This episode doesn't have the twists and turns of a complicated TNG plot, instead it has the intensity of drive of one of the better TOS movies, specifically it reminded me of parts of Wrath. But it also didn't feel like it was aping directly from it despite the borrowed plot elements of a group of genetically engineered people taking a ship and then a space station. Specifically this episode is about the crew of the station we only saw as corpses in Wrath with the added twist of a human "father" to try and keep his children on the moral path. I also like the emerging conflict between Soong and Malik over leadership of the group. It is clear Soong doesn't understand what kind of trouble he is really in.
We open with what I guess is a flashback to Soong with his augment children teaching them about how humans will never accept them. After the credits he and the augments are on the Klingon ship the stole trying to figure a way to steal the embryos of the rest of their kind from a Starfleet base embedded in an asteroid. Meanwhile Archer and company are on their former homeworld looking for some sign of where they are headed when they encounter a young augment who tries to attack with knife before being knocked out by Archer. The young man is named Udar and he was apparently left behind for being too weak. He is distrustful at first but after Archer shows him his actual parents he seems to open up a bit. Meanwhile Soong and company take a Denobulan shuttle which they use to sneak into the station with the embryos but before they can get in the head scientist locks everything down.
It doesn't take Malik long to start threatening to kill the scientists and Soong is barely able to hold him back. Things get worse when Enterprise arrives but Archer decides to pull back rather than watch the hostages be killed one by one. Instead he comes up with a plan to sneak a team on board that includes Phlox and Udar. Soong decides to expose one of the scientists to a deadly pathogen to get the code from the head scientist but gives up and orders Malik to save him, which Malik refuses to do. Archer shows up and Malik tries to use Phlox to get the code and this time it works. But the rift between Soong and Malik only widens. They take the embryos but Malik also takes several super deadly pathogens with them. He gets into a fist fight with Archer and wins leaving the station to release all the pathogens after they leave and killing Udar for helping the humans. We close with the pathogens about to be released and the augments escaping on their Klingon ship.
Review: This is a tense episode with plenty of action and lots of moral conflict. There are many TNG episodes without half the tension this episode creates. Can't wait to see where this goes!
8 out of 10
Tuesday, February 28, 2017
Monday, February 27, 2017
ENT: Borderlands
First of all I have to say having Brent Spiner show up as a villain in ENT was unexpected and awesome. I wish it was a little clearer that he wasn't playing Noonian Soong since he is essentially always referred to as Dr. Soong, but having looked it up and discovering he is supposed to be Data's fathers ancestor made it a little more obvious. I am not certain if he is supposed to himself be genetically engineered or if it is just his kids. He certainly shows super human intelligence many times in the episode, but not the super strength we tend to associate with augmented people. Also, I get that earth is a little touchy about eugenics after having fought a war over it, but it seems like some genetic engineering is clearly a good idea, and if someone has created super human children, maybe don't just try to lock them up. That they would try to escape is obvious and that they would succeed and be hella resentful towards regular humans who they haven't harmed is double obvious. I am looking forward to seeing how this story plays out.
We open with a Klingon bird of prey intercepting a shuttle only to have the entire Klingon crew killed by two apparently augmented humans. Cut to Earth were Dr. Arik Soong is in a prison cell when Archer arrives. It seems the humans who took the Klingon ship are augments he created years earlier. They get underway to start the search and we cut to the Klingon ship where the augments are fighting over who should be in charge. Enterprise doesn't get far before being attacked by Orion raiders who taked 11 crew including Hoshi and T'Pol to seel as slaves. Archer and Soong beam down to the Orion slave dealing planet but after T'Pol has already been sold. The new slaves all have a neural implant to keep them from escaping. The augments keep fighting and one kills their former leader, but since we haven't met them before it is hard to get too worked up over it. Soong helps Archer disable the implants in the slaves but it disables all of them so chaos breaks up, but they are able to get their crew back. Soong tries to escape by tasing himself or something but of course that doesn't stop him from being beamed back. The Orions pursue but the Klingon ship shows up and blast them. The augments board Enterprise and take Archer hostage until they can break Soong out. Luckily for them Soong orders them to not destroy Enterprise.
Review: A interesting episode that delves into Trek's backstory in several interesting ways and has a solid guest star to boot. My understanding is that this season has a bunch of two and three part mini-arcs so I can't wait to see where this goes.
6 out of 10
We open with a Klingon bird of prey intercepting a shuttle only to have the entire Klingon crew killed by two apparently augmented humans. Cut to Earth were Dr. Arik Soong is in a prison cell when Archer arrives. It seems the humans who took the Klingon ship are augments he created years earlier. They get underway to start the search and we cut to the Klingon ship where the augments are fighting over who should be in charge. Enterprise doesn't get far before being attacked by Orion raiders who taked 11 crew including Hoshi and T'Pol to seel as slaves. Archer and Soong beam down to the Orion slave dealing planet but after T'Pol has already been sold. The new slaves all have a neural implant to keep them from escaping. The augments keep fighting and one kills their former leader, but since we haven't met them before it is hard to get too worked up over it. Soong helps Archer disable the implants in the slaves but it disables all of them so chaos breaks up, but they are able to get their crew back. Soong tries to escape by tasing himself or something but of course that doesn't stop him from being beamed back. The Orions pursue but the Klingon ship shows up and blast them. The augments board Enterprise and take Archer hostage until they can break Soong out. Luckily for them Soong orders them to not destroy Enterprise.
Review: A interesting episode that delves into Trek's backstory in several interesting ways and has a solid guest star to boot. My understanding is that this season has a bunch of two and three part mini-arcs so I can't wait to see where this goes.
6 out of 10
Sunday, February 26, 2017
ENT: Home
This is clearly ENT's attempt to have an episode like Family from TNG and it is pretty well deserved at this point. It is also an opportunity to show how the various characters deal with what the went through, to show how humanity is reacting to what happened, and even to make the Vulcans seem a bit more reasonable again. I really appreciated the scene where the Vulcan ambassador thanks Archer for what he did, something we are told earlier in the episode isn't something Vulcans do so it makes the gesture even more meaningful. I am not sure where they are going with T'Pols marriage, and that is a good thing. I called her and Trip hooking up early first season and I don't object to their relationship, but it is nice to see something unexpected happening as well. Giving Archer some actual personal interests other than just being obsessed with water polo was cool too. Not sure if his romance is going to continue, but it makes him more of a person.
We open with the crew of Enterprise being honored in San Francisco for saving earth. After Archer meets up with Erika Hernandez, captain of the Columbia NX-02 and apparently a former love interest. Trip and T'Pol discuss shore leave options and eventually agree to go to Vulcan together. Back to Archer and he is being chewed out by the Vulcan ambassador for not doing more to save the vulcans driven mad by trillium in the expanse. Trip and T'Pol arrive on vulcan and T'Pol is surprised to find her mother not at work. Her mother is also clearly surprised, and not in a good way, that she brought a human with her. Trip though gets to work fixing stuff for her and being his usual helpful self. We soon learn T'Pols mother wants her to marry the man she was betrothed to as a child named Voss. Archer and Hernandez head out rock climbing together and we see he isn't taking the changes he has gone through well. Phlox, Malcolm and Tucker head to a bar where Phlox is confronted by a racist human and the other two jump to his defense, but he stops the fight by puffing up his face. T'Pol learns from Voss that her mother actually lost her job because of T'Pol. Later while visiting a lava field with Trip she tells him she is going to marry Voss. Now it is her mother who comes to Trip and asks if he has told T'Pol that he loves her, but he can't do it. After a nightmare about the Xindi and some freaking out Archer kisses Hernandez and seems to calm down a bit. Back at Starfeelt they complete his debriefing after which the Vulcan ambassador pulls him aside for a heartfelt thank you. We close with the beginning of T'Pol's marriage to Voss.
Review: Not much action of science fiction, but exactly the kind of character building this show has suffered for the lack of which is good to see. Bonus point for making the Vulcans into more reasonable people.
6 out of 10
We open with the crew of Enterprise being honored in San Francisco for saving earth. After Archer meets up with Erika Hernandez, captain of the Columbia NX-02 and apparently a former love interest. Trip and T'Pol discuss shore leave options and eventually agree to go to Vulcan together. Back to Archer and he is being chewed out by the Vulcan ambassador for not doing more to save the vulcans driven mad by trillium in the expanse. Trip and T'Pol arrive on vulcan and T'Pol is surprised to find her mother not at work. Her mother is also clearly surprised, and not in a good way, that she brought a human with her. Trip though gets to work fixing stuff for her and being his usual helpful self. We soon learn T'Pols mother wants her to marry the man she was betrothed to as a child named Voss. Archer and Hernandez head out rock climbing together and we see he isn't taking the changes he has gone through well. Phlox, Malcolm and Tucker head to a bar where Phlox is confronted by a racist human and the other two jump to his defense, but he stops the fight by puffing up his face. T'Pol learns from Voss that her mother actually lost her job because of T'Pol. Later while visiting a lava field with Trip she tells him she is going to marry Voss. Now it is her mother who comes to Trip and asks if he has told T'Pol that he loves her, but he can't do it. After a nightmare about the Xindi and some freaking out Archer kisses Hernandez and seems to calm down a bit. Back at Starfeelt they complete his debriefing after which the Vulcan ambassador pulls him aside for a heartfelt thank you. We close with the beginning of T'Pol's marriage to Voss.
Review: Not much action of science fiction, but exactly the kind of character building this show has suffered for the lack of which is good to see. Bonus point for making the Vulcans into more reasonable people.
6 out of 10
Saturday, February 25, 2017
ENT: Storm Front, Part II
Ok, overall this was a great episode, but not entirely for what it did, but for what it did with the show. This episode has a clear message of, "we agree the temporal coldwar was kinda dumb, but it should conclude somehow so we are going to wrap this as fast as possible and move on to better stories." My only serious complaint is how it makes clear that what they did to "fix" the timeline shouldn't have worked since the assassination of Lenin still happened so WWII is still hella messed up. Not sure how destroying a time machine in 1944 would solve a problem that took place almost 20 years earlier, but whatever, the temporal cold war is done and I am over it.
We open with the nazi conquest of America well under way with Hitler touring New York city (why wasn't this a story about killing Hitler????). However it is clear that the evil time travel aliens and their nazi allies are starting to have some serious differences, specifically why the aliens haven't given the nazis the super weapons they were promised. It seems this causes the head evil alien to have a change of heart and he offers to return Trip and Tucker in return for hearing out a proposal of his. Archer plays along but doesn't keep up the ruse for long and soon they are shooting at each other. Also it turns out that the Trip who was returned is actually Silik, but the other aliens are not aware of this as Silik stole a bunch of their data. Archer decides to team up with Silik along with the resistance mafia to go in and destroy the time machine once and for all. They make it inside and disable the shields but Silik is killed in the process. Enterprise ends up flying in low of New York City and getting in a gun fight with super stukas armed with plasma weapons, but they also destroy the time machine just before the badguys use it to seal our fate forever. We close with Daniels telling Acher they won't see each other again since the temporal cold war is now over apparently.
Review: A fun and action packed episode that is only bogged down but some fairly serious plot holes, but still manages to get us out of a terrible plot line that didn't seem to be going anywhere. Not perfect, but a sign of good things to come I really hope.
