Star Trek ENT: General Discussion Thread

[Overmind One]

True.

I liked season one, and most of season two. Season three had a potentially interesting arc but also the weird stuff with T'Pol and Season Four is pretty much fanwankery trying to force the show to fit into canon. Heck, the while "Kir'Shara" multipart episode is basically remaking the Vulcans into what we see in TOS.

BINGO = bolded. It was about the end of Season 3 that Paramount had endured the wrath of millions of Trekkies because of the Xindi and Crack Whore T'Pol. That was when demands were met, like adding the words Star Trek before Enterprise in the title (Star Trek: Enterprise), as opposed to just Enterprise. The Kir'Shara episode fixed the Vulcans, and other changes did tie it into the Trek canon like the two parter with Dr Sung and his Augments. But you are right, it was last ditch effort. Ratings for the show had already slid to unrecoverable depths and the excitement was gone.

Having said that, I still cant warm up to NuTrek. Even Star Trek: Enterprise seems brilliant by comparison IMO. I would have loved to explored more of the TNG universe Andorians and Romulans or the El Aurians. A war between the TOS Organians and the Q perhaps? All of that is gone now.

 

[Jim of WVa]

The whole idea of the Xindi was worse than anything else in the series.

 

[shavedape]

Not Scott Bakula? I thought Jolene Blalock's character as T'Pol was somewhat interesting, but they added too much sexual energy to her character. The tight, hiphugging outfits, chest enhancing clothes, exposed middriff, etc. Hot, but hardly Vulcan. Making her the requisite Vulcan on the bridge AND the show's female hottie was a big mistake. Hoshi and the Engineering guy Lt Reed were flat. Other than that, the rest of the show was fairly decent.

Bakula is a total turn off. As Capt. Archer he's weak and attenuated and, in general, a pussy. He doesn't exude any sort of masculine strength, which is something a Starfleet captain needs to project. Kirk, Picard and even Janeway all project strength. Archer, not so much.

 

[Joelist]

It was an irony in ENT that when the casting was announced fans were enthused about Bakula and had concerns about Jolene Blalock. In practice it turned out almost the opposite - Bakula's portrayal was off while Blalock (when they actually wrote her character properly prior to Season Three) was right on the money.

 

[ParagonPie]

Bakula is a total turn off. As Capt. Archer he's weak and attenuated and, in general, a pussy. He doesn't exude any sort of masculine strength, which is something a Starfleet captain needs to project. Kirk, Picard and even Janeway all project strength. Archer, not so much.

Well, I'd say he was just an idiot. He was a man willing to risk the lives of his crew than let his pride be damaged, plus you got the whole near on racist attitude with him and the Vulcans, the fact he left space port when the ship wasn't even ready and wondered why when they got into hostile contact they got battered around. They committed genocide on an advanced culture despite having the cure for their problems. Then you have the whole temporal cold war aspect, which didn't go anywhere at all and the whole issue with time travel is well, you have to really think it through, you can't just wing it. For example if the time police (for lack of a better word) are from 3000AD, then why aren't the time police from 4000AD intervening also, and so on and so forth. The only way is to have them as a separate body from normal timeline functions (like in the Voyager episode year of the hell, with the ship that had the temporal shielding) but then again it begs the question of all problems will be solved since they have the technology to basically do anything they like or to fix it how it is meant to be.

 

[mzzz]

Well, I'd say he was just an idiot. He was a man willing to risk the lives of his crew than let his pride be damaged, plus you got the whole near on racist attitude with him and the Vulcans, the fact he left space port when the ship wasn't even ready and wondered why when they got into hostile contact they got battered around. They committed genocide on an advanced culture despite having the cure for their problems. Then you have the whole temporal cold war aspect, which didn't go anywhere at all and the whole issue with time travel is well, you have to really think it through, you can't just wing it. For example if the time police (for lack of a better word) are from 3000AD, then why aren't the time police from 4000AD intervening also, and so on and so forth. The only way is to have them as a separate body from normal timeline functions (like in the Voyager episode year of the hell, with the ship that had the temporal shielding) but then again it begs the question of all problems will be solved since they have the technology to basically do anything they like or to fix it how it is meant to be.

