Enterprise 10-15

ChaoZ · Post by **ChaoZ** » Sun Oct 17, 2004 12:06 am

SPOILERS HERE BE, YARGGG!

Good to see the end of the temporal war thing. I'm looking forward to the return of some typical Star Trek. I'm sure there's tons of plotholes wtih regard to time travel, but I've long since learned to turn my mind off when watching Enterprise.

Highlight of the episode:

Enterprise flying through New York while fending off German Stukas armed with plasma cannons.

Ranulf · Post by **Ranulf** » Sun Oct 17, 2004 12:47 am

Yeah it wasn't too bad but still, evil alien nazis.... It will be interesting to see how the next episode is and if it deals with the ending of the Xindi threat etc..

CSL · Post by **CSL** » Sun Oct 17, 2004 1:07 am

WTF!

That looks hella interesting, maybe I should start watching that show again.

ChaoZ · Post by **ChaoZ** » Sun Oct 17, 2004 1:43 am

I, for one, want to see if they've built NX-02.
They'll need to spend some time repairing Enterprise, and the crew will probably go on shore leave for a month or so.

Orpheo · Post by **Orpheo** » Sun Oct 17, 2004 3:12 am

Personally, I was looking forward to a season full of the temporal hot war, with the Enterprise being flung around the galaxy and across history, fixing damaged timelines. I was disappointed when they tied up the whole time travel thing, though I'm sure it'll be back.

Asharak · Post by **Asharak** » Sun Oct 17, 2004 9:37 am

Orpheo wrote:Personally, I was looking forward to a season full of the temporal hot war, with the Enterprise being flung around the galaxy and across history, fixing damaged timelines.

I thought that had potential, too, but I'm just as glad for the opportunity for a fresh start and possibly slightly more intelligent plot lines now that they aren't tied in to the Evil Alien Nazis thing for the whole season.

- Ash

Flatlander · Post by **Flatlander** » Sun Oct 17, 2004 12:00 pm

I haven't watched much of Enterprise but I saw friday's episode. Other than a strange feeling of deja'vu for the old original trek's Nazi planet and Gangster planet episodes, the biggest problem I had with the episode was the huge reset button ending.

"Hey congratulations Capt. Archer, blowing up that space nazi time-thingamabob was exactly what was needed to completely repair the timeline and undo all the changes done by all the different temporal cold-war factions mucking with all of history. Now we'll send you home to your time period and it will be like this episode never even happened".

Cop out endings have killed what interest I had in later trek. It's just lazy, Deus ex machina storytelling when the writers set up a plot, put the characters in a dramatic situation, and then rather than actually resolving the story so it has some consequences and weight, they just reset everything back to status quo in the last five minutes.

Voyager, and now Enterprise have abused this plot device even more than the cliched and tiresome technobabble and ham fisted moralizing (sharing is good, bullies are bad).

I was willing to give the show a chance, but it's just shown me that trek has become a broken record, playing the same song over and over again.

PS. I will give them points for the phaser armed Stukas. That was kinda cool in a Harry Turtledove sort of way.

D.A.Lewis · Post by **D.A.Lewis** » Sun Oct 17, 2004 12:46 pm

They may have had the replay button stuck as far as plot devises, but it was a well needed devise. This show has abused far too much of Trek Canon and with a new head writer coming on board, this allows him to get a fresh start.

Forgot to add. Enterprise flying through the skyline of New York was a site to behold. My only gripe was I wish they could have shown some reactions shots from people in the streets.

Asharak · Post by **Asharak** » Sun Oct 17, 2004 5:02 pm

Flatlander wrote:Cop out endings have killed what interest I had in later trek. It's just lazy, Deus ex machina storytelling when the writers set up a plot, put the characters in a dramatic situation, and then rather than actually resolving the story so it has some consequences and weight, they just reset everything back to status quo in the last five minutes.

Voyager, and now Enterprise have abused this plot device

I have to say that's not entirely fair. With the exception of the final part of DS9, every Trek show ever has functioned that way.

It's a style of storytelling just as legimitate as any other. Expressed in its simplist abstract form it's A-B-A writing, whereas shows that conclude with "consequences and weight", as you put it, have a A-B-C format. The former has a circular conclusion, with the characters overcoming the obstacles of the plot to return to their comfortable starting point, while the latter's more linear structure leaves the characters somewhere different, for better or worse.

Long before Enterprise and Voyager this comparison was being made between Star Trek in general (representing A-B-A writing) and Babylon 5 (representing A-B-C wrting).

That said, I agree with your underlying point, that Enterprise uses cop-out endings. The problem, for me, is not that the characters wind up back where they started, consequence free, but how they get there. In better episodes, the characters get back to point A through their own struggles; whereas, in episodes like this one, it is transparently obvious that the writers simply 'gave' them that ending without any effort to maintain a sense of plausibility for the show or achievement for the characters.

As much as I'm glad the sloppily-executed temporal cold war storyline is (apparently) over, it would have been more narratively professional to have Enterprise spend most of the season "being flung around the galaxy and across history, fixing damaged timelines", as Orpheo put it. At least that way, when they finally got back to their Earth, it would have felt like they earned it.

- Ash

D.A.Lewis · Post by **D.A.Lewis** » Sun Oct 17, 2004 7:12 pm

Well put Ash.

But the writing on Enterprise and for most of Voyager was cookie cutter. I can't find much fault in that considering the medium and the head honcho but the production staff feels they did not get the bang for the buck with the season arc story. I find that sad becasue last season was Enterprise's best thus far. So this season they vowed to stay away from that type of stuff.

I'm not sure I would have liked a seaon of Temporal fixes in the hands of these guys. I fear the stories would have been far to predictable. But that is a tremendous idea.

