Why was my comment deleted? It did not break any rules nor was it disrespectful in any way. I came here to reply to the person who commented my message and I saw it's gone. I will repost it since it did not break the rules. The comment could also be helpful to the newcomers who might think this is a brand new show.
-------Comment posted on 26 Nov 2023
Why in the world is this marked as separate show and the one from 2005 marked as Ended? This is not a reboot, but a direct continuation of the previous episode The Power of the Doctor! I know they want to call the new season Season 1 because of Disney Plus, but it is not, it's actually Season 14. It makes no sense at all. Not to mention that the specials also reference previous seasons. This is not like a reboot from 2005 when newcomers could just start watching from there and ignore Classic Who. Newcomers can't start from here! I don't understand why it couldn't say Season 14 on Disney. All the previous seasons could be imported at some point once the whatever deal they have with BBC expires (I assume that's what is stopping them from putting them on the platform right away).
This is just insane, an insult to the fans, Jodie (doctor not regenerating into her clothes), Chibnall, everyone...
How do we organize our collection now and sync with Trakt? I don't want to label it as a separate show. What's interesting is that IMDB and TVDB show seasons correctly and have Season 14. TMDB does some weird stuff.
Update: If someone is wondering how to organize the collection in Plex, just follow TVDB and it will be shown correctly.
Is this episode written by 16 years old?
This episode wanted to be Seven Samurai but ended up as that terrible The Walking Dead episode where everyone gets slaughtered (they're not though in Mandalorian, since this is a Disney series).
There is no development and no build up at all in this episode. Like the previous episode, everything is self-contained. All are introduced and resolved in this same episode. A lot of things happened in this episode but nothing actually contributes to the plot - except for exposition dump.
The bandit raid is a terribly weak, villain of the week setup. They just show up as some evil nuisances - no motives, no goals at all. The Mando teams up with an ex-rebel, which debunks a tired cliche, but at this point this feels like a try-hard attempt to make The Mando as a morally righteous hero. There is a half-assed attempts at romance here, but it feels forced as it happens so sudden. Despite being self-contained (or maybe because it is) the episode lacks closure by the end, and the nifty little scene regarding one stray bounty hunter seems like something that appears just because they still have several episodes to go.
The dialogues are terrible: it's a tonne of exposition dumps. I don't have any idea why the writers think it makes sense for the characters to suddenly ask a stranger, "when was your last time you open your helmet?" and, in return, open up a heart-to-heart "hey I got a tragic story" past to a stranger. The banters with Gina Carano's character is okay, but it feels like they have to slip backstory every now and then. As if they're not having a real, human conversation. Every dialogue feels so forced and hurried as if they have to make it fit into this episode.
Also, it seems like they have no idea what an AT-ST is. It's a vehicle, not a droid.
Best lines
I’m waiting for an old friend - Bran
You left me for dead - Hound
I also robbed you - Arya
I’ve always had blue eyes! - Tormund
Whatever they want - Dany
but
It had its moments - Sansa
They need wheelchair ramps in Winterfell. They left Bran in the courtyard overnight!
Parallelism between Season 1 Episode 1 and Season 8 Episode 1
¯\_(ツ)_/¯ S08E01 Jon: "Where's Arya?" Sansa: "Lurking somewhere."Foreshadowing (from different Seasons/Episodes.)
01. S03E05“ “Let’s not go back. Let’s stay here a while longer,” Ygritte tells Jon. “I don’t ever want to leave this cave, Jon Snow.” S08E01 “We could stay a thousand years. No one would find us,” Daenerys says to Jon.02. Sam is suggesting rebelling against the Targaryen because they burned his father and brother alive. Similar to when Robert's Rebellion, began when Rhaegar Targaryen, allegedly abducted Robert's betrothed, Lyanna Stark.
Man, this time I thought I was keeping perfect track of everything and had some theories lined up, surely they couldn't pull the rug from under us again... most of what I thought ended up being just dead wrong, I'm a fool, can't believe it haha. They pulled the "different timelines" trick of Season 1 mixed with the "fidelity time jump" trick of Season 2, and I definitely need to watch this one again.
So basically, everything we've seen with Caleb and Maeve (including the past stuff shown in this episode) happened in the few years following Season 3, but then they "died". Hale then dominates the world, and over two decades later, I guess there's only a faction of humans that remain, including Caleb's daughter, and that's when Bernard begins doing his stuff / Dolores begins realizing things are strange. The twist makes a lot of sense... knowing this, I'm super excited to see what the show becomes now.
What I'm most curious about is finding out exactly what Hale is doing, because it seems like the hosts aren't really aware of what went down and just "live life" normally in the world - so rather than just being a "human vs hosts" situation, at least it looks like Hale is also playing god even among the hosts, plus, humans are being made into hosts, such as Caleb. I wonder why, and also wonder if William is still being kept alive.
The biggest question though... was Stubbs just sitting down waiting for 30 years for Bernard to be back? lol
Best Snyder movie so far. Sadly it is deeply misunderstood. Movie is way more deeper and complex than it looks like on first glance.
People don't realize Sweet Pea is the protagonist, Babydoll is a figment of Sweet Pea’s imagination. Babydoll does not exist. Babydoll's story is Sweet Pea’s story. Sweet Pea was sexually abused, killed her sister and is in psychiatric hospital in therapy. Babydoll is Sweet Pea's avatar. Way of dealing with grief, with guilt, and way to manage her current situation and overcome it. Babydoll is also Sweet Pea's guardian angel.
Sweet Pea is the only fully rounded character, other girls represent aspects of her psyche. Babydoll represents strength and courage, Amber loyalty, Blondie fear, and Rocket represents guilt. In the third level reality her psyche fights for the things to get her free from her current state. Second guardian angel (the Wise Man) guides her through. To fully recover she needs to get over her guilt (Rocket dies as a symbol), also other girls represent things which she needs to leave behind to fully recover .
Babydoll is one of those things. She is the fifth thing (“The fifth is a mystery. It is the reason. It is the goal. It will be a deep sacrifice and a perfect victory.”). Lobotomy of Babydoll represents Sweet Pea’s mind of taking control. Sweet Pea needs to sacrifice Babydoll to be “cured”. Escape at the end is a symbol of that process of being cured. That’s why the driver is the Wise Man, he guides her further.
Sucker Punch is Sweet Pea’s journey from “madness” to “sanity”. Movie is philosophical / psychological investigation wrapped in a special effects action-fantasy. As the movie changes realities (mostly in the third reality), Snyder uses more fetishized image of the girls. He uses clichés and cluttered iconography (nazi zombies, sexy schoolgirls). It is a way to detached and disconnected characters from second reality. Second reality, the brothel, is the “main” reality. In which everything happens.
1/10
Weak Sauce
straight up sucked
with "The Message".
Woke propaganda
Piss-Poor Bull-shit.
THE "MESSAGE"
IS STRONG.
(Go Woke Go Broke).
(They Couldn't even
give The Legend
Wilfred a proper
send off and the
Ultimate respect
he deserves because
they were to busy
Ticking boxes
and being
"Stunning and Brave"
I put up with Chinballs
era using this show as
his own personal
Chew toy to spread
The Agenda
("The Message") as
I knew my man
Russell was coming
back to take over.
David and Catherine
were never my favourites,
(Rose "Billie Piper"
(the greatest of all time)
is
and always will be my
all time favourite
companion and
Peter Capaldi will always
be the best Doctor
of all time and my Favourite
Doctor).
I had hope they may
come back at some point
for the 60th but after this
Abomination of 59 minutes
preaching
"The Message"
and the fact that they
are not even trying
to hide the Woke propaganda
anymore
I don't want "my" Rose
(BadWolf) or Peter anywhere
near this DumpsterFire
shit-show.
And now Russell who
is Woke AF making
Davros a normal dude
who looks as though
his boss is Hitler,
Now Russel is saying
that one of the most iconic
characters of all time
can no longer be in
a wheelchair because
apparently according to him
it paints people in
actual wheelchairs as
been associated with
being "Evil",
(you can't have
disabilities associated with
Davos because he's evil
so that automatically makes
a real person with disabilities
evil), i shit you not.
This is where Russells Agenda
driven head is at,
it's actually disgusting
what he is implying
about people with a
disability and he's actually
pissed all those people
off and I'm not surprised,
(I've lost all respect for him).
so now you have (wish)
Davros straight up and
walking
(absolute nonsense).
