-sigh- I had high hopes for Enterprise, I really did. Season 1 wasn't perfect, but having not been able to get into DS9 or Voyager I was just happy to have a new show take place on a ship called Enterprise, in a time period that had never been explored. It was exciting to imagine a Star Trek that was closer to our time than ever, with cool little backstories for the technology like Warp Drive and Transporters. Season 2 got weird with the cameos (the borg and ferengi episodes were a bit too much, and I remember wondering why TNG villains were appearing 200 years before they should) but it was still good.
Then Season 3 happened.
I have often said that Star Trek Into Darkness is one of my favorite Trek movies because of its turning TWOK on it's head and examining a similar story in the Kelvin Timeline, but also (and mainly) because it depicted accurately how I feel Star Trek as a franchise should have reacted to the events of September 11th 2001 when the World Trade Centers collapsed. I won't get political here, but I always felt that the plot of Into Darkness was a parable for the war on terror: there is a terrorist attack (on The World Trade Center AND Starfleet HQ), our heroes lose someone they care deeply about in the attack (thousands of people in New York AND Admiral Pike), are sent to war on the party they believe is responsible (Al Qaeda AND Khan), only to find that the part responsible was armed several years prior by the government for whom the heroes serve (The White House AND Starfleet, specifically Admiral Marcus), and the "villains" are just striking back because they have fallen out of favor with the government of our heroes. Kirk's speech even feels like it addresses the soldiers who went to war with Afghanistan, and later Iraq: "Our first instinct is to take revenge when someone we love is taken from us. But that's not who we are..." THAT is how Star Trek should always be, a beacon of what humanity is capable of in it's finest hour and at it's best. THAT is not what Season 3 of Enterprise did.
Compare the above with Enterprise Season 3 and the war on terror: there is a terrorist attack (on the World Trade Center AND the gulf coast of Earth) our heroes lose someone they care deeply about in the attack (thousands of people in New York city AND Trip's Sister) are sent to war on the party they believe is responsible (Al Qaeda AND the Xindi) only to find that the villain is...wait, what? Developing an even bigger weapon because they are a bunch of xenophobic monsters who deserve to be wiped out? And no one questions whether or not they should even be doing this? Granted, I got impatient after a few episodes of Season 3, and especially after I realized the whole friggin' season was gonna be Starfleet's war on terror - er I mean, the Xindi.
Star Trek had an obligation, a responsibility to its fans, to take the tragedy of 9-11 and turn it into a meaningful parable about how nothing is ever as it seems. TOS did it with "The Devil in the Dark", and TNG did it with "Darmok". Enterprise decided to, and I can't mince words here, jump on the war train. The Xindi are evil! They have a weapon! We must destroy it before it destroys us! The story would have been at least more palatable if there had BEEN no weapon, maybe even no Xindi; just the sad remnants of a previously warp capable society who had launched the weapon centuries ago and it just so happened to reach Earth when it did. But NO. We had to instead suffer through seeing our heroes, explorers on a ship of peace, turn into soldiers on a battleship. Sorry, that's not Star Trek. A ton of other space adventures have been told about war in space, and it is something that looks ugly on Trek (one of many reasons I never watched DS9 was the dominion war, and even still DS9 did it better than Enterprise).
Sorry if I ruffled any feathers, but there are only two bits of Star Trek I hate with a burning passion: Nemesis, and Enterprise Season 3. Both because they were so anti trek it hurt. I never saw Season 4 other than the finale (which I actually enjoyed oddly enough, Trip's death aside) because I just stopped caring. Star Trek stayed dead for me from then until 2009.
Then Season 3 happened.
I have often said that Star Trek Into Darkness is one of my favorite Trek movies because of its turning TWOK on it's head and examining a similar story in the Kelvin Timeline, but also (and mainly) because it depicted accurately how I feel Star Trek as a franchise should have reacted to the events of September 11th 2001 when the World Trade Centers collapsed. I won't get political here, but I always felt that the plot of Into Darkness was a parable for the war on terror: there is a terrorist attack (on The World Trade Center AND Starfleet HQ), our heroes lose someone they care deeply about in the attack (thousands of people in New York AND Admiral Pike), are sent to war on the party they believe is responsible (Al Qaeda AND Khan), only to find that the part responsible was armed several years prior by the government for whom the heroes serve (The White House AND Starfleet, specifically Admiral Marcus), and the "villains" are just striking back because they have fallen out of favor with the government of our heroes. Kirk's speech even feels like it addresses the soldiers who went to war with Afghanistan, and later Iraq: "Our first instinct is to take revenge when someone we love is taken from us. But that's not who we are..." THAT is how Star Trek should always be, a beacon of what humanity is capable of in it's finest hour and at it's best. THAT is not what Season 3 of Enterprise did.
Compare the above with Enterprise Season 3 and the war on terror: there is a terrorist attack (on the World Trade Center AND the gulf coast of Earth) our heroes lose someone they care deeply about in the attack (thousands of people in New York city AND Trip's Sister) are sent to war on the party they believe is responsible (Al Qaeda AND the Xindi) only to find that the villain is...wait, what? Developing an even bigger weapon because they are a bunch of xenophobic monsters who deserve to be wiped out? And no one questions whether or not they should even be doing this? Granted, I got impatient after a few episodes of Season 3, and especially after I realized the whole friggin' season was gonna be Starfleet's war on terror - er I mean, the Xindi.
Star Trek had an obligation, a responsibility to its fans, to take the tragedy of 9-11 and turn it into a meaningful parable about how nothing is ever as it seems. TOS did it with "The Devil in the Dark", and TNG did it with "Darmok". Enterprise decided to, and I can't mince words here, jump on the war train. The Xindi are evil! They have a weapon! We must destroy it before it destroys us! The story would have been at least more palatable if there had BEEN no weapon, maybe even no Xindi; just the sad remnants of a previously warp capable society who had launched the weapon centuries ago and it just so happened to reach Earth when it did. But NO. We had to instead suffer through seeing our heroes, explorers on a ship of peace, turn into soldiers on a battleship. Sorry, that's not Star Trek. A ton of other space adventures have been told about war in space, and it is something that looks ugly on Trek (one of many reasons I never watched DS9 was the dominion war, and even still DS9 did it better than Enterprise).
Sorry if I ruffled any feathers, but there are only two bits of Star Trek I hate with a burning passion: Nemesis, and Enterprise Season 3. Both because they were so anti trek it hurt. I never saw Season 4 other than the finale (which I actually enjoyed oddly enough, Trip's death aside) because I just stopped caring. Star Trek stayed dead for me from then until 2009.
