Overrated Or Underrated: ENTERPRISE Edition...

[Damian]

Deep Space Nine was running with arcs long before Enterprise hit the scene.

DS9 featured continuing storylines, and there was the story arc of when the Dominion took over DS9 in season 6 that could be considered such an arc. But DS9 still felt more episodic otherwise. You could watch most episodes without seeing the preceding episodes and not be adrift.

I think the 3rd season of Enterprise was Star Trek's first attempts at a season long arc though--and that fed into season 4, just on a smaller scale with 2 or 3 episode arcs.

But like most things in the entertainment industry, someone didn't just turn on a switch and create series/season wide arcs like are common today. It was a gradual shifting. DS9 could be considered an early flirtation with less episodic Star Trek. Even going to TNG, they did feature characters and story elements that cropped up later. And their was a loose gradual story from the first episode to the last. DS9 too it another step, as did Voyager. Enterprise was another step and Discovery now moved us more in line with what's currently popular.

 

[Sakonna]

I think "Affliction" and "Divergence" are under-rated. A lot of people hated them for trying to explain a makeup revision (which was subsequently ignored by ST: Discovery) but I thought the episodes were just fun.

I'd agree that Affliction/Divergence is under-rated -- explaining the makeup conflict is a bit insane, but it's the fun kind of insane that I can get on board with.

The recent Discovery comics mini-series "Aftermath" seemed to mix in a few smooth-headed Klingons with L'Rell & friends, so I'm amused to see that pop up again, even though they're a bit cagey about it (hair and head-gear and furrowed brows stops the smooth heads from really jumping out at you).

 

[Farscape One]

Yes, that two-parter gets far more hate than it deserves. I thought it was a creative way to explain, in universe, the real life ifference between the Klingons.

And a nice pseudo-nod to DS9, because it literally combines Bashir and O'Brien's possible reasons when they ask Worf.

 

[Damian]

I think "Affliction" and "Divergence" are under-rated. A lot of people hated them for trying to explain a makeup revision (which was subsequently ignored by ST: Discovery) but I thought the episodes were just fun.

I'd agree that Affliction/Divergence is under-rated -- explaining the makeup conflict is a bit insane, but it's the fun kind of insane that I can get on board with.

Yes, that two-parter gets far more hate than it deserves. I thought it was a creative way to explain, in universe, the real life ifference between the Klingons.

Yeah, I agree. I was surprised actually that some fans don't like the in universe explanations. It was something that was speculated on years. I know Rodenberry wanted us to pretend Klingons always looked like they did in TMP and beyond. But did he really think he could leave it at that.

True other aliens have had design changes but either they were subtle (Romulan brow ridges) or they were to species not seen all that often (Tellarites for instance). Klingons were pretty significant in the Star Trek universe and the change in appearance was significant.

So I loved that they gave an in-universe canon explanation finally. And it's actually one that was pretty good I think. Genetics makes more sense then say plastic surgery IMO.

I don't care a whole lot for the Klingons in Discovery, like King Daniel. Though in Season 2 they did align them a bit better. Adding hair to some of them made them more familiar at least. I actually kind of wished on screen they added a few smooth headed Klingons, even if they were just in the background. Something to acknowledge the Klingons of Enterprise and the original series.

 

[sekundant]

Hate? Really? I have read some people hate Similitude, Carbon Creek, Acquisition etc. I am not agree with their arguments, at least they have some arguments which depend on some "kind if logic".
What is the argument of Klingon arc haters? They try to give a reason why Klingons look different? What's wrong about delivering a reason behind one of the most speculated mysteries of Trek?

 

[BillJ]

Underrated: "Fusion"
Overrated: "The Andorian Incident"

 

[Damian]

Hate? Really? I have read some people hate Similitude, Carbon Creek, Acquisition etc. I am not agree with their arguments, at least they have some arguments which depend on some "kind if logic".
What is the argument of Klingon arc haters? They try to give a reason why Klingons look different? What's wrong about delivering a reason behind one of the most speculated mysteries of Trek?

