Summary
- Star Trek: Voyager’s Doctor had 11 major romantic encounters throughout the show, which helped him explore his growing humanity and emotions.
- Some of his notable romances include Freya, whom he formed a connection with but tragically lost; Danara Pel, with whom he fell in love but parted ways when she returned to her people; and Charlene, the holographic wife he created.
- The Doctor’s most complex romance was with Seven of Nine, as he developed romantic feelings for her but never confessed them, ultimately losing his chance when Seven started dating Chakotay.
Star Trek: Voyager‘s Doctor (Robert Picardo) was involved in a number of romances over the course of the show. As a hologram, the Doctor began Voyager as a blank slate of a character, with no past and seemingly no personality or interests. However, as the Doctor was allowed to grow into his humanity and began realizing when it meant to be alive, he quickly developed into a vibrant character and was often Voyager‘s main comedic relief, engaging in a variety of interests that helped him explore the delights of humanity.
One of the delights that the Doctor engaged in quite often was flirtation and even full-blown romance with various side characters in episodes. Beginning as early as Voyager season 1, the Doctor was given a number of romantic subplots that helped explore his growing humanity and capacity for a wider range of emotions, such as love. In total, the Doctor had 11 major romantic encounters during Voyager‘s run, ranging from minor flirtations to a tragic, unrequited love story with another main character on the show.
11 Freya
Star Trek: Voyager Season 1, Episode 12, “Heroes and Demons”
The Doctor’s very first love interest was Freya (Marjorie Monaghan) a character on the holodeck in a program based on Beowulf created by Harry Kim (Garrett Wang). When the holodeck malfunctioned due to the USS Voyager’s encounter with photonic lifeforms, crew members began disappearing from the program. The Doctor was sent in to investigate on his first-ever away mission and formed a connection with Freya almost immediately. The two shared a kiss, but Freya was tragically killed by another character during the episode’s climax. Her death deeply affected the Doctor, but meeting her started his journey on the road to many more romantic encounters.
10 Danara Pel
Star Trek: Voyager Season 2, Episode 19, “Lifesigns” & Episode 25, “Resolutions”
After Freya, the Doctor’s next serious romance was with Danara Pel (Susan Diol), a Vidiian doctor whom Voyager rescued. While the Doctor worked to save Danara’s life from the Phage, he created her holographic body to allow her to help him treat her condition. As they worked together, the two began to fall in love and even experimented with dating, but their romance inevitably came to an end when Danara’s real body was revived. She chose to return to her own people in order to continue her work fighting the Phage, but was able to help Voyager again briefly later in season 2 when they needed her medical expertise.
9 Charlene
Star Trek: Voyager Season 3, Episode 22, “Real Life”
Unlike his other romances, Charlene (Wendy Schaal) was a relationship the Doctor orchestrated rather than something that came about naturally. In order to experience more of humanity, the Doctor decided to create a holographic family in Voyager season 3. Charlene was the Doctor’s wife in his persona as “Kenneth.” Initially programming his family to be too perfect, the Doctor’s experiment in family life ended in tragedy when he introduced a random element into the program that caused his daughter to die in a sports-related accident. Although the Doctor stayed with his family during his daughter’s passing, he presumably shut down the program soon after, since Charlene was never seen again.
8 Daydream Janeway
Star Trek: Voyager Season 6, Episode 4, “Tinker, Tenor, Doctor, Spy”
Although any romance between him and the real Captain Janeway (Kate Mulgrew) never happened, the Doctor’s daydreams about one were broadcast for the crew to see in “Tinker, Tenor, Doctor, Spy.” In the episode, the Doctor created a daydreaming addition to his program as a fun side project, but when the program began to malfunction, the Doctor became trapped in his daydreams. In order to help, the crew had to project the subroutine onto the holodeck, which allowed them to see into the Doctor’s daydreams, including his fantasies about all the women on Voyager’s senior staff, including Janeway, being attracted to him.
7 Daydream B’Elanna
Star Trek: Voyager Season 6, Episode 4, “Tinker, Tenor, Doctor, Spy”
Like Janeway, the Doctor fantasized about the idea of being in a relationship with B’Elanna Torres (Roxann Dawson) in “Tinker, Tenor, Doctor, Spy.” B’Elanna was embarrassed and annoyed by this when she saw the Doctor’s fantasies, especially because she was already in a serious relationship with Tom Paris (Robert Duncan McNeill). Although the Doctor was mortified that his fellow crew members had been privy to his private daydreams, none of the women he fantasized about ended up holding it against him, although all of them made it clear that they did not reciprocate his feelings.
