Hardcore fans like to call Star Trek Voyager more suitable for "casual" fans, which means that this is the most approachable Star Trek TV series out of all Star Treks.

Voyager was similar to the original Star Trek with the same kind of balance between a sense of danger and the wonders of exploring different imaginary cultures, and without the mind numbing minutiae of keeping track of the sanctity of the story continuity or the micro-interactions between every single commanders in every fleet in some unnecessarily complex space war.

Every episode resets clean - to some fans' dismay - like a bitesized sitcom of the 90's, and I see that as a plus. You don't need to worry about jumping into the middle of an episode not knowing what had happened or spoiling what will happen, as every episode is a self-contained story, a single 45-minute episode you can enjoy at any time without the need to binge everything to understand what's going on. It's not so different from watching a random episode of Futurama or Friends. It's a guaranteed joyride, with Star Trek flavor.

The characters are interesting and likable. Unlike other Trek series, the technobabble is reduced to the minimum and the writing is more fun and intimate instead of stoic and serious. Captain Janeway is a flexible, warm yet tough leader and she sticks close to her moral compass. I don't always agree with her decisions, but that's the point. You see the ex-Maquis Chakotay and B'lanna slowly integrates with the crew, with the latter [spoiler]falling in love with[/spoiler] Tom. And the cast was taken to the next level with the introduction of Seven of Nine, who does not need further introductions.

While I find other ST series kind of dry, ST Voyager is full of warmth. I genuinely cried at a few moments in the story. Despite the lack of emphasis on continuity, the story does keep track of how far they had travelled and how characters had grown and related to each other. Season 4, for example, had one big arc on the recovery of Seven of Nine with a couple smaller arcs on the Hirogen and the message from the Federation. There were also occasionally some two-parter episodes for a deeper storyline.

One might question how this small starship managed to survive _so many_ hijacks and attacks within the course of _7 years_ with the crew seemingly still content as if nothing happened... but Star Trek has never been The Expanse, so it's pointless to try to compare Voyager to that. Deus Ex Machina (e.g. Q or usually some brand new unexplained scientific phenomenon) has been pretty much a main character of Star Trek since the original series. Star Trek has always been about the optimism of utopian futures and the pacifist and empathetic attitudes towards cultural conflicts. I much rather enjoy the guaranteed safety of this wonderful crew before I choose to watch an episode, in fact. It's nice to know that the crew will survive no matter what crazy difficult challenges they face. It's the optimism we need today.

Anyway, ignore the toxic fandom gatekeepers - get a nice warm cup of coffee like Captain Janeway, and enjoy the show for what it is.