Yep, I agree with almost all that. I was gonna go on a tirade about this show like I did on Voyager, but it wasn't worth my time.

While some disliked in 4th season, I honestly thought that season was decent because of Manny Coto's storytelling capacity, not necessarily the stories themselves. I wish he actually had a chance to run the show from the beginning. That season was spent almost entirely on rectifying the mess those other scumbags made in the earlier seasons. He was trying to get rid of them for the most part, but I think that also failed, but not due to him, rather due to the pervasiveness of the crap he was left with.

There were still canon violations which pissed me off, like that whole Borg encounter. There's no such an encounter gets lost in the books somehow. There are very few cybernetic beings, and none that had such a presence as those Borgs did. Completely violated that whole TNG being the first to encounter them. They tried to make their own set of aliens with the Xindi and those other dimensional creatures, but the problem with that was their non-presence later on in the other shows as well as their irrelevance after being depicted as such big enemies.

That genocide thing really pissed me off. I had no respect for the dude after that and that insect babies episode. Coto I think tried to rectify that episode as well with some advanced aliens episode in 4th season where they got some virus or something. Then Archer makes an argument that his crew should be saved even though he decided not to save those people that numbered far greater than his small crew. Just a completely hypocritical asshole. He and his crew also committed infanticide (insecticide?) on a large scale level when they encountered that Insectoid nursery shit. People can make arguments on whatever side but none can deny this: the crew felt no sense of remorse or guilt at letting those babies die, they actually felt justified in killing them. That just mars their moral character to me in ways that I felt were irredeemable.

Won't get into the time bullshit. So many contradictions. One of the biggest ones obviously stem from just this one principle: when a person is aware of another timeline that has been altered (e.g. future guy noticing that things have gotten worse in his future but still remember enough to know that it has gotten worse), this automatically indicates the existence of at least two timelines. The reason is because the memories he has of the other timeline are very vivid memories, as in memories that were formed from first hand experience with their own senses and memory imprinting. But his existence in the altered timeline are also indicative of a different timeline. Both of those things indicate at least two timelines. Then the whole trying to change the timeline bullshit kind of falls apart when you consider that principle because there is no one universal timeline that is to be rectified, just multiple timelines. It's just all nonsense, Voyager had those problems too.

Yeah...fuck Enterprise.

 

[Overmind One]

Yep, I agree with almost all that. I was gonna go on a tirade about this show like I did on Voyager, but it wasn't worth my time.

While some disliked in 4th season, I honestly thought that season was decent because of Manny Coto's storytelling capacity, not necessarily the stories themselves. I wish he actually had a chance to run the show from the beginning. That season was spent almost entirely on rectifying the mess those other scumbags made in the earlier seasons. He was trying to get rid of them for the most part, but I think that also failed, but not due to him, rather due to the pervasiveness of the crap he was left with.

I agree about Manny Coto. He should have had Brannon Braga's chair. But Season 4 was it's best season. After the utter trampling of canon and characters in Season 3, Season 4 seemed polished and better written.

There were still canon violations which pissed me off, like that whole Borg encounter. There's no such an encounter gets lost in the books somehow. There are very few cybernetic beings, and none that had such a presence as those Borgs did. Completely violated that whole TNG being the first to encounter them. They tried to make their own set of aliens with the Xindi and those other dimensional creatures, but the problem with that was their non-presence later on in the other shows as well as their irrelevance after being depicted as such big enemies.