6 out of 10
We open with the nazi conquest of America well under way with Hitler touring New York city (why wasn't this a story about killing Hitler????). However it is clear that the evil time travel aliens and their nazi allies are starting to have some serious differences, specifically why the aliens haven't given the nazis the super weapons they were promised. It seems this causes the head evil alien to have a change of heart and he offers to return Trip and Tucker in return for hearing out a proposal of his. Archer plays along but doesn't keep up the ruse for long and soon they are shooting at each other. Also it turns out that the Trip who was returned is actually Silik, but the other aliens are not aware of this as Silik stole a bunch of their data. Archer decides to team up with Silik along with the resistance mafia to go in and destroy the time machine once and for all. They make it inside and disable the shields but Silik is killed in the process. Enterprise ends up flying in low of New York City and getting in a gun fight with super stukas armed with plasma weapons, but they also destroy the time machine just before the badguys use it to seal our fate forever. We close with Daniels telling Acher they won't see each other again since the temporal cold war is now over apparently.
Review: A fun and action packed episode that is only bogged down but some fairly serious plot holes, but still manages to get us out of a terrible plot line that didn't seem to be going anywhere. Not perfect, but a sign of good things to come I really hope.
6 out of 10
Friday, February 24, 2017
ENT: Storm Front
I am not sure we are ever going to get a real explanation for why Enterprise was thrown back in time, but it seems like if they aren't their world won't exist so I guess I can accept that. This is by far the most interesting thing the temporal cold war has given us in all of ENT so I can't really argue. I am not sure who the new gray faced, red eyed aliens are, but presumably the Suliban have something to do with it. Also, it seems like maybe they don't need to worry about messing up the timeline too much at this point. It is going to be interesting to see how they solve this problem since at this point history has already been pretty badly damaged. Even if the allies manage to pull off a victory the German conquest of the east coast of America seems like a bit of a problem for the timeline.
We open with Trip and Tucker in the shuttle flying into San Francisco under heavy machine gun and then flak fire. They head back to Enterprise which has realized they aren't in the right time. Archer meanwhile is being transported by German soldiers through the woods when they are ambushed by what turns out to be the mafia resistance. Archer gets taken to Alicia Travers apartment in Brooklyn, she is a member of the resistance and believes he is an American serviceman. The nazi aliens meanwhile have figured out Archer is from the future and send out goon squads to try and locate him. In the shuttlebay Trip is attacked by Silik, the Suliban leader who steals a shuttle and despite weapons fire from Enterprise manages to make it to the surface. Also a totally messed up Daniels shows up on Enterprise and manages to tell T'Pol that this is part of the temporal cold war, but the cold war just got hot. Archer manages to convince his mafia/resistance buddies that there are strange creatures working with the nazis and they set up a meeting with one. Trip and Tucker beam down to look for the shuttle and plant charges to destroy it, but just then the nazis arrive. Archer and the mafia interrogate the alien they contacted but he won't talk, luckily Archer recovers a communicator from him. Trip and Tucker appear to have been captured and things don't look much better for Archer, but just in time to gets through to Enterprise and both he and Alicia are beamed to safety.
Review: Lots of action and some actual story too. Plus Archer is written like a human being instead of some perfect jesus figure like he was the first three seasons which is a huge improvement. Can't give this a higher score until I see the conclusion, but I am actually looking forward to it which is really nice.
6 out of 10
We open with Trip and Tucker in the shuttle flying into San Francisco under heavy machine gun and then flak fire. They head back to Enterprise which has realized they aren't in the right time. Archer meanwhile is being transported by German soldiers through the woods when they are ambushed by what turns out to be the mafia resistance. Archer gets taken to Alicia Travers apartment in Brooklyn, she is a member of the resistance and believes he is an American serviceman. The nazi aliens meanwhile have figured out Archer is from the future and send out goon squads to try and locate him. In the shuttlebay Trip is attacked by Silik, the Suliban leader who steals a shuttle and despite weapons fire from Enterprise manages to make it to the surface. Also a totally messed up Daniels shows up on Enterprise and manages to tell T'Pol that this is part of the temporal cold war, but the cold war just got hot. Archer manages to convince his mafia/resistance buddies that there are strange creatures working with the nazis and they set up a meeting with one. Trip and Tucker beam down to look for the shuttle and plant charges to destroy it, but just then the nazis arrive. Archer and the mafia interrogate the alien they contacted but he won't talk, luckily Archer recovers a communicator from him. Trip and Tucker appear to have been captured and things don't look much better for Archer, but just in time to gets through to Enterprise and both he and Alicia are beamed to safety.
Review: Lots of action and some actual story too. Plus Archer is written like a human being instead of some perfect jesus figure like he was the first three seasons which is a huge improvement. Can't give this a higher score until I see the conclusion, but I am actually looking forward to it which is really nice.
6 out of 10
Thursday, February 23, 2017
ENT: Zero Hour
Honestly this is a pretty solid conclusion to what has so far been the best season of ENT, and yes, I know that is damning by faint praise. But at the same time it did at least pay off most of what it set up despite the rather strange ending. Getting to see Archer detonate the head reptilian was satisfying and the destruction of the spheres was about what I expected. However the arrival of the Andorians to save Earth was unexpected and badass. The dumb netflix capsule summary mentioned unexpected help by I honestly didn't expect the Andorians. they have been gone for so long that it was really cool to have them show up when earth needed them the most. The scene where Daniels tries to talk Archer into not going himself was dumb, there is literally no way the writers were going to let anyone but Archer actually stop the weapon so that made the scene really feel like filler in an ep that didn't have room for it.
We open with everything happening at once. Trip and T'Pol are trying to figure out how to destroy the spheres but not also Enterprise as Archer gets Hoshi and Malcolm ready to go with him to stop the weapon. The friendly Xindi are being helpful, but it seems they may be too late. The weapon arrives at Earth, but still needs several minutes. The Xindi destroy a space station we have never heard of for no apparent reason and as Degra's ship flies in totally outgunned Shran shows up with the other Andorians and saves the day. T'Pol meanwhile flies Enterprise into the area around the guide sphere which is no heavily distorted. Trip needs a few minutes and the sphere builders show up to try and stop them, but of course at literally the last possible second the plan works saving them and destroying the spheres. Archer, Malcolm, Hoshi and some unnamed MACO's beam into the weapon and Archer starts the overload sequence. There is a lot of fighting but it eventually comes down to Archer versus the head reptile. Archer wins but is maybe killed in the explosion. On Enterprise the aquatics show up to take them back to Earth, but when they arrive they aren't greeted and when Trip and Tucker take a shuttle down they are shot at by P-51's. Cut to a german field hospital in WWII where Archer is lying wounded surrounded by nazi's, one of whom is revealed to be a alien as we cut to commercials.
Review: A satisfying conclusion to a season that was overall better than the first two, but still had some serious low points. Actually looking forward to next season and a new writing team!
7 out of 10
We open with everything happening at once. Trip and T'Pol are trying to figure out how to destroy the spheres but not also Enterprise as Archer gets Hoshi and Malcolm ready to go with him to stop the weapon. The friendly Xindi are being helpful, but it seems they may be too late. The weapon arrives at Earth, but still needs several minutes. The Xindi destroy a space station we have never heard of for no apparent reason and as Degra's ship flies in totally outgunned Shran shows up with the other Andorians and saves the day. T'Pol meanwhile flies Enterprise into the area around the guide sphere which is no heavily distorted. Trip needs a few minutes and the sphere builders show up to try and stop them, but of course at literally the last possible second the plan works saving them and destroying the spheres. Archer, Malcolm, Hoshi and some unnamed MACO's beam into the weapon and Archer starts the overload sequence. There is a lot of fighting but it eventually comes down to Archer versus the head reptile. Archer wins but is maybe killed in the explosion. On Enterprise the aquatics show up to take them back to Earth, but when they arrive they aren't greeted and when Trip and Tucker take a shuttle down they are shot at by P-51's. Cut to a german field hospital in WWII where Archer is lying wounded surrounded by nazi's, one of whom is revealed to be a alien as we cut to commercials.
Review: A satisfying conclusion to a season that was overall better than the first two, but still had some serious low points. Actually looking forward to next season and a new writing team!
7 out of 10
Wednesday, February 22, 2017
ENT: Countdown
I will admit that they did find a way to make the wait for the conclusion actually make sense. I had assumed that when they launched the weapon into space it was launched, but no, it was apparently not activated yet which kinda makes sense. What doesn't make sense is how they built a room to hold it with giant doors on the surface of a planet after having constructed it under water. Why not just keep it in space? Or under water again? Not really sure about that. I hadn't really realized that Hayes had become a fairly important character until a few episodes ago, but honestly he has the best arc of any of the characters on the show at this point including his definitive conclusion/death saving Hoshi as a member of the crew in this episode. I actually really liked how the insectoid Xindi turned on the reptiles when they saw that they were wrong, kinda rare in fiction like this for bad guys to be shown as actually smart and self interested.
We open with Hoshi on the reptilian ship. She refuses to help of course, but they inject her with brain parasites to make her more compliant. Archer meanwhile is trying to convince the aquatics to join him and they seem interested, but only if he can turn off the spheres. Trip and T'Pol are working on that and fighting a lot as T'Pol loses control of her emotions which she finally admits to Trip, but not the reason. Malcolm has a bit of a confrontation with Hayes, but it is clear they two are on the same side now, just both stressed at the loss of the MACO on the previous mission. Malcolm gives Hayes the job of getting Hoshi back which is something he clearly wants to do, but his job is on the bridge right now. Hoshi meanwhile is now working with the reptilians. Well, at first she keeps resisting, but eventually gets the aquatic launch code decrypted. The sphere builders meanwhile turn on the spheres to protect the weapon. The MACO's manages to get Hoshi back, but Hayes is killed on the mission. The reptilians manage to get the weapon launched and into the subspace corridor as the insectoid leader realizes Archer was right about the sphere builders, but too late, his ship is destroyed by the reptiles.
Review: Only one more episode left in this story arc and while I object to how long they took to get here, it does at least seem to be coming together. Certainly a lot better than the dumb temporal cold war.
6 out of 10
We open with Hoshi on the reptilian ship. She refuses to help of course, but they inject her with brain parasites to make her more compliant. Archer meanwhile is trying to convince the aquatics to join him and they seem interested, but only if he can turn off the spheres. Trip and T'Pol are working on that and fighting a lot as T'Pol loses control of her emotions which she finally admits to Trip, but not the reason. Malcolm has a bit of a confrontation with Hayes, but it is clear they two are on the same side now, just both stressed at the loss of the MACO on the previous mission. Malcolm gives Hayes the job of getting Hoshi back which is something he clearly wants to do, but his job is on the bridge right now. Hoshi meanwhile is now working with the reptilians. Well, at first she keeps resisting, but eventually gets the aquatic launch code decrypted. The sphere builders meanwhile turn on the spheres to protect the weapon. The MACO's manages to get Hoshi back, but Hayes is killed on the mission. The reptilians manage to get the weapon launched and into the subspace corridor as the insectoid leader realizes Archer was right about the sphere builders, but too late, his ship is destroyed by the reptiles.
Review: Only one more episode left in this story arc and while I object to how long they took to get here, it does at least seem to be coming together. Certainly a lot better than the dumb temporal cold war.