"I'll see myself out".
Don't get me started
on The Doctor
a 4.5 billion year old
Time Lord who knows 5 billion
languages getting a dressing down
on using pronouns...wtaf,
it's arrogant-shitty and lazy writing
to even think the alien
The Doctor was talking too
would use human terms
for it's own gender,
get the fcuk outta here.
That ending is the most
Woke and cringe worthy
nonsense I have ever witnessed.
(you know nothing and we know
everything, because you
are a male presenting
Time Lord, if you were
still a woman you'd understand,
(WTAF).
I'll stop there it's killing
me just writing this and
remembering what an
Abysmal Abomination
piss take this was,
I was so angry how they
scrubbed quality writing
and story telling to
preach at me for 59 minutes,
this is not what I signed up for,
I've lost all respect for
David Tennant as he's all
for this Woke Bull-Crap
and bashing people over
the head with propaganda,
(David has a 10 year old
"Rose", so he's all for
Doctor Who being
high jacked).
Even The BBC review bomb
it's own show thst's
being shown
on it's own platform,
saying "Doctor Who has
always been progressive but
all it is now is a vessel to
spread "The Message",
that's all I need to hear to
know this once great show
"must see tv" is dead a buried
and it ain't never coming back.
And it's only going to get worse,
just listen to Russell in any
interview about his thoughts
and plans for the new Doctor
after David.
And I thought Russell
was going to be the
Saviour, instead he's
the Destroyer and he's
just picked up right
where Chinballs left this show,
In the mud.
I'm mostly annoyed that this still wasn't even the actual conclusion. What the hell do we need another season for? I also don't see why humanity in the real world is apparently guaranteed to go instinct after all of this (according to Christina aka "Dolores" during her final dialogue).
Hell, while we're talking about that, how can she speak of having seen the best and worst of humanity and not acknowledge that the hosts did the exact same thing to humanity when the humans were basically hosts themselves with narratives written for them?
Considering that the hosts knew humans were intelligent, sentient, beings, where in the original park pretty much none of the humans knew that the hosts weren't simply robots without actual feelings one could argue that what the hosts did was actually far worse (at least, the hosts in the real world).
Lastly, why does she need one "final" test? As a test for what? The good that can be found in humanity? Weren't we just talking about seeing the beauty in this world? The ancient order in the chaos? What does she need another test/game for?
How do you spend an entire season showing hosts are just as flawed as humans (hell, this was one of the main reasons Hale wanted the hosts to transcend and not waste their time around humans in the city) and then not acknowledge it at the end and instead focus on the humans being the ones that need to face a final test? At least during her dialogue with Ted. It just makes no sense to me.
Maybe I completely misunderstood as she does mention "maybe this time we'll set ourselves free" and it's not so much a test for humanity but for all sentient beings (and would any human she created from memory in her virtual park actually still be a human to begin with?).
This is the one. This is the episode where, back in 1999(?), I more or less gave up on Star Trek: Voyager. I caught a few more episodes over the next year or two, but my heart really wasn't in it anymore and this was the nail in the coffin.
It's an episode that fails in every way, made worse by the fact that it's attempting to make a valid point about blind hate and propaganda. The horrible icing on the cake is that, of all the characters, Chakotay is the one chosen to lead this outing.
The peculiar dialogue, while initially intriguing, quickly becomes tiresome and cheesy, and then infuriating. Especially given how seriously all the actors attempt to deliver it, and then once Chakotay begins to use it it's unbearable.
In a lazy move, the Kradin appear to just be a slight variation on Nausicaans. The episode ends with an unbelievable act of stupidity on the Voyager crew's part when they bring the Kradin ambassador to meet Chakotay and wonder why the Commander is uncomfortable. HE'S JUST BEEN BRAINWASHED TO HATE THEM.
How many shuttlecraft does Voyager have? This is the third to be lost in the last three episodes.
Apparently it may take some time for Chakotay to get over this, but don't worry everyone - he'll have forgotten all about it next week. Just like this episode forgot that Tom and B'Elanna professed their love for each other last week after a whole year of trying to get us to believe it.
To see a show which tackled a somewhat similar subject and did it very well, see the Stargate SG-1 episode 'The Other Side'.
Creative and enjoyable, with a pleasantly weird alternate-universe/time-shift aspect that never becomes too complicated to follow. It leaves you with the odd feeling of having seen the Voyager crew die, but never really being sure if they were our original crew, or whether that even matters. The exact same thing happens to Harry that happens to O'Brien in DS9's 'Visionary', in that we are left with a version of the character who isn't exactly our own one.
It was also good to see the Vidiians back to being pretty decent bad guys again. There was something chilling about the way they just assessed unconscious people by which organs they could harvest from them. Janeway was a bit of a badass in regards to the solution to getting rid of them.
Having the duplicate Janeways standing so close to each other during their scenes made it look like they were about to kiss, and really made me aware of how shows had to work within the 4:3 aspect ratio back then. I felt a bit more let down that the two versions of Kes didn't really interact with each other at all.
I got quite wrapped up in the ordeal of Ensign Wildman finally having her baby, which certainly ran through a gamut of emotions! Chakotay was as useless as ever, and I noticed that Voyager didn't require his authorisation to concur with setting the self-destruct - I guess Janeway changed that because she knows he'd just mess it up.
The most interesting thing here is the mind-controlling alien itself. It shows a level of either control or technology that hasn't really been done before, and that makes it kind of fascinating.
The hallucinations that everyone has are unfortunately very obvious and unadventurous. Particularly cringeworthy is the stuff with Paris and his father; daddy issues have never felt so dull. Far better is the revelation that B'Elanna kind of wants to get it on with Chakotay, and true to her Klingon heritage she wants him to be forceful about it. Not something I'm particularly eager to see, but it did manage to take me by surprise. Tuvok was a particular let down with his "I ... do not ... understand ... how this is ... possible". Seriously? There's a mind controlling alien giving you hallucinations, Tuvok, it's pretty obvious. You're supposed to be a logical and clever Vulcan, act like one.
Janeway's holodeck fantasy is a fun diversion despite some of the actors involved. For all its silliness, it's managed to create a compelling mystery (WHAT IS ON THE FOURTH FLOOR?!). However, having had cucumber sandwiches myself I can say with certainty that they are never something worth fantasising about.
Kes continues to develop her mental abilities and comes out, again, as the best part of the story.
So did Tony die or didn't he? I think he did. I think the suddenness of the cut to black and the previous flashback to his conversation with Bobby that you don't see or hear death nods in that direction. But I also think it doesn't really matter. The point, if I may be so bold, is that the end doesn't necessarily come on schedule. It can come at any time, when you least expect it, when you're not thinking about it, in the heightened moments when you fear for your life at a safe house with an assault rifle draped across your stomach, or when you're feeling safe and enjoying a family meal at a diner.
We try to ignore that fact, to try to live as though it weren't true. You pretty much have to in order to keep living any semblance of a real life. But Tony, more than most people, lives, as Carmella notes, with a sword of damocles hanging over his head at all times. And that means that we should, as Tony once said and as AJ reminds him, remember the good times, to try to enjoy those sweet moments when we have them because we don't know how long they might last or how many opportunities we may have to find them again. It's existentialist, but a surprisingly optimistic take on it for this show.
Drawing back to the title, there's always been something the show posits as quintessentially American about Tony. In the final scene, they surround him with Americana at the diner: the friendly young couple, the cub scout troupe, the sports hero murals on the walls. Even Tony is assembling his nuclear family. He's from an immigrant family, considers himself self-made and both proud of his heritage and a part of the melting pot. Is Tony himself an aging superpower, or am I reading too much into it here?
The finale spends more time with AJ than I might prefer. But it also shows that as much as Tony wanted it, his kids cannot really escape his orbit. AJ is naive and misguided for the most part, and certainly insanely self-pitying, but he also shows a (again naive) sense of understanding about the greater tragedies in the world. His method of trying to help is an interesting one, but also a hard one, which is not typically the Sopranos way. Instead, his parents ply him with a cushy job (as the equivalent of a D-Girl, as Chris might say). And suddenly his concerns about the material world seem to drift away. He may not be a mobster, but he can be corrupted.
