces, but nothing gets the weight it needs to make these other aliens or events feel like they matter.

And to top it all off, Janeway destroys the Array at the end, aka their only immediate way home, in order to prevent the Kazon from controlling its technology. Because, apparently, they couldn't have used it themselves and set time bombs to explode after they got back to the Alpha Quadrant. No time bombs in the future, I guess. Universal translator? Sure. Replicator for anything you could want? Yup. Holographic sex huts for when you're feeling lonely? Federation's got you, holmes. But time bombs? Never heard of 'em.

Plot holes galore, boring diversions, irritating new aliens, incomprehensible logic leaps, you name it -- Voyager's pilot has them all. They succeed at introducing most of the main characters adequately enough, but everything else is just a jumbled mess. And considering what a cool idea Lost in Space meets Star Trek should have been, Caretaker's failings are all the more unforgivable.

The reason I rate "Caretaker" higher than Farpoint and "The Cage", though, is because it really, really tries to give the audience the moon. Michael PIllar and Jeri Taylor were willing to take a lot of big risks throughout which is admirable. It's just that most of those risks happened to fall flat.

Also, Neelix looks like he's wearing a couch.