6 out of 10
Tuesday, February 21, 2017
ENT: The Council
In terms of making the Xindi story line actually pay off in some way this episode may be as good as it gets. Not that in theory the following episode shouldn't be even better, but I am low on faith in this show by now. Unlike the past few which were entirely reflections on how the crew are handling things, now they actually have to do something. Also I was wrong about how things went down in this episode and that is a good thing. I get tired of episodes that you can see how they end in the first five minutes. Especially a story that has taken so long to pay off, it better conclude well. Trek has historically had problems with concluding big story arcs so I hope this is the exception. Also, I am pretty sure there are two more episodes this season and I am not sure how there is enough story. I am going to be hella pissed if tomorrow somehow manages to be filler.
We open with Degra leading the way to the Xindi council while T'Pol, Travis, Malcolm and some Maco guy we haven't met before go to try and get information from inside one of the spheres. There is lots of foreshadowing that the dude is going to die and sure enough, but I am getting ahead of myself. When Enterprise gets close to the council the reptilians show up and try to stop them, but the combined primate, arboreal and aquatic force prevails and they enter without incident. Archer and Hoshi take a shuttle into talk to the council. It seems to be going ok until the reptilian councilor gets pissed and storms off. Afterwards Degra talks with Archer and explains they need a good visual, the aquatics in particular find them more convincing that words and he starts working with Trip and Phlox on a plan. T'Pol guides them through a hologram covered entrance to the sphere in an unnecessarily stressful way, but I guess she is a jerk now that she has emotions. They get inside and find the core, but are being followed by some sort of killbot. In the council chamber Archer and Degra present an hologram of the sphere builder from the pod and it seems to do the trick, the reptilians even agree to hold off on launching the weapon. But of course behind the scenes they have been talking with the sphere builders and this is a ruse. Their leader stabs Degra to death for the destruction of the reptilian ship and they call the council to announce they are unilaterally launching the weapon. The Maco is predictably killed by the killbot but the others escape just in time to see Enterprise chasing the weapon as it disappears into a subspace corridor.
Review: Lots of action but also lots of story. For literally the first time watching this show I am looking forward to tuning in tomorrow to see where this goes. Probably downhill, but so far so good.
7 out of 10
We open with Degra leading the way to the Xindi council while T'Pol, Travis, Malcolm and some Maco guy we haven't met before go to try and get information from inside one of the spheres. There is lots of foreshadowing that the dude is going to die and sure enough, but I am getting ahead of myself. When Enterprise gets close to the council the reptilians show up and try to stop them, but the combined primate, arboreal and aquatic force prevails and they enter without incident. Archer and Hoshi take a shuttle into talk to the council. It seems to be going ok until the reptilian councilor gets pissed and storms off. Afterwards Degra talks with Archer and explains they need a good visual, the aquatics in particular find them more convincing that words and he starts working with Trip and Phlox on a plan. T'Pol guides them through a hologram covered entrance to the sphere in an unnecessarily stressful way, but I guess she is a jerk now that she has emotions. They get inside and find the core, but are being followed by some sort of killbot. In the council chamber Archer and Degra present an hologram of the sphere builder from the pod and it seems to do the trick, the reptilians even agree to hold off on launching the weapon. But of course behind the scenes they have been talking with the sphere builders and this is a ruse. Their leader stabs Degra to death for the destruction of the reptilian ship and they call the council to announce they are unilaterally launching the weapon. The Maco is predictably killed by the killbot but the others escape just in time to see Enterprise chasing the weapon as it disappears into a subspace corridor.
Review: Lots of action but also lots of story. For literally the first time watching this show I am looking forward to tuning in tomorrow to see where this goes. Probably downhill, but so far so good.
7 out of 10
Monday, February 20, 2017
ENT: E²
I guess B&B couldn't resist sneaking one more time travel story in before the end of season 3. Actually I wouldn't be at all shocked if the conclusion somehow involved time travel as well. This is another episode that feels crippled by being part of the larger story arc. It neither stands on its own nor actually moves the story forward in any way which turns what would otherwise be maybe an interesting episode into pure filler. The Enterprise from the past succeeds at its mission either way which is to make sure they never exist, but that also means they presumably never existed. Trek rules means they get to keep the stuff from that timeline though presumably. Also I never bought the idea that past Enterprise was going to screw them over. It just didn't make any sense.
We open with a very old T'Pol telling her son that they have failed to stop the probe going to earth and their only choice is to find Archer. In the present Trip is trying to help T'Pol deal with what she is going through, but she isn't interested. As Enterprise approaches the nebula with the wormhole they are intercepted by another ship from Earth, well, not another ship, themselves but with a different crew. It seems when they entered the nebula it sent them back 130 years in time in addition to several light years distance. Their captain, Lorian, is the son of Trip and T'Pol. He tells them not to enter the wormhole but to instead let his people modify Enterprise to go warp 6.5 but Archer has his doubts. Meanwhile the Xindi are discussing Archer. Degra is determined to let him address the council, but none of the rest of them seem interested.
The two Enterprise crews are getting to know each other and it is clear things have been pretty rough for past Enterprise. Lorian is also evidently not interested in Archer hesitating to listen to him. T'Pol tells Archer that there may be a way other than high warp which pisses Lorian off. When Archer opts for T'Pol's plan instead of Lorian's things go bad. Lorian sends teams to steal present Enterprise's plasma injectors and after a fight both ships end up disabled. Eventually they work things out and team up to get present Enterprise through the wormhole, but the other ship never makes it. We close with Degra arriving just as he promised.
Review: Not awful, but didn't really do all that much either which is clearly a problem. In the end they could have just skipped this one any maybe saved a bit more screen time for the conclusion.
4 out of 10
We open with a very old T'Pol telling her son that they have failed to stop the probe going to earth and their only choice is to find Archer. In the present Trip is trying to help T'Pol deal with what she is going through, but she isn't interested. As Enterprise approaches the nebula with the wormhole they are intercepted by another ship from Earth, well, not another ship, themselves but with a different crew. It seems when they entered the nebula it sent them back 130 years in time in addition to several light years distance. Their captain, Lorian, is the son of Trip and T'Pol. He tells them not to enter the wormhole but to instead let his people modify Enterprise to go warp 6.5 but Archer has his doubts. Meanwhile the Xindi are discussing Archer. Degra is determined to let him address the council, but none of the rest of them seem interested.
The two Enterprise crews are getting to know each other and it is clear things have been pretty rough for past Enterprise. Lorian is also evidently not interested in Archer hesitating to listen to him. T'Pol tells Archer that there may be a way other than high warp which pisses Lorian off. When Archer opts for T'Pol's plan instead of Lorian's things go bad. Lorian sends teams to steal present Enterprise's plasma injectors and after a fight both ships end up disabled. Eventually they work things out and team up to get present Enterprise through the wormhole, but the other ship never makes it. We close with Degra arriving just as he promised.
Review: Not awful, but didn't really do all that much either which is clearly a problem. In the end they could have just skipped this one any maybe saved a bit more screen time for the conclusion.
4 out of 10
Sunday, February 19, 2017
ENT: The Forgotten
This episode could have just as easily been called the easily forgotten. The good parts were the bits dealing with how Trip, T'Pol and Malcolm are struggling to deal with the pressures of the situation they are in. The bad parts were everything to do with the main story and the Xindi. Since it turns out Archer doesn't actually have any proof of anything Daniels has told him and in fact the only reason he believes him I suspect is the race thing it seems like the arboreal Xindi has a real point. Why should they trust the humans? It seems the sphere builders have legitimately helped them already a few times.
We open with a flashback to Trip dreaming about the death of his sister and then it is straight into a memorial for the fallen after the credits. The ship is barely holding together and the crew aren't in much better shape. Trip especially hasn't slept in days and only gets more stressed when Archer assigns him the job of writing to one of his fallen engineer's family. They make it to the meeting Degra who brings the arboreal representative and Archer shows him all the evidence, but really it isn't that much and he isn't all that convinced. A reptillian ship shows up and they work together to destroy it so we see Degra is at least serious. There is an incident with a plasma fire on the outside of the ship and Trip and Malcolm go to repair but Malcolm doesn't watch out for his own safety and passes out from too much heat. Lots of being stressed out and not much actual story.
Review: Not much happened honestly other than a look at how the crew are handling the stress.
4 out of 10
We open with a flashback to Trip dreaming about the death of his sister and then it is straight into a memorial for the fallen after the credits. The ship is barely holding together and the crew aren't in much better shape. Trip especially hasn't slept in days and only gets more stressed when Archer assigns him the job of writing to one of his fallen engineer's family. They make it to the meeting Degra who brings the arboreal representative and Archer shows him all the evidence, but really it isn't that much and he isn't all that convinced. A reptillian ship shows up and they work together to destroy it so we see Degra is at least serious. There is an incident with a plasma fire on the outside of the ship and Trip and Malcolm go to repair but Malcolm doesn't watch out for his own safety and passes out from too much heat. Lots of being stressed out and not much actual story.
Review: Not much happened honestly other than a look at how the crew are handling the stress.
4 out of 10
Saturday, February 18, 2017
ENT: Damage
Having T'Pol get addicted to trellium seems kinda silly, but it does at least explain her emotional outburst the previous episode. It seems like a strange way to get around an emotional block that is created by mental focus, but people are weird when it comes to stuff like this. The GreatestGen guys would probably call her the ultimate vape bro for injecting her vaped rock right into her blood. I really wonder what the hell the Xindi council was thinking sending Archer back to Enterprise. I guess it makes it easier to write with him home, but it seems like they really do need information from him. Also Archer turning pirate is hardly surprising. When he sets his mind to something he does it, even if it turns out to be a horrible idea.
We open with Enterprise it tatters and T'Pol not really holding herself together much better than the ship. Some of the Xindi council members yell at the bad reptile Xindi guy about beating up Archer and we learn they have taken possession of him. We see Archer briefly in an Aquatic Xindi space ship (which raises some questions, but doesn't seem impossible). He passes out quickly and we cut back to Enterprise. It seems that while many systems can be repaired there is just no way to get the warp engines going again without a new core. They are surprised by the arrival of a small ship which turns out to have a badly hurt Archer inside. He takes over fairly quickly and quickly notices something is wrong with T'Pol. She sneaks off in a space suit into a part of the ship in vacuum to retrieve her stash of some sort of green rocks we see her vape and inject. Enterprise encounters another badly damaged ship and offers a bunch of trellium-d in exchange for their warp core but the aliens aren't interested. They part ways as T'Pol tells Archer about a message hidden in the pod he was returned in that gives a meeting location and time, but they can't possibly make it without warp drive. Archer decides to go steal the core from the aliens. They aren't happy about it, but the plan works. T'Pol also has to go to Phlox eventually and he is shocked that she has been freebasing trellium to get an emotional rush and has probably done permanent damage to herself.
Review: Mostly stuff moving things towards the conclusion of the season, but not a bad episode. I am going to give it an extra point for fixing problems with the previous episode.