And Meadow has given up Tony's dream for her - becoming a pediatrician, and helping little babies. (The episode does lean hard into the "sociopaths like babies and pets" idea between this and the cat.). Instead, she's going to become a civil rights lawyers, and Tony can see her representing folks like him, marrying another mobster, and being pulled into a life he did not want for her. If there's a persistent theme to these series, it's not simply about the difficulty of changing on a personal level, it's about it on a generational level, how we carry the baggage of our parents and grandparents and other generations past, that makes it difficult to escape from their orbit. The show is a little blunt about it when Meadow says that if she hadn't seen her father dragged away so many times civil rights wouldn't be such a salient concern for her, but it's an interesting idea.
Indeed, another theme the show has kept close and blossoms in this episode is the idea that Tony taints whatever he touches. AJ is back to being a spoiled brat. Meadow is too much in the world of the mob to truly escape it. Carmela long ago figured out that she was in too deep to pull out of the life she had made with Tony. Agent Harris has gone native, cheering on the NJ crime family when he hears that Phil has been executed. Paulie talks about taking time off, but instead agrees to skipper the construction crew. And as he hits out in front of Satriale's, there are a lot of empty tables there with him.
So when the episode cuts to black, do we see a man about to get his just deserts, a tumor in the lives of friends and family being removed, or have we simply ended our time with a man who will go on to face a weapons charge? I have my thoughts on it, but more importantly than the outcome is the idea behind it. We don't know whether Tony lived or died, just like we don't know when the end is coming. There are perilous forces in the world like Tony Soprano who result in people like the motorcyclist from the last episode dying, or the comare and her father, who have no reason to suspect they'd be impacted by these events in this way. You can live the high-powered life of Junior Soprano and still have who you are taken away by forces beyond your control. Value the good times, David Chase & Co. seem to say, because we live in a state of sudden uncertainty, where the cut to black could come without warning or fanfare, and those moments become all we have, or had.
I'd say that in general this season had some of the best Jodie episodes for me, and Dan quickly became my favorite of her companions... but nothing changes the fact that there was just too much going on. Too many characters, too many plots to tie together. I shouldn't be very surprised by my disappointment... but I was surprised anyway, there was so much wasted potential.
In the end, there was zero pay-off with Swarm, Azure, and Passenger, they were gone in seconds and there was never any big revelation. Swarm loved to talk as if he was secretly someone tied to the Doctor's past (in the same vein as The Master or another past Time Lord), but was just someone going up against "Division" I guess? (I'm starting to think they're overestimating how interesting the "Division" plotline is.)
The Grand Serpent was absolutely of no consequence other than to bring back Kate Stewart I suppose, yet her interactions with the Doctor were small, and not really as fun as they could've been? And also... so... many... Sontarans. Why so much focus on the Sontarans and their plans, when they already had an entire episode about their conquest, and were defeated before? I don't know if it's because COVID affected the amount of episodes, but everything just fell flat as hell.
I hate being so negative - I really did enjoy these episodes more than the past couple of seasons and there were plenty of memorable moments, including great supporting characters. But it feels so frustrating that they didn't capitalize on all the buildup. I'm definitely looking to the Thirteenth Doctor's specials though - maybe we will see some of it come back and get a better resolution. All I hope is Jodie gets the sendoff she deserves, because even though I had plenty of issues with this era of Doctor Who, she's a great performer and wonderful Doctor.
Me at the start of this episode:
- What the hell, B'Elanna and Tom are getting married? When did this all happen?
- Tom's a Lieutenant? He was demoted. How stupid are the writers on this show?
- Voyager has a new warp core? Why is this the first we're hearing of it?! I hate this show.
And as it turns out it's all a deception, nicely done. I did not see it coming. That still doesn't change the fact that the episode is all just a bit shit, really. It's got to be one of the most depressing ones, too. The crew's generally subdued reactions to finding out they're not who they think they were, Tom being the one angry crew member and suddenly becoming an arsehole bad boy (like the series initially set him up to be, but forgot about), these things just don't ring true.
The makeup effects also look very silly, and I honestly couldn't stop laughing as the episode progressed. The performances didn't help either, with Janeway mostly coming across as sleepy, Neelix looking like a leprechaun and Harry looking like a frog.
On the positive side, I like that the episode picked up a storyline from a previous one and I was impressed that Jeri Ryan still looked gorgeous even with the "melting" makeup. The ending is really dark and final, something which I wasn't expecting.
I was worried when this started as it looked like was going to be an episode all about Neelix and his jealousy. It turns out that it is, but it's nowhere near as bad as I had feared. Tom and Neelix really needed to work their differences out, and in true cliched TV tradition they get stranded together. It becomes a prime example of how simplistic the writing on this show was, as the two of them bond over a baby and magically resolve all of their differences. You could argue that Trek in general operates like this, but Voyager somehow makes it much harder to stomach. Still, I'm really glad that the Neelix/Paris jealousy story is over.
It's also a shame that the alien baby puppet looks like a reject from that '90s TV show Dinosaurs.
I really appreciated the calmer moments of this one, such as Harry playing clarinet and the Doctor's discussion with Kes. Voyager was not one for really digging into characters, so when the moments occur I tend to enjoy them. I think this also wins the prize for the most insane camera shaking ever during the shuttle's crash landing. That was absolutely nuts.
Janeway's new hairdo is awesome.
Creepy friendly alien race is creepy!
This is an example of how much better Voyager could have been, as it demonstrates many elements that make for compelling television. It's all about the characters and their choices, and we see how much having decisions made for them by others is affecting them.
The potential mutiny here is the real spark of the episode, and it's important to note that it begins with a mixture of the Maquis and Starfleet crews. Seska is the one who keeps pushing, but it doesn't take much for others to be willing. And once it all really begins to play out, it's Tuvok of all people who sees it as the logical course of action.
Janeway's decision is the part that speaks most to me. I have to admit, I think she was wrong. Her primary duty to her crew is to get them home and she denies them that because she's worried about upsetting another culture, and betraying her principles. That would be all well and fine until Harry is offered another way to get the technology they need. That was a loophole on a platter.
The final scene with Tuvok is heartfelt and lays bare a lot about each character's way of thinking. I think he did the right thing even if it was for the wrong reasons, but it can't be overlooked that he probably averted a ship-wide mutiny.
The thing which really brings the episode down are the terrible aliens and their terrible planet, with Gath being particularly hard to watch.
And here we have it, the real blemish on an otherwise great show and a contender for the worst episode in the whole Trek franchise. This is quite a disgusting episode for very clear reasons: it makes light of sexism, sexual assault and attempts to turn trans-genderism/gender identity into a joke. I honestly have no idea how anyone thought this was a good idea, other maybe than "it'll be funny!". It's a shame, because the episode starts with the very interesting issue of women getting equal rights on Ferenginar before becoming derailed. It also has the superb Wallace Shawn and Jeffrey Combs doing their usual excellent work.
We open with Quark, a character we've come to love through his faults, openly encouraging a female employee to perform sexual acts on him under the threat of being fired. But it's okay, right? It's meant to be funny.
Quark is forced to have gender reassignment and becomes woman. It's okay, it's meant to be funny.
We all laugh at Quark trying to act like a woman, and the way his hormones now make him feel. It's okay, it's meant to be funny.
A Ferengi male traps female-Quark in his quarters and chases her around in an attempt to have sex with her against her will. It's all very slapstick. It's meant to be funny!
At the end, it turns out that Quark's female employee actually wants to perform the work-enforced sex acts on him! Women always say yes if you're persistent enough, right? SO FUNNY!