Perhaps hate is too strong a word. Some fans are just better at pretending I guess. There are some fans that want to take the Rodenberry attitude, that there was no 'actual' change and just to ignore it.

Perhaps it's more accurate to say they thought it was ridiculous they felt the need to explain what is basically an artistic decision.

What makes the difference for me, why I liked it, is that it was probably the most significant change in appearance for a Star Trek species that is significant itself up to that time. And it was the first major artistic change to an alien species in Star Trek (and it would be years before any other changes in alien design were made, probably not until TNG came out). I guess you can argue the Klingons in TSFS were another change---though I think of that is more a refinement of TMP design.

But as a result of how long it was and how significant the change was there was a lot of in story speculation. A couple of novels during the period tried to offer up explanations. So I think it was pretty clear at least a good percentage of fans wanted something in story to explain it. And I was glad they finally did. And it happened to be 2 pretty good episodes too--not just because of the explanation but the story was pretty good as well regardless.

 

[Damian]

I have to say, I kind of liked Similitude. Carbon Creek too (I have to admit I always liked the book "Strangers from the Sky" and this episode reminded me just a bit of that novel. Acquisition--that one didn't do a whole lot for me. I don't hate it. I'm just not sure why they wanted to do a Ferengi episode in the first place. It seemed like a wasted story for something that could have been spent on, I don't know, a prequel to the original series instead of TNG. But it wasn't horrible taken on its own.

TATV---yeah, bad. I've never hated a Star Trek episode of movie. Even Voyager's "Threshhold". I could find some things to like and it's one of those things where it's goofiness was it's own entertainment in some ways. But TATV pushed me to my limit. I only watch it when doing a series rewatch and now I view it in light of the novel "The Good That Men Do"---otherwise I probably would just pretend it never existed.

 

[Hopeful Romantic]

I loved Similitude, it's one of my Top 3 episodes of Enterprise. I guess fans like me are the reason other fans think Similitude is overrated.

I think TPTB did Acquisition because the Ferengi have some of the greatest, most hilarious dialogue of any species in Trek and the Powers wanted to have some fun. And if I was a producer and Jeff Combs came up to me and said he wanted to be a Ferengi on ENT, I would fall all over myself to get an episode written just to make it so. Because Jeff Combs is pure gold. Plus it was a way to see a Ferengi First Contact, what a kick! A lot of folks really don't like Acquisition, but I had great fun watching it, so I think it's underrated.

 

[sekundant]

Perhaps hate is too strong a word. Some fans are just better at pretending I guess. There are some fans that want to take the Rodenberry attitude, that there was no 'actual' change and just to ignore it.

Thank you @Damian. It is always funny to notice another indication why some pop culture experts states the Trekiness is kind of new age religion. I knew what Roddenberry said, but I didn't realize that will be accepted literally.

TATV---yeah, bad. I've never hated a Star Trek episode of movie. Even Voyager's "Threshhold". I could find some things to like and it's one of those things where it's goofiness was it's own entertainment in some ways. But TATV pushed me to my limit. I only watch it when doing a series rewatch and now I view it in light of the novel "The Good That Men Do"---otherwise I probably would just pretend it never existed.

I know and understand your position, as we discussed before, but for me TGTMD - and following post-TATV novels- are not worthy for ENT. The authors destroyed without mercy and respect characters of all main protagonists and -maybe except Travis who we didn't know very well- not for good, for the sake of their own created meaningless/boring/one dimensional characters. Whatsoever, this is zeitgeist at pop culture, instead of creating totally new exciting characters, first destroy all beloved ones, from Star Wars to Terminator all the same. I assume it is not only creative crisis, far more than this finding new consumer. Nevertheless, I am sure that digital natives, gamer guys find another creative way to tell us new sagas. Internet makes it possible to break the "legal" frames of monopolist concerns.

I never thought Similitude can be perceived as overrated, it is about the question being individual, being awareness of your self and not only for Sim, but also Archer, Phlox and T'Pol. I wish they showed us how Sim effected at Trip later. (Was the bond thing possible with Sims tissue? ) One of the arguments of haters is "killing" Sim is soo unTrek. War/ instinct of survival make the people not ethical but rational and pragmatist. Trek was never happy go lucky kind of story.