Asharak · Post by **Asharak** » Sun Oct 17, 2004 8:34 pm

D.A.Lewis wrote:Well put Ash.

But the writing on Enterprise and for most of Voyager was cookie cutter.

No need for a "but" there; I agree with you. I wasn't defending the writing of Voyager/Enterprise (which was/is cookie cutter) so much as defending the A-B-A form in general. Good storytelling can come from that form, but the recent Trek shows haven't produced it.

- Ash

Jag · Post by **Jag** » Mon Oct 18, 2004 12:24 pm

Flatlander wrote:
PS. I will give them points for the phaser armed Stukas. That was kinda cool in a Harry Turtledove sort of way.

My thoughts exactly.

Next ep could be good with Brent Spiner as Data's creator's ancestor, plus some stuff on the Eugenics war as well.

Asharak · Post by **Asharak** » Mon Oct 18, 2004 3:21 pm

Jag wrote:Next ep could be good with Brent Spiner as Data's creator's ancestor, plus some stuff on the Eugenics war as well.

I missed the preview... seriously?

- Ash

Dirt · Post by **Dirt** » Mon Oct 18, 2004 7:23 pm

Is this show still on? Let the franchise go for a decade.

Ranulf · Post by **Ranulf** » Mon Oct 18, 2004 9:30 pm

Asharak wrote:
Jag wrote:Next ep could be good with Brent Spiner as Data's creator's ancestor, plus some stuff on the Eugenics war as well.
I missed the preview... seriously?

- Ash

Seriously. I dont think they said what the ep is about. All I saw was, "in two weeks Brent Spiner comes to Enterprise".

Asharak · Post by **Asharak** » Mon Oct 18, 2004 9:42 pm

Ranulf wrote:Seriously. I dont think they said what the ep is about. All I saw was, "in two weeks Brent Spiner comes to Enterprise".

I will go on record now as saying that if they screw that up too badly, I will never watch Enterprise again.

- Ash

Odin · Post by **Odin** » Mon Oct 18, 2004 10:09 pm

Dirt wrote:Is this show still on? Let the franchise go for a decade.

You know, I've heard people say this before, and I just don't get it.

If you really hate the show so much, nobody's making you watch it.

If you're of the impression that it would somehow benefit from a break, I simply don't see how. People only work on TV shows when they're being paid, so it isn't as if there'd be a team of people working for years on the show to get it just right so it could come back on the air. Was The Next Generation good in it's own right, or was it somehow "better" because it came after a long break from the Original Series? To put it the other way, how much better would the history of television been if the Original Series hadn't been canceled so soon - if it had run for 4 seasons or 5 or 10? Who knows, but I just don't buy that "taking a break" automatically has a positive impact on a franchise. It's just as likely to be helmed by asshats when it comes back as if it stays on the air.

I'm of the opinion that ANY true attempt to make a decent sci-fi show, even if the attempt fails, is better than nothing. Sci-fi is a huge minority on TV as compared to comedy, drama, sports, news, reality, etc. If all we get is Star Trek, Stargate, and Andromeda, I simply don't see it as an improvement to REDUCE the quantity of sci-fi by a third. I'd rather see them keep trying and failing in the hope that they eventually get it right (or maybe they only get it right with the occasional episode) than quit trying altogether and leave us with squat.

In fact, many people were ready to give up on Enterprise after seasons 1 and 2. Then along came season 3, which most agreed was far superior to the prior two seasons and actually worth watching. What a shame it would have been had they given up after season 2. Now we're on to season 4 and they've FINALLY brought a new writing staff on board. Maybe they'll suck and the series will spiral into the toilet. Maybe they'll hit a homer and the show will be up to the calibur of the best TNG or DS9 episodes. As long as they keep trying, sci-fi fans will have something to watch.

Sith

Dirt · Post by **Dirt** » Tue Oct 19, 2004 11:45 am

I don't watch it.

It's so bad that this is going to be it's last season from what I understand.

Vesper · Post by **Vesper** » Tue Oct 19, 2004 1:25 pm

The reason they ended the whole temporal cold war thing is to allow the new Producer/Writer, Manny Coto, to start fresh. Finally, they're letting someone with some talnet write episodes and give direction to the series. Manny is the brains behind Odyssey 5, which ranks a close 2nd to Firefly in "Series that should have never been cancelled." (Showtime just wrapped up showing reruns of it. Maybe they'll do it again soon.)

Give Enterprise a chance, and see what the new blood can do.

Odin · Post by **Odin** » Tue Oct 19, 2004 1:41 pm

Dirt wrote:I don't watch it.

It's so bad that this is going to be it's last season from what I understand.

ROFL. You got me. I didn't realize you were just trolling. Obviously if you don't watch the show, you can't possibly have an opinion on whether its any good or not, but I took you seriously at first. Good one!

Sith

Jag · Post by **Jag** » Tue Oct 19, 2004 1:59 pm

Ranulf wrote:
Asharak wrote:
Jag wrote:Next ep could be good with Brent Spiner as Data's creator's ancestor, plus some stuff on the Eugenics war as well.
I missed the preview... seriously?

- Ash
Seriously. I dont think they said what the ep is about. All I saw was, "in two weeks Brent Spiner comes to Enterprise".

Yep. It's on in 2 weeks. Next episode is 'homecoming' looks boring. BUT on 10/29 this is what we get:

"When genetic supermen left over from the Eugenics Wars hijack a Klingon ship, Archer must rely on their creator, the criminal Dr. Arik Soong, to help hunt them down and avert an interstellar war."

http://www.startrek.com/startrek/view/s ... /6485.html