226 The Expanse
The season finale.

More Klingons. Angry Klingons. Looks like Duras is back for blood. It turns out that the actor playing Duras, apart from having a history of playing Klingons in earlier Star Trek series, also had the honor of being in Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo.

"Architects take a lot of trips." Sure they do, Trip. You are an idiot. She was probably home. Along with the seven million people who live in this tiny strip in the middle of Florida. I guess there are a lot of trailer parks in the future.

The Vulcans don't believe in time travel. But the quantum date reads -420. That must means it was made by stoners, if logic prevails. Not that it was made in the future.

The Florida destruction scene looked kinda cool. I can see a parallel between that and the World Trade Center destruction. The destruction of the Klingon ship was also pretty neat. The special effects have certainly come a long way from the bluescreens of TNG. Nevermind what they did in the 60s.

But something tells me it's not good when your captain tells you to "hold on" and you have inertial dampners.

I am still waiting for them to reveal that this temporal shadow dude is Q.
- posted by Joel @ 9:35 PM - leave a

215 Cease Fire
The Andorians have a dubious past in the Star Trek universe. Apparently they don't have much of a history after Star Trek the original series. Their antenna can break off easily. They are angry, hotheaded and get their ass kicked in every episode.

Now Jeffrey Combs, best know for his perenial Alien portrayal in Voyager and Deep Space 9, including the infamous Wayoun. Now they've got CG antenna, and a bit more of a personality. Kind of cool, actually ... not clearly enemies, but obviously somewhat nasty.

What makes me sick is the hick trip sometimes gets command of Enterprise. Although I have to say, it's pretty cool that he put the two ship captains on 3-way calling.


- posted by Joel @ 9:26 PM - leave a

217 Canamar
This was a somewhat interesting episode. A Nosican (those mean-spirited aliens that stabbed Picard in TNG) plays the muscle, although I don't know why they have such a bad reputation. Trip beats one up.

I especially liked the annoying alien with the seaweed on his face. I imagine that the vast cultural differences would make most aliens as annoying as that guy. They probably would all be a bunch of Neelix's.
- posted by Joel @ 9:24 PM - leave a

216 Future Tense
Future Sexual Tension is more like it. Not having sex and starfleet uniforms, sounds like fun to me.

Another time episode. I do not think I am ready for this tonight. Or ever again. It's too bad it's the background of this series.

It's interesting that when time repeated over and over again for Trip and Malcolm, it seemed to remind me of the past. A Star Trek: The Next Generation episode, in fact. Just wondering, if they could go back in time to any point to beam the ship back to the "31st century," why did they beam it away at the end of the episode and not the beginning?

There are no batteries in Enterprise, there are power modules.
There are no wrenches in Enterprise, there are micro-calipers.
There are no hispanics in Enterprise, there are aliens.

- posted by Joel @ 9:14 PM - leave a

213 Dawn
Oh, a Trip-heavy episode. How exciting.

How come the alien on the planet does not speak english, but the one in the space ship does? Is the universal translator a human invention? How come no aliens have it?

Why does such a violent seeming alien species have neosporin as saliva. And why is Trip such a dumbass that he keeps attacking this dude and then letting him go?

Hmm, a nice throwback episode. This planet really does look like a soundstage, a bit like those old Star Trek episodes. Lots of crumpled paper mache.
- posted by Joel @ 9:24 PM - leave a

224 First Flight
Dark matter. When our scientists figure out another reason to explain discrepancies in universal mass, and debunk dark matter, this is going to seem like science fiction. Oh wait, it is already. Sometimes I forget San Francisco doesn't have a Starfleet Academy yet. You wouldn't know by stickers you see on some cars.

Whoah, the barmaid Ruby looks familiar. In fact, I remember seeing her in an MST3k epside, Quest of the Delta Knights. As a bar wench. Talk about being typecast.