Acquisition is for me a fun and "meet again" episode, kind of light "food" , popcorn, why it should be canon conform and who defines in this case what is canon or not?

 

[Damian]

I knew what Roddenberry said, but I didn't realize that will be accepted literally

I would probably say some fans agree with Roddenberry than just accept. There are some fans that just felt it was a make-up change and no explanation was necessary.

But of course, Trekkies are never unanimous in anything.

I know and understand your position, as we discussed before, but for me TGTMD - and following post-TATV novels- are not worthy for ENT.

Ha-ha. I remember. Goes to my point that we Trekkies are never unanimous. My biggest complaint about the post-TATV novels is that the Romulan War novels were cut short. I loved the first one and the second one, because it was cut down to just one more novel, moved at warp speed and felt more like a summary.

Which is the point when I always ask S&S to commission a "Tales of the Romulan War" collection to fill in the gaps based on the Romulan War novels. I honestly don't ever expect to see it but I throw it out there whenever I have the opportunity .

But otherwise I enjoyed the post-TATV novels and can't say I had any issues with the characterizations. The changes you note I found to be more gradual--first the Xindi mission in season 3 changed all their attitudes to a point. Then the Romulan War caused some changes as well. And I thought Trip's joining Section 31 made sense in context of the stories in the novel. And it was a way to undo his completely senseless death in TATV in a way that made some sense. And because Trip is an honorable man he begins to question Section 31's methods and turns on them in later novels. But during wartime questionable things happen and Trip was just doing his part to help Starfleet win the war.

 

[Danny99]

I liked Daedalus too and I felt that got a bum rap when it first came out. I thought Bill Cobb was good in it too.

It had a good premise, but the writing let it down from being a great episode. Get rid of the daughter character and eliminate the son being some kind of ghost killing people with the lights flickering. The template for Cobb's character should've been Daystrom from "The Ultimate Computer", but his obsession with finding his son consumes him and has him lead the crew somewhere dangerous.

It is far from Enterprise's worst episode however.

 

[sekundant]

Goes to my point that we Trekkies are never unanimous

Heyy thank you for calling me Trekkie! (I don't consider myself as Trekkie, I am only a fan, I have to do more than this to be called Trekkie, imho.)

I don't want to capture this very interesting thread with our novel discussion, maybe we should continue at another thread, but I want to let here some thoughts.
Romulan War was one of the main reason why I read the books. I wish Xindi had something to do with Romulans. At the 3rd season, it was known that the show stands very nearly to the edge.
I don't know the reason behind but it was clear to me that Romulan War Novels are shortened. I think Martin tried to write Trek kind of "War and Peace" with hundreds of characters and failed completely.

Spoiler

Trip, Archer or T'Pol are not main characters anymore. Before or after his meaningless joining to Sector 31 nothing what Trip did was game changer or even smart or funny or wonder engineer, he became -without reason- a criminal and abandoned T'Pol for a criminal Orion female. Archer behaves like disgusting politician with intelligent of 13 years old. T'Pol is a desperately house captain and lost all her wits, intelligent, humor and rebel attitude. Nop, I don't like none of them and I don't see why they became what they are. I told you before, I am witness of a civil war and like another people, victim of it. I saw too many people with very hard PTSD, I saw too many people who lost all their family and belongings, I saw people who are totally innocent sentenced to death. Some of them I knew and befriended before the war. During and after the war I worked with that people as a volunteer and cared about the them, but I never ever meet someone who changed his/her character soo radical as those three. Even the hard cases have their moments, I realized that " they are there". Hardly damaged, broken under own deeds, but still dignified human beings, not totally lost, just as T/T/A.
So all those novels cannot be written from the people who did their homework and understand what they are writing about. And I am very happy that at least for two years we don't have new ENT novel, and hope it stays that way or they push the reset button and start again. After second read all of the novels I lost all my -not so huge- sympathy, which I press to myself to have. I would like to support your "Tales" idea, if we get something to worth it.