Quark doesn't actually learn anything from his experience as a woman! Ha! Sexism wasn't ever a real thing! Oh MY!
so sherlock is over, and these are my thoughts on the finale in order of appearance:
since when the show is a horror movie and why was there a fucking clown.
the motion sensor was activated after the drone had landed and mycroft obviously knew enough about those explosives to realise that’s how they work, so why the hell did they wait for that to happen instead of immediately running away? oh wait. the drama.
they actually put that horrible cgi explosion from the trailer into the episode… why. later, in the very end, i will be reminded of it while watching sherlock and john run in slow mo.
why couldn’t mycroft, an important government figure and a relative of eurus, officially check up on her instead of the whole dress up game? and then he obviously shows us that he can fire or order around anyone in that prison which makes their shenanigans even less relevant. it’s really sad to see non-existent problems beings “solved” just to use screen time and mindlessly entertain the viewers. detective stories are supposed to be reasonable.
okay, i’m sorry but i’m not buying that “enslaving” bullshit. i want to know how she does it, because all we were given is some pieces of weird bullshit that wouldn’t faze anyone in their right mind. it reminds me of the cabbie from the pilot episode that supposedly talked his victims into killing themselves. but in the end we learned that he just threatened them with a fake gun. ah those good old times when the show had its wits and integrity still intact…
they sure like to deliberately make sherlock obtuse. i just don’t buy him missing that there’s no glass when he’s close to it and there’s still no reflexion. and shouldn’t the music sound muffled too or did the fiddle had its own voice modulator installed? interesting.
i know moriarty being alive would make no sense, but the show is guilty of occasionally doing that already, and he’s such a believably smart and psychotic character that’s interesting to watch that i would have gladly used my suspension of disbelief card.
i thought the girl on the plane was an idiot because she kept giving useless answers to important questions, but the reveal in the end explained it. 1-0, touche. then again, surely eurus would be imagining herself as the young version of herself and the sole reason they used another child actor is to keep the mystery up, which is a pretty cheap trick. 1-1.
now the real idiot (or more like a dumb plot device) here is undoubtedly molly. she fucking knows what sherlock does and in what kind of situations he sometime ends up being, and he obviously sounded nervous and agitated from the get go and eventually resorted to fucking begging, so why the hell couldn’t she trust him and just say what he asked her to? oh i know why. the drama. again. also her making sherlock “confess” his love for her she knows he doesn’t have literally came out of nowhere and had fanservice written all over it. and that conversation was so unrealistic and forced for the sake of plot progression it honestly made me cringe. god i wish they were more subtle with molly and her sad love for sherlock and all the irene adler mentions before it instead of jamming them into the storyline and reinforcing their awkward attempts to bring to life sherlock’s absent libido. they even made him destroy that coffin in a melodramatic fit, which was ridiculous because compared to the other experiments the molly incident surely warranted that kind of emotional outburst the least, no one had died after all. but wait, some fans are gonna love using that as proof for sherlock’s romantic feelings for molly, so that’s why it happened.
mycroft goading sherlock into killing him was painfully obvious, considering he’s the one who has been quite vocal about his brother not being a pragmatic automaton but a quite emotionally driven creature, and that he would never kill john, regardless of his intellectual capabilities.
so the lesson here is that you should pay more attention to your little sisters?..
you can’t just switch psychopathy on and off. but of course eurus was able to. in once instance she’s a cold blooded murderer that doesn’t understand the difference between killing someone innocent and someone guilty, in general she has a spontaneous child murder on her record, but oh no, the episode is almost over and we can’t possibly kill john watson (like we couldn't blow up molly or shoot mycroft, but had no problem axing mary, a character that no one gave two shits about, dead or alive, or moriarty, who had basically been the best character; good job on fucking up twice), the fans would rage, so let’s make our villain a crying scared little girl that longs for brotherly love and make her suddenly change her evil ways, so we could wrap this shit up and move on.
and why did they put her back in the place she can easily break out from? what even has changed? can’t she make the staff into her bitches again just by talking to them (eternal eyeroll) like she did before? yeah she’s not mad at sherlock anymore (because he gives her attention now! how cute), but she’s still a mentally disturbed person and the cage must get boring when you have a fiddle as your only source of entertainment.
so yeah, i basically wrote a fucking essay or more like a hateful ode to the show, but i don’t actually hate it, i still adore first two seasons, tolerate the third and i have been relatively entertained by the last one, this episode included, even if i undoubtedly think the show hasn't been clever for a long time and it's finale was less a detective and more a weird left-field saw tribute without everything that actually makes saw enjoyable. i'm writing this as a former fan that for the last few years has been mostly disappointed by the show they once loved, that’s all. i’m also bored and writing this kept my mind busy. that makes this otherwise useless “review” worth it, i guess.
I don't think this episode had much impact on me as a kid, but watching it now I realised what a wonderful piece of work it is. I've often had a problem with the Borg, in that they just aren't very interesting. Certainly they've managed to give them a cold sort of sense of dread, but mostly they are incredibly bland. 'I, Borg' finally gives them a new angle and it was much needed.
It's also surprising just how little they featured in the show, with this only being their third appearance. We get a brilliant character piece here for Picard, but also for Guinan and even Geordi. It's especially unnerving to Guinan, usually the poster child for serenity and good sense, to clearly be angry and unwilling to let go of her hate. Picard's responses are more expected and the episode allows us to go on a wonderful journey with him. I was particularly impressed by his mental transition back to being Locutus.
The real reason the episode works as a whole though is because the great performance by the young actor playing Hugh. He presents vulnerability and confusion well, without breaking into anything overly emotional or melodramatic.
It does seem that this episode would be completely ignored by the time of the First Contact movie, notably in regard to Picard's state of mind, and there are inconsistencies which aren't really addressed. I think at this point the idea was that Borg were still born and grown instead of being made up of all the species that they had assimilated.
Of all TNG episodes, 'The Wounded' feels like the one which firmly leads to the creation of Deep Space Nine. Chief O'Brien, having been given more and more screen time over the past couple of seasons, is finally given something of a leading role and a huge amount of character development. I would think that it's this episode that brought his character over to DS9. I really love the dinner scenes with Keiko, and of course the fantastic talk in Ten-Forward.
Additionally, we get to meet the Cardassians for the first time. These guys are just incredible, and I think one of the most developed alien races in popular science fiction. A big part of their success is down to the casting here, with Marc Alaimo playing Gul Macet. It's no coincidence he was later cast as Gul Dukat throughout DS9 (and for me, by far and away the best Trek villain ever). He brings a great deal of menace and intellect to the role, but we also get depth when you look at all 3 of the Cardassian actors together as they each display very different personalities. If they hadn't all worked so well I'm not sure that the Cardassians would have become some an important part of the franchise. There are wonderful scenes on the bridge as Picard has to deal with events while Macet watches on, tense stuff.
The weaker parts of the episode for me come in the form of Captain Maddox. Maybe it's because we've gotten so used to Picard as an example of a leader, but this guy just crumbles in comparison to him. It's also odd that we never see any of Maddox's crew and have to assume that they are just blindly following his bizarre orders.
[9.1/10] There was a news story a few years ago about a little girl who was born with a degenerative condition. The treatment of the condition required a certain type of donation, and so her parents had another child specifically to be that donor. (Apologies in perpetuity throughout the universe for the details that I’m sure I’m getting wrong from this half-remembered story.) The situation raised the intrigue and outrage of ethicists and laymen alike. Is it okay to make life just to save another life? Is it okay to bring someone into this world with the deliberate purpose of serving, in some ways, the needs of someone else? What rights does that second child have to agree or refuse to the procedure, however great or minor the risks?
These are questions with no easy answers, to the extent that they have any real answers at all. Now take that already impossibly complicated situation and throw in a few more dimensions of complexity. What if the sick child wasn’t just a helpless kid, but a vital member of a team who could accomplish things no one else could? What if you were on a mission against what might be an existential threat for all of humanity? What if the second child was only going to live for a matter of weeks regardless? What if there were a risky and experimental treatment that could extend their life, but at the expense of the life of the sick child?
The difficulties and moral intricacies of that situation would expand exponentially. That’s essentially what “Similitude” accomplishes. It takes an already ethically fraught area -- the creation of one life not as an end unto itself, but to save another -- and piles on added consideration after added consideration that only makes the situation more thorny and harder to decide what side you come down on.
That is, in a word, wonderful. Don’t get me wrong, this is episode is tough to watch in stretches. There is a Benjamin Button peculiarity and fragileness to Sim’s life, where he has to get by in a community and in a miniature set of norms that are not built or meant for someone like him. That leads to hard realizations and difficult experiences for the poor soul at times. Even beyond his considerable plight, it’s hard to have to watch Archer and Dr. Phlox and others, who both care about Trip and care about this innocent being whose inner life is just as rich, have to wrestle with the quandary of who lives and who dies.
