TheGodBen Revisits Enterprise

[Joel_Kirk]

I'm two episodes in, and one thing that sticks out in a bad way is the way Archer seems to be so reactive. (You're a captain, on an official deep space mission of exploration; you have 60 crew members under you.)

Another thing......Archer seems to always 'hover' over his officers: In 'Fight or Flight' he tells Hoshi she is their key to explain their findings to the Axanar....and instead of allowing her to gain courage, as she stands in front of the viewscreen and speaks with conviction to the Axanar pilot...Archer stands just inches away from her--actually, an inch--taking away from Hoshi handling the situation herself.

I believe in the next episode, 'Strange New World' Archer is leaning all in Travis' space as the man is trying to fly the ship...

In that same episode ('Strange New World') we have all the Enterprise senior officers down on the planet: T'Pol is maintaining her sexy coolness, Trip is going crazy, Travis is hallucinating...so Archer decides to take a shuttlecraft--himself, with Reed tagging along--to pick up his officers during a windstorm that already is making shuttlecraft flight impossible.

Reed should have been on that bridge....!

With all that said, aside from Archer's questionable command abilities, I'm looking forward to the next episodes...

P.S. Reed is a little itchy on the trigger finger....

 

[bluedana]

Archer doesn't realise that telling a bunch of aliens on the brink of a global war that their enemies have super-soldiers and advanced weaponary might be a bad idea?

Telling them the lie was the better of two horrible choices. They had to explain their different physiology somehow, especially if they were going to be subjected to full autopsies anyway. Yes, it probably would result in an escalation of war, perhaps even a cold war (USA v. USSR) with mutual assured destruction dictating a fragile peace. On the other hand, telling them that they were aliens may very well have destabilized their whole civilization. What if their world view was incompatible with life Out There? People went into mass panic during Orson Welles' War of the Worlds broadcast, and that was with no physical evidence.

No idea why they wouldn't use the transporter.

 

[TheGodBen]

Telling them the lie was the better of two horrible choices.

I disagree. Telling them that your an alien who was just exploring the culture of the planet and you intend to leave them in peace probably wouldn't be too damaging, and the military would probably cover it up anyway. Telling them that he's a super-soldier from a rival faction will just make a volatile situation explosive. Which would have scared more Americans during the Cold War, aliens having ray-guns and invisible planes or the Russians?

As for the War of the Worlds thing, that was describing an actual alien invasion, it wasn't describing two aliens who went to a bar one evening, and the reports that there was mass hysteria were drummed up afterwards because the print media wanted to demonise broadcast media since they were a threat.

Wikipedia:

Robert E. Bartholomew suggests that hundreds of thousands were frightened in some way, but notes that evidence of people taking action based on this fear is "scant" and "anecdotal". Indeed, contemporary news articles indicate that police were swamped with hundreds of calls in numerous locations, but stories of people doing anything more than calling the authorities typically involve groups of ones or tens and were often reported by people who were panicking themselves.

Singularity (**½)

(I watched this episode a few days ago but since then I've been busy upgrading my computers to Windows 7 so I haven't had the time to write anything. As a result this review may be a little shorter than normal because the episode isn't fresh in my mind.)

The idea of a crew acting out of the ordinary isn't original, it reminds me a bit of Sisko and his clock in Dramatis Personae with T'Pol taking on the role of Odo. Even if this episode hasn't precisely been done on Trek before it still feels like a "TNG episode" so I'm deducting a mark for that.

I liked Reed's obsession about the new alert, it's a bit fanwanky but it makes sense that he would come up with something like that after the various tactical situations they have found themselves in over the past year. I also liked Trip and the chair, nothing ground-breaking but mildly amusing. Archer's preface was something I could take or leave. Phlox and Travis in sickbay grated a little bit; even when Travis is obsessive about something he still doesn't try very hard to actually do it. Hoshi's soup had to best the worst, it wasn't funny or interesting.

The solution comes when T'Pol realises that the effect of the radiation goes away with a cold shower, which was also the solution to A Night in Sickbay.

 

[apenpaap]

Hoshi's soup had to best the worst, it wasn't funny or interesting.

Really? "CARROTS!" was great IMO.

 

[gblews]

Hoshi's soup had to best the worst, it wasn't funny or interesting.

Really? "CARROTS!" was great IMO.