This show's biggest flaw was where it was slotted in Trek canon. Why did they pick that era if they were not going to tie it in properly? Like you said, the aliens shown in Enterprise ruined it and they caused Trekkies to send thousands of letters to Paramount. There was something of a viewing boycott organized, and the ratings suffered. The new" races they introduced:

• The Denobulans: They were co-running Federation outposts and space stations? Before Kirk's time?
• The Suliban: Really? Such beings would have been much more of a threat than the Borg in Archer's time, Kirk's time and even Picard's time. Shapeshifting, genetically mutable beings who have time traveling abilities? You bet.
• The Orion Syndicate: Yawn. From the Shrek planet.
• The Xindi: This was a 5-fer, with the Primates, Aboreals, the Insectoids, the Aquatics, and the Reptilians.

None of these were in any of the later series and that makes no sense. The Xindi attacked earth itself with a weapon of mass destruction, and no mention or record of it in later series? They should have used the Crystalline Entity storyline from TNG and had the Xindi the aliens behind it's origins or something. Earth cant just be attacked in that fashion and no record of it in later series. There is NO WAY they did not know this was a violation of canon, and Trekkies were livid.

That genocide thing really pissed me off. I had no respect for the dude after that and that insect babies episode. Coto I think tried to rectify that episode as well with some advanced aliens episode in 4th season where they got some virus or something. Then Archer makes an argument that his crew should be saved even though he decided not to save those people that numbered far greater than his small crew. Just a completely hypocritical asshole. He and his crew also committed infanticide (insecticide?) on a large scale level when they encountered that Insectoid nursery shit. People can make arguments on whatever side but none can deny this: the crew felt no sense of remorse or guilt at letting those babies die, they actually felt justified in killing them. That just mars their moral character to me in ways that I felt were irredeemable.

Worse yet, was in Season 3 when Archer literally mugged the alien ship that helped him, and stole their warp coil. And they did not even show them going back to make sure they were okay. The entire crew went along with it. WHAT? I lost respect for Archer because of that.

Won't get into the time bullshit. So many contradictions. One of the biggest ones obviously stem from just this one principle: when a person is aware of another timeline that has been altered (e.g. future guy noticing that things have gotten worse in his future but still remember enough to know that it has gotten worse), this automatically indicates the existence of at least two timelines. The reason is because the memories he has of the other timeline are very vivid memories, as in memories that were formed from first hand experience with their own senses and memory imprinting. But his existence in the altered timeline are also indicative of a different timeline. Both of those things indicate at least two timelines. Then the whole trying to change the timeline bullshit kind of falls apart when you consider that principle because there is no one universal timeline that is to be rectified, just multiple timelines. It's just all nonsense, Voyager had those problems too.

Im really tired of the time travel trope in science fiction. It is no longer seen as something viable (or even possible) scientifically. Every episode which used time travel in Voyager, TNG or Enterprise was silly to me, even if interesting stories were being told. The entire 3rd season of Enterprise revolved around not only the lame and unwanted Xindi but also time travel and the Traveler. Why didnt they have Wesley Crusher play the role of Daniel? He became a Traveler in TNG.

Yeah...fuck Enterprise.

Word of advice to enjoy Enterprise: Watch Star Trek 2009 and Star Trek Into Darkness first.

 

[Joelist]

Actually both TNG (Time's Arrow) and Voyager (Relativity) had good, watchable time travel episodes. Interestingly, neither one was a conventional time travel trope. Time's Arrow lets us watch a Predestination Paradox play out while Relativity is about time travel enforcers trying to repair the time line. Perhaps that is why they were interesting.

 

[mzzz]

I agree about Manny Coto. He should have had Brannon Braga's chair. But Season 4 was it's best season. After the utter trampling of canon and characters in Season 3, Season 4 seemed polished and better written.



This show's biggest flaw was where it was slotted in Trek canon. Why did they pick that era if they were not going to tie it in properly? Like you said, the aliens shown in Enterprise ruined it and they caused Trekkies to send thousands of letters to Paramount. There was something of a viewing boycott organized, and the ratings suffered. The new" races they introduced:

• The Denobulans: They were co-running Federation outposts and space stations? Before Kirk's time?
• The Suliban: Really? Such beings would have been much more of a threat than the Borg in Archer's time, Kirk's time and even Picard's time. Shapeshifting, genetically mutable beings who have time traveling abilities? You bet.
• The Orion Syndicate: Yawn. From the Shrek planet.
• The Xindi: This was a 5-fer, with the Primates, Aboreals, the Insectoids, the Aquatics, and the Reptilians.