5 out of 10
We open with Enterprise it tatters and T'Pol not really holding herself together much better than the ship. Some of the Xindi council members yell at the bad reptile Xindi guy about beating up Archer and we learn they have taken possession of him. We see Archer briefly in an Aquatic Xindi space ship (which raises some questions, but doesn't seem impossible). He passes out quickly and we cut back to Enterprise. It seems that while many systems can be repaired there is just no way to get the warp engines going again without a new core. They are surprised by the arrival of a small ship which turns out to have a badly hurt Archer inside. He takes over fairly quickly and quickly notices something is wrong with T'Pol. She sneaks off in a space suit into a part of the ship in vacuum to retrieve her stash of some sort of green rocks we see her vape and inject. Enterprise encounters another badly damaged ship and offers a bunch of trellium-d in exchange for their warp core but the aliens aren't interested. They part ways as T'Pol tells Archer about a message hidden in the pod he was returned in that gives a meeting location and time, but they can't possibly make it without warp drive. Archer decides to go steal the core from the aliens. They aren't happy about it, but the plan works. T'Pol also has to go to Phlox eventually and he is shocked that she has been freebasing trellium to get an emotional rush and has probably done permanent damage to herself.
Review: Mostly stuff moving things towards the conclusion of the season, but not a bad episode. I am going to give it an extra point for fixing problems with the previous episode.
5 out of 10
Friday, February 17, 2017
ENT: Azati Prime
Not an awful way to move things forward, but I do have two strong objections. First of all there is no reason for Archer to do this himself, especially since they should have just destroyed the weapon when they were there the first time. Going back obviously a bad idea. And the point that is raised and then ignored, I think by the arboreal Xindi, that Archer is only negotiating because his plan to destroy the weapon failed is a pretty big problem for the episode. He was obviously there to destroy the weapon and all the talking he is doing afterwards should clearly just come across as the cries of a desperate man. Second and honestly more important, what the hell were they thinking having a scene where T'Pol cries because Archer is leaving. Literally last episode she was willing to mutiny against him for acting against the mission. Plus we have literally only seen Vulcans cry when they are badly ill and about to die. If that turns out to be the big reveal I may go back and edit this, but as of now it is just out of character and wrong.
We open with Enterprise arriving at the Azati system with the promised red giant. They figure out which planet the weapon is probably on pretty quick from the super dense web of tracking satellites. Luckily they still have the captured Xindi insectoid shuttle so Trip and Tucker take it in for a closer look. They have no problem flying right up to the weapon in fact despite it being underwater and get all the scans they need. When they get back Archer gets taken to the future by Daniels who tells him the spheres are being used to modify space for the transdimensional aliens and the Xindi will end up teaming up with the humans in the future to stop them. He gives Archer an artifact from the future but for whatever reason Archer doesn't believe him or something. Trip and Tucker return so for whatever reason Archer decides to take the shuttle on a suicide mission to destroy the weapon leaving tearful T'Pol in charge. Archer's dumb plan doesn't work and he is captured so T'Pol decides to go in and negotiate or something? Trip tries to stop her but she refuses to listen until they come under attack by the Xindi. Archer meanwhile convinces Degra somehow that maybe he is telling the truth. Unfortunately the reptilian Xindi are apparently calling the shots and take Degra and company into custody while continuing the attack on a crippled Enterprise.
Review: A few big problems keep this from being as good as it might have been. I had a really hard time accepting how quickly the Xindi were willing to listen to Archer, but maybe their cultural weakness is they are suckers for the last good pitch they heard.
4 out of 10
We open with Enterprise arriving at the Azati system with the promised red giant. They figure out which planet the weapon is probably on pretty quick from the super dense web of tracking satellites. Luckily they still have the captured Xindi insectoid shuttle so Trip and Tucker take it in for a closer look. They have no problem flying right up to the weapon in fact despite it being underwater and get all the scans they need. When they get back Archer gets taken to the future by Daniels who tells him the spheres are being used to modify space for the transdimensional aliens and the Xindi will end up teaming up with the humans in the future to stop them. He gives Archer an artifact from the future but for whatever reason Archer doesn't believe him or something. Trip and Tucker return so for whatever reason Archer decides to take the shuttle on a suicide mission to destroy the weapon leaving tearful T'Pol in charge. Archer's dumb plan doesn't work and he is captured so T'Pol decides to go in and negotiate or something? Trip tries to stop her but she refuses to listen until they come under attack by the Xindi. Archer meanwhile convinces Degra somehow that maybe he is telling the truth. Unfortunately the reptilian Xindi are apparently calling the shots and take Degra and company into custody while continuing the attack on a crippled Enterprise.
Review: A few big problems keep this from being as good as it might have been. I had a really hard time accepting how quickly the Xindi were willing to listen to Archer, but maybe their cultural weakness is they are suckers for the last good pitch they heard.
4 out of 10
Thursday, February 16, 2017
ENT: Hatchery
How the hell are the crew supposed to be able to tell that Archer is acting crazy? It is basically his every day routine honestly. I guess it is just that the focus of his madness shifted in an unacceptable way. Also, this has come up so many times before, but Starfleet really needs a better procedure for what you do when the captain has his or her mind or body taken over or replaced by an alien. You shouldn't have to mutiny to stop the "captain" from ruining everything all the time. In theory it is the most acceptable on Enterprise since it is the earliest time it has happened as far as we know, but it continues through all the series as a regular plot device. Also, they commit one of the cardinal sins of science fiction, taking off your helmets on an alien world/spaceship and immediately getting infected with something that you inhale/get sprayed with/have literally crammed down your throat. This is an automatic point off for the episode, writers take note.
We open with the discovery of an crashed Xindi ship that turns out to be insetoid. Archer leads a team down on a shuttle and they find several adult bodies before entering a pressurized section of the ship. For no clear reason they take their helmets off and find a hatchery of Xindi Insectoid eggs. Archer gets sprayed by some goop from one but seems fine after going to sickbay. However he becomes suddenly obsessed with saving the eggs from destruction, even at the possible cost of the failure of their mission to save Earth. When T'Pol questions him he has her relieved of duty and confined to quarters. Archer orders much of Enterprise's anti-matter, literally the fuel that makes the ship go, transferred to the Xindi ship to save the eggs. When some Xindi show up and attack Malcolm destroys their ship and is relieved of his post for the trouble. Trip and Phlox decide they need to do something and threaten Archer with removal from command if he doesn't go through with a medical screening so he threatens to have them confined to quarters. Luckily Archer heads back to the hatchery leaving Hayes in charge of the bridge. Trip and Phlox free T'Pol and Malcolm and set about taking over the ship. The only real trouble is the bridge, but they prevail as Trip knocks out Archer in the surface. Phlox discovers that the stuff Archer got sprayed with made him think he was the insects mother or something and he has fixed it.
Review: Would have been more fun if it hadn't been done a bunch of times before, but fairly well carried out in any case. Taking off the helmet only to get sprayed was already a cliche at that point so for sure one point off for that.
4 out of 10
We open with the discovery of an crashed Xindi ship that turns out to be insetoid. Archer leads a team down on a shuttle and they find several adult bodies before entering a pressurized section of the ship. For no clear reason they take their helmets off and find a hatchery of Xindi Insectoid eggs. Archer gets sprayed by some goop from one but seems fine after going to sickbay. However he becomes suddenly obsessed with saving the eggs from destruction, even at the possible cost of the failure of their mission to save Earth. When T'Pol questions him he has her relieved of duty and confined to quarters. Archer orders much of Enterprise's anti-matter, literally the fuel that makes the ship go, transferred to the Xindi ship to save the eggs. When some Xindi show up and attack Malcolm destroys their ship and is relieved of his post for the trouble. Trip and Phlox decide they need to do something and threaten Archer with removal from command if he doesn't go through with a medical screening so he threatens to have them confined to quarters. Luckily Archer heads back to the hatchery leaving Hayes in charge of the bridge. Trip and Phlox free T'Pol and Malcolm and set about taking over the ship. The only real trouble is the bridge, but they prevail as Trip knocks out Archer in the surface. Phlox discovers that the stuff Archer got sprayed with made him think he was the insects mother or something and he has fixed it.
Review: Would have been more fun if it hadn't been done a bunch of times before, but fairly well carried out in any case. Taking off the helmet only to get sprayed was already a cliche at that point so for sure one point off for that.
4 out of 10
Wednesday, February 15, 2017
ENT: Doctor's Orders
Pretty much any other member of the crew being essentially the only one in the episode might have been a problem, but luckily Phlox is a pretty decent character. Plus they gave him phantom T'Pol, oh wait, spoilers. I guess I have always assumed no one would ever read this without having watched the episode. Well, realistically no one will probably read this either way. Also, if you are upset about spoilers for a 13 year old episode of the worst Trek series you have bigger problems in your life. As usual for episodes that are essentially entirely hallucinations I am going to do a bit of a short write up, but remember that this one is at least decent.
We open with an empty ship other than Porthos and Phlox who enter Archers quarters so Porthos can visit his master, who is in some sort of Coma. It seems a few days earlier they encountered a region with dense anomalies which would damage the brains of almost all of the crew. Phlox suggested that they be put into temporary comas to protect their brains and he would run the ship for the few days it would take to get through the region. He isn't taking it all that well though as he starts hearing things, but eventually runs into T'Pol who is apparently not in a coma either. She scolds him for messing about in engineering. After she leaves Phlox sees an insectoid Xindi in Hoshi's quarters and ends up searching the ship with T'Pol. After almost shooting Porthos Phlox starts really freaking out and seeing things all over before heading to sickbay and scanning his mind. It seems he is being effected, but not as strongly. He prepares to put himself into a Coma but T'Pol tells him she is also having problems and needs his help. The two discover that the ship isn't making the progress they need for the crew to survive and end up running the warp engines since the space is apparently expanding. Cut to Phlox waking Archer with the news they are clear of the anomalies. He runs into T'Pol who is exhausted and offers to walk her to her quarters. When he arrives though he finds that she is in an induced coma and the T'Pol he worked with the entire time has vanished.
Review: A decent episode overall, but the twist wasn't all that shocking. Pretty good for ENT, pretty average for Trek.
5 out of 10
We open with an empty ship other than Porthos and Phlox who enter Archers quarters so Porthos can visit his master, who is in some sort of Coma. It seems a few days earlier they encountered a region with dense anomalies which would damage the brains of almost all of the crew. Phlox suggested that they be put into temporary comas to protect their brains and he would run the ship for the few days it would take to get through the region. He isn't taking it all that well though as he starts hearing things, but eventually runs into T'Pol who is apparently not in a coma either. She scolds him for messing about in engineering. After she leaves Phlox sees an insectoid Xindi in Hoshi's quarters and ends up searching the ship with T'Pol. After almost shooting Porthos Phlox starts really freaking out and seeing things all over before heading to sickbay and scanning his mind. It seems he is being effected, but not as strongly. He prepares to put himself into a Coma but T'Pol tells him she is also having problems and needs his help. The two discover that the ship isn't making the progress they need for the crew to survive and end up running the warp engines since the space is apparently expanding. Cut to Phlox waking Archer with the news they are clear of the anomalies. He runs into T'Pol who is exhausted and offers to walk her to her quarters. When he arrives though he finds that she is in an induced coma and the T'Pol he worked with the entire time has vanished.
Review: A decent episode overall, but the twist wasn't all that shocking. Pretty good for ENT, pretty average for Trek.
5 out of 10
Tuesday, February 14, 2017
ENT: Harbinger
I was starting to debate which was getting more annoying: waiting for Trip and T'Pol to hook up, or Malcolm and Hayes either actually killing each other or working shit out. I have to say I was shocked to see both stories work on in fairly satisfying ways in a single episode. Plus a C story about some inter-dimensional alien who may be from the race that got the Xindi on the path of destroying Earth. All three of these stories even manage to intertwine in ways that actually make sense. It is unclear just how interested in Corporal Cole Trip actually is, but you can't really blame him for giving up on whatever interest he may have had in T'Pol. She isn't exactly emotionally accessible.
