Series / Voyagers!

Voyagers! was a short-lived Science Fiction TV show from the 1980s. It told the story of Phineas Bogg (played by Jon-Erik Hexum), a man who works as a "Voyager": a member of a mysterious Time Police group of people who travel through time and make sure history is the way it should be. Unlike in other Time Travel series, there was no clear reason why history was changing. The series was meant as a way to subtly teach history to the target audience. In the pilot episode, Bogg is joined in his travels by Jeffrey Jones (played by Meeno Peluce), a young boy from 1982 (who is something of a history expert) after Bogg loses his Voyager's manual; Bogg had failed to pay enough attention during his training and didn't know what to do without the book.

Compare and Contrast Time Squad.

The program ran for one season on NBC (1982-1983). Unfortunately, most people's awareness of the show is due to the unfortunate accidental death of Jon-Erik Hexum a year after the show had been canceled. (While on the set of his next series, Cover Up, he shot himself in the head with a pistol loaded with blanks as a joke, and died of a skull fracture.)

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Tropes:

• Adventures in the Bible: In the pilot, Bogg and Jeffrey find the infant Moses and send him down the Nile where he is found by the Pharaoh's daughter.
• All Women Are Lustful: One of Bogg's defining traits is his inability to control himself around a pretty face, but there's something to be said about the way he's almost never turned down. Occasionally, even women who are already taken fall for his charms.
• Alliterative Title: "Bully and Billy".
• And Knowing Is Half the Battle: During the credits, viewers are told if they want to know more about the people, places, and events featured in the episode, to visit their local public library.
• Applied Phlebotinum: The pocketwatch-like device, the Omni, used by the Voyagers to time travel.
• Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: In the first episode, "Voyagers", Bogg is chewing Jeffrey out and listing the events that could happen as a result of him losing his guidebook: empires falling, wars raging, and Bogg losing his job.
• Artistic License – History: In "Agents of Satan", Bogg is convicted of witchcraft at the Salem witch trials on November 13, 1692 and is sentenced to burn at the stake. In reality, none of the 19 people convicted of witchcraft in Salem received this sentence; they were all hanged. Giles Corey was crushed to death for refusing to enter a plea.
• Badass and Child Duo: An unconventional example of this trope, as Bogg is much more reliant on Jeffrey's skills than the traditional badass. However, Jeffrey's inability to defend himself often brings out Bogg's fighting abilities and resourcefulness.
• Beethoven Was an Alien Spy: Though the show did not make bizarre claims about the backstories of the historic figures Bogg and Jones met during their adventures, there were a few odd moments...
  • Cleopatra running around Prohibition-era New York with gangsters, and meeting Babe Ruth, while speaking perfect English.
  • Jules Verne naming the globetrotting hero of Around the World in Eighty Days Phileas Fogg after meeting Bogg.
  • Subverted later in "Jack's Back". Jeff asks if Jack the Ripper was really Drake, the renegade Voyager. Bogg says that the real deal's M.O. isn't like him and thinks he's just trying to mess up history by going after Nellie Bly.
• Berserker Tears: Jeffrey is susceptible to tearing up when he gets angry.
• The Boxing Episode: "All Fall Down" concerns the 1938 rematch between Joe Louis and Max Schmeling.
• Brainy Brunette: Jeffrey is quite resourceful and knowledgeable and has brown hair.
  • Jackie Knox is an Intelligence officer and daughter of an Army General stationed on Pearl Harbor. She gets to prove herself during the attack on Pearl Harbor in the episode, "Sneak Attack."
• Broken Pedestal:
  • "Bully and Billy" has Jeff encountering Billy the Kid, who he thinks is not honestly such a bad person. He changes his mind after seeing how mean and dishonorable he could be.
  • In "Jack's Back", Bogg is disillusioned with Nellie Bly after she falsely accuses him and has him arrested for attacking her at night in London, instead of being the dogged Investigative Journalist history painted her to be.
• Cassandra Truth: Jeffrey, anguished about all the loss of life that's going to occur, tries to warn people that the Titanic is going to hit an iceberg. History continues on course because he can't get anyone to believe him. However, Captain Smith seems a little rattled and discreetly orders more seamen on watch.