Agree. This line, the way Park delivers it, like so many other parts of Singularity, makes me laugh out loud every time I see the episode. With her ability to handle comedy, action, and drama, I nominate Linda Park as the most underrated actor in the cast, though obviously not the hottest.

 

[SRFX]

Singularity is a guilty pleasure. I try to avoid it when re-watching because I know it's pointless, but if ever catch it airing, I can't help but watch it. Trip's chair dilemma sells this episode for me.

 

[TheGodBen]

Vanishing Point (*½)

Okay, I can go multiple ways on with this one:

1) Hoshi is involved in a transporter accident and she ends up invisible and able to walk through solid objects, almost as if she is out of... phase or something. The crew thinks that she is dead and they act despondently, so she listens in on what they have to say about her. Then she learns that some aliens are trying to blow up the ship and she has to find a way to stop them. Hmm, seems familiar...

2) Hoshi is involved in an accident and she ends up invisible and able to walk through solid objects, almost as if she is a ghost or something. The crew thinks that she's dead and they act despondently, so she listens in on what they have to say about her. Turns out that none of it was real and all the emotional stuff was just her imaginings of how people should react to her death. Oh, and her father makes an appearance... Dear god, it's Coda again!! Bugger it all to hell!

3) Hoshi is terrified of being transported and in the matter stream she beings to imagine things. After the transport she experiences some unusual things but she fears she is being a hypochondriac and ignores it. Turns out her fears were justified and in the end her experience in this... realm of... scary things leads her not to fear the transporter so much.

4) Hoshi is involved in a transporter malfunction and loses all her clothes. Turns out that those troll-like aliens from Acquisition, who never gave their name and thus I have no idea who they are, messed with the settings so that all females end up naked. (Okay, this one I've made up, but I wouldn't put it past Braga if this was part of his original plan for the episode.)

Transporter: 5

 

[SRFX]

Vanishing Point reminded me a lot of TNG's The Next Phase. Also commonly, I dislike that episode a lot too.

It's a shame that Hoshi focus episodes are terrible (the only truly terrible episode from season 3 was Exile), because I like her as a character and as we have established, Park is cute.

 

[Skywalker]

Vanishing Point reminded me a lot of TNG's The Next Phase. Also commonly, I dislike that episode a lot too.

It's a shame that Hoshi focus episodes are terrible (the only truly terrible episode from season 3 was Exile), because I like her as a character and as we have established, Park is cute.

I think Extinction was S3's truly terrible episode. Exile was just boring.

 

[SRFX]

Vanishing Point reminded me a lot of TNG's The Next Phase. Also commonly, I dislike that episode a lot too.

It's a shame that Hoshi focus episodes are terrible (the only truly terrible episode from season 3 was Exile), because I like her as a character and as we have established, Park is cute.

I think Extinction was S3's truly terrible episode. Exile was just boring.

Ooo yes. I forgot about Extinction. Well played.

 

[Seven of Five]

Sorta vanished from the thread when season two started as it's just full of so-so episodes. I've only watched these once and I don't know how many I'd rewatch when the day of the ENT rewatch finally comes.

I did like Vanishing Point though, so I must be as strange as I think I am. I also thought The Seventh was somewhat decent. No other episodes want me to stand up and shout though yet.

The one-two knockout punch of Nemesis and ENT's second season really did leave the Trek franchise in a bad way there for a while.

 

[bluedana]

Hoshi's soup had to best the worst, it wasn't funny or interesting.

Really? "CARROTS!" was great IMO.

Agree. This line, the way Park delivers it, like so many other parts of Singularity, makes me laugh out loud every time I see the episode. With her ability to handle comedy, action, and drama, I nominate Linda Park as the most underrated actor in the cast, though obviously not the hottest.

On rewatch one time, I realized that Park gives the line a Japanese inflection (CARROTS-uh!") which is, of course, perfect for Hoshi - underscoring that people tend to revert to their native language or accent under stress (my family can ALWAYS tell when I'm about to lose it because my accent gets more pronounced). I love that both TNG and ENT gave homage to one of the best TOS episodes.

 

[TheGodBen]

Precious Cargo (0)

Since when can Tucker play the harmonica?

Disappearing Aliens: 12
Captain Redshirt: 16
Nipples Ahoy!: 9

 

[Disillusioned]

Telling them the lie was the better of two horrible choices. They had to explain their different physiology somehow, especially if they were going to be subjected to full autopsies anyway. Yes, it probably would result in an escalation of war, perhaps even a cold war (USA v. USSR) with mutual assured destruction dictating a fragile peace. On the other hand, telling them that they were aliens may very well have destabilized their whole civilization. What if their world view was incompatible with life Out There? People went into mass panic during Orson Welles' War of the Worlds broadcast, and that was with no physical evidence.