Read fanfictions! They have crazy ideas, some of them really really good, some of them not, but at least authors love and respect the characters and ENT.

Daedalus would be a good first season episode, if the story were solid. Maybe that's only me, even better executed TNG Transporter episodes weren't thrilling enough for my taste. That would be interesting for example if they had reservation about transporting of personality after Archer's unavoidably beaming.

 

[Damian]

Heyy thank you for calling me Trekkie! (I don't consider myself as Trekkie, I am only a fan, I have to do more than this to be called Trekkie, imho.)

Posting here probably makes you as close to a Trekkie as you can get probably. But just like we don't always agree with each other, Trekkies also come in all stripes. Including some that may only follow some of the shows. I personally follow them all and have read hundreds of the novels so I'm pretty hard core (though I don't collect stuff outside the Blu-Rays/DVDs/Books and the occasional Hallmark Ornament) and I don't do conventions. For whatever reason the one convention I went to I felt a bit awkward. As much as I post here I don't actually 'talk' about Star Trek a lot.

I don't know the reason behind but it was clear to me that Romulan War Novels are shortened.

I believe the intent originally was to have about a year or so of the war per book (I can't remember if it was supposed to be 3 or 4 books). I really liked the first Romulan War book. Then for some reason it was shortened (maybe the 1st one didn't sell as well--I honestly don't know the reason). And I think Michael Martin then had to cram the remainder of the war into a single book. Perhaps if he had known it was going to be 2 books from the get go he would have done things differently with the first book. Sadly what happened was the 2nd book seemed more like an overview or highlights of the war. I was always curious if he was frustrated at all about that--honestly I don't know. Perhaps it's common and he took it in stride. It's interesting that he hasn't written any Star Trek books since (at least I don't believe so--certainly no Enterprise books--Christopher Bennett wrote the next several Enterprise books).

But your comment does provide a bit more insight. I'm an avid novel reader. The relaunches for the various other series like TNG, DS9 and Voyager have continued years past the ends of those shows and include numerous novel original characters and some changes to the show characters as the years have passed. A lot of the show characters have moved on. So for me the Enterprise novels focusing on characters other than the show characters really didn't phase me. I didn't give it a lot of thought when reading them actually. But I can see how someone who's only read a few Star Trek novels might be put off by that. In Enterprise it was a bit more sudden because war broke out, leading to sudden changes. In the other relaunches it was much more gradual. A character here and there falling off, another being added in, and the character changes were gradual, so you had time to adjust.

 

[Damian]

Also some of the later Enterprise novels had changes as well even from the Romulan War books. Trip, for instance, starts to question Section 31's methods and starts to turn on them. During war (as is usually the case during wartime) it's a bit easier to overlook some questionable things going on. Not so easy once the war ends. Archer is a bit wiser in the later novels. And the crew obviously has split up since the Enterprise is retired (with a lot of them being promoted which is to be expected). I think Christopher captured the essence of Reed, Hoshi and Trip pretty well in his later novels. Archer too, though since the Xindi year he's a bit more jaded about things.

 

[F. King Daniel]

For whatever it's worth, the new Picard series has invalidated the post-Nemesis novelverse (TNG, DS9, VOY), and because of time travel weirdness (the Destiny trilogy's Borg origins) it's possibly had the same effect on the ENT books. Although since the connections there are weakest, they may just continue and never ever mention the invalidated bits again.

 

[sekundant]

But I can see how someone who's only read a few Star Trek novels might be put off by that. In Enterprise it was a bit more sudden because war broke out, leading to sudden changes. In the other relaunches it was much more gradual. A character here and there falling off, another being added in, and the character changes were gradual, so you had time to adjust.