• Character Catchphrase:
  • Bogg has two: "Bat's breath!" and "Smart kids give me a pain."
  • When Jeffrey finds something amiss in history, he usually says "Bogg, this is all wrong!"
• Clip Show: "The Trial of Phineas Bogg" is an unusually good instance of this (and an odd instance of this for a one-season show). The clips are mostly explained in-universe as recordings from the omni of past adventures.
• Crash Course Landing: At one point in the episode "All Fall Down," Jeffery must land a plane after everyone else on board is knocked out (including Bogg). He's walked through it by an air traffic controller, and manages to successfully land the plane.
• Crisis Catch And Carry: In the opening and at the end of the first episode, Bogg picks up Jeff and runs away with him when the situation in the part of the time stream they jump into gets very dangerous very fast. Bogg ends up doing this a lot, given his younger partner's relative lack of strength and speed.
• Cut Short: Due to the show's cancellation, the plot ended with Bogg and Jeff wrapping up another case successfully (of course, there will always be another one) but failing to capture Drake.
• Devoted to You: While Bogg flirts with and falls for a woman in nearly every episode of the series, "The Barriers of Sound", shows the first time he finds himself helplessly in love when he meets Mabel Gardiner Hubbard. He even considers giving up his life as a Voyager to be with her. But Mabel's destined husband, Alexander Graham Bell is similarly devoted to her. In the end, he's happy to serve as a shoulder to cry on after her heart is broken.
• Disapproving Look: Jeffrey often gives this to Bogg when the latter doesn't recognize an important historical icon. Less frequently, it can be used the other way around when Bogg disapproves of Jeffrey's behavior.
• Double Standard: Discussed in "Buffalo Bill and Annie Play the Palace". Annie Oakley, matched in a shooting contest against the Grand Duke Michael, is asked to throw the contest to avoid making him look bad in front of his intended. She says that it would be an insult to her to lose on purpose, especially because in her life she's had to work twice as hard just to be considered equal to a man.
• Dub Pronunciation Change: The Latin American Spanish dub of the show was particularly inconsistent with this. One episode about the Roosevelt family correctly pronounced the family name as "rose-ah-belt" (when even some American works pronounce it "ROOS-belt"), but the episode about Harry Houdini pronounced his last name following Spanish conventions rather than American English ones, resulting in his last name being pronounced "ow-dee-nee" instead of "hoo-dee-nee".
• Emergency Temporal Shift: Once per Episode, any time the protagonists are in a dangerous situation, they time travel to a random location.
• Eternal English: Absolutely everyone in every single time period visited by Jeffrey and Bogg spoke flawless, 20th Century English, from Cleopatra to Kublai Khan.
• Everyone Went to School Together: Bogg turns out to have been at the academy with at least three of the other Voyagers we meet during the series (Olivia, Susan, and Drake). Then again, as far as we know, there is only one Voyager school.
• Evil Former Friend: While they have contrasting views of their past together, Drake claims that he and Bogg were friends when they were classmates.
• Fire-Forged Friends: Bogg and Jeffrey start out at odds, with Bogg blaming Jeffrey for the loss of his guidebook and Jeffrey angry about being taken from his own time. But even then, Bogg shows a protective instinct, pulling Jeffrey out of danger multiple times before they start to get along. In the end, they develop a good working relationship after facing armed soldiers, conducting a life-threatening experiment with a prototype airplane, and shooting down the Red Baron.
• Great Big Book of Everything:
  • Averted in that Bogg loses his "Voyagers Guidebook" in the pilot. Jeffrey tags along to help, as he is a history buff (and Bogg can't return him to his own time, as his omni only goes up to 1970).
  • Voyager Olivia Dunn uses the Guidebook in the episode "Voyagers of the Titanic".
  • In "The Trial of Phineas Bogg", Professor Garth, the leader of the Voyager Tribunal is about to give Bogg his replacement Guidebook after his trial, but Bogg and Jeff disappear happily because they won the case and can remain Voyager partners.
