"Star Trek: Voyager" Tinker Tenor Doctor Spy (TV Episode 1999) Poster

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8/10
Solid comedy
snoozejonc13 July 2020
I enjoyed this episode for Robert Picardo's impeccable comic timing and the relatively lighter tone of the episode in general.

It is very funny without being too silly and only someone who really takes the franchise a bit too seriously would pick holes in the inconsistencies the episode has within the Trek universe.

Seven of Nine's final line of the episode delivered in her usual deadpan way works so well with the doctor's performance in this episode.

If you take your Trek very seriously, this might not be for you, but if you can appreciate a story and performers entertaining you and making you laugh, I would recommend watching.
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9/10
The best and funniest Star Trek episode I've ever seen
Storms78623 April 2012
Warning: Spoilers
The beginning opera scene, the 'photonic canon', the females falling head over heels and the final climax... this episode had me in stitches throughout.

You'll only fully appreciate this episode if you're already familiar with the characters (i.e. make sure you've seen other episodes of Voyager so you know the characters, don't watch this as your first).

Typically of Star Trek there were some thought-provoking underlying points; e.g. how does ones imagination influence reality; and when a fantasy does become reality it's not quite what you imagined.

Brilliant!
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8/10
Picardo rules again
jasonbuckley-0296215 July 2020
It is no coincidence that the highest rating episodes all star the 'Doctor'.

Such a versatile actor who outshines the rest.

This is a great episode.
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10/10
I didn't realize that "Star Trek: Voyager" was a comedy! Three cheers for Captain Doctor!
planktonrules1 March 2015
This is a very funny and unusual episode for the Doctor. He apparently has been altering himself by creating a subroutine that allows him to daydream. His daydreams are hilarious and involve him being more like a super-hero than just a holo doctor. He repeatedly saves the day and in one case he destroys a Borg cube single- handedly and becomes a major chick-magnet!! In another, he sings a lovely aria with hilarious lyrics as he takes out a crazed Tuvok who is experiencing Pom Far. He also is a great painter in another and is trying his hand at painting a naked Seven of Nine! What's even funnier is that an alien race is secretly watching Voyager and they can see the Doctor's fantasies and believe they are real!! So, when they attack the Federation, they know they'll have their hands full with this holo doctor!! What's next in this silly little episode?!

The bottom line is that this is one of the funniest episodes of the series and repeatedly made me smile. Plus, I always have loved the Doctor on the show--so it's nice to see him the star in this one. For me, it's everything I wanted. And, it's the one chance you can get to see Captain Doctor!

By the way, Seven's final conversation with the Doctor....priceless!
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10/10
The opening pre-credits scene alone is worth a 10.
movies-10929 January 2021
Star Trek humor requires a vested interest in characters, and characters of the past, and episodes of the past. This one references all the way back to TOS S2E1 Amok Time. Enjoy!
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9/10
The Secret Life of Walter Doctor
Hitchcoc10 September 2018
This is another light hearted interruption to the more serious stuff. The Doctor has begun making demands due to his skill set. He sends a letter to Janeway, asking for promotions. Being a hologram, he has no status when it comes to Starfleet rank. He begins to daydream about doing all kinds of heroic things. A group of salvage ships that attack starships and steal their valuable cargo and technology has spotted them. But they are in for a surprise. A delightful episode.
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10/10
I love this episode
dcobbimdb15 January 2017
Star trek TNG and Voyager were my two favorite shows of the ST universe. And every once in a while I go on binges where I watch favorite episodes of both and this by far is one of my favorite Voyager episodes.

Mainly because it just exploits things that aren't the status quo such that we get to see the actors so out of normal character, that and I love it when they bring comedy into such a serious show as this, and repeatedly throughout the episode. Robert totally stole the show, as he should considering this episode was all about him anyway. But what's great is it really lets him shine as he is such a fine and versatile actor, plus you get to see and hear him sing, yes that's his voice...

Outside of the obvious comedic situations is the more subtle looks & gestures from the rest of the crew during such situations, in way too many scenes to mention, which makes an already hilarious episode even more over the top. I can only imagine how fun this episode much have been to film.

ST universe is normally a pretty serious universe with humor spliced in here and there, which is what makes this episode so special, that and we get to see a wider range of acting from our family of actors in this show. Makes me laugh again and again every time I see this episode. 10/10!
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10/10
I laughed so much
jdthird26 June 2023
Here it is, 2023, and I'm watching this series for the first time. A friend made me start watching all of the Star Trek shows so that I could be prepared to start watching Picard. So far I've enjoyed them, and the doctor in this series is actually one of my favorite characters just because of his snarky behavior. This episode is just so filled with hilarious little moments that are so directly opposite of the much more normal serious tone of the show, especially considering the dark nature of the episode immediately before this one.

I actually made a comment to that friend that today, in an earlier episode, I had my second laugh out loud moment of the series. Considering this is season six, and it was only yesterday and today that I had laugh out loud moments, it's obvious that they don't go for laughs and this one nearly as much. And then this episode came along, and I've lost count.

