Lieutenant B'Elanna Torres (Roxann Dawson) was the first female chief engineer in Star Trek, and her wit, intensity, and Klingon heritage set Lieutenant Torres apart. More broadly, Voyager was the first show to have a significant portion of its crew not be Starfleet - the USS Voyager is partly crewed by former Maquis.

But Voyager's diverse cast was not the only way Voyager changed the scope of Star Trek. Voyager aired in 1995, right after Star Trek: The Next Generation concluded in 1994. At that point in time, the only other Trek airing was Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, which focused on its titular stationary space station, which couldn't travel to explore the galaxy. So, in an era when special effects technology was advancing rapidly, Voyager was perfectly positioned to show off new tech on new planets in the Delta Quadrant. There were suddenly no limits on what Voyager could show on screen.

Star Trek: Voyager Was The First To Show A Starship Land & Take Off

It Was Too Expensive For TOS And TNG

At the start of Voyager season 2, the USS Voyager did the unthinkable, and became the first starship to land on a planet, taking off again at the end of the episode. From the inception of Voyager, writers always wanted to make the ship land. For that reason, landing hatches were drawn into initial concept art for the ship, and subsequent models included clear landing gears. Producer Brannon Braga said, "That's something we've always thought the ship could do," so when Voyager finally landed it was really a chance to show off what made the new show and ship different from previous Star Trek shows.

Even in Star Trek: Voyager, landing the ship was expensive enough that the ship could only be shown taking off and landing a few times throughout all seven seasons of the show.

Of course, there was a good reason that earlier shows had never shown ships landing and taking off from planets - it was prohibitively expensive. In order to make Voyager land, special sets, models, and effects had to be designed and implemented. Even in Star Trek: Voyager, landing the ship was expensive enough that the ship could only be shown taking off and landing a few times throughout all seven seasons of the show.

To get around this expense, earlier generations of Star Trek employed numerous clever techniques. Concepts like "standard orbit," shuttles, and even transporters were initially introduced to Star Trek so that crews could get down to planets without the immense cost of landing a ship on screen. So in some ways, the inability to land ships in Star Trek: The Original Series and The Next Generation lead to some of the most iconic and definitive concepts in all of Star Trek. Nevertheless, seeing Voyager land for the first time was a cathartic conclusion to decades of build-up.

Other Star Trek Ships Have Followed Voyager’s Lead

Modern Tech Makes More Landings Possible

Of course, now that Voyager has landed and proved that it's possible, the floodgates are open for the rest of Trek. With new twenty-first-century Star Trek shows airing, it is more affordable than ever to have ships land on the strange new worlds they encounter. The USS Discovery crash-landed on a glacier at the start of season 3 of Star Trek: Discovery. The animated playground of Star Trek: Prodigy meant that the USS Protostar could land as often as the writers wanted. Similarly, the Anaximander landed in Star Trek: Lower Decks 509.

Because the USS Enterprise was designed at a time when it was impossible to show a starship landing, it is unlikely that there will be any ships landing in Star Trek: Strange New Worlds.

Landing an entire starship on the surface of a planet changes the game every time it occurs. If the ship itself has landed, then effectively the entire crew is on an away mission, and at risk in ways that are otherwise impossible. These dangers mean it can be a mistake for a captain to land a ship, upping the stakes for every attempted landing. With current technology making landings easier than ever, and lots of new Star Trek coming out, it is possible that we will see more exciting starship landings in 2025, following in the footsteps of Star Trek: Voyager.