We open with Trip giving out some Vulcan neuropressure, but not to T'Pol. Instead he is hanging out with one of the Maco's (I know I keep calling them marines and I still think that is what they should have gone with, but they are turning out to be an actually good part of the show so I will give up my hate fest for their dumb name). It seem he and the beautiful Amanda Cole have been hanging out a lot lately and literally everyone on the ship seems to know about it. Somewhere in here we get that Malcolm is pissed that Hayes has asked the captain to do combat training with the security personnel and senior staff which Malcolm feels is his duty. Also they encounter an area of extreme density of spacial anomalies. After taking some damage they find a strange pod with life signs and grapple the hell out of it. Inside they find an alien that Phlox gets to work on, but not after mentioning Corporal Cole's neuropressure sessions with Trip to T'Pol because they seem to be causing Cole headaches, this visibly upsets T'Pol.
At the training session Malcolm and Hayes are feuding all but openly. Trip and Cole though spend the entire time flirting while T'Pol flashes jealous eyes. The alien wakes up and is alarmed to not be in the pod and insists on getting back in, but for some reason I missed Archer is sure he knows something and probably something related to the Xindi. Trip and T'Pol meanwhile are having another neuropressure session and T'Pol is obviously upset about Cole but won't admit it. Instead she tells Trip about Sim telling her that he is attracted to her which makes Trip jealous and then they start kissing and more. Cut to Malcolm working out in the training room when Hayes shows up and the two start sparring, but really just beating the shit out of each other.
The alien meanwhile wakes up and knocks out Phlox before phasing through the ship which sounds alarms which bring Malcolm and Hayes back to their senses. The two team up to fight the alien, and badly damage the engine, but the important thing is they are doing things together. The next morning Trip and T'Pol have an awkward conversation in the mess hall and Trip is visibly upset that she doesn't seem interested in a relationship, but she is in for more "neuropressure." In the captains office badly bruised Malcolm and Hayes are being chewed out for getting in such a serious brawl at a critical time. But it is clear that he two have worked out their differences. Archer is called to sickbay by Phlox, the alien is awake again, but won't be alive for long. Archer confronts him one last time to be told that Earth will be destroyed and it is kinda implyed maybe these trans-dimensional beings were responsibly for the Xindi.
Review: I should have payed attention at the opening credits, but it turns out this was also written by Manny Coto and I can't wait for him to take over the show overall. This episode resolves so many loose plot threads in ways more satisfying than seemed possible, especially on ENT.
6 out of 10
We open with Trip giving out some Vulcan neuropressure, but not to T'Pol. Instead he is hanging out with one of the Maco's (I know I keep calling them marines and I still think that is what they should have gone with, but they are turning out to be an actually good part of the show so I will give up my hate fest for their dumb name). It seem he and the beautiful Amanda Cole have been hanging out a lot lately and literally everyone on the ship seems to know about it. Somewhere in here we get that Malcolm is pissed that Hayes has asked the captain to do combat training with the security personnel and senior staff which Malcolm feels is his duty. Also they encounter an area of extreme density of spacial anomalies. After taking some damage they find a strange pod with life signs and grapple the hell out of it. Inside they find an alien that Phlox gets to work on, but not after mentioning Corporal Cole's neuropressure sessions with Trip to T'Pol because they seem to be causing Cole headaches, this visibly upsets T'Pol.
At the training session Malcolm and Hayes are feuding all but openly. Trip and Cole though spend the entire time flirting while T'Pol flashes jealous eyes. The alien wakes up and is alarmed to not be in the pod and insists on getting back in, but for some reason I missed Archer is sure he knows something and probably something related to the Xindi. Trip and T'Pol meanwhile are having another neuropressure session and T'Pol is obviously upset about Cole but won't admit it. Instead she tells Trip about Sim telling her that he is attracted to her which makes Trip jealous and then they start kissing and more. Cut to Malcolm working out in the training room when Hayes shows up and the two start sparring, but really just beating the shit out of each other.
The alien meanwhile wakes up and knocks out Phlox before phasing through the ship which sounds alarms which bring Malcolm and Hayes back to their senses. The two team up to fight the alien, and badly damage the engine, but the important thing is they are doing things together. The next morning Trip and T'Pol have an awkward conversation in the mess hall and Trip is visibly upset that she doesn't seem interested in a relationship, but she is in for more "neuropressure." In the captains office badly bruised Malcolm and Hayes are being chewed out for getting in such a serious brawl at a critical time. But it is clear that he two have worked out their differences. Archer is called to sickbay by Phlox, the alien is awake again, but won't be alive for long. Archer confronts him one last time to be told that Earth will be destroyed and it is kinda implyed maybe these trans-dimensional beings were responsibly for the Xindi.
Review: I should have payed attention at the opening credits, but it turns out this was also written by Manny Coto and I can't wait for him to take over the show overall. This episode resolves so many loose plot threads in ways more satisfying than seemed possible, especially on ENT.
6 out of 10
Monday, February 13, 2017
ENT: Stratagem
From the beginning it was obvious something was up with the opening of this episode. But with all the time travel going on it wasn't initially obvious if that was the way they were going to get out of saying Earth had been destroyed again. As a result I was totally ok with it ending up that Archer had captured a Xindi commander and wiped his memory. It was also good to see the whole thing fall apart. It didn't seem reasonable that you could keep a guy like that fooled for very long. The final trick probably shouldn't have worked, but Degra was pretty shaken up by that point and it wasn't clear what exactly he remembered so maybe it would work. I can't help but wonder if tomorrow I am going to see another side plot episode though that doesn't continue the main story at all. We shall see.
We open with Archer and the weapon designer Degra in an alien shuttle. Archer explains that they both just escaped from an Xindi Insectoid jail and that Degra had his memory wiped by torture. Sure enough a blood worm soon starts wriggling under Degra's skin until Archer cuts it out. Degra doesn't want to believe Archer, but after they almost both die and Archer saves him from a coolant leak he seems more pliable. And when he goes to sleep Archer injects him with something and opens the door onto Enterprise's cargo bay. Cut to a few days earlier and Enterprise is still at the proving ground when Degra shows up in a shuttle or something to inspect the site. He and his crew are captured but refuse to talk, so Archer gets Phlox to erase his short term memory and we go back to the opening.
Back in the simulator Archer convinces Degra that three years have passed and there is a Xindi civil war going on in the aftermath of the destruction of Earth. He eventually programs in the coordinates to his families home planet into the simulator, but he encrypts them to keep them from Archer, luckily this isn't a problem for T'Pol. The problem is they aren't sure if that is also where the weapon is and can't figure a way to find out. Luckily for them I guess the simulator breaks and Degra figures it out. Eventually they bring him to the bridge and he sees what appears to be his families star system on the screen and bursts out that they will never get through the weapons defense screens and then they turn the viewer back to what is really outside, the same blasted moon proving grounds that were there before. We close with all the Xindi getting their memories wiped again and left on their ship as Enterprise heads for the weapon.
Review: I think the word for this episode is competent. Nothing goes horribly wrong with the story and the characters aren't insane. But it also didn't feel all that inspired or great.
5 out of 10
We open with Archer and the weapon designer Degra in an alien shuttle. Archer explains that they both just escaped from an Xindi Insectoid jail and that Degra had his memory wiped by torture. Sure enough a blood worm soon starts wriggling under Degra's skin until Archer cuts it out. Degra doesn't want to believe Archer, but after they almost both die and Archer saves him from a coolant leak he seems more pliable. And when he goes to sleep Archer injects him with something and opens the door onto Enterprise's cargo bay. Cut to a few days earlier and Enterprise is still at the proving ground when Degra shows up in a shuttle or something to inspect the site. He and his crew are captured but refuse to talk, so Archer gets Phlox to erase his short term memory and we go back to the opening.
Back in the simulator Archer convinces Degra that three years have passed and there is a Xindi civil war going on in the aftermath of the destruction of Earth. He eventually programs in the coordinates to his families home planet into the simulator, but he encrypts them to keep them from Archer, luckily this isn't a problem for T'Pol. The problem is they aren't sure if that is also where the weapon is and can't figure a way to find out. Luckily for them I guess the simulator breaks and Degra figures it out. Eventually they bring him to the bridge and he sees what appears to be his families star system on the screen and bursts out that they will never get through the weapons defense screens and then they turn the viewer back to what is really outside, the same blasted moon proving grounds that were there before. We close with all the Xindi getting their memories wiped again and left on their ship as Enterprise heads for the weapon.
Review: I think the word for this episode is competent. Nothing goes horribly wrong with the story and the characters aren't insane. But it also didn't feel all that inspired or great.
5 out of 10
Sunday, February 12, 2017
ENT: Proving Ground
Of the Berman/Braga races the only one that really works is strangely one they nabbed from TOS, the Andorians. In this episode they again arrive with both confidence, but also competence. Their distrust of Vulcans is very justified and they are shown to be individuals capable of making their own decisions unlike so many races that are super strong mono-cultures. I was thinking Archer was just being a classic jerk when he insisted on being in charge, but sure enough he was betrayed. And the betrayal wasn't a mustache twirling one, it actually makes sense that the Andorians would want a super weapon to at least keep them safe from the Vulcans. Finally, the conclusion actually worked well I thought. Detonating the weapon inside the Andorian ship is exactly what they needed to do. The only thing missing was the reaction of the Xindi. I suspect we will get that in a later episode so I am not that worried, but it felt like something that belonged in this episode.
We open with Enterprise back to their allegedly main mission of tracking down the Xindi weapon. They miscalculate though and get stuck in an anomaly only to get rescued by the Andorian Commander Shran. He is super friendly and offers to help them with repairs. And he is true to his word, the crew of Enterprise and uniformly impressed with the work. Malcolm even hits it off with their head of security, it turns out they are both from long military families. While work continues they detect a group of Xindi ships and what appears to be a version of the weapon. We cut to the Xindi counsel who are preparing to watch what they hope will be a full power test. But they are interrupted by Shran showing up (with Archer and T'Pol observing) and pretending to be miners (kinda unreasonable since he is in an advanced warship, but it worked for me at the time). After getting scans they bug out and the Xindi proceed with their test. Only something goes wrong and it almost overloads and has to be shut down.
The weapon turns out to be dangerously radioactive after use so it has to cool off for a while. This makes Archer want to fly in and grab it, but Shran points out Enterprise is insufficiently shielded for such things and offers the use of his ship. Archer agrees on the condition that he be in command which Shran hesitantly agrees to. We see Malcolms lady friend messing with something in the armory about the same time Shran takes a call from space central ordering him to seize the weapon which he is hesitant to do. The plan goes great in terms of Enterprise disabling the Xindi while Shran grabs the weapon, and takes off for Andoria. He dumps Archer in an escape pod confident that Enterprise's sensors and disabled. But Malcolm wasn't slipping and already has things working. Enterprise catches the Andorians who seem unworried, until Archer uses the captured activation codes to turn the weapon on inside their ship. Shran dumps it just in time, but his ship is damaged. He refuses to the offer of repairs, but a few days later Archer receives a coded Andorian transmission with detailed scans on the weapon, presumably from Shran.
Review: Still not sure I can strongly recommend these episodes, but things are coming together a bit. That and Shran turning into an actually interesting character made this an actually good episode.
