I'm going to get this out of the way first. Out of all the cadet characters, Genesis has been my favorite since the pilot. She's smart, has good instincts, is thorough, professional... in short, she BELONGS in the Academy, and has what it takes to be a real Starfleet officer. She's the only cadet character that hasn't annoyed me at any time.
Until now.
I get that she is young and as such is capable of doing stupid things, but breaking into the bridge and get a key so she can change a recommendation on her file? I can see her doing something stupid for a better reason: save a life, help a struggling fellow cadet, an attempt to improve a ship's system. Anything would have been better than what was written. And that just ANNOYED me. The writers just couldn't help themselves, could they? They had to make the only cadet that truly acted like an adult and bring her down. Even worse, they made her selfish in doing this. The one cadet in the group who has been on probation more often than Bender (Judd Nelson) in THE BREAKFAST CLUB, and she decides it was a good idea to risk HIS standing in the Academy. I know that Caleb is almost untouchable because of Ake and Genesis knows this, which in itself is a problem. But that just means she was using him as a means to an end, and that really demonstrates the worst traits any potential leader can have. (Darem, by contrast, was essentially the exact opposite in this episode, but I'll get to him shortly.)
And some of the antics she and Caleb were doing were just... incredibly stupid. Best example of this stupidity: "toxic or non-toxic". So, stick your hand in a locked container of stuff, and hope it doesn't hurt or kill you? Sure, why not... let's all just play a game of "which basket has the snake in it: put your hand in and find out!" These are not toddlers, these are Starfleet Academy cadets! This just underscores one of the worst aspects of the series.
I do like that Ake was actually acting more like a captain and Chancellor when she was giving out their punishments.
I will also give Caleb some credit here. He did try to stop Genesis on the bridge from going too far in restarting systems (which was almost certainly a ploy by her to keep him occupied while she got the key) and he did try to take the blame for the whole thing with Ake.
Speaking of Caleb and Genesis, we got a couple glimpses of some possible feelings on her end for him in the pilot. And now, we get even further on that, to the point that it seems to be setting up a triangle between them and Tarima. A love triangle in a series between leads is one of THE most common tropes in tv ever, and I don't normally have an issue with it.
But we ALREADY have a triangle with Jay-Den, Kyle, and Darem. So, TWO triangles that involve pretty much ALL the organic cadets in the group? It's too much, and just reeks of the worst kind of soap opera tropes around. I don't like to use this term because I don't usually think it's fair to say... but this just screams of lazy writing. They couldn't come up with something more interesting for all these characters? What's next, a third triangle so we can have a complete set of Triforces: Wisdom, Power, and Courage?
Now to Darem and Jay-Den, which I actually thought was the better part of the episode. As I mentioned earlier, Darem was the opposite of Genesis here: he was acting more selfless and was working for a greater good. While we know he was not going to stay with his people by the end, I figured they would do what T'Pol and Koss in ENT's "HOME" had arranged. (Which, by the way, arranged marriages has been done so often in the franchise and it always ends the same way... it doesn't happen and it returns to the status quo. So the story itself here was already rather mundane.) I'll give it credit for giving a slightly different action to create the result... abdication, then end the marriage.
Jay-Den was pretty good here, though you have to wonder if he knew what he was doing in how he worded his speech. Whether he intended what happened to occur or not, his speech was pretty good.
Reno was funny in her scenes, so it brought some levity to an episode that felt like it was dragging.
The music, though, is just abysmal. The really cheesy (bad cheesy) background music coupled with songs that are just terrible just make listening to the episode, and the whole series when that music comes up, a chore.
Overall, I really did not like this one. A MAJOR step down from last week. It's not the worst of SFA so far... that title goes to "Vitus Reflux". But it is pretty close to it. It really damaged a character that I really liked, and, despite this having the shortest run time of the series so far, felt like it dragged on and felt longer than even the pilot, which WAS the longest episode.
This one is a 3.
Until now.
I get that she is young and as such is capable of doing stupid things, but breaking into the bridge and get a key so she can change a recommendation on her file? I can see her doing something stupid for a better reason: save a life, help a struggling fellow cadet, an attempt to improve a ship's system. Anything would have been better than what was written. And that just ANNOYED me. The writers just couldn't help themselves, could they? They had to make the only cadet that truly acted like an adult and bring her down. Even worse, they made her selfish in doing this. The one cadet in the group who has been on probation more often than Bender (Judd Nelson) in THE BREAKFAST CLUB, and she decides it was a good idea to risk HIS standing in the Academy. I know that Caleb is almost untouchable because of Ake and Genesis knows this, which in itself is a problem. But that just means she was using him as a means to an end, and that really demonstrates the worst traits any potential leader can have. (Darem, by contrast, was essentially the exact opposite in this episode, but I'll get to him shortly.)
And some of the antics she and Caleb were doing were just... incredibly stupid. Best example of this stupidity: "toxic or non-toxic". So, stick your hand in a locked container of stuff, and hope it doesn't hurt or kill you? Sure, why not... let's all just play a game of "which basket has the snake in it: put your hand in and find out!" These are not toddlers, these are Starfleet Academy cadets! This just underscores one of the worst aspects of the series.
I do like that Ake was actually acting more like a captain and Chancellor when she was giving out their punishments.
I will also give Caleb some credit here. He did try to stop Genesis on the bridge from going too far in restarting systems (which was almost certainly a ploy by her to keep him occupied while she got the key) and he did try to take the blame for the whole thing with Ake.
Speaking of Caleb and Genesis, we got a couple glimpses of some possible feelings on her end for him in the pilot. And now, we get even further on that, to the point that it seems to be setting up a triangle between them and Tarima. A love triangle in a series between leads is one of THE most common tropes in tv ever, and I don't normally have an issue with it.
But we ALREADY have a triangle with Jay-Den, Kyle, and Darem. So, TWO triangles that involve pretty much ALL the organic cadets in the group? It's too much, and just reeks of the worst kind of soap opera tropes around. I don't like to use this term because I don't usually think it's fair to say... but this just screams of lazy writing. They couldn't come up with something more interesting for all these characters? What's next, a third triangle so we can have a complete set of Triforces: Wisdom, Power, and Courage?
Now to Darem and Jay-Den, which I actually thought was the better part of the episode. As I mentioned earlier, Darem was the opposite of Genesis here: he was acting more selfless and was working for a greater good. While we know he was not going to stay with his people by the end, I figured they would do what T'Pol and Koss in ENT's "HOME" had arranged. (Which, by the way, arranged marriages has been done so often in the franchise and it always ends the same way... it doesn't happen and it returns to the status quo. So the story itself here was already rather mundane.) I'll give it credit for giving a slightly different action to create the result... abdication, then end the marriage.
Jay-Den was pretty good here, though you have to wonder if he knew what he was doing in how he worded his speech. Whether he intended what happened to occur or not, his speech was pretty good.
Reno was funny in her scenes, so it brought some levity to an episode that felt like it was dragging.
The music, though, is just abysmal. The really cheesy (bad cheesy) background music coupled with songs that are just terrible just make listening to the episode, and the whole series when that music comes up, a chore.
Overall, I really did not like this one. A MAJOR step down from last week. It's not the worst of SFA so far... that title goes to "Vitus Reflux". But it is pretty close to it. It really damaged a character that I really liked, and, despite this having the shortest run time of the series so far, felt like it dragged on and felt longer than even the pilot, which WAS the longest episode.
This one is a 3.