The show does such a good job of building the characters, their personalities, their histories, that you immediately know what their reactions are going to be in different situations. And this episode simply tosses all of that out the window.

I know some trekkie purists out there really didn't like this one, but I think this just might be my favorite episode of all so far. All the other episodes are so similar, this one really shows a creative left turn for the writing staff.
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10/10
RAVES FOR THE DOCTOR!
alydar216 January 2023
Voyager is our favorite Trek series, Picardo is our favorite doctor (or at least tied with McCoy). He continually thrives to improve his own holographic contributions, especially if it aids betterment of the crew and its missions. But he splashes a morass when he tries to conquer the unfamiliar art of daydreaming. This provokes him to explore remarkably unfamiliar territory that we begin to wonder if Starship Voyager will survive because now the crew needs to get involved with his overindulgence.

This episode is special to us and you may treasure it also! It garners our vote for 'best Picardo episode.
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8/10
Step aside Captain Kirk and Picard -----
thevacinstaller9 February 2023
Warning: Spoilers
I haven't laughed with a star trek episode this much since 'House of Quark'. I will also not be the one to throw stones at the Doctor for daydreaming about the female crew ----- Janeway as a disciplinarian is a classic go-to for me.

This episode is all so-meta. There are many hardcore trek fans out there who go all out with the cosplay and imagine themselves being Captain Kirk somehow surviving impossible odd's and falling in love with a beautiful women to cap it off.

Voyager has a deep well of acting talent and Ricardo is either at the top or near the top of that list in terms of range/timing/charisma and he comes through in this episode with a great performance.

This also hits one of my checkboxes ---- the 'crazy idea' implemented perfectly. It's a very creative idea for an episode and I appreciate that.

My life is not exactly thrilling ---- I am stuck in our modern gentle form of serfdom --- work and pay tax --- Well, it could be worse is my motto. It would be cool to be on a starship exploring the final frontier and not paying taxes.
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2/10
Not one of the worst, but pretty unwatchable Warning: Spoilers
I understand the concept of this episode - Secret Life of Walter Mitty and all that. It could have been a decent episode, but it's tragically bad. It comes out of nowhere - the Doctor has always been a relatively grounded figure, so having him suddenly daydreaming out of control is just stupid.

First, the Doctor's daydreams of half the women on the ship sexually attracted to him. No one acts like this, and the fact that he interprets everyone to act like this is just ridiculous.

The Emergency Command Hologram is an interesting idea, but again, his daydreams of all of this is just stupid - it's worse than the worst fanfic I've read. Especially with turning all of the intelligent and capable women in the show suddenly fighting over him.

The potato people (very similar looking to the Sontaran in Dr Who) are kind of a fun change from all the baddies who want to kill everyone all the time, but it's just exhausting watching this episode.

In short, this episode is something that probably sounded good in the writer's room, but in practice it's an absolute failure. Especially the bit where he's painting Seven.

These are all cheesier and worse than those Captain Proton stories - at least in the Captain Proton stories, they knew it was absurd, and everyone was in on the joke. This is just grating and idiotic.

And the singing - look, I like Robert Picardo, I like him a lot. But he's gotta stop singing.

I always skip this episode in rewatches - because it's unwatchable.
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10/10
A Whole Race of Aliens who look like Googy Gress!
XweAponX6 October 2013
Warning: Spoilers
I don't think these guys have ever been identified by name, other than "The Hierarchy". But every single member of this race looks like Googy Gress! So I suppose we can call them "The Googys". They appear to be a race of busybodies, spies and Peeping Toms.

They also look a bit like an Illustration I saw by Rick Sternbach for a Book by Larry Niven regarding a bar on the Moon called "The Draco Tavern" - One of the Sternbach covers for that book showed a couple of Aliens drinking in a bar and I am positive one of them looked just like these guys - But I am not surprised, as Rick Sternbach has been one of Trek's Main Illustrators for decades, and has worked with Mike Okuda on at least 3 Trek Shows.

So these guys and this episode have a special place in my affection of Trek, just knowing that most of the Ships in Trek were designed by Sternbach, I can look at any number of Del Rey Science Fiction books from the 70's and 80's and I see space ships that he drew used in Trek Episodes. So when I saw the Hierarchy Ships this call came back to me.

The Doctor has created a subroutine that allows him to daydream. He is doing so as this episode starts, he is singing about the plight of Vulcan Pon Farr to the tune of "Le Donna e Mobile". Robert Picardo has an excellent singing voice, and this is probably the first time he gets to sing almost a full verse of Opera and not "I've been Workin' On the Railroad".

But from this point the episode just keeps getting funnier, especially when they plug The Doc into the Holodeck and get to see exactly what he has been fantasizing about.

Embarrassing to say the least, nobody would like to have their daydreams dissected the way The Docs are here. But I think Trek has hit upon something important that we all share, a healthy ability to Daydream, Woolgather and Fantasize.