None of these were in any of the later series and that makes no sense. The Xindi attacked earth itself with a weapon of mass destruction, and no mention or record of it in later series? They should have used the Crystalline Entity storyline from TNG and had the Xindi the aliens behind it's origins or something. Earth cant just be attacked in that fashion and no record of it in later series. There is NO WAY they did not know this was a violation of canon, and Trekkies were livid.



Worse yet, was in Season 3 when Archer literally mugged the alien ship that helped him, and stole their warp coil. And they did not even show them going back to make sure they were okay. The entire crew went along with it. WHAT? I lost respect for Archer because of that.



Im really tired of the time travel trope in science fiction. It is no longer seen as something viable (or even possible) scientifically. Every episode which used time travel in Voyager, TNG or Enterprise was silly to me, even if interesting stories were being told. The entire 3rd season of Enterprise revolved around not only the lame and unwanted Xindi but also time travel and the Traveler. Why didnt they have Wesley Crusher play the role of Daniel? He became a Traveler in TNG.



Word of advice to enjoy Enterprise: Watch Star Trek 2009 and Star Trek Into Darkness first.

You should check out Odyssey 5, Manny Coto ran that I think. Wasn't great but had plenty of potential. I wouldn't mind seeing him take on a reboot for Stargate in a tv capacity.

lol, that time device they quarantined in that person's room was just silly. When they had a need to consult the knowledge on that, they went and looked into it. But they didn't explore it any other time. That was super silly. It was pretty much a deus ex machina device. They were afraid of corrupting the timeline? Well, they should have gotten someone with a disciplined mind to pick and choose what knowledge might have been useful that wouldn't have done much corruption, like a Vulcan. But oh wait, they ruined the Vulcans completely. What the hell was that all about?

I'm glad T'Pol's actor was outspoken about how crappy her role was. I wish Berman and Braga actually cared about their actors, or even respected them (decontamination room, I mean wtf). They had similar issues with Voyager. I mean look at Farscape, the actors had respect and some input into the writing of their characters, and it benefited a lot from that.

Oh yeah, I remember that one, where he stole their device when they freaking came to his aid! And the least they could have done was go to a supply station to buy another one of those devices and go give one to them on the way out. They didn't even do that. Freaking ridiculous.

 

[Joelist]

I've been sitting here watching Enterprise (Season 4 episode "Home") and it suddenly came to me what is possibly the biggest problem how with the Vulcans on the show "feel" - they move wrong and sound wrong.

Vulcans had a more formalistic way of walking before Enterprise - on Enterprise they move exactly like contemporary humans. Even worse is how they talk. They sound just like contemporary humans even down to the use of contractions in their speech. Prior to Enterprise their speech had no contractions and a very precise cadence. The effect is to rob them of their "alienness". The strange part is T'Pol in Season One did display the correct movement and speech but then in Season Two and later it all disappeared.

I am well aware of the plot problems with the Vulcans, which necessitated a special set of episodes (the Kir'Shara story) just to fix them. Really, all of Season 4 seemed to be devoted to "fixing" things and making Enterprise sort of fit in canon. But the fact that they felt wrong made things rather a lot worse.

 

[Bluce Ree]

I've been sitting here watching Enterprise (Season 4 episode "Home") and it suddenly came to me what is possibly the biggest problem how with the Vulcans on the show "feel" - they move wrong and sound wrong.