But that is the space where Star Trek, as a franchise, soars. It’s these little moral thought experiments that challenge our notion of what’s right and fair and just through the lens of abstraction that science fiction provides. I can honestly say that I don’t know what I would do were I in Sim’s or Archer’s or Dr. Phlox’s position. The episode builds the moral considerations on both sides of the ledger to the point that choosing anything, even vicariously through the characters, feels a little heartbreaking, which is the sign of both a well-designed thought experiment, and a well-built episode.
Granted, Enterprise takes some liberties here that grease the wheels a little too much in places. For one thing, the cold open with “Trip” in the coffin is a pretty cheesy fake out. For another, it seems awfully convenient that Phlox just has this creature at the ready and has never mentioned it before. And last but not least, it’s vaguely implausible (albeit well within the realm of willing suspension of disbelief for a sci-fi show) that Sim retains Trip’s memories, not just his physical structure.
None of that really matters in the final tally, though, because Enterprise doesn't just take this admittedly out there situation seriously; it takes the characters who are enmeshed in it seriously.
While Sim’s development is understandably rushed, the focus of the hour is on his journey, and the bizarre but pathos-ridden experience of being born to die, while having the memories and the lust for life of the man whose health you’re supposed to sacrifice yourself to restore. While, as usual, Bakula can’t quite pull off the “morally distraught but determined” vibe, the production and the script take pains to show the tolls this situation is taking on him, with his morals balanced against his duty to the people of Earth.
And my god, Jolene Blalock gives what is maybe the best performance of the series so far. The way she is able to convey the sense in which T’Pol harbors affection for Sim and for Trip, and how she’s quietly breaking apart beneath her stoic Vulcan veneer when facing this situation, is brilliant. She conveys so many layers of surprise, of caution, of concern of pulling in too close to someone she’ll just have to say goodbye to, with such minor changes in expressions. In an episode that understandably gives Connor Trineer a lot to do, Blalock still manages to stand out.
The episode isn’t just character studies and moral philosophy though. It manages to tie all of this into a specific plot obstacle -- namely that the ship is stuck in some sort of magnetic rust nebula and has to get out before they’re jammed their forever, adding extra urgency to the required Trip resurrection. But even that adds moral complexity to Archer’s choices, when Sim contributes the idea that makes their escape possible, but isn’t allowed to lead the mission lest Trip’s last hope for revival blows up in the process.
Still, it’s the moments after that problem is solved that are the most harrowing here. When Sim discovers that there might be a way to end his life, when Archer has to threaten to kill one innocent person to save another, when T’Pol resolves (if only for a moment) her complicated feelings for the man in a coma and the man who’s assumed his life, when Dr. Phlox has to set aside his “do no harm” principles, the episode rises to a gripping, heartrending crescendo.
It’s a climax that involves sacrifice, of recognizing the impact of the greater cause hanging over all of them, of reckoning with your own impending death, of being glad for the brief life you had. In short, it is the stuff that great Star Trek is made of: the character-focus, the sci-fi plot hurdles, and most of all the high-minded philosophical challenges, that come together to expand our minds and test our hearts.
“Similitude” was penned by Manny Coto, who would go on to showrun this series, and if this is what he has in store for the show, I can’t wait for more.
As expected, this finale ended up being slightly underwhelming. Honestly, this whole season has been somewhat underwhelming. But that's beside the point right now. As always, though, there were moments that I liked in this episode, moments that weren't underwhelming, so to speak. The episode itself, on the other hand, was essentially like all the other episodes of the season; plotlines and plot progression that take a few steps forward and then take more steps backward and stay there, slow (and not in a well-done way, in my opinion), and ultimately, probably easily forgettable; with, of course, moments that weren't or were more memorable.
Seemingly, The Boys are disbanded. M.M. has returned to his family; something that I think he brought up in the premiere, and some other times throughout the season, as well. Frenchie and Kimiko are growing closer and seem to be off on their own adventure. Billy seemed to decline Grace's offer at the end of the episode; well, he didn't answer. And Hughie wants a break from having guts all over him, thinks he doesn't fit in with The Boys and never has, and wants to stand on his own two feet for once, and now wants to do things the right way, in a way that seemingly indicates that it won't result in having guts all over him.
Of course, this seeming-to-be disbandment of The Boys isn't going to last. And I think I know what's going to bring everyone back together, minus Hughie; but maybe he'll come back, too, due to something else. I was expecting Grace to die in this finale. I remember that there was a flashback in the comics of The Boys making a deal with The Seven with Mallory (who was a guy in the comics) at the helm, a deal having to do with both parties no longer fighting each other, something like that; and that he was killed at some point after that deal was made, which led to The Boys coming back together, back in business, and then, that's what ended up leading to Billy recruiting Hughie.
Grace's death would work as a tool to bring everyone back together, no matter what. But Hughie doesn't know her as well as Billy, Frenchie, and M.M. do, which is why I think something else besides that will be the ultimate reason for Hughie to come back. And while Kimiko doesn't know Grace that well, either, she'll probably go wherever Frenchie goes.
So, Victoria has superpowers. And they seem to coincide with what happened at the end of the previous episode and with what happened to Susan. Based on that revelation, the scene with her and Grace talking to the Secretary of Defense is seen in a different light. In that scene, she placed blame on Vought ━ twice. She blamed them for what happened. Then, when Robert replied by stating that a bunch of their guys died, too, she responded by insinuating it was to cover their tracks. Those two details stick out now.
It's possible that she did all of that to push the President to start having people use Compound V, for some reason; political gain, perhaps, or maybe she's truly against Vought and is using Compound V; so she has the means to do it her way, like in the comics where The Boys used it to have better chances against those with superpowers and did things their way.
After all, the Church of the Collective is on Vought's side or something like that, and she probably knew that. Meaning, taking out Alastair wasn't a move that was done out of now being a villain but rather a necessary evil to deal a major blow to Vought, specifically Stan. I'm not convinced that she's going to be a villain. But I don't think that she was the one who killed Susan and those people in the courtroom in the previous episode.
At the end of this episode, we saw her eyes as a metallic, silvery color, which suggests that when she uses her powers, her eyes glow like that and that she has to be looking at the person, of course. And we didn't see her eyes do that in the courtroom. I think my theory about Compound V; Stan getting it into the systems of people who'd be in the courtroom; is correct or more likely than Victoria being responsible. And if I'm correct, that could mean Stan did that to push the President into supplying Compound V.
I don't quite have any ideas as to what the purpose of Victoria is going to be and what she's going to be used for in the third season because I think she's a character who's exclusive to the show. I don't think she's from the comics. But it's possible that there was a character in the comics who was somewhat significant and a politician, and her character is based around that character, or it's the same thing with her as it is with Grace and Stormfront; as in, their counterparts in the comics were men.
Also, what's up with Cindy? The last time we saw her was two episodes ago; she didn't show up again in the previous episode. There's no way she isn't going to return in the third season because that will be ridiculous on the writers' part to leave something like that open-ended and forget all about it. But, oddly, they didn't have her show up again in the last two episodes of the season. Could she have been in the comics, like Love Sausage, and that's why the last time we saw her was the way it was?
I think there were things done throughout this season, developments that were built, that are paving the way for the show to be closer to the comics, specifically in the third season and onward; certain aspects like the world itself, which I think is starting to become more similar to the way it was from the get-go in the comics, the way it felt; the relationships and dynamics between the characters, like Frenchie and Kimiko; new characters introduced that were prominent in the comics, developments to one's character that aligns said character more to his or her's counterpart in the comics, like the death of Billy's wife, Becca; so on and so forth. I think, as an entire thing, that was the highlight of the season, with there being moments that were other highlights, in a lesser and/or different sense.
Anyway, this finale was alright. I know that I rated the previous episode with an eight (out of ten), the highest rating I've given an episode of this season; it was because of the ending, but it was still like all the other episodes, as was this finale. The plot, story, or plotlines, whatever you'd call it, of this season was the main factor for the feeling of underwhelming-ness to each episode. Despite that, I still enjoyed watching each episode, including this finale. And, as I've said before, there were plenty of moments; yes, moments, throughout the season, throughout each episode, moments that were good and memorable, better than others, better than the episodes themselves. And, well, I guess that's good enough.