6 out of 10
We open with Enterprise back to their allegedly main mission of tracking down the Xindi weapon. They miscalculate though and get stuck in an anomaly only to get rescued by the Andorian Commander Shran. He is super friendly and offers to help them with repairs. And he is true to his word, the crew of Enterprise and uniformly impressed with the work. Malcolm even hits it off with their head of security, it turns out they are both from long military families. While work continues they detect a group of Xindi ships and what appears to be a version of the weapon. We cut to the Xindi counsel who are preparing to watch what they hope will be a full power test. But they are interrupted by Shran showing up (with Archer and T'Pol observing) and pretending to be miners (kinda unreasonable since he is in an advanced warship, but it worked for me at the time). After getting scans they bug out and the Xindi proceed with their test. Only something goes wrong and it almost overloads and has to be shut down.
The weapon turns out to be dangerously radioactive after use so it has to cool off for a while. This makes Archer want to fly in and grab it, but Shran points out Enterprise is insufficiently shielded for such things and offers the use of his ship. Archer agrees on the condition that he be in command which Shran hesitantly agrees to. We see Malcolms lady friend messing with something in the armory about the same time Shran takes a call from space central ordering him to seize the weapon which he is hesitant to do. The plan goes great in terms of Enterprise disabling the Xindi while Shran grabs the weapon, and takes off for Andoria. He dumps Archer in an escape pod confident that Enterprise's sensors and disabled. But Malcolm wasn't slipping and already has things working. Enterprise catches the Andorians who seem unworried, until Archer uses the captured activation codes to turn the weapon on inside their ship. Shran dumps it just in time, but his ship is damaged. He refuses to the offer of repairs, but a few days later Archer receives a coded Andorian transmission with detailed scans on the weapon, presumably from Shran.
Review: Still not sure I can strongly recommend these episodes, but things are coming together a bit. That and Shran turning into an actually interesting character made this an actually good episode.
6 out of 10
Saturday, February 11, 2017
ENT: Chosen Realm
I actually stopped part way through this episode and had to ponder for a few minutes. Archer did something using the transporter that was both super smart and actually used their technology in clever way that hadn't been done before. After I restarted I noticed that Archer was actually making tough decisions, and paying the price for it, but not giving up either. Then he used his space marines to help retake the ship after getting Phlox to work his magic on an anti-exploding gas. By the end I felt like I had watched an actual episode of Star Trek with a message and everything. I was sure this was just some anomaly, must just be luck or something, but no. It turns out Manny Coto wrote but this one and the previous interesting episode, and there's more, he is the guy who gets hired to replace Rick Berman and Brannon Braga for the fourth season. I know there is still more of their third season left, but there is at least light at the end of the tunnel!
We open with Trip and Tucker flying around one of the spheres in the expanse giving it a close scan. They return to Enterprise and we cut to the bridge of a Triannon ship. Their leader, Pri'Nam D'Jamat tells them that they have found what they are looking for and should prepare to take Enterprise. On Enterprise they detect the Triannon vessel in very bad shape. Archer is suspicious though and tells Malcolm to take all precautions. They dock with the ship and take the injured to sick bay, but their religious beliefs prevent the scans Phlox would like to do. Soon D'Jamat shows up in Archer's ready room and tells him that his people are all over Enterprise and are living bombs. To prove his point he signals one of his people to explode himself which kills a member of Enterprise as well. Archer gives in to the demands and surrenders Enterprise ordering Trip to help them, but also telling him it isn't over.
D'Jamat turns out to want the ship to kill a rival faction of his religion that believes the universe was created in 10 days, not 9 which is so Star Trek it hurts. It also turns out they consider the spheres hella holy and think what Enterprise did was sacrilegious which is punished by death. Luckily for them D'Jamat is feeling lenient and tells Archer to pick just one person to die. Archer picks himself and suggests a novel for of execution, the use of a device that disassembles matter completely and painlessly. D'Jamat agrees because he is a zealot, not an engineer and of course it turns out to be the transporter. Soon after they encounter members of the rival faction you D'Jamat begins to slaughter without mercy.
Fortunately for them Archer is loose on the ship first heading to some sort of auxiliary controls and knocks them out of warp and disables weapons and sensors. He frees Malcolm and sends him to get the marines. Archer sends a clever coded message to Phlox and finds out Phlox needs a scan of one of them to figure out how to make them less explosive so Archer knocks out one of the zealots before he can self destruct and scans him. Next Archer talks one of the zealots who seemed a little shaky on the commitment to self destruction into helping him distribute the enzyme that will disable the explosives. After some firefights they retake the ship and get the other faction to stand down. In the end Archer takes them where they wanted to go, their homeworld. Which is already a nuclear wasteland from the same war they were trying to drag Enterprise into.
Review: I am not sure I am ready to call this great, but it was an actually good episode of Star Trek in almost every what that I measure. The crew were smart, but also tried to help people. There was a clear message that would have fit perfecting into TOS. Man, I can't wait for season four.
7 out of 10
We open with Trip and Tucker flying around one of the spheres in the expanse giving it a close scan. They return to Enterprise and we cut to the bridge of a Triannon ship. Their leader, Pri'Nam D'Jamat tells them that they have found what they are looking for and should prepare to take Enterprise. On Enterprise they detect the Triannon vessel in very bad shape. Archer is suspicious though and tells Malcolm to take all precautions. They dock with the ship and take the injured to sick bay, but their religious beliefs prevent the scans Phlox would like to do. Soon D'Jamat shows up in Archer's ready room and tells him that his people are all over Enterprise and are living bombs. To prove his point he signals one of his people to explode himself which kills a member of Enterprise as well. Archer gives in to the demands and surrenders Enterprise ordering Trip to help them, but also telling him it isn't over.
D'Jamat turns out to want the ship to kill a rival faction of his religion that believes the universe was created in 10 days, not 9 which is so Star Trek it hurts. It also turns out they consider the spheres hella holy and think what Enterprise did was sacrilegious which is punished by death. Luckily for them D'Jamat is feeling lenient and tells Archer to pick just one person to die. Archer picks himself and suggests a novel for of execution, the use of a device that disassembles matter completely and painlessly. D'Jamat agrees because he is a zealot, not an engineer and of course it turns out to be the transporter. Soon after they encounter members of the rival faction you D'Jamat begins to slaughter without mercy.
Fortunately for them Archer is loose on the ship first heading to some sort of auxiliary controls and knocks them out of warp and disables weapons and sensors. He frees Malcolm and sends him to get the marines. Archer sends a clever coded message to Phlox and finds out Phlox needs a scan of one of them to figure out how to make them less explosive so Archer knocks out one of the zealots before he can self destruct and scans him. Next Archer talks one of the zealots who seemed a little shaky on the commitment to self destruction into helping him distribute the enzyme that will disable the explosives. After some firefights they retake the ship and get the other faction to stand down. In the end Archer takes them where they wanted to go, their homeworld. Which is already a nuclear wasteland from the same war they were trying to drag Enterprise into.
Review: I am not sure I am ready to call this great, but it was an actually good episode of Star Trek in almost every what that I measure. The crew were smart, but also tried to help people. There was a clear message that would have fit perfecting into TOS. Man, I can't wait for season four.
7 out of 10
Friday, February 10, 2017
ENT: Carpenter Street
First of all, it is totally reasonable when Archer asks why the Xindi are trying to make a virus (or is it a toxin, they don't seem sure) when they are making a super weapon to literally destroy earth. The fact that they point out this huge plot hole doesn't remove the plot hole though unfortunately. On the upside the actual episode worked pretty well. Maybe giving us a reason why Loomis decided serial kidnapping was the right call when he had a decent job already, but it didn't ruin things to not have that. They did well casting the guy who played the serial killer hologram in Revulsion. Here he also managed to seem believably desperate without seeming crazy or anything. For a time travel episode it worked pretty well, I think the idea of time changes propagating slowly is new to Trek, but it seemed like a reasonable way for a universe to work. Could have used less Archer of course, but at least he didn't have to rescue T'Pol which is something.
We open in 2004 Detroit with a guy who it turns out works at a blood bank (which is actually fairly smoothly inserted in) kidnapping a prostitute and dropping her off in warehouse with two other sedated people and the guy, named Loomis, leaving with a briefcase of cash. On Enterprise Daniels drops in on Archer hanging out with Porthos with the news about the Xindi in Detroit. Archer and T'Pol are sent back to try and stop them. They start by stealing some cash and a car with a magic stealing box. They use a scanner to track down the Xindi just as Loomis shows up with another victim. They follow him home and he flees out a window but T'Pol takes him down with a neck pinch. He assumes they are the cops despite some pretty obvious signs they aren't. He agrees to drop Archer off not sedated as though he was a victim. Archer finds three Xindi making what he can tell from across the room is a virus tailored to human blood types. He stuns one of the reptilian Xindi but the other two make off the with toxin (I know). T'Pol tries to help but gets into a fight with Loomis and has to stun him. Archer takes down another Xindi so we are on the way to the rooftop showdown. Of course Archer wins and gets the virus and the Xindi who are transported to Enterprise along with their equipment. We close with Loomis getting arrested.
Review: The story works in some ways and not others. Overall a lot more fun to watch that much of ENT, but it could have used another rewrite or two.
4 out of 10
We open in 2004 Detroit with a guy who it turns out works at a blood bank (which is actually fairly smoothly inserted in) kidnapping a prostitute and dropping her off in warehouse with two other sedated people and the guy, named Loomis, leaving with a briefcase of cash. On Enterprise Daniels drops in on Archer hanging out with Porthos with the news about the Xindi in Detroit. Archer and T'Pol are sent back to try and stop them. They start by stealing some cash and a car with a magic stealing box. They use a scanner to track down the Xindi just as Loomis shows up with another victim. They follow him home and he flees out a window but T'Pol takes him down with a neck pinch. He assumes they are the cops despite some pretty obvious signs they aren't. He agrees to drop Archer off not sedated as though he was a victim. Archer finds three Xindi making what he can tell from across the room is a virus tailored to human blood types. He stuns one of the reptilian Xindi but the other two make off the with toxin (I know). T'Pol tries to help but gets into a fight with Loomis and has to stun him. Archer takes down another Xindi so we are on the way to the rooftop showdown. Of course Archer wins and gets the virus and the Xindi who are transported to Enterprise along with their equipment. We close with Loomis getting arrested.
Review: The story works in some ways and not others. Overall a lot more fun to watch that much of ENT, but it could have used another rewrite or two.
4 out of 10
Thursday, February 9, 2017
ENT: Similitude
When they opened with Trip dead I was kinda worried that this would be the episode where he gets killed. This all stems from something I saw on the Wiki implying that he gets killed during the course of the series. This may not even be true, when I saw it I stopped reading to avoid spoilers. It also got my interest because I was hoping he would have an important death saving them all or something. And he actually did. But then Phlox and Archer couldn't leave good enough alone and sorta cloned him to use for spare parts. It is one of those things where I think you are supposed to feel for the dilemma Archer is in, but this was pretty much going to be the situation either way. The alternative I guess is that Trip recovers only to have to watch himself die of old age. Having to go to his own funeral was bad enough. He is going to need a lot of neural massaging to get over this one.
