Star Trek: Voyager Season 7, Episode 22, "Natural Law"
Mission Log: A Roddenberry Star Trek Podcast
Roddenberry Entertainment
4.8 • 1.2K Ratings
🗓️ 30 October 2025
⏱️ 73 minutes
🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
On the Star Trek: Voyager episode Natural Law, Chakotay and Seven find themselves stranded in a protected zone among a pre-industrial alien society. Seven plays catch-up with cultural sensitivity while Chakotay's inner anthropologist intensifies. But even good intentions have consequences when modern colonists arrive. Meanwhile, Tom Paris is cited for flying while cocky. This week, Mission Log explores Natural Law.
Hosted by John Champion and Norman Lao
Welcome to Mission Log, a Roddenberry Entertainment podcast, where we explore the Star Trek universe one episode at a time. Each week, Mission Log examines a single episode of Star Trek, diving into its ethical subtext, metaphors, and cultural significance. From the show's most iconic moments to its hidden gems, we analyze what makes Star Trek one of the greatest science fiction sagas of all time.
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- Recap the story and analyze key moments.
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Technical Director - Earl Green
Producer - John Champion
Associate Producer - Jessica Lynn Verdi
Executive Producer - Eugene "Rod" Roddenberry
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | You're listening to a Roddenberry podcast. |
| 0:10.6 | Mission Log, a Roddenberry Star Trek podcast, episode 596, Natural Law. |
| 0:35.3 | Welcome into another episode of Mission Log, a Roddenberry Star Trek podcast. |
| 0:36.7 | I'm John Champion. |
| 0:38.3 | And I'm Norman Lau. Each week on Mission Log, we take a look at an episode of Star Trek. |
| 0:42.3 | In doing so, our search intensifies as we look for the morals, meanings, and messages contained within, |
| 0:48.3 | and ask ourselves whether the episode stands the test of Tom. |
| 0:52.3 | Time! |
| 0:53.3 | Stands the test of time. This week, natural law. The |
| 0:58.8 | one where seven and Chakotay's commitment to the prime directive intensifies as they try to |
| 1:04.2 | erase Starfleet's technological traces from a primitive culture, only to find their efforts |
| 1:09.1 | may be causing more harm than good. |
| 1:12.2 | John will be back with trivia in a moment right after I tell all of you how to stay in touch with |
| 1:17.4 | us because we'd love to hear from you. Mission Log is a conversation about Star Trek. Find us on |
| 1:22.9 | Facebook at Mission Log Pod and on Instagram and threads at Roddenberry Podcasts. |
| 1:28.3 | The conversation always continues in the Mission Lock Discord with near daily live events |
| 1:32.8 | and 24-7 chat about the topics you love. |
| 1:35.8 | Get your invitation to our private server by joining patreon.com slash mission log. |
| 1:40.5 | While you're at it, one of the most important ways to help your favorite podcast is to leave a five-star rating and a review at Apple or your preferred podcast platform. |
| 1:49.9 | And remember, your comments could be used on the show. |
| 1:53.8 | And now here's John Champion, as this week's trivia intensifies. |
| 1:59.9 | All right, we have a story by Ken Biller and James Kahn never surprised to see showrunner Ken Biller at this point in the credits up front. He most recently got the sole story credit for Q2 in our rewatch, alongside James here, who we most recently discussed when we covered the void. |
... |
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