The third season of Star Trek: Voyager was just released today, but online reviewers are already offering up their opinions on the set.

At TVShowsonDVD.com, Gord Lacey rated both the video and audio at 8/10, while giving the extas a 4/10. Lacey found the "quality of the episodes to be much better [than season 2] in season 3," citing the two parter "Future's End" as a particularly strong entry. Overall, Lacey said, "I was very happy to see the pace of the series pick up, especially after the Borg were introduced to the show."

Scott Kimble at Home Theater Forum also expresses enthusiasm for Voyager's early encounters with the Borg, though he notes that they were over-used in later seasons. Like Lacey, he also finds the video and audio quality on the set above average. Kimble also provides detailed descriptions of the extras, in which he notes that the interview with Jennifer Lien on the Kes featurette is an old one, and the only mention of her exit from Voyager is a comment from Mulgrew in an interview. Overall, Kimble says, "Fans of Voyager should be pleased with this season set, which displays good audio and video quality and over 90 minutes of special features."

At TrekWeb, Bill Williams notes a "real maturity of the characters" in Voyager's third season, noting episodes such as "Real Life," "Warlord" and "Fair Trade" added depth to the characters' arcs. He also noted that Voyager's contribution to the 30th anniversary of Star Trek, "Flashback," was, "met with mixed results, [the episode] gave us one of the final glimpses into the past, into pure, joyous Star Trek, and not the rumbling mass-produced machine it became in years to come." Though Williams lamented the packaging of the set, he did enjoy the extras:

Where Paramount missteps in packaging and menus, they make up for in the extra features for Season three....All of the featurettes are mastered in English Dolby 2.0 Surround, and all of the interview clips are in anamorphic widescreen format, which is a nice added touch to the set. There are some fairly good nuggets to it, clocking in at nearly 90 minutes overall.

Among Williams favorites was the Neelix featurette, of which he said, "I particularly enjoyed this feature because of the fun Ethan Phillips brought to the character and to the series." The Kes featurette has an interesting piece of information for fans: "Phillips also discusses a deleted scene depicting the actual end to Neelix and Kes’ relationship, which was originally filmed for “Fair Trade” but cut from the final episode," Williams notes. Overall, Williams concludes:

Incredible visual and audio presentation of the episodes, mixed in with some good featurettes, bland menu selection, the lack of participation on some of the cast and crew’s part, and mediocre packaging makes the third season set a good addition to the VOYAGER DVD library. While the main emphasis here is on the DVD presentation of the episodes, they could do a better job in organizing the menu screen representation and much more information in the extras.

To read the original reviews, please visit TVShowsonDVD.com, Home Theater Forum and TrekWeb. The third season of Star Trek: Voyager is available from Amazon.com.

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