We open at the funeral for what appears to be Trip. Cut to two weeks earlier and he is working on a plan to get the warp injectors working better. Something goes wrong and he jumps on the core saving the ship but sustaining a life threatening injury. The ship is also crippled and taking on some sort of debris that is threatening to crush the hull. Phlox offers a solution to both problems, make a short term clone of Trip to harvest for parts in a few days, but first he can save them all. Archer agrees to this for some reason, I guess he is just that worried about earth (not sure why he wasn't this worried yesterday). The clone, who they name Sim for presumably creepy reasons, starts growing up with Phlox as a surrogate father. But he quickly starts having Trips memories come back to him. He doesn't understand what is going on until Archer shows him Trip's body. Sim quickly grows up and comes up with a plan that saves the ship. But Archer he determined to kill him and harvest his organs even though there is a change he could have is rapid development halted. The reason for not doing so is super shallow and in the end Archer requires that he submit to execution to save Trip. We end with Sim's funeral and Trip looking HELLA bothered by all this.
Review: The justification that this is all to save earth might have worked better if they hadn't spent the entire last episode messing around in the space wild west for no clear reason. Archer's terribleness actually helped this episode at least be one to think about which is better than usual.
4 out of 10
We open at the funeral for what appears to be Trip. Cut to two weeks earlier and he is working on a plan to get the warp injectors working better. Something goes wrong and he jumps on the core saving the ship but sustaining a life threatening injury. The ship is also crippled and taking on some sort of debris that is threatening to crush the hull. Phlox offers a solution to both problems, make a short term clone of Trip to harvest for parts in a few days, but first he can save them all. Archer agrees to this for some reason, I guess he is just that worried about earth (not sure why he wasn't this worried yesterday). The clone, who they name Sim for presumably creepy reasons, starts growing up with Phlox as a surrogate father. But he quickly starts having Trips memories come back to him. He doesn't understand what is going on until Archer shows him Trip's body. Sim quickly grows up and comes up with a plan that saves the ship. But Archer he determined to kill him and harvest his organs even though there is a change he could have is rapid development halted. The reason for not doing so is super shallow and in the end Archer requires that he submit to execution to save Trip. We end with Sim's funeral and Trip looking HELLA bothered by all this.
Review: The justification that this is all to save earth might have worked better if they hadn't spent the entire last episode messing around in the space wild west for no clear reason. Archer's terribleness actually helped this episode at least be one to think about which is better than usual.
4 out of 10
Wednesday, February 8, 2017
ENT: North Star
While there are definitely some things that raised my ire about this episode, overall I think it worked pretty well. First the annoying stuff, Archer has to be the hero as always but it felt like he was just going through the motions this time. Also, why is it still the wild west? I get that the people were taken from there, but why haven't they evolved since then? And did they really get to take horses when they were kidnapped to be slaves? And where did the guns come from? Are they all 300 years old? Or is there a more industrial part of the planet somewhere and Archer just decided to land in hicktown for no good reason. On the upside they actually used the transporter in a circumstance where it would actually be really helpful. And T'Pol only stepped in when there was actually going to be a threat to the Skagarans instead of the non-existent prime directive. And speaking of, I really liked that the solution in the end was to just reveal that they were from Earth and try to restart contact between the locals and the rest of humanity.
We open with the lynching of what turns out to be an alien somewhere in what appears to be the wild west. Archer, T'Pol and Trip are all in the village looking around and discover that this colony of humans is living along side a group of aliens called Skagarans. It seems the Skagarans kidnapped the humans as slaves but the humans over threw them 200 years earlier and now keep the Skagarans as second class citizens. Archer befriends a school teacher who is illegally teaching the Skagaran youth at night but since Archer isn't good at his job he is easily followed there and she gets arrested. The sheriff just wants Archer to leave town but he decides to break the teacher out of jail along the way. She gets shot and they both beam to Enterprise. The deputy who has been causing trouble abandons his job and sets out to go kill the Skagarans as Archer returns with a shuttlepod full of marines. But of course he has to go out alone somehow to win the day in single combat against the evil deputy. We close with a bunch of kids being taught in school (but the Skagaran makeup is so mild it is actually hard to tell if it they are there, but whatever).
Review: TOS did episodes like this all the damn time and they didn't bother me all that much then. But this show was made much more recently so I kinda wish they had put a bit more thought into the set up. Not a bad bit of social commentary, but I could have done without Archer saving everybody again.
5 out of 10
We open with the lynching of what turns out to be an alien somewhere in what appears to be the wild west. Archer, T'Pol and Trip are all in the village looking around and discover that this colony of humans is living along side a group of aliens called Skagarans. It seems the Skagarans kidnapped the humans as slaves but the humans over threw them 200 years earlier and now keep the Skagarans as second class citizens. Archer befriends a school teacher who is illegally teaching the Skagaran youth at night but since Archer isn't good at his job he is easily followed there and she gets arrested. The sheriff just wants Archer to leave town but he decides to break the teacher out of jail along the way. She gets shot and they both beam to Enterprise. The deputy who has been causing trouble abandons his job and sets out to go kill the Skagarans as Archer returns with a shuttlepod full of marines. But of course he has to go out alone somehow to win the day in single combat against the evil deputy. We close with a bunch of kids being taught in school (but the Skagaran makeup is so mild it is actually hard to tell if it they are there, but whatever).
Review: TOS did episodes like this all the damn time and they didn't bother me all that much then. But this show was made much more recently so I kinda wish they had put a bit more thought into the set up. Not a bad bit of social commentary, but I could have done without Archer saving everybody again.
5 out of 10
Tuesday, February 7, 2017
ENT: Twilight
I bet you all can figure out how I feel about an episode whose entire premise is that Archer is the only important person in the universe and everyone else can die as long as he is there to save the day. On the upside having him out of commission for most of the episode means we get to see some of the rest of the staff step up, but of course they all have to be incompetent without their wonderful leader to save them all. Also of course the Xindi are going to send numerous ships to be destroyed if only they can catch Archer. It isn't like he has been totally irrelevant for the last 9 years, they must just know deep down inside that he holds the key to a brighter future for humanity. On the upside having a Memento inspired episode isn't a terrible idea, I could have just used a lot less Archer worship.
We open with Archer waking up in his quarters confused why there is fighting going on. He rushes past the guard at his door to the bridge only to see Earth destroyed before his eyes. Cut to commercial and we return on Ceti Alpha V where T'Pol is making him breakfast. She explains he saved her life 9 years earlier but that it caused him to get brain parasites that kept him from forming new memories. First she took over Enterprise but eventually she stepped down to take care of Archer and Trip took over. Phlox stops by for a visit but also with a plant to use Enterprise's warp engines to finally get rid of the parasites. Trip is happy to give it a try and it manages to destroy some of them. But just then then find a ship hiding near the star spying on them. They capture it, but it is already too late, the Xindi are on their way since they have nothing better to do than track down individual humans. The Xindi attack and destroy the bridge and Archer and T'Pol rush to engineering. It seems Phlox's therapy also removed the parasites earlier in time so maybe if they can only save Archer humanity will be saved too. Of course Archer has to go down like a hero and we undo the entire episode.
Review: Not a bad idea, but I am so sick of Archer worship this can't be described as good at this point. Fun to see Malcolm and Trip in command, too bad they have to be terrible at it since only Archer truly has the matrix of leadership or whatever.
3 out of 10
We open with Archer waking up in his quarters confused why there is fighting going on. He rushes past the guard at his door to the bridge only to see Earth destroyed before his eyes. Cut to commercial and we return on Ceti Alpha V where T'Pol is making him breakfast. She explains he saved her life 9 years earlier but that it caused him to get brain parasites that kept him from forming new memories. First she took over Enterprise but eventually she stepped down to take care of Archer and Trip took over. Phlox stops by for a visit but also with a plant to use Enterprise's warp engines to finally get rid of the parasites. Trip is happy to give it a try and it manages to destroy some of them. But just then then find a ship hiding near the star spying on them. They capture it, but it is already too late, the Xindi are on their way since they have nothing better to do than track down individual humans. The Xindi attack and destroy the bridge and Archer and T'Pol rush to engineering. It seems Phlox's therapy also removed the parasites earlier in time so maybe if they can only save Archer humanity will be saved too. Of course Archer has to go down like a hero and we undo the entire episode.
Review: Not a bad idea, but I am so sick of Archer worship this can't be described as good at this point. Fun to see Malcolm and Trip in command, too bad they have to be terrible at it since only Archer truly has the matrix of leadership or whatever.
3 out of 10
Monday, February 6, 2017
ENT: The Shipment
For a while I was concerned this was going to turn into another Archer torturing people episode, but no. Instead it is all about how Archer can convince a guy to totally screw himself and his people over by just being so convincing. Except he really isn't convincing on screen which pretty much messes the whole thing up. This is made worse by the fact that according to the wiki the scientist who helps them gets executed for his trouble. WHICH IS OBVIOUSLY WHAT WOULD HAPPEN TO HIM. It is one thing to be against the use of your work to make a weapon, but it should probably have been obvious he was working on a weapon to start with.
We open with Enterprise following up on the info they got from Hoshi's abductor and sure enough, there is a Xindi colony working on the weapon. Archer takes Malcolm and some marines down to investigate and luckily there is LITERALLY NO SECURITY AT THIS SECURE WEAPONS MAKING COMPOUND. They are able to walk into a lab and mess with the product without being seen by any cameras on guards. Eventually they take an engineer hostage in his own house but before he has to torture him Archer manages to convince him to help for no clear reason. They hide in caves even though revealing that he is being kidnapped is probably the best thing the engineer could do, but whatever, this is a dumb episode. Eventually he helps them sabotage the weapon and put a tracker in the material so Enterprise can find where the actual weapon is and the engineer goes back to work like nothing happened even though he is clearly the one responsible for the sabotage and is going to be executed for it.
Review: I guess they just thought Archer was so convincing that they didn't really need to actually show him convincing anyone. Which was stupid and makes an already dumb episode extra unwatchable. Not the worst of ENT, but bad bad bad.
2 out of 10
We open with Enterprise following up on the info they got from Hoshi's abductor and sure enough, there is a Xindi colony working on the weapon. Archer takes Malcolm and some marines down to investigate and luckily there is LITERALLY NO SECURITY AT THIS SECURE WEAPONS MAKING COMPOUND. They are able to walk into a lab and mess with the product without being seen by any cameras on guards. Eventually they take an engineer hostage in his own house but before he has to torture him Archer manages to convince him to help for no clear reason. They hide in caves even though revealing that he is being kidnapped is probably the best thing the engineer could do, but whatever, this is a dumb episode. Eventually he helps them sabotage the weapon and put a tracker in the material so Enterprise can find where the actual weapon is and the engineer goes back to work like nothing happened even though he is clearly the one responsible for the sabotage and is going to be executed for it.
Review: I guess they just thought Archer was so convincing that they didn't really need to actually show him convincing anyone. Which was stupid and makes an already dumb episode extra unwatchable. Not the worst of ENT, but bad bad bad.
2 out of 10
Sunday, February 5, 2017
ENT: Exile
Wow this episode felt rapey. Having an alien force Hoshi to hang out in her underwear near the graves of the five women he previously forced into this relationship is one thing, but her leaving him to keep perpetuating the cycle endlessly is just messed up. The side story about finding another sphere wasn't very interesting either which didn't help anything. This one isn't awful by ENT standards, but is pretty bland by the standards of the rest of Trek.