That didn't seem to be the case with these aliens though. In fact, they arrived at the idea that Archer and Reed were aliens fairly quickly and didn't seem all that alarmed at the suggestion. If anything the military guy seemed kind of fascinated at the idea. It probably still would have ended badly for Archer and Reed without intervention, because I'm guessing an autopsy would have still been the order of the day.

No idea why they wouldn't use the transporter.

Because then they wouldn't have an episode.

Singularity (**½)

(I watched this episode a few days ago but since then I've been busy upgrading my computers to Windows 7 so I haven't had the time to write anything. As a result this review may be a little shorter than normal because the episode isn't fresh in my mind.)

The idea of a crew acting out of the ordinary isn't original, it reminds me a bit of Sisko and his clock in Dramatis Personae with T'Pol taking on the role of Odo. Even if this episode hasn't precisely been done on Trek before it still feels like a "TNG episode" so I'm deducting a mark for that.

I liked Reed's obsession about the new alert, it's a bit fanwanky but it makes sense that he would come up with something like that after the various tactical situations they have found themselves in over the past year. I also liked Trip and the chair, nothing ground-breaking but mildly amusing. Archer's preface was something I could take or leave. Phlox and Travis in sickbay grated a little bit; even when Travis is obsessive about something he still doesn't try very hard to actually do it. Hoshi's soup had to best the worst, it wasn't funny or interesting.

The solution comes when T'Pol realises that the effect of the radiation goes away with a cold shower, which was also the solution to A Night in Sickbay.

at that last part. As far as the episode, what made this one a little different was that rather than trying to explore each character's personality, each of them was just stuck obsessing over whatever it was they were doing when the space magic started to effect them.

Vanishing Point (*½)

Okay, I can go multiple ways on with this one:

1) Hoshi is involved in a transporter accident and she ends up invisible and able to walk through solid objects, almost as if she is out of... phase or something. The crew thinks that she is dead and they act despondently, so she listens in on what they have to say about her. Then she learns that some aliens are trying to blow up the ship and she has to find a way to stop them. Hmm, seems familiar...

2) Hoshi is involved in an accident and she ends up invisible and able to walk through solid objects, almost as if she is a ghost or something. The crew thinks that she's dead and they act despondently, so she listens in on what they have to say about her. Turns out that none of it was real and all the emotional stuff was just her imaginings of how people should react to her death. Oh, and her father makes an appearance... Dear god, it's Coda again!! Bugger it all to hell!

3) Hoshi is terrified of being transported and in the matter stream she beings to imagine things. After the transport she experiences some unusual things but she fears she is being a hypochondriac and ignores it. Turns out her fears were justified and in the end her experience in this... realm of... scary things leads her not to fear the transporter so much.

4) Hoshi is involved in a transporter malfunction and loses all her clothes. Turns out that those troll-like aliens from Acquisition, who never gave their name and thus I have no idea who they are, messed with the settings so that all females end up naked. (Okay, this one I've made up, but I wouldn't put it past Braga if this was part of his original plan for the episode.)

Transporter: 5

So did you deduct a point for each episode of TNG this was like then?

Vanishing Point reminded me a lot of TNG's The Next Phase. Also commonly, I dislike that episode a lot too.

It's a shame that Hoshi focus episodes are terrible (the only truly terrible episode from season 3 was Exile), because I like her as a character and as we have established, Park is cute.

Something I never got about that episode or anything like it is if they can pass through walls and even the bulkheads of the ship, why didn't they fall through the floors? For that matter, why did gravity have any effect on them at all?

Precious Cargo (0)

Since when can Tucker play the harmonica?

Disappearing Aliens: 12
Captain Redshirt: 16
Nipples Ahoy!: 9

Since he was a stereotype?

 

[Sykonee]

I always seemed to have the worst luck when I tried to watch ENT. Caught Vanishing Point, which I thought was alright, and decided to check out the next episode. Lo, it was Precious Cargo. Could there not be a worse way to turn a guy off a series for good?

To be fair, though, I did catch a few sporadic S3 episodes later on.

 

[Pemmer Harge]

Precious Cargo? What is this crap?!! Watching reruns that were on one a day made this kind of tolerable, but if I'd been watching the original run there's a chance this episode would have made me give up.

