We watched last night’s Enterprise double-header. The first episode, “Terra Prime,” was great. Peter Weller was chilling in his conviction, and the tear-jerker ending showed why Conner Trinnear’s “Tucker” is the best regular character (with “Phlox” as a close second). The only thing really missing was a red shirt for the infiltrator. You know, just to make it feel like old-Trek.
Next up was the series finale, “These are the Voyages.”
(Spoilers within.)
My one-line summary for this episode: What a fracking waste.
When we heard they were going to have Riker and Troi in it, and it would be holodeck-based, we were prepared for a total letdown.
The holodeck is the Star Trek equivalent of deus ex machina, “God from the machine.” Want to have characters dressing up as Robin Hood characters? Can’t plot yourself out of a paper bag? Fear not, the holodeck makes it so! That’s how it felt towards the waning years of TNG and DS9. When I was catching up on Voyager and DS9, I generally skipped those episodes.
To ease the potential pain, we had a chilled bottle of riesling ready.
And, hoo-doggies, we needed it.
The first few minutes sucked because it was obvious no character development had occurred during the “missing six years.” Whats-his-name, played by Anthony Montgomery, didn’t settle down as he had been planning. The relationship between T’Pol and Tucker is apparently off-again. I think. Sheesh, we need an holodeck episode to finally work this out. (wink)
Shran, arguably the best non-regular character, shows up only as a plot advancement device. After his daughter is rescued he … well, that was it, he’s outta there without so much as a “Thank-you, pink skin, your debt to me is repaid.”
Tucker’s death occurs while preventing the annoying random aliens from causing annoying random problems. It was annoyingly meaningless and randomly revealed beforehand. Fine acting squandered by bad writing.
The only enjoyable thing was Jonathan Frakes’ portraying the chef/gossip. He’s a natural for randomly massaging dough. This might have been a fine TNG episode, but it wasn’t, nor should it have been. It’s a pity they didn’t give the cast a better sendoff.
The whole series was a dissapointment really. I never thought it found its stride and never really looked forward to watching it, unlike the new Battlestar Galactica, which I think is WAY awesome, even in its opening season.