As I read them -I didn't ever read Trek novels before and I thought always it is something for really hardcore Trekies and maybe I wouldn't do, if we get a final episode like " All Good Things..." and maybe never join to here- .. as I read them, I thought maybe my non existing experience with Trek Novels can be the reason why it wasn't satisfying enough to me. Before the second round I read highly recommended books from the series Corps of Engineers, Destiny, Titan, Department of Temporal Investigations, etc. And I tried them again,so it didn't help too much, on the contrary I was more frustrated before, since the other novels were mostly "conform" with the series and characters were still kind of authentic.
I want the write some other points, so I will continue three days later, when I comeback.

 

[Anna Yolei]

My appreciation to Prax for inspiring me when he created the same titled thread in the TNG forum.

We all know there are episodes everyone loves, and those everyone hates. We all have episodes that some may feel they are the only ones who appreciate them. And sometimes, there are episodes that are both underrated AND overrated. This thread is about that.

"TERRA NOVA" - While I do agree it is NOT a great episode, I don't think it deserves the hatred it seems to get. We get to see a brand new human culture, something rarely seen in the franchise at this point. I thought it was interesting because of how it could very well be a 'what if' scenario for us. An asteroid hits the planet hard, releases deadly radiation, and the survivors all have to live underground for generations. I've always thought of this episode in those terms, not as 'shale'. When looked at through this lens, we might get more appreciation of this episode. Underrated episode... but not overly so.

"REGENERATION" - When it first about to air, and I saw the trailer for it, my immediaye reaction wad likely the same as most others... WTF are the Borg doing here? But I have to give Berman and Braga credit... this episode made the Borh scary again, something I didn't think was possible after how VOYAGER defanged them. My only real gripe is that Phlox was able to unassimilate himself... I'd have preferred this subplot didn't happen at all. I'm not entirely sure if this episode is overrated or underrated, but it definitely deserves some love.

"DAEDALUS" - Don't throw tomatoes at me yet. I never really liked this episode, and I never really will. But it DID give us a look at how horrible the costs were to bring transporter technology into existence. This really gives weight to the arguments that Dr. McCoy and Dr. Pulaski had about the use of this device, and by extension all people who have deathly fears of other modes of travel, such as flying. And while it IS on the bottom end of quality for season 4, at least it isn't THE worst one in a season that was just gold. Side note: I don't think it's a coincidence that the two writers of this episode, Ken LaZebnik amd Alan Brennert, were out after this episode.

How about the rest of you? Any thoughts? Your own episodes that you feel get too much love or not enough? Please share!

I remember Daedalus getting slammed pretty hard in it's episode rating thread here at the time, so that's not a unique opinion.

I also think if that episode suffered more from when it aired. If it had aired two years earlier, it would easily have been the best episode of that season and possibly gotten a better reaction from fans. Still, it's a good sign as to the jump in quality that this wasn't a stand out episode for this season.

The episode that I find overrated in retrospect is Congenitor for the episode framing Trip as the bad guy for giving someone an education and them deciding they will not remain in what amounts to sexual slavery. And for Archer of all people to preachify about not playing God considering he condemned an entire species to death "because reasons" was truly rich.

(There's also the unintended questions as to how couples are selected to receive a Congenitor-- Is it something only the rich and powerful seek out? Are congenitors taken from their families at birth and raised by the state for this purpose like Jedi children in the Old Republic? )

 

[Anna Yolei]

Yes, that two-parter gets far more hate than it deserves. I thought it was a creative way to explain, in universe, the real life ifference between the Klingons.

And a nice pseudo-nod to DS9, because it literally combines Bashir and O'Brien's possible reasons when they ask Worf.

For me, I was already burned out on any and everything Klingon between Worf's stories across two series, Jadzia being DS9's Klingon whisper and B'Elanna's perpetual angst about her dual heritage that has aged as well as milk left out in Phoenix in July for reasons I'll save for the Voyager thread. And then, Enterprise does not one, not two, but THREE episodes on Klingons in its first season.

Gene Roddenberry himself could have returned from heaven to write this himself and I'd still want to nope out of this. Some things just aren't for me.

 

[Ocanain]

It had a reception so awful I considered not watching it at all but when I did I was pleasantly surprised. The prequel theme mixed with a more levelled characterisation is something I very much enjoyed. From my point of view it’s very under rated by the Star Trek community.