Often the subject of disagreement, Voyager is talked about poorly by some and praised by others. Seeing plenty of posts about it here. Well ya know - I think Voyager is underrated.
That show took risks. They ran some stories that were just risky in terms of writing and production - sometimes it was a hit, sometimes a stinker. That's why it has some amazing episodes and some really really stupid ones, because they were willing to take a chance on something uncertain. And I respect that, too many shows these days feel like the same recycled crap because television has become so risk-averse and they're not willing to take a chance on something that might turn out dumb.
So we got ones like the infamous warp 10 episode, and those are remembered as cases where the show got really dumb. But as an example, Seven of Nine could've completely bombed that show. Yes it looked like they were bringing on a bimbo for sex appeal, and they absolutely could've went that route with her. Fans might've hated the change no matter what. I mean, that's a big deal, losing a main character and adding a new one - shows don't always survive that.
Also there are things I notice from a production standpoint. From reading about the making of TNG, one thing I remember is them talking about never wanting to damage the costumes or get them dirty, or damage the set. That increases their production costs, cheaper to just not do that.
But Voyager does this all the time. Uniforms are always getting burned and torn, Neelix spills things on his shirt, the bridge is shown being blown up or completely transformed. All the times they have smoke inside there, there's something with water, parts are broken off - that's something they had to clean up for the next episode. If they show burn marks on the captain's chair, that means they'll have to be cleaned or the whole prop replaced, at the risk of it not being identical or impossible to fix.
So the point is - respect for taking those risks. Didn't always land, but plenty of them did.
As I read though your post, I realized there's similarities to the Star Wars Prequels. They were hated at the time probably for the same reasons you mentioned, it was different, new things were added that the older and louder fans didn't like, but as time went on, those people quit complaining so much and people realized there was a lot to enjoy... I guess some things just need time.
Interestingly it was almost an opposite phenomenon, Voyager was widely liked at the time but became less popular as serialised TV shows took off.
It's now coming back again as people are getting a bit burned out by everything having to have a season long plot line
I think that's what I really liked about DS9 and what happened in Enterprise that I wish could've happened with Voyager: front loaded with unserialized episodes but then the final seasons having some real stakes, strong character growth, and a big story to bring the series to a close.