The commencement speech Archer is reading on the monitor when Hoshi notifies him of the Tarkalean ship's distress call is a great touch. If you pause the blu-ray, you can actually read it (gotta love HD Star Trek). As I suspected, Archer confirms that they're Zefram Cochrane's words in a later scene. As much as Enterprise loves to mess with the existing continuity of the Trek universe, this episode is a great example of what it can do when it builds upon, instead of contradicts, the established events. The "message to the 24th century" is the only really trite part of this episode; everything else is extremely well done and fits so perfectly with the Borg stories we got to watch in the latter half of Voyager, it's hard to truly find fault with this episode.
What does bug me a bit is the seemingly automatic use of the established terms for things like "nanoprobes", "tubules", etc. Phlox is the one who introduces all of these Borg-related terms, which seems suspicious because he does so before becoming "infected" himself. It's been rather a long time since I saw First Contact, so perhaps those terms came up in Cochrane's retracted statements about the events surrounding his first warp flight and the influence of these cybernetic beings from the future?
It's much harder to excuse the fact that the security team's phase pistols cease working on the Borg drones who are trying to take over Enterprise well before the rifles Reed and Archer took over to the assimilated transport stop being effective. The same modifications were made to both weapon types, and the drones are part of the same local hive consciousness, so they should adapt to the weapons fire at the same time. (Yes, I was an avid reader of The Nitpicker's Guide when I last went through TNG.)
[4.1/10] I am the king of complaining about Star Trek episodes where some Federation ship barges in and just completely upends somebody else’s society. If I had a nickel for every time Captain Kirk strolled onto some alien planet and, over the advice of Spock, decided that their way of life was wrong and he knew better, I could afford to build my own stentorian-voiced authoritarian supercomputer. There’s a lack of nuance and practicality that always drove me nuts in that, and it’s a strain of arrogant righteousness that ran from the 1960s series to the latest one.
But holy hell, “Cogentior” ends with Archer chewing Trip out for teaching a slave to read and blaming him for the slave’s suicide. I just....I don’t know what to do with that.
Let’s go back to the basics of the situation. The Enterprise is studying some megastar and runs into a more advanced species. They have fancier ships and better equipment and, for once, they’re friendly rather than hostile! They too are explorers, hoping to meet new species and learn more about the galaxy. After so much rough and tumble diplomacy, Archer and company meet some aliens who are excited to see them, ready to teach them about their technology, and seem to share the same values.
That alone is kind of refreshing. Granted, friendly aliens don’t usually make for great drama, which is probably why Star Trek tends to go more for the aggressive/greedy/paranoid types, but still. There’s something kind of adorable about Archer and the alien captain trading quotes about Shakespeare (a Trek tradition), and having their little mutual admiration society.
The catch to all of this is that Trip discovers the species’ titular “cogenitor.” You see, the Vissians have a third gender, who expectant couples take with them when they decide they want to have a baby. The episode plays things a little coy when Trip finds the setup a bit weird and has a certain purtianical curiosity about the whole thing. At first, it feels like an extension of the subplot from “Stigma”, where he’s just a little uncomfortable, or even close-minded, about other species’ cultural practices.
But then the episode takes a startling right left turn, when Trip discovers that the Vissians’ cogenitors are basically chattel. He follows on his shock and curiosity and uncovers the fact that neurologically, the congenitors are exactly the same as the other Vissians, despite the fact that they’re treated like will-less property. He is aghast, and aims to teach the nameless congenitor on board how to read and instill in it the idea that it could have freedom and self-direction and the capabilities to be something more that need not be penned in by the restrictions of the Vissians’ society.
That actually sets up a really interesting dilemma and bit of social commentary. Here you have one of the most kind, altruistic, advanced, and seemingly enlightened species that humanity has ever met. They have a lot to teach Archer and his crew, and it seems like the beginning of a long, fruitful, mutually beneficial relationship between the two peoples. What happens when you realize that your new best friends are slavers? What do you do when the nicest people in the galaxy, who’ve been exploring the galaxy for 1,000 years, turn out to casually treat sentient beings like pieces of property?
There is a push and pull between notions of moral relativism and practicality versus the founding values of Starfleet and respect for sentient beings’ human rights that is a worthwhile and engaging topic to plumb the depths of. It’s the sort of conundrum we rarely see, and it’s especially salient at a time when the Federation doesn't even exist yet, and humanity is the new kid on the block that needs all the help it can get rather than the intergalactic equivalent of a global superpower.
But for some godforsaken reason, Enterprise elides all of that, and basically comes down almost wholesale on the side of “it’s their culture, and if they want to have slaves, it’s none of our business, and shame on you for interfering!”
It is mindboggling. After forty years, this is where Star Trek draws the line? This is where the franchise finally takes its whole “noninterference” thing seriously? After dozens, maybe hundreds of episodes where the crew of Federation ship decides that their morality and ethics supersedes those of the other cultures they encounter, the hill that Trek is willing to die on is “so what if this species has fully sentient, socially subjugated, baby-making slaves? It’s none of our business!” What the bloody hell!
It doesn't help that, like “Stigma”, this episode breaks up its “Very Special Episode” seriousness with broad, inessential subplot. Chief among these is Reed flirting with one of the Vissians. It’s a pointless but cute bit of cultural exchange, and in another episode, I think I’d like it. It’s the sort of slice of life bit of Trek that we don’t get enough of. But here, it just feels out of place.
The same goes for Archer and the Vissian captain’s adventure exploring the megastar. Being the most charitable, you could argue that these scenes are necessary to establish the bond that Archer is forming with the Vissians, which makes him loathe to let anything disrupt the relationship. But really, it feels like a chance for the show to show off some mid-2000s CGI firestorm effects, which are fine for their time, but pretty unavailing when you’re dealing with a choppily-edited story of Trip trying to free a slave in the main story of the episode.
Naturally, when Archer gets back from his sojourn and learns what Trip’s done from the Vissians, there’s hell to pay. The episode pays lip service to Archer seriously considering the Cogenitor’s seeking asylum, but devolves into even more stultifying Archer speeches and Vissian recriminations about not judging other cultures. So in the end, Archer agrees to return the congenitor back to the Vissians.
That alone would be a somewhat unsatisfying conclusion, albeit probably a realistic one. But what happens next takes the cake. The Enterprise gets word that the congenitor, having been consigned to a life of repression and servitude, takes its own life after having been shown the greater possibilities it will never experience by Trip. Archer reams out his chief engineer over this, laying the death at Trip’s feet and tearing him a new one for being reckless, without any consideration for the fact that, you know, this is a sentient being who was in bondage that Trip was trying to help.
What kills me is that you could keep the major beats of this story and still make it work. All it would take is Archer being genuinely conflicted, genuinely understanding of why Trip did what he did, for someone other than Trip to acknowledge the utter horribleness of what the Vissians are doing to these people, however nice they may seem otherwise.
If there were some bit of realpolitik going on, of Archer or T’Pol or somebody else saying, “You are right. This is terrible. But being absolute novices in deep space and humanity’s only representatives means that sometimes we have to make hard choices about what we tolerate in the name of not making enemies when we need friends,” then this would still be a hard episode to watch, but it would be bearable and even comprehensible.
Instead, the message of the episode seems to be “Trip was dead wrong for teaching that slave how to read and that it deserves freedom, and the congenitor’s blood is on his hand.” That is a lesson so far removed from the enlightened, compassionate ethos of Star Trek that it feels like an insult. At its best, the franchises explores the moral gray areas of where personal ethics meet cross-cultural exchange, and the fraught sore spots that arise when those two things clash. But an episode that aims to do the same, and yet lands on a message of “how dare you mess with those aliens’ practice of slavery!” is utterly antithetical to the nuance and the values that have sustained Star Trek for so many years.
If the neutronic storm front is "traveling at high warp", how can Archer see it out his window? It should have already engulfed the ship by the time its reflected light reaches their position. (I accept that we, the viewers, can see it, for dramatic reasons…reluctantly.)
With the main power grid shut down, how can they polarize the hull plating? Sure, they have backup power systems that can keep stuff like life support running, but wouldn't polarizing the entire hull take an awful lot of power?
The galley has an awful lot of stuff sitting around that would have fallen to the deck by then, most likely, from all the turbulence. And if the radiation is lethal to a human after three minutes of exposure, are the foodstuffs they left behind even going to be edible after spending over a week bathed in it? I guess it depends on whether the radiation is absorbed and held by organic matter. (At any rate, the real reason food was left in the galley was probably so they could explode lettuce with weapons fire in a later scene. And things hadn't fallen to the deck yet because they needed stuff to fall due to turbulence during the firefight. Dramatic necessity, blah blah.)