• The Glomp: When they reunite after being separated or facing a dangerous situation, Bogg and Jeffrey often meet with a hug.
• Heartwarming Orphan: Jeffrey Jones, an orphan at the beginning of the series, tends to be liked by most of the people he encounters. One of the bigger examples is his effect on Bogg, who transforms from self-proclaimed loner to protective caretaker after getting stuck with him.
• Heroic BSoD: Olivia plans to quit after failing to save the Mona Lisa from the Titanic's sinking and unintentionally endangering Jeffrey. She gets over it after collaborating with Phineas at a second attempt to rescue the painting.
• Historical Domain Character: At least one appeared in every episode while Bogg often mentioned meeting others such as Marie Antoinette (who had terrible legs, apparently) and Archimedes. However, some of the Historical Domain Characters are less historical than others, such as Robin Hood.
  • Eddie Rickenbacker, Wilbur Wright, Orville Wright and Manfred von Richthofen (The Red Baron) in the pilot "Voyagers". It also depicts Moses and the Pharaoh's daughter as historical figures.
  • Spartacus, Cicero, Bitiatus (also spelled Batiatus), Harriet Tubman and Samuel Langhorne Clemens (Mark Twain) in "Created Equal".
  • Billy the Kid, Theodore Roosevelt and Benjamin Franklin in "Bully and Billy".
  • Benjamin Franklin's mother Abiah Folger, Reverend Samuel Parris, Betty Parris, Abigail Williams, Susannah Martin, Justice Samuel Sewell, Harry Houdini and Francis Scott Key in "Agents of Satan". (With eight historical figures, this episode features more than any other.)
  • Lawrence of Arabia, Thomas Edison, Mary Edison, J.P. Morgan and Grosnevor P. Lowery in "Worlds Apart".
  • Cleopatra, Babe Ruth, Ed Barrow, Lucky Luciano and Mark Antony in "Cleo and the Babe".
  • Abraham Lincoln, Mary Todd Lincoln and Charles Dickens in "The Day the Rebs Took Lincoln". It also depicts Oliver Twist characters Fagin, the Artful Dodger, Bill Sikes and Nancy as historical figures.
  • Andrew Jackson, Jean Lafitte, Pierre Lafitte, William Clark and Merriwether Lewis in "Old Hickory and the Pirate".
  • Marco Polo, Maffeo Polo, Niccolo Polo, Kublai Khan, Albert Einstein, his wife Elsa and Clara Barton in "The Travels of Marco... and Friends".
  • Charles Lindbergh, his mother Evangeline Lindbergh, Harold Bixby, James H. "Doc" Kimball and Prince John (later King John) in "An Arrow Pointing East". It also depicts Robin Hood, Maid Marian, Little John, Friar Tuck and the Sheriff of Nottingham as historical figures.
  • George Washington, his mother Mary Bell Washington and Samuel Gompers in "Merry Christmas, Bogg".
  • Annie Oakley, Buffalo Bill Cody, Queen Victoria, Princess Victoria, Grand Duke Michael of Russia and Albert Schweitzer in "Buffalo Bill and Annie Play the Palace".
  • Sam Houston in "The Trial of Phineas Bogg".
  • Buffalo Bill Cody (again) and General Douglas MacArthur in "Sneak Attack".
  • Louis Pasteur, Bruce Ismay, Captain Edward J. Smith, Molly Brown and Lt. William Murdoch in "Voyagers of the Titanic".
  • Werner von Braun and General Hans Kammler in "Pursuit".
  • Franklin D. Roosevelt, Eleanor Roosevelt and Sara Roosevelt in "Destiny's Choice".
  • Joe Louis, Jack Blackburn, Max Schmeling and Jimmy Carter in "All Fall Down". Of all the real life people depicted as characters on the series, Schmeling and Carter were the only ones who were still alive at the time.
  • Alexander Graham Bell, Mabel Hubbard, Thomas A. Watson, Gardiner Greene Hubbard and Dwight D. Eisenhower (as a baby) in "Barriers of Sound".
  • Arthur Conan Doyle and Nellie Bly in "Jack's Back". It also depicts Inspector Lestrade as an historical figure.
