Series Review-Star Trek: Enterprise

After many work delays , I've finally got a day off to give you my review of Star Trek: Enterprise. On the whole, this was an ejoyable series. However, there are a few cons to this series which I will into in detail. Now, the moment you've all been waiting for, my extensive review.

Season 1-I found this to be an excellent start. It was nice to see them exploring for an entire year and meeting new species we hadn't seen before (or since). For example, there was an entirely new species called Suliban. Some of them had been genectically enhanced by a man from the future who was only called "Future Guy." I would've gone with something a little manlier like "Future Man" but that's just me. The members of this "Cabal" were enhanced to fight a "Temporal Cold War." What that means essentially is people going back in time and changing events to suit their tastes. Examples of this would be stopping Hitler and averting the assassination of John F. Kennedy. Changing these events would make cause significant changes in our "timeline". The main villian this season was a Suliban by the name of Silik. This character was masterfully played by John Fleck. The Suliban had the potential to be an excellent villian species but they weren't handle well in the seaons that followed.

Another new species they introduced were the Denobulans. The one that was posted on board Enterprise (Dr. Phlox) was quite humorous in this season. He was especially funny in the episode "Two Days and Two Nights." They didn't give out too many details of this species other than they can have up to 3 spouses. There were appearences by the Klingons, Andorians, Naussicans and the Ferengi in this season. The Naussicans were more or less pirates that were well known but (thankfully) the Ferengi weren't. I especially enjoyed listening to the native language of the Ferengi and the fact that they needed a translator to talk to the crew.

I don't have any gripes about the first season. I think it flowed smoothly and there wasn't much that was too unbeliveable.

Season 2-There was yet even more exploring this season but also some character development. There were several "One Hit Wonder" species that would serve as the good/bad species for the week. The Andorians would make another appearence, the Kilngons would play a larger role in this season and the Romulans would make their first appearence.

The big surprise for this season was the Borg. In the episode "Regeneration", a team of scientists would discover several cybernetically enhanced beings who had been buried in an arctic glacier for 100 years. They would turn out to be Borg that were left on Earth after the Enterprise-E destroyed the ship they were on in "Star Trek: First Contact." They did this episode correctly in the terms that they didn't know who they were or what they were doing. There was a nice tie-in at the end of the episode where the Enterprise intercepted a transmission the Borg had sent to their homeworld. The amonut of time the message would take to reach it's destination was about the same time the Enterprise-D would encounter the Borg in the 24th century.

The episode that I thought was very entertaining was titled "Carbon Creek." It was a story the Vulcan Science Officer told about her great-grandmother and some other Vulcans crash landing on Earth around the launch of Sputnik. Vulcans have pointed ears so they not only needed native clothing but also something to cover the tops of their ears. One of the males wore a stocking cap while the female and the other male covered it up with their hair. There was one line in this episode where an Earth child said the Vulcan hairstyle resembled that of Moe Howard.

The finale for this season was a nice cliffhanger. It dealt with an alien probe appearing out of nowhere and causing damage from Florida to Venezuela. It had the potential of becoming a great story idea but, as you will see, it was better on paper.

Season 3-The NX-01 Enterprise was sent into a region of space called "The Expanse" to find the race responsible for the attack on Earth. This region of space was highly unstable and could cause several distortions when a ship would pass through them. The name of the whole race is Xindi (pronounced Zindi). There are many species that make up this race. They are Aquatics ( who could be considered whales with our level of intelligence), Arboreals (described in Wikipedia as "covered with hair and resemble Earth sloths"), Avians (giant birds), Insectoids (described by Wikipedia as "a cross between six-foot Earth praying mantises, flies, ants, and several other types of insects"), Primates (who closely resemble humans) and Reptilians (who look like a combo of Earth lizards) The first probe they sent was a small prototype and it would take an entire year to get a weapon big enough to destroy an entire planet. The "Temporal Cold War" Was only mentioned I thought it was a cool idea to have a year long story. I thought it would go smoothly and be very exciting. When I first saw this season that's exactly what I got. However, after reapeated viewings I noticed a huge plot hole.

The biggest plot hole I've seen is the amount of damage NX-01 Enterprise took in the episode "Azati Prime." They were being attacked by several powerful ships and taking a savage beating. By the end of the episode I asked myself, "How in the world is this ship still in one piece?" To me, this was totally unbelieveable. My reasoning for this is after watching every other series where the starships have shields, and are usually larger than NX01 Enterprise, it's hard to believe a small ship built mainly for exploration could take that much damage.

The finale for this season had a nice twist. They managed to destroy the Superweapon and were being taken back to Earth by an Aquatic starship. When they arrive they have a feeling something is wrong. Two crewmembers went down to Earth in a shuttlepod and were attacked by P-51 Mustangs.

Season 4-Having known this was going to be their last season, the creators of the show (Rick Berman and Brannon Braga), as well as the writers, decided to tie it in with the rest of the franchise. The majority of the tie-ins were for The Original Series with the series finale being a tie-in to The Next Generation. There were 4 two-part episodes, 3 three-part episodes and 5 stand-alone episodes.

The first 2-parter was titled "Storm Front." This was the season opener and explained how Enterprise was taken back to the year 1944. They were brought back by a man named Daniels. He was a "Temporal Agent" who first appeared in the Season 1 episode "Cold Front." It looked like the Suliban Silik had killed him in that episode but he would show up again in the 2-parter episode "Shockwave" (the 1st Season Finale and 2nd Season Opener respectively). When we see him here he is in bad shape and appears to die again near the end of the episode.

Daniels has brought them to an alternate 1944 where Germany has occupied the eastern coast of the United States. They are helped by an alien race from the 29th century called "Na'kuhl." They need to stop them from making a time portal and dominating the timeline. Captain Archer and Enterprise manage to do that with help from Silik. The explanation for Silik being there is that "Future Guy" sent him back there. I can see that, but what I can't see is how the character dies. I was disappointed to see such a promising character killed by a 1944 German officier.

The next "mini-arc" was a 3-parter focusing on the "Eugenics Wars." This was first heard about in TOS where genetically engineered humans tried to take over the wolrd in the 1990s in their time. A Dr. Arik Soong had stolen frozen embryos left over from that war to see if he could modify them. He lived on a remote planet raising them until Starfleet found and put him in prison. His modifications worked too well as the "Augments" hijacked a Klingon ship and tried to start a war with the Kilngons and Earth. Captain Archer got Dr. Soong out of jail on the condition he help reign them in. They were prevented from doing this and Arik Soong was sent back to prison. His last words to Archer are about changing directions from genetic engineering to cybernetics (which clears the path for his descendant Noonien Soong in the 24th century).

There is also a 3-parter that delves into the history of the Vulcans, a 3-parter with the Romulans nearly causing a galactic war and a 2-parter showing why the Klingons in the 23rd century didn't have ridges on their foreheads.

There were 2 awesome episodes in this season. The first was a 2-part story set in the "Mirror Universe." People in this universe are the exact opposite of who they are in this reality. This means that if you're really nice in this universe, you'd be really mean in that one. It had great connections to TOS. I love the Mirror Universe so I highly enjoyed watching these.

The second was the Series Finale titled "These Are The Voyages..." It was quite a surprise to see 2 characters from The Next Generation along with the NX-01 Enterprise crew. One of them actually interacted with the senior officers. This was also the episode where the Federation charter would be signed. This whole season would build up to this and it was excellently done.

Final thoughts-This series was highly enjoyable. The pros definetly outweigh the cons for me.

Blogged with Flock