Vulcans had a more formalistic way of walking before Enterprise - on Enterprise they move exactly like contemporary humans. Even worse is how they talk. They sound just like contemporary humans even down to the use of contractions in their speech. Prior to Enterprise their speech had no contractions and a very precise cadence. The effect is to rob them of their "alienness". The strange part is T'Pol in Season One did display the correct movement and speech but then in Season Two and later it all disappeared.

I am well aware of the plot problems with the Vulcans, which necessitated a special set of episodes (the Kir'Shara story) just to fix them. Really, all of Season 4 seemed to be devoted to "fixing" things and making Enterprise sort of fit in canon. But the fact that they felt wrong made things rather a lot worse.

Because much of the Federation's history was laid out throughout the previous series, it was an arduous task to come up with "new" material in what was essentially written history.

My biggest beef was the tech. Their first gen phasers, for example, seemed to have far more power than their modern counterparts in some circumstances. Their ships looked more modern than their TOS counterparts. Their "shields" were polarized plating, which I imagine was effective in mitigating some of the effects of energy weapons and useless against projectile weapons of any kind regardless of how much harder and more resistant polarizing claims to make the hull. The Klingons were far more advanced with shields, cloak and weaponry and could have easily taken out Starlfeet's entire fleet with a couple warbirds. How the Federation didn't get annexed by the empire still puzzles me.

 

[Overmind One]

Because much of the Federation's history was laid out throughout the previous series, it was an arduous task to come up with "new" material in what was essentially written history.

My biggest beef was the tech. Their first gen phasers, for example, seemed to have far more power than their modern counterparts in some circumstances. Their ships looked more modern than their TOS counterparts. Their "shields" were polarized plating, which I imagine was effective in mitigating some of the effects of energy weapons and useless against projectile weapons of any kind regardless of how much harder and more resistant polarizing claims to make the hull. The Klingons were far more advanced with shields, cloak and weaponry and could have easily taken out Starlfeet's entire fleet with a couple warbirds. How the Federation didn't get annexed by the empire still puzzles me.

THIS STUFF. They purposely had to ramp back the tech to force it to fit in the timeline slot they chose (WHY did they try and pick pre-Kirk?). I never could get around the "Polarize the hull!" stuff. How could they go to warp if they did not have shields? The purpose of the deflector dish (according to Roddenberry) was to deflect asteroids and other large bodies at sub-light speeds, and SHIELDS were designed to protect the ship at warp and against directed energy weapons. Polarizing the hull would not protect against torpedoes at all, would it? And the Akira class starship from DS9 and Voyager is a dead ringer for the Enterprise NX-01 only with inverted warp nacelles:

There were too many things wrong with Enterprise when it was out and those things put off the Trekkies. T-Pol being in that catsuit was such an insult to Vulcans! She did look hot in it but damn. Today, I think of Enterprise as being at least two intellectual levels above either of the two newest Star Trek films from Abrams. Those films are bubble gum Trek.

 

[Bluce Ree]

THIS STUFF. They purposely had to ramp back the tech to force it to fit in the timeline slot they chose (WHY did they try and pick pre-Kirk?). I never could get around the "Polarize the hull!" stuff. How could they go to warp if they did not have shields? The purpose of the deflector dish (according to Roddenberry) was to deflect asteroids and other large bodies at sub-light speeds, and SHIELDS were designed to protect the ship at warp and against directed energy weapons. Polarizing the hull would not protect against torpedoes at all, would it? And the Akira class starship from DS9 and Voyager is a dead ringer for the Enterprise NX-01 only with inverted warp nacelles:

View attachment 31069

There were too many things wrong with Enterprise when it was out and those things put off the Trekkies. T-Pol being in that catsuit was such an insult to Vulcans! She did look hot in it but damn. Today, I think of Enterprise as being at least two intellectual levels above either of the two newest Star Trek films from Abrams. Those films are bubble gum Trek.

I like the term "bubble gum trek".

 

[Joelist]

I agree the tech was off too. But it wasn't so much that Enterprise was too backwards but that the other aliens were too advanced. Both the Romulans and Klingons were way too advanced especially in weapons technology. And lest we forget the Andorians who give Starfleet photon torpedo technology? It was ridiculous.