• I Want My Mommy!: A gender-flipped variation from "Voyagers of the Titanic". While sick and half-conscious from rabies, Jeff moans for Bogg. The two are sometimes portrayed as having an almost father/son relationship.
• I Work Alone: Bogg insists on this in the beginning, but it soon becomes clear that he can't do much without Jeffrey's help.
• In Love with Love: In the first episode, Bogg explains that Agnes and the Wright Brothers are this: "This is a case of three people being confused about what they really want. Agnes thinks she wants love, but all she really cares about is romance. Orville and Wilbur think they want Agnes, but all they really care about is flying."
• Intergenerational Friendship: Bogg and Jeffrey are close friends, but so far apart in age that they are often mistaken for father and son.
• Kneel, Push, Trip: In "Created Equal", Bogg knocks a large gladiator backwards over Jeff.
• Last-Name Basis: Jeffrey always refers to Bogg by his surname, never as Phineas, which gets pretty odd during highly emotional moments.
• Like a Son to Me: After a little while of time-traveling together, Phineas comes to see Jeff as being like his son (he actually says to another character that Jeff isn't his son, but he wishes he could say he was). While they don't quite have an average father/son relationship, he does try to teach and protect him.
• Men Don't Cry: Mentioned in "Cleo and the Babe". At one point, Jeffrey tears up at seeing Yankee Stadium, as he used to go there with his father. He tells Bogg he doesn't want to be seen like this as crying is "sissy" for a man.
• Misplaced Accent:
  • Given that everyone speaks English, this comes up in most episodes but it's never more glaring than in "Buffalo Bill and Annie Play the Palace" which depicts Queen Victoria, her granddaughter Princess Victoria and Grand Duke Michael of Russia as having American accents. It's all the more noticeable as every other British character on the series has some variety of British accent, as does the odd non-Briton for that matter.
  • In "Jack's Back", Arthur Conan Doyle (who was Scottish) has an English accent.
• Near-Villain Victory: "The Trial of Phineas Bogg." Drake has convicted and banished thirty Voyagers and it looks like Phineas is going to be the thirty-first, until Susan turns up with Drake's copy of The Prince, in which he wrote all the unethical things he did. Drake would have won if he'd been able to resist leaving a record for posterity.
• No Historical Figures Were Harmed:
  • Mary Murphy, who appears in the pilot, is an obvious one for Mary Pickford, given that she's the most famous actress of the silent era. She was also a close friend of Douglas Fairbanks, to whom Mary Pickford was married from 1920 to 1936. Pickford was later mentioned in "Destiny's Choice".
  • In "Destiny's Choice", a bunch of little child actors run around the Hollywood studio causing mischief and try to run away from Jeffrey with the Omni. They're called the "Terrible Tots" because the estate of Hal Roach wouldn't allow the "Little Rascals" name to be used.
• Orphan's Ordeal: A recurring plot point is Jeff dealing with the deaths of his parents. As emotionally close as he becomes to Bogg, he still remembers his mother and father and frequently finds his memories of them being triggered. The loss of his parents also heightens his fear when it seems like something might happen to Bogg or the two might be separated.
• Parental Abandonment: Jeffrey's parents died in a car accident before the beginning of the show (and his aunt, who was boarding him in the pilot, wasn't too keen on having him there), hence his willingness to chase around time and space with Bogg. It helps that Phineas attempts to fill the gap.
• Parental Substitute: While they don't have an average father/son relationship, Jeffrey gives signs of seeing Bogg as a substitute for his parents, who were killed before the beginning of the show.
• Plagued by Nightmares: The series begins with Jeffrey dreaming about being unable to save his parents in a swashbuckling escapade—likely influenced by the book he fell asleep reading as well as his real guilt surrounding his parents' deaths. In "The Trial of Phineas Bogg", when he worries that he and Bogg will be separated, he reveals that his nightmares had recently stopped, but he worries that they'll come back—this time about losing Bogg.
• Platonic Declaration of Love: In "The Trial of Phineas Bogg", Drake accuses Phineas of endangering Jeffrey during their time-travel experiences. Phineas responds that he loves Jeffrey and wouldn't let anything hurt him. As Phineas said in an earlier episode that he would like to be able to say Jeffrey was his son, it's pretty clear it isn't sexual.
