Episode by Episode - Star Trek: Enterprise

Season 1

Episode 9 Civilization

The crew of the Enterprise discover a planet which can support life.  A pre-industrial society exists there but their scans show tech that should not be there.  The crew investigates and comes across an alien race which is secretly mining for certain resources and poisoning the population in the process.  A fight ensues, the Enterprise chases off the aliens and the Vulcans agree to monitor and protect the planet in the future.

 

It’s an interesting episode, Earth doesn’t have a prime directive like Starfleet has in the other Star Trek shows.  The Enterprise crew still follows the Vulcan’s advice and tries not to culturally contaminate planets that do not have warp capability.  

 

It setup a lot of potential tension for the future with no set rule about aliens visiting other worlds and no prime directive.  Ultimately the show never explored this concept any deeper.   

 

Written by
Joseph Ammendolea
Owner/President
“I Like To Play With Toys” Productions®
ILikeToPlayWithToysProductions@Yahoo.com

2022 Eternal Con - Sophie

Episode by Episode - Star Trek: Enterprise

Season 1

Episode 8 Breaking the Ice

 

Another solid episode and a good follow-up to the prior.  Captain Archer has trust issues with his Vulcan first officer T’Pol and has his engineer Commander Tucker hack an encrypted message she received.  Turns out, the message is just a personal letter about her arranged marriage falling apart.    Tucker feels bad, Archer feels bad.  Relationships are mended

 

The main plot involves some of the Enterprise crew getting stuck in a meteor of ice while a Vulcan ship observes.  The Vulcan captain offers to help, Archer is stubborn and wants to solve the problem himself.  After a few failed attempts and his crew members on the verge of dying, T’Pol convinces Archer to accept the Vulcan’s help.  She states the captain of the Vulcan ship wants to prove that Earthlings are stubborn and would rather let their own people die than accept help.  Archer relents, the day is saved. 

 

Written by
Joseph Ammendolea
Owner/President
“I Like To Play With Toys” Productions®
ILikeToPlayWithToysProductions@Yahoo.com

2022 Eternal Con Randomness

Episode by Episode - Star Trek: Enterprise

Season 1

Episode 7 The Andorian Incident 

There’s a lot to love in this episode.  For starters we’re introduced to the Alien species the Andorians which have floated around in different Star Trek shows for years but never received any deep coverage.  So we get to enjoy exactly what these aliens were like.  Also, since it’s a prequel, they don’t necessarily have to be allies.  

 

The Andorians attack a Vulcan monastery while Enterprise is paying a visit and keep the crew hostage.  The Andorians believe the Vulcans have a hidden spy post there.  Enterprise doesn’t believe them and fights back.  During the scuffle the spy post is discovered.  Captain Archer is pissed at the Vulcans for lying, gives the proof of the spy post to the Andorians and sends them on their way.  

 

The Andorians come off as ruthless paranoid bullies who turn out to be right.  That’s a nice twist.  They start off as enemies and leave as possible friends.  It also shows that Vulcans aren’t the most trusting.  A far cry from the days of Spock and Captain Kirk.  

 

Written by
Joseph Ammendolea
Owner/President
“I Like To Play With Toys” Productions®
ILikeToPlayWithToysProductions@Yahoo.com

Episode by Episode - Star Trek: Enterprise

Season 1

Episode 6 Terra Nova

 

Enterprise goes to visit a human space colony that Earth lost contact with a generation ago.  The mythos is there was bad blood between the colony and Earth.  Enterprise is hoping to mend fences.  Instead they come across a bunch of people living underground who hate Earth and blame them for some sci-fi natural disaster.   It’s just like the Star Trek Voyager Episode “Friendship 1” where Earth was blamed for the destruction of the planet because they wanted to invade or kill everyone.  It’s almost identical with people living underground and a bunch of other tropes involving crew hostages and solutions on how to get the people off the planet but they eventually settle on a solution that lets the people stay on the planet.  

 

It’s such a recycle, from a prior episode it’s painful to watch.   How was this not caught in the pitch meeting?  Ultimately this episode is a fail and worth skipping when watching the series.  

 

Written by
Joseph Ammendolea
Owner/President
“I Like To Play With Toys” Productions®
ILikeToPlayWithToysProductions@Yahoo.com

Episode by Episode - Star Trek: Enterprise

Season 1

Episode 5 Unexpected

This comedic episode centers around Commander Tucker who helps some aliens perform repairs on their ship and accidentally gets pregnant.  It’s not terrible, has funny moments.  We get an episode featuring one of the more likeable characters of the series.  