We open with the sphere side story about T'Pol finding a bunch more of them and Trip getting a shuttlepod modified with shielding so she can't go on it. Hoshi meanwhile starts having creepy visions of some creepy guy who wants her to come hang out. She tells Archer so he goes with her to investigate and it turns out it is an even creepier looking alien. He offers them a bunch of info on the Xindi weapon if she will just hang with him for a bit. She agrees for some reason and things get bad fast. It turns out he has been reading her mind for weeks and has a bunch of graves of the previous women he has done this to. For no good reason she keeps dressing super sexy too. Eventually he decides she can't leave and tries to trap her so she threatens to destroy his psychic orb thing that lets him lure women but she doesn't apparently. Archer and Trip find another giant sphere thing and after being forced to land on it head back without incident. After Hoshi escapes the guy shows up in her mind again and gives her info on the Xindi for some reason.
Review: Another bland episode that got tied to the "main story" to keep it from being totally irrelevant.
3 out of 10
We open with the sphere side story about T'Pol finding a bunch more of them and Trip getting a shuttlepod modified with shielding so she can't go on it. Hoshi meanwhile starts having creepy visions of some creepy guy who wants her to come hang out. She tells Archer so he goes with her to investigate and it turns out it is an even creepier looking alien. He offers them a bunch of info on the Xindi weapon if she will just hang with him for a bit. She agrees for some reason and things get bad fast. It turns out he has been reading her mind for weeks and has a bunch of graves of the previous women he has done this to. For no good reason she keeps dressing super sexy too. Eventually he decides she can't leave and tries to trap her so she threatens to destroy his psychic orb thing that lets him lure women but she doesn't apparently. Archer and Trip find another giant sphere thing and after being forced to land on it head back without incident. After Hoshi escapes the guy shows up in her mind again and gives her info on the Xindi for some reason.
Review: Another bland episode that got tied to the "main story" to keep it from being totally irrelevant.
3 out of 10
Saturday, February 4, 2017
ENT: Impulse
Space marines versus zombie Vulcans! The deathmatch of the century! At least you would think, but this episode didn't really do a great job delivering on its promise. Archer insisting on not killing the Vulcans was just dumb at that point. Sure, I get it, you want to save everybody, but they are a direct threat to your life and to say stun was ineffective was an understatement. You clearly try stun first, but that didn't cut it and their inability to get the situation under control led directly to the death of all the vulcans anyway since their ship ended up exploding.
We open with T'Pol totally out of control in sickbay as Archer and Phlox try to restrain her. They finally get her tied down and sedated as we cut to one day earlier. They are in an asteroid field with lots of the shielding stuff but the spacial distortions make the transporters useless. They get a signal from a Vulcan ship that has been in the expanse for a year and head in to investigate. They get on board and have a scramble in the dark all over the ship fighting infection zombie vulcans for most of the episode. Trip and Tucker manage to take a shuttle to an asteroid and get a bunch of the stuff. Eventually Archer and company figure out it is the shielding stuff that is making the vulcans crazy. Archer makes a bunch of poor decisions and they only barely escape with their lives and the vulcan ship explodes. Phlox manages to cure T'Pol the end.
Review: I guess this is part of the story arc since it is about expanse stuff, but really this is just a lame attempt at an action/horror episode. Revealing in the opening that they all make it back basically fine doesn't do great things for the tension.
.3 out of 10
We open with T'Pol totally out of control in sickbay as Archer and Phlox try to restrain her. They finally get her tied down and sedated as we cut to one day earlier. They are in an asteroid field with lots of the shielding stuff but the spacial distortions make the transporters useless. They get a signal from a Vulcan ship that has been in the expanse for a year and head in to investigate. They get on board and have a scramble in the dark all over the ship fighting infection zombie vulcans for most of the episode. Trip and Tucker manage to take a shuttle to an asteroid and get a bunch of the stuff. Eventually Archer and company figure out it is the shielding stuff that is making the vulcans crazy. Archer makes a bunch of poor decisions and they only barely escape with their lives and the vulcan ship explodes. Phlox manages to cure T'Pol the end.
Review: I guess this is part of the story arc since it is about expanse stuff, but really this is just a lame attempt at an action/horror episode. Revealing in the opening that they all make it back basically fine doesn't do great things for the tension.
.3 out of 10
Friday, February 3, 2017
ENT: Rajiin
I am honestly shocked it took ENT this long to get to slave women. Hell, TOS got there in the pilot so they are really slacking off. And of course in this case the woman is actually there to trick them or something, but she is presumably also a slave. Which of course raises the question why did she keep helping the Xindi, it was pretty clear Archer was down to help her no matter what, so why not just betray them? Maybe they had something over her, but if so, maybe have that come up at some point? But no, of course not. This also seems like a pretty extreme way to get a bioscan of a human. They wander around markets bumping into people all the time and literally have no idea what most Xindi species look like. And they would have even less of an idea if they didn't go and board Enterprise to get the bioscan info.
We open with the council of Xindi twisting their mustaches as Enterprise continues into the expanse. Speaking of, they have arrived at a trade planet where they have a hot tip on a guy who can show them how to make the material needed to shield against anomalies and also info on the Xindi. Somewhere in there Trip gets another erotic massage as well. The shield goop turns out to be super dangerous to make so Trip and T'Pol get the job. The Xindi tip sends them to a slave trader who did business with them and one girl catches Archers eye. But of course he isn't going to pay, instead he helps her escape in what is pretty obviously a set up. She sets out to seduce Archer and he isn't exactly opposed to it. She does some sort of psychic bond or something and sees through his skin and then he passes out. She ends up fighting T'Pol for some reason, mostly because it is hot I suspect, and then heads to the transporter room where she is captured, but not before calling her boss. Two ships of Xindi show up and board Enterprise. They are mostly resistant to the human weapons but one reptile is killed. The take Rajiin and escape to go back to the mustache twirling. Back on Enterprise they at least got the consolation prize of a dead Xindi to study.
Review: Not an awful episode, but pretty bland as is the case for so much of ENT. Well, the better part of ENT at least. Glad to see they are continuing to move the story forward.
4 out of 10
We open with the council of Xindi twisting their mustaches as Enterprise continues into the expanse. Speaking of, they have arrived at a trade planet where they have a hot tip on a guy who can show them how to make the material needed to shield against anomalies and also info on the Xindi. Somewhere in there Trip gets another erotic massage as well. The shield goop turns out to be super dangerous to make so Trip and T'Pol get the job. The Xindi tip sends them to a slave trader who did business with them and one girl catches Archers eye. But of course he isn't going to pay, instead he helps her escape in what is pretty obviously a set up. She sets out to seduce Archer and he isn't exactly opposed to it. She does some sort of psychic bond or something and sees through his skin and then he passes out. She ends up fighting T'Pol for some reason, mostly because it is hot I suspect, and then heads to the transporter room where she is captured, but not before calling her boss. Two ships of Xindi show up and board Enterprise. They are mostly resistant to the human weapons but one reptile is killed. The take Rajiin and escape to go back to the mustache twirling. Back on Enterprise they at least got the consolation prize of a dead Xindi to study.
Review: Not an awful episode, but pretty bland as is the case for so much of ENT. Well, the better part of ENT at least. Glad to see they are continuing to move the story forward.
4 out of 10
Thursday, February 2, 2017
ENT: Extinction
My guess is this is the ENT attempt to make a version of Inner Light but they failed, big time. At least 20% of this episode is unsubtitled alien gibberish that I pretty much just zoned out through. To be fair having Archer speaking gibberish is hardly new. Also Archer making a big deal out of saving the virus at the end is super dumb. Sure, that race is gone, but forcing people to become that race and also super dumb isn't the way to preserve them. In theory this isn't a terrible idea for an episode, it just wasn't executed well at all.
We open with dudes in space suits killing some guy with flame throwers. On Enterprise they discover a new planet with a ship crashed on it. They head down to investigate and of course don't wear atmosphere suits since there is never anything bad on alien planets. Soon Archer, Malcolm and Hoshi are all turned into bug eye aliens and T'Pol only barely manage to get word to Enterprise before they tie her up. Cut to 20 minutes later and some aliens show up demanding to kill the infected people. Trip won't stand for it and they manage to rescue them and cure the illness. Along the way Archer has memories of an ancient culture or something but it is really shallow and doesn't go anywhere. It ends with him telling Phlox to save the virus for some reason.
Review: Terrible decisions in turning this from a story to an episode really doomed this one. Not an awful idea, but not a well told story in the slightest.
3 out of 10
We open with dudes in space suits killing some guy with flame throwers. On Enterprise they discover a new planet with a ship crashed on it. They head down to investigate and of course don't wear atmosphere suits since there is never anything bad on alien planets. Soon Archer, Malcolm and Hoshi are all turned into bug eye aliens and T'Pol only barely manage to get word to Enterprise before they tie her up. Cut to 20 minutes later and some aliens show up demanding to kill the infected people. Trip won't stand for it and they manage to rescue them and cure the illness. Along the way Archer has memories of an ancient culture or something but it is really shallow and doesn't go anywhere. It ends with him telling Phlox to save the virus for some reason.
Review: Terrible decisions in turning this from a story to an episode really doomed this one. Not an awful idea, but not a well told story in the slightest.
3 out of 10
Wednesday, February 1, 2017
ENT: Anomaly
A fairly decent adventure story that keeps pushing the Xindi arc along. Not a big fan of Archer torturing the captive though. I get that this is the 9/11 story arc, but it didn't really work for America all that well, no reason to think Archer would have better luck getting useful information. I am not really surprised they returned to the Dyson Sphere idea. It was only ever touched in Relics so having one show up here makes sense. It is actually a bit small for a Dyson Sphere so maybe it is for the best that they don't call it that.
We open with Enterprise finding a ship full of dead bodies. They hit a bad patch of spacial anomalies and soon learn who killed all those people. Raiders show up and attack, quickly beaming onto Enterprise and stealing everything that isn't nailed down. Malcolm and the marines manage to drive them off, but they took enough that warp engines are down. They also managed to capture a prisoner, but he isn't interested in talking. After a lot of messing around they find a series of cloaked passages through the expanse and they lead to a giant sphere that turns out to have their stuff inside it. It is also probably responsible for all the spacial distortions in the region. Archer ends up torturing the prisoner by putting him in an airlock and gradually opening it until he talks and they get the codes to the alien ships computer. They attack the aliens again and manage to get a bunch of info on the Xindi out of them before disabling the pirates and leaving them crashed on the sphere.
Review: Pretty straightforward story with a bit more filler than is desirable, but still not a bad one in general. At least for ENT.
4 out of 10
We open with Enterprise finding a ship full of dead bodies. They hit a bad patch of spacial anomalies and soon learn who killed all those people. Raiders show up and attack, quickly beaming onto Enterprise and stealing everything that isn't nailed down. Malcolm and the marines manage to drive them off, but they took enough that warp engines are down. They also managed to capture a prisoner, but he isn't interested in talking. After a lot of messing around they find a series of cloaked passages through the expanse and they lead to a giant sphere that turns out to have their stuff inside it. It is also probably responsible for all the spacial distortions in the region. Archer ends up torturing the prisoner by putting him in an airlock and gradually opening it until he talks and they get the codes to the alien ships computer. They attack the aliens again and manage to get a bunch of info on the Xindi out of them before disabling the pirates and leaving them crashed on the sphere.
Review: Pretty straightforward story with a bit more filler than is desirable, but still not a bad one in general. At least for ENT.
4 out of 10
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