My technical nitpicking aside, this was a fairly solid episode from a story standpoint. It was certainly much better than "Precious Cargo". About the only thing I really have to call out is Archer's slightly hokey handling of aliens appearing out of the blue, demanding to come aboard for shelter from a storm Enterprise hadn't even detected yet. (I suppose I should also call out Enterprise's failure to detect the storm on its own sooner. For a ship with supposedly decent long-range scanning capability, that was a fair flub.)
I think this episode suffered from trying to include too many subplots. In the end none of the stories got any real closure.
Perhaps it was intentional that all of the plot lines were so superficial, but I don't have to like it.
What does it say about this episode that its only real effect was to make me like Hoshi even more? (For that matter, what does it say about me?) None of these little vignettes had any real character insight to offer. We already knew that Trip and Reed are perhaps a bit incautious when it comes to booze and women. (I'll leave aside the contradictions I see with their previously established backstories.) We already knew that Archer is inclined to distrust anyone who talks too much about the Suliban. We also already knew that Hoshi is amazing at learning languages—it's literally the reason Archer wanted her on his ship in the first place. (Doesn't make it any less interesting to "see" the character "learn" new languages.) I guess we didn't know that Phlox gets silly when he's woken up mid-hibernation, but that felt more like a shoehorned-in comic relief plot than anything.
To sum up: Hoshi is adorable. Phlox gets a chance to be supremely silly, though it doesn't really work with the tone of the show for me. Trip and Malcolm don't really have any presence, just a one-off gag (of sorts) scene that just gets left. Archer meets a mysterious woman who can only be a hint at things to come. (For that reason, his is the most fulfilling subplot—though it is fulfilling only in that it promises more intrigue next season and beyond.)
[6.7/10] I hate to complain about Star Trek being formulaic. There’s certain beats the franchise likes to hit or tropes it likes to deploy, but that’s part of the charm. The series has never been a procedural exactly, but even with the vast reaches of space at their disposal, there’s certain types of stories that are familiar, but pleasantly so. Star Trek has always had a certain sensibility, with repeated elements particularly recognizable for fans who’ve been following it for decades, that make the execution of the idea more important than how fresh or well-worn it may be.
But “Oasis” feels like paint-by-numbers Star Trek to me. It is not bad by any stretch of the imagination. It is a sturdy, tidily-constructed episode that parcels out its mysteries and reveals nicely, features from able performances, and bakes in a little of that moral thought experiment material that usually elevates the franchise. It’s all just very familiar, and never transcends being “pretty good” instead of “great”, without anything that could truly surprise or pull the rug out from under a longtime viewer.
The episode starts with a dinner engagement between the Enterprise’s main trio and Harry Mudd-esque alien who tells them of a ship containing precious materials in exchange for some bags of coffee. But he warns them -- it’s haunted! It’s a cute way to start the episode that diverts from the usual “Captain, we’re getting a strange reading from that sector” kick-off that so many installments begin with. Granted, there is a strange reading here -- the fact that scanners reveal no life signs on the ship, but the away team discovers any entire crew of humanoids living in secret there -- but it’s at least a fun way to dive into that material.
From there, “Oasis” plays into the usual mystery angle. Once the Enterprise crew discovers the ship’s secret inhabitants, we learn the story that they were attacked by some aliens and standed, putting up a dampening field in case the aggressors returned and building a new life on the ship after it was too damaged to make the flight home or even contact help. Naturally, Archer and company want to do everything they can to help these people, which mostly means fixing their computer systems and upgrading some others, while the locals are surprisingly resistant to notions that the Enterprise would help them make the year’s journey back to their home planet.
All of this material is perfectly fine, in the usual “local community has a jam, and the spacemen try to help them out of it” sort of way. But things quickly proceed into the usual “this seemingly normal group has a dark secret” rigamarole. Reed and others discover that the ship has been stranded for much longer than its residents admitted, and the ship itself shows no sign of being attacked. When they take in an escape pod with a dead body in it, it becomes doubly fishy. Again, there’s nothing wrong with any of this. It’s just the standard beats for Trek, where you discovery some new group, things seem fine if a little odd, then the oddness starts escalating, until some terrible secret is revealed that forces the crew into a difficult moral choice.
I have nothing against that structure, but without an intriguing idea or a crackerjack performance or some really sharp writing, it becomes replacement-level Star Trek, without much objectionable but also not much to recommend it either.
The two things Enterprise does to try to spice up the proceedings are also familiar ones. The first is that Trip falls in love with one of the locals, Lyana, with a dynamic that feels strikingly like Pike’s and Vina’s in “The Menagerie” from The Original Series. Their chemistry is cute (with a particularly amusing exchange about rocky road ice cream), and T’Pol’s references to the last time Trip got involved with an engineer on another ship are well-taken, but there’s not much novel to it. It’s meant to give the Enterprise crew, and the audience, a more personal stake in what happens to these stranded humanoids, but if you have romantic entanglements on a nigh-weekly basis that are quickly forgotten, both on this show and Star Trek in general, it’s hard to get too invested in the relationship without some extra spark.
Some of that spark is supposed to come from Rene Auberjonois (who played Odo on Deep Space 9) guest-starring as Lyana’s father (getting the “And” credit to boot!), who is more than meets the eye. After the locals try to take T’Pol and Trip hostage to make the repairs, Lyana intervenes, pulling some circuits in the control room and making almost all of her compatriots disappear. Her father then confesses that they’re all holograms he created after their ship crashed, meant to give his daughter some companions and a normal life to grow up with, and assuage his guilt for being part of the reason the ship crashed after he left his post to try to rescue her.
(As an aside, it’s fun for fans of Avatar: The Last Airbender to see Auberjonois playing a character who lives in an isolated community where he engineers all kinds of wild inventions in order to give his child a better life.)
As reveals go, it’s not bad. There’s a personal reason behind the exposition and explanation, and Auberjonois gets a good monologue about being afraid of change but pushing past it for the good of his daughter. It all just never really rises above that. It leads to the Enterprise crew helping make the ship fly again, so that Lyana can see the world, and she and Trip have a sweet little goodbye. It’s a pat, but serviceable ending, that doesn't really challenge the characters or the viewers. It’s satisfying enough, but not much more than that.
Friends who watched the series in real time have told me that Enterprise was, at least in part, an effort to expand the reach and popularity of the franchise beyond the die-hards. If you’re new to Star Trek, and chose to start with Enterprise for some reason, maybe there would be more novelty to all of this. And it’s probably unfair to judge these episodes from the perspective of someone who’s seen these tropes and story beats deployed across decades of shows. But alas, it’s the only perspective I have to give. From that vantage point “Oasis” is an ably-done version of several things Star Trek has done and done better elsewhere, which never rankles, but never soars either.
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Themes: character degradation
Trip and Reed are making their way back to rendezvous point near asteroid field in shuttle, only to find what appears to be Enterprise plastered on the side of the asteroid. They immediately start to panic and argue, as one would expect from some of the best Starfleet has to offer.
In the very next scene we learn that Enterprise is just fine, transporting Tesninans to their home world after their ship was destroyed in a docking attempt, taking away part of docking bay door with it.
And approximately 3 minutes in episode that's it for the plot. We know they'll rescue them so there's no real tension so we are left with almost 40 minutes of them bickering, Reed sending endless letters and T'Pol trying to convince Archer that micro singularities exist.
Now this is absolute garbagefest. There's no real plot, almost no character development (and what there is doesn't flatter anyone), no new information, only endless stupidity, bad acting and bad dialogue.
We get such memorable scenes as Reed sealing a hole in a shuttle plating from micro black whole with mashed potatoes and Reed having fantasy about T'Pol complete with him staring at her boobs and Reed and Trip overacting during drinking scene. Ok, we get to know that Reed is a melancholic ladies man, something we really didn't need to know.
And it's funny that even though Archer appears for a minute, they still manage to make his character even more unlikable. As if he didn't come across as ignorant enough, he literally laughs off the idea of micro singularities. Oh stupid vulcans and their scientific theories, what do they know, right?