One member of The Hierarchy, "Devro" (Robert Greenberg) has figured out a way to tap in to The Doc's perceptual subroutines, but he is seeing only the Docs Daydreams, Devro thinks what he sees is real, so he becomes rather alarmed when he sees "The Emergency Command Hologram" Blast a Borg Cube into Microscopic Kibbles, Bits and Chunks with a "Photonic Cannon".

But Devro's Peeping Tom gimmick has actually fouled up The Docs ability to sort out his own daydreams from reality, and Doc starts seeing all kinds of crazy stuff, and he can't control it or shut it off. B'Elanna has to turn him off and fix him.

Unfortunately, The Hierarchy has approved a Level Three attack on Voyager. This is how The Hierarchy operates, each member has to submit a proposal to their leaders to be approved (or not).

So Devro has to pull the wool over his own Overlooker, played by Googy. I wish they had used Googy for the Devro role, but he's great as The Overlooker. He does so with the help of The Doc.

As Harry says, "This is the part I like" - When The Doc takes on the ECH guise, four Captain's Dots appear on his new red uniform.

With Janeway's Permission, Doc becomes The Emergency Command Hologram for the first time and dodges a Level Four attack using a Bluff.

The Hierarchy shows up twice more in Voyager, one time In "The Void" and one more time when the Doc becomes a "Renaissance Man". Each time they appear they look like Googy, even though Googy only played an Overlooker this one time. An honor, a signal honor to have a Trek Alien even partially designed using one's features.

Too Bad they were only used in Three Episodes, they had a lot of potential. One of The Hierarchy underlings was named "Phlox" - Oops!

It's all so very Illlllogical.
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8/10
The Doctor daydreams
Tweekums29 March 2010
Warning: Spoilers
When I read the plot synopsis before watching this episode I was expecting it to be somewhat silly and a weaker story, while it was a bit silly it was still a good episode thanks to Robert Picardo's excellent portrayal of the Doctor. Wanting to experience daydreams he adjusts his subroutines, at first these fantasies seem harmless like anybody's daydreams but when an alien ship attempting to scan Voyager taps into the Doctor they believe what they are seeing is reality not just idle fantasies. As the daydreams continue they start to manifest themselves when he is on duty and soon he can't separate reality and fantasy. Based on what they have seen the aliens plan to attack Voyager and by the time the one responsible for hacking into the Doctor's dreams realises his mistake it is too late for him to tell his superiors without risking his job. After he has supposedly been fixed he has another dream, this time the alien who hacked him appears in it and tells him of the attack offering to help the Doctor prevent the attack in exchange for the doctor playing captain so that his superiors don't find out his information was erroneous.

This episode was rather fun, it was interesting to see what the Doctor dreamt about, he is more human than one would expect of a hologram, the fantasied about being desired by female crew members, being highly respected and being given the opportunity to become the emergency Command Hologram... he even has a dirty mind; dreaming of painting a nude Seven of Nine.
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9/10
The doctor is a ladies man - at least in his dreams
tomsly-4001515 January 2024
Once again the doctor has been tinkering with his programming, this time to add daydreaming to his subroutines (this has some parallels to Data's development in TNG). Unfortunately, he constantly loses himself in these dreams, even in the middle of senior staff meetings. And he not only dreams of saving the crew as the captain of Voyager, but also has an all too vivid imagination when it comes to the ladies on the crew...

After an alien species (which for a change has been designed to look really strange and not just have slightly different nose ridges) taps into the doctor's mind to secretly find out more about Voyager and its crew, they are confronted with all of his daydreams which they consider to be reality. Since the doctor also destroys Borg in his dreams and developed a superweapon, the aliens are planning a full-scale attack on Voyager because they see it as a threat. However, the crew has an ally on their side with one of the aliens on board the alien ships. The doctor has to impersonate the captain (with a lot of overacting) in order to use this charade to convince the aliens that they shouldn't mess with Voyager!

In any case, the scene before the opening credits is hilarious and reminds me of the SNW episode "Subspace Rhapsody", in which the actors interpreted the story by singing and dancing. Robert Picardo is once again at his peak in this episode.

By the way: In one of the dream scenes, Seven poses naked for the doctor, who is drawing her. But to the chagrin of all pubescent boys, her two special talents are not visible.
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Awful
artiemcc20 February 2019
Possibly the worst Star Trek (any series) episode that didn't include Wil Wheaton.
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3/10
Another annoying doctor episode!
herbie-1712 September 2019
Seeing the doctor being his even more arrogant than usual self (mixed in with him getting all the attention) makes this episode stupid, not funny. Fantasy Star Trek episodes are never successful (Barclay and his was just as bad).

Also, who on god's green earth told Robert Picasso that he could sing. As a trained singer his La Donna e mobile is truly terrible (then later on he gets a whole episode dedicated to him being an opera singer. Oy).
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Twaddle.
duncancmccann27 February 2020
Utter waste of time, it contributes nothing to any character or the story. Waste of time all round - and no, it's not funny.
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