• The Power of Family: "Merry Christmas, Bogg" seems like it's going to go this route, with Jeffrey finding an instant connection with his great grandparents. But in the end, it's shown that his kinship with Bogg is stronger.
• The Queen's Latin: In "Created Equal", Cicero and the slave-master Bitiatus both have upper class English accents.
• Red-plica Baron: The pilot episode sees Bogg and Jeffrey dogfighting with Richthofen when they travel back in time. In that episode, Richthofen personally challenges American ace Eddie Rickenbacker; in reality, no such engagement ever occurred.
• Ripple Effect Indicator: Red Light = History Needs Fixing. Green Light = History's Been Fixed.
• Ripple-Effect-Proof Memory: After setting history back on course, Jeffrey and Bogg are the only ones who remember the alternative timelines.
• San Dimas Time: Most episodes start with Jeffrey and Bogg arriving in one time period, jumping to another time period (usually to escape a sticky situation), and then returning to the first time period to fix history. This often results in Bogg wanting to hang around in the second time period (usually because of a woman) while Jeffrey anxiously tries to impress on him the urgency of needing to go back to the first time period "before it's too late", despite how little sense this makes.
• Set Right What Once Went Wrong: This was also the plot for the entire series — Phineas and Jeffrey would travel through time to give history "a shove where it's needed". (Alternate phrase from the word "push")
  Bogg: We travel through time to help history along - give it a push where it's needed. When the Omni's red, it means history's wrong. Our job is to get everything back on track.
• Skilled, but Naive: Jeffrey can often hold his own with his book smarts and resourcefulness, but his immaturity can occasionally come to the surface, most notably in his idolization of Billy the Kid in "Bully and Billy."
• Steampunk
• Time Travel Escape: This happens once per episode, though Bogg and Jeffrey always return to set history back on course.
• Time-Travelers Are Spies: In "Sneak Attack", Jackie Knox mistakes Bogg and Jeffrey for Axis spies in Pearl Harbor on December 6, 1941.
• Trapped in the Past: As the Omni is only supposed to go up until 1970 and Bogg's arrival in 1982 was a fluke, he can't return Jeffrey to his own time.
• Vagabond Buddies: Bogg and Jeffrey.
• Vitriolic Best Buds: With their clashing values and personalities, Bogg and Jeffrey are prone to bickering about how to go about missions. But through it all, they are shown to respect and care for one another, and they never hesitate to act when the other is in danger.
• Wacky Parent, Serious Child: Played with. Bogg and Jeff's relationship is odd, but there are hints that it's partially a father/son bond. Bogg is historically ignorant and easily distracted by a pretty face, often needing Jeff to advise him or get him back on track. However, there are cases where it's Jeff who needs Bogg to keep him in line.

• Workaholic: Although Bogg is prone to distractions during missions, as long as there isn't a pretty blond around, he is intensely focused on his work. Much to Jeffrey's chagrin, he often turns down invitations to dinner from other characters or chances to witness historical events for the fun of it.
• Would Hurt a Child: Equally likely to be subverted or played straight in this show. Due to television laws at the time restricting violence against children, Jeffrey is often left out of fight scenes—even when he is involved, he won't be directly hurt. However, villains on the show have no qualms about arresting him, or selling him into slavery, or chasing him through dangerous environments.
• Young Future Famous People: In the first episode, Jeffrey and Bogg find the infant Moses in his basket and send it down the Nile where it was discovered by the Pharaoh's daughter. They later meet the 12-year-old Samuel Clemens (a.k.a. Mark Twain) in Hannibal, Missouri in 1847 and the 14-year-old Buffalo Bill Cody (whom they had previously met as an adult at Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee celebrations in London in 1887) working the Pony Express in 1860. Furthermore, they often meet historical figures before they become famous but who are already adults such as Spartacus, Harriet Tubman and Theodore Roosevelt. Bogg helps deliver Dwight D. Eisenhower in "Barriers of Sound".

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