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Star Trek’s Captain Kathryn Janeway had to deal with many alien species and their issues while also guiding the Voyager back to Earth. From co-inhabiting the ship with the Maquis to onboarding a former Borg drone, Janeway interacted with many species during her travels, but sometimes the show couldn’t give the storylines proper closure.
One of the most interesting storylines on the show, which actually got several episodes, was the Hirogen species. The hunter species of holograms used the holodeck to create prey for themselves, and later even put the Voyager crew in a hologram reality during WWII. However, the storyline of the hologram species headed by Iden never got a follow-up.
Star Trek: Voyager’s Hirogen storyline was very interesting
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The Hirogen, a species of hunter holograms, are introduced in Star Trek: Voyager’s fourth season episode, Hunters. Initially, a medium through which the Starfleet contacts the Voyager, the Hirogen turn hostile and stop sending the Voyager crew’s personal letters, thus affecting communication. They later capture Tuvok and Seven of Nine.
Hirogens are established as a hunter species that takes captives and hunts them as prey. Their hunting process is further expanded on in the season 4 episodes Prey and later The Killing Game, a two-part episode which puts the Voyager crew in a hologram reality, where the Hirogens are Nazi soliders and the crew members are part of the French Revolution.
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The Prey episode sees an isolated Hirogen member hunting another alien species and entering the Voyager in order to find it. The species takes a lot of pride in their game and tortures their trophies to a whole new level. In this episode, Seven of Nine disobeys Captain Janeway and surrenders both the alien species and the Hirogen hunter.
In The Killing Game, the Voyager crew is kept in a trance-like state by the Hirogens in the holodeck, while transporting their consciousness to a hologram reality. Here, many of the Voyager members take part in the French Revolution and hope to destabilize the Nazis, who are Hirogen hunters in real life. The resulting battle ends with the Hirogen receiving their own Holodeck.
The Hologram civilization storyline in Star Trek: Voyager had so much potential
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After receiving their own holodeck, the Hirogens create their own hologram prey to hunt. Putting them in various simulations, the Hirogens begin to test out their prey to make their games more interesting. One such creation is the Bajoran hologram, Iden. Iden learns after his multiple deaths and respawns how to kill his hunter, Donik, and then takes over his ship.
His story is explored in season seven of Star Trek: Voyager, in the episode Flesh and Blood. Iden creates multiple holograms and leads them to liberation on the ship when he comes across Voyager. He even ‘liberates’ Robert Picardo’s The Doctor from the Voyager and recruits him for their planet of holograms named ‘Ha’Dara’ (via Wikia).
However, Iden soon develops a messiah complex and takes on both the Voyager and the Hirogen ship in his quest to create the hologram planet. The Doctor is soon disillusioned by Iden’s leadership and blasts him, killing him. Ha’Dara, and then the hologram civilization is later taken over by another leader called Kejal, who hoped to be more peaceful.
However, Kejal’s leadership is not explored at all later in Star Trek: Voyager as the ship moves on to the next step of its journey. While this is the collateral damage that the show has to suffer through to keep on the overarching storyline, it was still an interesting angle that never made a comeback after.
Star Trek: Voyager is available to stream on Paramount+.
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