Star Trek Phase II

I've just watched "Kitumba" which is the latest episode from Star Trek New Voyagers / Phase II and as you would expect every production gets better and better. The story was interesting and the production was very very good, some excellent makeup and prosthetic work especially offering us both types of Klingon and well the CGI was just beautiful, the K't'inga class warships were stunning. The acting and dialogue in places struggled but overall and great example of an original series production from outside of the studio system and even better how cool was it to see Gil Gerard (Buck Rogers) on my television once again:)

Oh and I just loved the fight scene, can't have Star Trek without a shirt ripping and punch throwing brawl and even the references to Enterprise and the 2009 movie were quite fitting:)
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Star Trek Enterprise Marathon Part 24

Star Trek Enterprise Marathon Part 24
Season 4 Disk 4

United

The second episode of the three parter continues with the Andorians and Tellarites clashing onboard the Enterprise as the fiendish plot to turn worlds against each other is all too successful. Tripp and Malcolm still stuck on the alien ship continue to search for a means to escape and Archer is forced to engage in a honour duel to prevent the death of an ambassador.

A solid and entertaining episode, once again Shran is a delight and Archer pulls the proverbial rabbit out of the hat to defuse the situation and earn more respect from the Andorians and Tellarites.

The Aenar

The discovery of the pilot leads the Enterprise back to Andorian and a meeting with a secretive offshoot who are highly telepathic. Shran bonds with the young Aenar "Jhamel" who agrees to operate the device which they hope will allow them to access the remote systems of the alien starship. Once again we get some excellent work down fleshing out one of the first Trek alien races, the Aenar being a good addition without seeming to be too silly or desperate.  

The consequences of Archer's actions strengthen the bonds between him and Shran and by extension cements maybe the first real agreements between the Andorians and Tellarites two of the founding members of the Federation.

Affliction

Phlox is kidnapped whilst on Earth and it seems that someone in Starfleet may have helped to facilitate the abduction. We get more twists and turns as it turns out the Klingons are behind the kidnapping and a shadowy organisation within Starfleet who quote Section 31 of the charter have an operative on board the Enterprise and is ordered to prevent the ship from rescuing Phlox.

Affliction is the first half of a two part Klingon centric story which ultimately attempts to provide a reasonable explanation of why some Klingons have ridges and others as in TOS were smooth. In that regard I think it succeeded and the use of the human augment DNA just ties everything together.

Divergence

The Klingon story concludes with Phlox and his new friend searching for an antidote to the augmented DNA while avoiding being killed by the Klingon who sponsored these experiments who now needs to show results before the fleet arrives and bombards the planet from orbit.

Enterprise agrees to aid the research and has to fight off Klingons ships in the provess but it still takes a desperate hail mary pass to bring the events to a satisfying conclusion at least to most of the parties involved.

The Klingons in Enterprise have been done well, prosthetics are spot on as you would expect and the mannerisms and attitudes refined from years of TNG and DS9, all these factors add to the real quality in these two episodes. Of course not everyone is happy with the explanation of more human looking Klingons and others not able just to ignore it as being a product of the TV market at the time.

Star Trek Enterprise Marathon Part 21

Star Trek Enterprise Marathon Part 21
Season 4 Disk 1

Storm Front Part I & II
Archer wakes up in 1944 a world where the Nazis swept across Europe and took a very
strong foothold in the Americas helped by alien technology provided by a faction fighting
the Temporal Cold War. Daniels critically injured through temporal conflicts offers what he
can to the crew of the Enterprise and together along with Silik (nothing can kill that guy)
they attempt to defeat the aliens and right what went wrong which will reset the timeline.
The show made great use of standing backlot sets and the costuming department as well
a few familiar guest actors and while wrapping up the temporal cold war seemed a little
pat maybe it would be something relatively simple to cause it to collapse in upon itself.

Home
T'Pol returns to Vulcan to visit her mother and she takes Trip along for the ride, well you
know what I mean. Her mother T'Les played by Joanna Cassidy  isn't too happy with
having a human guest but we learn she lost her post thanks to the "scandal" of T'Pol and
the destruction of the monastery.
Meanwhile back on Earth and undercurrent of bigotry has broken out against aliens and
Phlox experiences a distasteful interaction with such men and Archer to has debrief with
Starfleet Command and the Vulcans whilst baring his soul to the new Captain of the
Columbia played by Ada Maris.
A mixed bag but an interesting look at the planet Vulcan more of which we'll see later
in the season and the seeds for the human first backlash.

