I finally saw the Gazelle Speech

[TEACAKE'S PLEATHER DOME]

I've grown to appreciate the MU eps for reasons like horatio83 mentions above. I enjoy studying the details. But the first couple time I watched them I didn't think they were fun, I thought they were awkward and boring (other than the opening credits which are pretty trippy, especially the Cochrane scene). The ENT MU eps look great, but they just don't work that well for me, though I've warmed to them with rewatchings.

I still think Mirror, Mirror is the best MU ep.

 

[ALF]

Thread needs moar gazelles people.

 

[Gaith]

TATV haters say that it was an insult to Enterprise, but I found IAMD to be an insult to Trek as a whole: gratuitous sleaze and violence without any kind of point. "Mirror, Mirror", OTOH, had a point, and it had heart.

I'm not opposed to the idea of doing an episode, miniseries, or even necessarily a show entirely within the Mirror Universe, or a version of it, but it'd have to have some kind of rooting interest. While I'd love to see a whole HBO show about, say, the inner workings of the Third Reich or Stalin's inner circle throughout WW2, I think that Trek always needs some degree of that humanistic heart. TATV had it, and so did XI. IAMD didn't.

 

[horatio83]

True but isn't it kinda enjoyable to see the characters being their very opposites for two hours ("Will you kindly die?")? Let's also not forget that the two-parter was basically the obligatory TOS homage story of the series. None of these stories had any point besides creating fangasms.

 

[stj]

Rewatching Enterprise on NetFlix. Strictly speaking, I'm watching a lot of it for the first time. I find that commercial free helps tremendously. So I too have seen the infamous speech for the first time recently.

The gazelle speech I think serves as a touchstone. Whatever it is that makes people hate it apparently is either too subtle to express in mere words, or too embarrassing to cop to, but if you find it something to hate, something weird is going on. It's something a normal human being, who is reasonably articulate but not an accomplished speaker, would say. Scott Bakula delivers it without a hint of insincerity or camp. The sentiment is decent, but there is no sentimentality. No, the mention of a baby is not sentimentality.

Enterprise was a departure from Star Trek, and I can find things to disagree with in their departure. But the dialogue was often pretty decent, except for the dreary insistence that techical jargon is nothing but technobabble. Hating the gazelle speech is like hating normal people or hating the idea that normal people can have ideals or that normal people would try to persuade someone with the best eloquence at their command, rather than just quip.

 

[RandyS]

Well, unfortunately, I didn't find it very fun.

Meh. I feel the same way about the entire Xindi arc.

 

[RandyS]

TATV haters say that it was an insult to Enterprise, but I found IAMD to be an insult to Trek as a whole: gratuitous sleaze and violence without any kind of point.

You've just described almost everything that's been on TV for the last decade.

 

[Gaith]

^ Supposing that were indeed true, which I neither endorse nor deny within the confines of this thread, all the more reason for Trek not to draw from the same well.