It’s
official. Our time together on board the NX-01 is limited.
In fact there are 11 adventures left. So we should savor every
last minute of the 22nd century. Unfortunately, the usual
sweet flavor of Enterprise has gone rotten.
“United”
is the first episode of Enterprise to hit the air
since UPN announced that the show would be terminated this
May. The hammer was dropped Wednesday after last week’s
“Babel One,”
AKA the lowest rated episode of Enterprise, ever
– and possibly its most boring. At this point it would
be so much easier to defend the prequel Trek with words
like, “it never got a fair shot,” or “Voyager
tainted the public’s view of Star Trek”
or “if you’ve missed this show you’ve
missed one of the best of the new shows of the Double-Ohs.”
(That’s my attempt to finally give a nickname to this
decade)
But the truth is; this week SUCKED. Last
week sucked. And as if I was trying to force down a propane
tank, this is hard to swallow. Maybe UPN was right in killing
Enterprise.
“United” tosses all character
logic out of the air lock, as well as some key continuity
in the Trek continuum. Archer, this week, is obsessed with
aligning the Andorians and the Tellarites. And somehow their
fragile agreement lies in an Andorian honor duel.
It’s
like the script plays six degrees of Kevin Bacon. It starts
with Star Fleet searching for a rogue marauder and ends
with Archer fighting Commander Shran with ice blades. The
journey between these two points is a painfully slow walk
through twelve feet of cheesy dialogue.
Commander Shran does everything short of
winking at the camera when he offers, “Perhaps future
ships will be named after our vessels. Especially if we
do something historic… together.” Oh, give me
a break. We know this is a founding Federation story. We
get that there are other Enterprises. We got that four years
ago when the show was announced. WHY bang it over our heads
NOW?
More
ridiculous lines of dialogue: Archer takes the place of
a Gral, the Tellarite who killed Shran’s girlfriend
last week. So T’Pol asks linguist Sato to look up
a loop hole out of the competition. When the work load gets
to heavy, Mayweather steps in with his unnecessary line,
“Two of us could get through that a lot faster.”
Lame. Just cut to them working together. Is this scene trying
to convey Travis’s emotional connection to the Captain?
So unnecessary. We know he’s pulling for Archer to
LIVE.
Speaking
of Travis, why does T’Pol say his first name while
discussing his enhanced sensor grid plan? While on duty
wouldn’t it be more in character for her to refer
to him as Ensign Mayweather? Or just Mayweather?
About the only clever line comes from Reed
while he and Trip are on board the remote control Romulan
ship. “You’re good at building things. I’m
good at blowing them up.” Perhaps it was in the works
to see more adventures featuring the two of them as the
fixer and the breaker. But unlikely now…
Shortly
after this exchange they jump out of the marauder ship while
it spins through space. Then they look suspiciously like
they’re dangling on wires. Someone should tell the
special effects supervisor, “People cannot wade in
space like it’s your grandma’s swimming pool.”
But
of course the existence of the Romulan ship is a point of
great confusion. It still hasn’t been explained how
the Vulcan cousins have access to such sophisticated technology
in the 22nd century. A holographic, remote-controlled, self-repairing
ship is so much better than just going under cloak.
Roy
Horn could jump tigers through these loopholes. I would
love to say that these are the sort of prequel stories that
are going to snag an audience in Enterprise’s
darkest hour. And that is definitely the sort of episode
we should’ve been watching since episode one –
and instead of a year long confusing Xindi story. But honestly…
This sucks.
And only 10 episodes left. Next week the
three part Andorian/Tellarite/Vulcan/Human vs Romulan story
ends. And there are albino Andorians.