 

Written by
Joseph Ammendolea
Owner/President
“I Like To Play With Toys” Productions®
ILikeToPlayWithToysProductions@Yahoo.com

Episode by Episode - Star Trek: Enterprise

Season 1

Episode 4 Strange New World

 

The crew of Enterprise find an M class planet and in their overzealousness send a landing party on the planet prematurely and the crew gets infected with some pollen that makes them hallucinate and become paranoid.  The Vulcan science officer T’Pol tries to caution the captain against diving head first but Captain Archer doesn’t heed her warnings.  

 

The episode has some decent tension and a few good twists.  At one point you really think Rock People are menacing the away party.  The pollen paranoia is a nice twist.  The real issue is humans should have learned this lesson years ago.  While the warp 5 engine is new.  Warp drive isn’t new.  Therefore they were already exploring the galaxy at a smaller distance.  Planet exploration protocols should have been established by this point, which just makes Captain Archer a complete moron who ignored them or Earth completely brain dead for not writing a policy sooner. 

 

Written by
Joseph Ammendolea
Owner/President
“I Like To Play With Toys” Productions®
ILikeToPlayWithToysProductions@Yahoo.com

Episode by Episode - Star Trek: Enterprise

Season 1

Episode 3 Fight or Flight

Not a good choice for the second episode.  Going back to Star Trek: The Next Generation.  The show found its footing in season three when each episode became character driven.  Therefore each character got their own episode centered around them where they learn a lesson and become a better person.  It's ultimately what Saved The Next Generation because those first two seasons were rough.  Extremely rough.  Once the episodes became character based and shifted away from sci-fi plot centric episodes, the stories got better, became more relatable.  

 

Star Trek took this character driven story writing method and applied it to its spin-offs Deep Space Nine and Voyager.  But episode 2 is centered around one of its whinier characters.  Hoshi Sato will spend the entire series putting people to sleep with her lack of confidence.  Characters that lack confidence work as secondary characters but when you devote entire episodes to their neurosis it’s less compelling story telling and more of a chore.  

 

Ultimately Sato has to use her great linguistic skills to solve a misunderstanding with an alien species.  Then everyone flies off all–the-better for the experience.  It’s a bit “by the numbers” for Star Trek by this point and one can wonder which abandoned script was dusted off from an old series to craft this story. 

 

Written by
Joseph Ammendolea
Owner/President
“I Like To Play With Toys” Productions®
ILikeToPlayWithToysProductions@Yahoo.com

Episode by Episode - Star Trek: Enterprise

Welcome to the first of an ongoing series where we review TV shows one episode at a time.  We’re starting with the lesser loved Star Trek series Enterprise.  Why?  Because it’s ripe for criticism but it’s not without its charm.  

Season 1

Episode 1 & 2 Broken Bow 

 

The first two episodes were aired back to back and offered a new take on the Star Trek mythos.  It is a prequel series about Earth before Starfleet was formed.  It establishes tension between Humans and Vulcans.  Jonathan Archer is about to embark on a historic expedition with a brand new starship powered by the warp 5 engine, the fastest warp engine mankind has ever created.  It will allow them to travel further and faster than had ever been possible for humans before.  

 

Shenanigans happen and a Klingon crashes on their planet.  Due to a misunderstanding the Klingon gets shot by a farmer.  Vulcans advise to pull the plug while he’s in a coma.  Earth insists on bringing him back to the Klingon home world to deliver a message.  

 

During their voyage to the planet Kronos the Klingon gets kidnapped by the Suliban who are part of a temporal cold war.  They are helping some dude in the future in exchange for evolutionary upgrades.  This was supposed to be the series ongoing story arc mixed in with stand-alone episodes.  As the season progress fans showed frustration with the storyline and it was finally abandoned by season 4.  The concept was the time travel story could be used to explain away any story inconsistencies created by other established Star Trek series.  

 

Eventually the Enterprise save the kidnapped Klingon, take him back to Kronos.  Begin their exploration of the galaxy.  

 

It’s a solid establishing episode.  We meet all the characters.  Learn about the plot of the show.  Has some interesting action.  It’s a good first start.  Not the best first episode ever made but certainly not the worst.  It’s far better that the first episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation.  

 

Written by
Joseph Ammendolea
Owner/President
“I Like To Play With Toys” Productions®
ILikeToPlayWithToysProductions@Yahoo.com