Also, it occurred to me that this was supposed to be a comedy episode. If so, its failure is even bigger. They very effectively degraded 3 characters and gained absolutely nothing in the process. And for this to come just after Shadows of P'jem, one of the best episodes of the season that had so much going on!
And only thing left to think about: shuttle was supposed to move away from Enterprise at least 20000km so they can adjust targeting. If we give it a benefit of a doubt that there is some reason why they were supposed to move away, why wouldn't Enterprise just hop near the shuttle, warn them they had an accident and that they'll return in 3 days (or you know, cancel the shuttlepod mission). It would take them a split second to cover that distance. Yep, this episode literally shouldn't have happened.
Worth watching
Themes: first contact, Reed development, Enterprise development
Enterprise is making way for future human space exploration by deploying subspace amplifiers, which apparently draws attention from a ship that even T'Pol doesn't recognize. They don't respond at all and just go away after taking a look. They return later, causing ship wide power failure, docking their shuttle, getting all old school alien with probing incapacitated crewmen and escaping before the crew can do anything. This makes Archer realise they are ill equipped for dealing with something as alien as this and turns them around to Jupiter station so they can get their phase cannons mounted. Reed and Tucker are certain they can do it themselves but Archer is too shaken to approve their request. That doesn't stop them from giving their all to do it themselves, which is the decision that ultimately saves them as they encounter aliens one more time, where it's finally clear their intention is to capture Enterprise. Aliens themselves have a part in their own defeat as their monitoring device causes power surge that boosts power of the cannons at the expense of other systems, which is something they use to defeat aliens and once more reverse course and go further into space.
Now this is really good. We get character development with having a character in question barely in that storyline at all, which is actually brilliant way to show just how much of a private person Reed is. We get truly alien looking aliens, not just humans with a little prosthetic detail to make them different (and also some slick looking ships). This goes a long way to show us there are other warp capable species in the universe whose motives and intentions can't be understood by usual human logic. Mystery surrounding them really brings a dose of scariness that isn't that usual in ST universe, as they genuinely seem as a threat, which really brings home the point of Enterprise and its crew not really being prepared for anything galaxy throws at them. Moreover, it also gives an opportunity to show us what the crew is made of, as they work relentlessly to mount those cannons themselves. It's everything one would hope for out of a Star Trek episode.
Fun fact: we get to learn there are 81 humans, 1 denobulan and 1 vulcan onboard.
[4.4/10] If there were two things that consistently drove me nuts about The Original Series, it was the “Kirk knows best” attitude, and the parade of disposable love interests. With the former, it didn’t matter how reasonably Spock’s points were, or how fragile the ecosystem of the community that this flaxen-haired spaceman was visiting. Kirk had his ideas, and he was going to jump in and execute them no matter what anyone else said. With the latter, to borrow a line from Community, Kirk (and plenty of other characters, to be fair), would often have passionate, instant chemistry with some random woman whom we’d never see again. Both of these problems dragged down more than a few of the 79 episodes that started this whole Trek shebang.
So it’s disheartening, to say the least, to see Enterprise repeating those mistakes. In fairness, there’s less of the “Captain is always right” thing here. I’d like to think that part of what this series is doing is showing the audience adventures from before there was a prime directive, or standard away team protocols, in order to have things come this close to going entirely pear-shaped and demonstrating why those rules were created in the first place. (Not that those rules did much to keep Kirk in line.)
That means that, while I find it annoying, I’m willing to tolerate Archer being dismissive of T’Pol’s concerns about screwing around in a pre-warp civilization if it’s a prelude to Archer running into real trouble and being a little chastened about the whole experience. But we don’t get that here. Instead, we get the old “some mysterious thing is making everyone of these mostly-human aliens sick, and we’ve got to save them” razmataz, replete with firefights in the streets and an attractive younger woman who’s paired up with the captain, and a chance for Archer to prove he was right to want to go down to the surface given how he manages to save the day.
It’s all just tiresome. Archer is kind of a supercilious dick through the whole thing, and I am increasingly skeptical of Scott Bakula’s ability to do the Kirk thing in 2001. (Hell, I’m still somewhat skeptical of Shatner’s ability to do the Kirk thing in 1966!). He’s not really convincing as a mystery solver or as a confidence man, but the show wants you to think he is, which makes his efforts to uncover the source of the illness meh at best. He’s also not great at the moral indignation thing, which is a good chunk of the episode.
It’s also just not that interesting of a mystery, and “Civilization” really belabors it. We barely get to know the native aliens before we’re introduced to the illness, mostly via exposition. It’s instantly clear that the concerned apothecary is the good guy and that the smug shopkeep is the bad guy, which takes a lot of the intrigue away. And the reveal that this is an Erin Brockovich/A Civil Action-esque story about mining runoff making people sick is a pretty boring reveal.
Ideally, the show wants to spruce up that fairly standard “Starfleet infiltrates pre-warp civilization and discovers mortal threat” template with the Archer/Riann romance, but that’s dull as dishwater, which brings things down considerably. I’m willing to give some leeway to episodic television to have single-serving romances to add a little excitement to these individual stories. But the show telegraphs the romance so heavily, hits such predictable beats, and finds absolutely no chemistry between its actors to the point that it’s a chore to get through their scenes.
Riann’s character is barely sketched beyond generic “something must be done!” And Archer’s interest in her isn’t sketched beyond him randomly kissing her when the universal translator stops working. It’s the usual “Here’s two people. We hope our focus on them will paper over the fact that we’ve done little-to-nothing to account for why they should be together” routine. That approach is particularly galling when you just know that Riann isn’t going to join them on the ship, and this is inevitably a dull, fleeting thing.
The episode is also just sloppy. Again, it’s immediately clear who the bad guys and good guys are. Archer and Riann escape the bunker where the mining is being done despite being theoretically trapped and held at gunpoint because...reasons? It’s never really made clear. They’re just suddenly out and running from the bad guy.
The one minor saving grace here is that it’s a good episode for T’Pol, who after some initial skepticism from yours truly, has settled into the Spock role nicely. Trip’s mini-freakout when she says to prepare to leave, only for her to slap him down (figuratively of course) and note that she had no intention of leaving the captain behind, is a great character moment. And while it’s a little convenient, her beaming the energy core that the bad guys were using into space, and then blasting to disable the ship, was pretty damn badass. Her lineread of “fire” when she had Reed then disable the enemy ship’s weapon systems was downright Picard-esque.
But at the end of the day, this is an Archer episode, and it’s just boring. The romance is predictable. The mystery is predictable. And the non-Enterprise part of the escape is done by fiat. I’m not one to poo poo the minor thrill of our heroes dressing like the natives and trying to learn a little more about an alien society. But in trying to give us the first such story in Starfleet history (at least chronologically in-universe), Enterprise delivers something generic at best, and eye-roll worthy at worst.
That comes down to an undercooked, underwhelming romance, and a heap of Archer ignoring everyone else’s advice because he just has a feeling about how to do and save everything. Rather than punishing our protagonist for the hubris or developing a romance worth rooting for, “Civilization” just gives the audience some reheated Kirk-esque leftovers, that were barely worth chowing down on when they came from the later (but earlier) Enterprise’s replicators.
An episode with a really interesting premise that sort of falls flat on its face. It also helps that Kim Rhodes is pretty charismatic in the role of Lyndsay.
But the episode is all over the place. First of all we get a bizarre situation in which Lyndsay attempts to communicate with Voyager and for some reason her transmission goes to an unmanned screen in an empty room where a little girl just happens to stumble upon it by chance. Since when does communication happen like that on a ship? If Voyager is contacted then the bridge is alerted and someone (usually Harry) says, "Captain, we're receiving a transmission." This episode just decides to do whatever.
Then there's the massive issue that Lyndsay was a beloved and trusted crew member that everyone remembers fondly. Harry was even in love with her. Except... we've never met her before. She's never even been mentioned before. The episode would have had some actual impact if this had been somebody from the show's past who died. Granted, Voyager has never actively tried to introduce us to many crew members outside of the main characters, but I'm sure there was scope for this to work somehow. As it is, we get a disjointed story that it's difficult to care about.
There's also very little drama in her return or subsequent leaving. She's desperate to return to Voyager but then she just decides "nah, not for me" and leaves. Not all that compelling.
Still, the stuff with Seven and the Borg kids (they're still around!) is a little diversion.