6 Mareeza
Star Trek: Voyager Season 6, Episode 12, “Blink Of An Eye”
Mareeza was never shown on screen but became one of the Doctor’s more tragic romantic encounters. After being drawn in by an unnamed planet’s gravity, Voyager became stuck in orbit and discovered that the planet was out of sync with normal time, moving much faster than the surrounding galaxy. The Doctor was the only person who could safely beam down for an away mission but ended up getting stuck on the planet for the equivalent of three years. During this time, the Doctor met and fell in love with Mareeza, a woman on the surface, living with her and even somehow fathering a son before Voyager beamed him back aboard.
5 Tincoo
Star Trek: Voyager Season 6, Episode 13, “Virtuoso”
In Voyager season 6, the Doctor shared a brief flirtation with Tincoo (Kamala Lopez-Dawson), a woman from a race called the Qomar who had never experienced music. When Voyager stopped at the Qomar’s home world, the Doctor became an immediate celebrity for introducing them to music and even considered staying on the planet, reveling in his newfound fame and considering a relationship with Tincoo. However, it became apparent that Tincoo wasn’t truly interested in the Doctor, only in what he represented as a conduit for music. Saddened, the Doctor abandoned his plans to stay on the Qomar homeworld, leaving his newfound fame behind.
4 Jaryn
Star Trek: Voyager Season 7, Episode 7, “Body and Soul”
One of the final romantic encounters the Doctor had was with Jaryn, a woman from a race called the Lokirrim who hated holograms. After he, Harry Kim, and Seven of Nine (Jeri Ryan) were captured by the Lokirrim, the Doctor had to download his program into Seven’s Borg implants in order to escape detection. In Seven’s body, the Doctor developed a rapport with Jaryn and became attracted to her as a result, something that angered Seven as she was an unwilling participant in their flirtation. Although nothing ended up happening between the Doctor and Jaryn, he did manage to change her mind about holograms by the end of the episode.
3 Lana
Star Trek Voyager Season 7, Episodes 25&26, “Endgame Parts I&II”
Voyager‘s series finale, “Endgame,” explored an alternate future timeline where the Doctor was married to a human woman named Lana (Amy Lindsay). The Doctor and Lana met after Voyager returned to Earth, and eventually ended up eloping with each other. The two seemed like a happy couple when they appeared at the Voyager crew reunion in 2404, but Admiral Janeway’s time travel back to 2378 to help Voyager return home sooner subsequently erased the future she had come from, meaning that the Doctor likely never met Lana in the first place even after Voyager returned home with the Admiral’s help.
2 Kes
Star Trek: Voyager Season 2, Episode 3, “Projections” & Season 3, Episode 18, “Darkling”
Kes (Jennifer Lien) and the Doctor had a complicated relationship during her time on Voyager. Although things between them were largely platonic, mostly based on friendship and mentorship, their relationship did verge into romantic territory on more than one occasion. While the Doctor was trapped on the holodeck in “Projections”, his program began to malfunction in a way that made him believe he was his creator, Lewis Zimmerman, and that Kes was his wife. In “Darkling”, the Doctor’s program again malfunctioned, creating a Jekyll and Hyde-like split in his personality, with the darker side developing a possessive obsession over Kes that verged on romantic as well.
1 Seven of Nine
Multiple Episodes
By far the most long and complicated of the Doctor’s romances on Voyager was with Seven of Nine, the former Borg drone who became a member of the crew after Kes’s departure in season 4. Although the two were never officially in a relationship, the Doctor developed romantic feelings for Seven after he began helping her explore her humanity. During season 5, episode 22, “Someone to Watch Over Me,” the Doctor began helping Seven explore the idea of dating but ended up falling in love with her as a result of their lessons.
However, the Doctor kept his feelings for Seven a secret throughout most of Star Trek: Voyager‘s run, maintaining a strictly friendly and professional relationship with her. Although the Doctor did end up confessing how he felt during season 7, episode 24, “Renaissance Man” when he thought his program was going to be destroyed, no real romance ever materialized between the two. Additionally, the Doctor lost his chance at one after Seven began dating Chakotay (Robert Beltran) at the very end of season 7.