 

[TheGodBen]

Precious Cargo made me consider giving up, but I decided to hang around until the end of the season at least, and there was enough of an upswing in those final episode to convince me to come back the following year. And boy was I glad.


The Catwalk (*****)

Wow, after the awfulness of Precious Cargo it is hard to believe that such an amazing episode could come right after it. I shouldn't be surprised, Mike Sussman does have a reputation for quality, and Phyllis Strong has a reputation for great caffeinated beverages. This episode had it all; Archer, Trip, Chef, a toilet, a reference to TAS, some cats walking, a tambourine, a yellow submarine, cola, oj, some purple stuff, Sunny D™, a game of monopoly, Tarzan, GAIUS BALTAR?!!!, a hairy back, a man with a tape recorder up his nose, a man with a tape recorder up his brother's nose, the song Layla, ass-to-ass, Michael J Fox in Teen Wolf, a deleted scene from Teen Wolf in which Michael J Fox performs ass-to-ass while listening to Layla, a clock radio, a manicure set, a collection of Christmas-themed towels, a desk-lamp and an umbrella. You have one minute to recall as many of these items as you can, and your time starts... now!

Sorry, I appear to have tangented off into The Generation Game.

Anyway, this is a brilliant episode and you should all run to your TVs to watch it right now. Good work, Mike!






















The Catwalk (**)

You've probably indulged me enough if you read that pointless list above, but I'd ask you to indulge me some more as I list why the storm in this episode is so stupid.
1) Space has three dimensions.
2) Archer looked out his window and managed to see something travelling towards him at hundreds of times the speed of light. That makes no sense.
3) A storm travelling faster than Enterprise which takes 8 days to get through? It took Enterprise 4 days to get to Qo'nos, so this storm must take up half the bloody quadrant.
4) Starfleet knew these storms existed and were content to send a ship out with no plans in place for the eventuality that they encounter one?
The episode needed a rewrite in order to get rid of some of these logical inconsistencies, all they needed was for Enterprise's engines to be affected by the [tech] from the storm so that they were unable to go to warp, now we have to worry about giant quadrant-sized storms which kill all life, yet never passed by Earth in 4 billion years.

Poor framing-device aside, there's a lot to like about the first half of this episode. It's fun seeing a new area of the ship, it is fun watching the crew evacuating and it is fun watching the crew get along in a confined space. Unfortunately it was decided that this fun stuff wasn't enough to fill a whole episode so we had to be subjected to mind-numbing action for the last 15 minutes. It has several Trek clichés; the misunderstood aliens who turn out to be good guys, evil aliens, technobabble, a captain willing to sacrifice his ship and fireworks going off on the bridge. The worst part is this:

TRIP: That storm must've been pretty scary.
TRAVIS: We only got worried when the generators went down. We lost the grav-plating, life support. I'll never forget that look in my father's eyes. He knew we were in trouble.

The writers already had a better story right there, they even wrote it down, so why did they go the stupid route instead?

Point deducted for being a TNG episode.

Disappearing Aliens: 13
Captain Redshirt: 17

 

[Vestboy]

How did Precious Cargo get Disappearing Aliens? I'll admit its bad, but weren't the aliens the same ones in TNG's "The Perfect Mate"?

Also, The Catwalk has it's flaws, but one thing it is not is the same as a TNG episode. This episode felt very uniquely Enterprise to me, in that they were in a situation they were ill-equipped, tech-wise, to handle, and they had to just ride it out.

 

[SRFX]

Vanishing Point reminded me a lot of TNG's The Next Phase. Also commonly, I dislike that episode a lot too.

Something I never got about that episode or anything like it is if they can pass through walls and even the bulkheads of the ship, why didn't they fall through the floors? For that matter, why did gravity have any effect on them at all?

I know...I know...

As for The Catwalk - I am a big fan of this episode. Yes, the storm is idiotic, but I am not really fussed as it sets up a really good bottle episode. The tension between the crew is good, and I agree with Vestboy - this episode felt uniquely ENT to me.

Besides, ST is no stranger to two-dimensional space phenomena

TheGhoulBen - the only TNG ep I can think of that was similar was Disaster - is that what you were thinking of?

 

[Glacial]

The thought of a Star Trek episode revolving around a space phenomenon that's laughably impossible scientifically shocks me to my very core!

Let's certainly not judge it as drama.