But I think I could have almost overlooked it had the stories been better and had the aliens been played correctly (per my Vulcan observation). At least Jeffrey Tambor did a good job as Shran.

 

[Overmind One]

I have been doing a rewatch of Enterprise and I am being thoroughly entertained by it. I have a new appreciation for it because of the Star Dreck that has come after. I am noticing just how much Enterprise DID take into the series from TOS. Many of the panels on the ship have flashing dummy lights and looping dummy displays like in TOS. I like that somebody took time to limit the tech appropriately to the timeline. I like the appropriately clunky phase pistols which look like a perfect pre-TOS phaser design. Same with the communicators.

The problems came with the Vulcans, the introduction of the Suliban and the Xindi. They purposely broke canon with the Xindi especially, even though the Xindi arc seems to contain the highest rated episodes of the series. Overall, rewatching this series in 2018 after seeing even ONE episode of the awful Discovery is enjoyable. Star Trek Enterprise is still Star Trek.

The only grating thing about this show which is almost unbearable is the theme song. The first season had the guitar prominently in the song. It was so bad that they toned it down in Season 2 and then almost eliminated it in Season 3 (btw, I said earlier that season 4 was when they added the words "Star Trek" to Enterprise, but it was Season 3). I am watching Season 3 right now, and each episode I have to say "Hey Google, fast forward one minute 15 seconds" to skip the song. Good song, wrong show.

 

[PussyGalore]

I'm rewatching it on one of the local channels. They just started it from the beginning. The show had promise but was also heavily flawed. I like that the Vulcans were dicks in many ways. It gave the show more realism than if they were our super cool bestest alien friends.

I can't stand Scott Bakula though. He was just so miscast in the role. Every scene he's in is almost cringe worthy. He has one facial expression: happy puppy dog. It gets old very, very fast.

I won't go on about the Xindi season because everyone agrees it was an abomination. Enough said.

I think T'Pol was good from the start and I liked her growth into understanding and appreciating her fellow human crew members. But the writers went off the rails several times with her character as the show went on.

Regardless, the show is much, much better than STD. For that alone it's worth watching.

 

[Joelist]

I gave Jolene Blalock respect props when she called out the producers in Season Three for making T'Pol into a "Vulcan crack whore".

 

[Overmind One]

I'm rewatching it on one of the local channels. They just started it from the beginning. The show had promise but was also heavily flawed. I like that the Vulcans were dicks in many ways. It gave the show more realism than if they were our super cool bestest alien friends.

I can't stand Scott Bakula though. He was just so miscast in the role. Every scene he's in is almost cringe worthy. He has one facial expression: happy puppy dog. It gets old very, very fast.

Well, actually two. The other one is his mad face which comes off like he is just kidding.

I won't go on about the Xindi season because everyone agrees it was an abomination. Enough said.

I totally agree, and was surprised to find that those Xindi episodes were the best rated in viewership (on average). I was like, where the hell did these guys come from? I thought the Andorians were WAAAAAY cooler.

I think T'Pol was good from the start and I liked her growth into understanding and appreciating her fellow human crew members. But the writers went off the rails several times with her character as the show went on.

Regardless, the show is much, much better than STD. For that alone it's worth watching.

They sexed her up too much, then took away her ability to ever be a stoic logical Vulcan again after her crack trellium addiction. I mean, was this really necessary?

 

[Overmind One]

I gave Jolene Blalock respect props when she called out the producers in Season Three for making T'Pol into a "Vulcan crack whore".

Yes, but they still did it and its in the series. That was a very low point in the show. I think the episode where Archer stole the warp coil from that alien race that helped them was probably the lowest, and I could never respect him after that.

 

[Joelist]

Oh I know they still did it. Blalock from what I understand protested privately and they did it anyway. That was when she went public and was part of the protests that helped get Manny Coto named showrunner for Season Four.