Cool, I like seeing Starfleet officers slugging back beers. Those wusses in The Next Generation drank that synthahol crap and still got hangovers. Although it looks like they like Budweiser. Which of course, leads into a bar brawl. Good thing trip got the drinks out of the way, I really would have liked to have seen AG cut Archer with a broken bottle.

Finding dark matter with fireworks, cool looking, but lousy filler. I suppose the story was a little weak, they needed to put in some special effects.
- posted by Joel @ 10:11 PM - leave a

223 Regeneration
The Borg.

"That research team was heavily armed." It was? Why?

Topol, that was a very convincing drink you took from the mug.

Hoshi packing heat. Purr.

So the Borg from the future got trapped on earth in the past. Now they are back and they are going to contact the Borg of the present and tell them they need to attack Earth now? Unfortunately, they forgot how to communicate. They cannot even tell each other how to adapt to phaser blasts when aboard different ships.

It is also interesting that they didn't refer to themselves as The Borg.
- posted by Joel @ 9:17 PM - leave a

222 Cogenitor
Trip is a jackass. He makes me realize that humans are all jackasses. That's what the show is about, right?

This epsode is awful. There is no nonstop 3-way action as promised.

I have to remember to use "I'd like to see your Tactical Array" as a pickup line. In 9 out of 10 cases it won't work, but in that one case, it'll be magical.

When Archer says "If you can't go over a wave, you have to go through it," he was talking about water, not million degree plasma. Fortunately it works.

What the hell ... very interesting thought experiement. Three genders. How would society be structured? Like it was in the TV show? With slaves?
- posted by Joel @ 11:20 PM - leave a

221 The Breach
There is no such thing as an original idea. Especially on television. And especially on Star Trek. I suppose all the good ideas are taken. But I do remember Worf running into the same ethical dillema as Dr. Flox.

I think the Enterprise crew uses the same backpacks I've seen trendy asian kids wear around Sony Metreon.

Oreganite. Sounds like a tasty mineral.

When did Archer become such a hardass?
- posted by Joel @ 10:03 PM - leave a

220 Horizon
Finally an entrance into Mayweather's "boomer" past. Quite obvious they were going to delve into it when he was introduced.

Ugh, super boring. The day to day life of the Enterprise crew at this time period is bad enough, who gives a shit what is happening to cargo ship crew? And it was more exciting to be watching an old (even by today's standards) Frankenstein movie than some planet being torn apart by two suns? What the hell? I do have to admit, T'Pol did have a humorous reaction to the movie. Quite unexpected. Remember, beware the peasants, for they come bearing torches.

Next weeks Enterprise is called "The Breach." More development for Dr. Flox's species.
- posted by Joel @ 10:59 PM - leave a

219 Judgement
Okay, I was real excited when I saw that Berman and Braga were starting a new series in the Star Trek line. I had watched Star Trek: The Next Generation when I was a kid. When Star Trek: Deep Space Nine came out, I really got into that. I even watched Star Trek Voyager throughout it's history, even without the sexual prodding of Seven of Nine.

This new show has me undecided. Yes, it's Star Trek. Technically. Yeah, it's got that guy from Quantum Leap who doesn't do much of acting. But Rick Berman and Brannon Braga have signed on to it, how bad can it be? I've watched a season and a half of it, and I can say it's pretty crappy. But every one of the post "original series" Star Treks have had this problem with starting off poor and building up to something decent. So I kept with it. Hell, even that stupid ass intro song grew on me.

I was happy when I saw on the TiVo that this was a Klingon heavy episdode. The actor J.G. Hertzler (aka General Martok) I noticed immediately after he spoke his first line. He has a very distinct, gravely voice. He has become the archtypical Klingon actor. In "Judgement" he plays an advocate, the equivilant of a public defender in American society. This is the first episode I've seen that I've considered fairly good, worthy of the name "Star Trek: Enterprise".

I think, based apon the prophetic predictions of Berman, we're going to see Hertzler's character as a regular member of the Enterprise crew.
- posted by Joel @ 6:38 PM - leave a