Borderland
Human augments hijack a Klingon bird of prey and in response the man who helped create
them Dr Arik Soong played by Brent Spiner  is placed on board the Enterprise to search
them out. Upon entering the Borderlands the ship is raided by Orions and a number of crew
taken to be sold as slaves and Soong agrees to help.
However he refuses to help the ship search for his "children" but that is solved when the bird of
prey attacks them and Soong escapes leading his own towards their future and past.
An excellent opener to a three episode mini-arc dealing with augmented humans whose
brethren were responsible for the Eugenics and third world wars and a fantastic role for Brent.

A very strong opening for the final season of Enterprise, ok maybe space Nazis are a little
cliched but the time travel/alternate reality worked well for the show. We got a very good
look at Vulcan as well which is going to pay off and of course the first part of the Eugenic
storyline and introduction of Soong, again big bucket of pay off.

Star Trek Enterprise Marathon Part 14

Star Trek Enterprise Marathon Part 14
Season 2 Disk 7

Bounty
Archer is captured by a Tellarite bounty hunter and has to make his escape
before being handed back to the Klingons. Meanwhile T'Pol is going though
Pon Farr brought on by a contagion and she is locked in decon with Phlox,
gel and hormones ahoy.
I'm not totally happy with a Vulcan female going through Pon Farr and the
gel/decon scenes tend to be a little cringe worthy, nice bounty hunter story
but embarrassingly bad how easily Archer was taken.

The Expanse
A surprise attack on the Earth leaves millions dead and the temporal cold
war really impacts on this part of the galaxy, Enterprise heads towards an
area of space known as the Expanse normally avoided by space faring
races but that is where the instigators of the attack reside. The Klingons
throw a wrench into the plans as Durass is keen to regain his honour.
An excellent season finale, the Klingon arc has been nicely handled and the
temporal war is now serious. I can't help but think the gouge in the Earth would
have been more fitting in Iowa or the Enterprise (2009) built in Florida.

Extras
Enterprise Moments
Jolene Blalock
Levar Burton
Enterprise Secrets
Outtakes
Insights: A Night in Sickbay
Shooting Future Tense
Commentaries
Deleted Scenes

Season 2 wasn't really a step up for the series, it wasn't a backwards step either but
maybe feels less than because you expect more from the second year. That said a
lot of the groundwork has now been laid down which allows the uber arc driven
third season to grow as there is less time for one off character/action pieces.
A nice bunch of extras on the final disk especially the interview with Jolene and Levar.
Roll on the Xindi.

Star Trek Enterprise Marathon Part 12

Star Trek Enterprise Marathon Part 12
Season 2 Disk 5

Canamar
Archer and Trip are taken prisoner accused of smuggling and how that all
came about is skipped (time and budget I guess). We see them on a prison
transport and getting in the middle of an escape attempt which forces them
to play along and hope the Enterprise catch up with them before it's
too late. A decent episode but how many times are members of the crew gonna
get into trouble before they sort some procedures out before going where
they shouldn't or limiting off ship travel to non-critical personnel.

The Crossing
A huge alien ship swallows the Enterprise whole and the alien crew beings
of energy possess various members of the crew to experience what it's like
to be corporeal but there are sinister motivations in play.
A decent first contact type episode with very different aliens yet with similar
goals to other "bad guys", I thought in the end they were rather easy to defeat
but Enterprise really didn't go for whole sale carnage early in it's run.

Judgement
Archer is taken before a Klingon court to answer charges of aiding enemies
of the empire a crime he is guilty of but Klingon justice is not exactly known
for it's belief in mitigating circumstances.
I thought it was a bit of a cop out not to show how Archer was captured but
that aside the set design was excellent (based on the movie set) and the
performances from everyone involved was top notch.
High praise towards the actors who played the Klingons..
J.G. Hertzler, John Vickery, Granville Van Dusen and Daniel Riordan.

Horizon
Mayweather returns for a visit to his families cargo ship to find that his father
who he knew was ill had passed weeks before, the return is bitter sweet and
his brother who now commands is not happy when Mayweather starts interfering
with the ships systems without asking permission.
This was a bit of a bland episode, Mayweather suffered thanks to little development
despite getting some decent screentime, the simplistic story didn't help.

Star Trek Enterprise Marathon Part 4

Star Trek Enterprise Marathon Part 4

Season 1 Disk 4

Dear Doctor
A Phlox ( John Billingsley ) centric episode and why not because Trek has never failed to
provide Doctors who are both interesting and popular. In this episode the over view is
Phlox writing a letter to a human friend who is back on Denobula in the same inter-species
medical programme. The writers also throw in an early case of how a prime directive
would be useful as an alien race destined to die out can be sustained but in turn that would
hamper the development of a second intelligent species on the same planet.
This episode also features Kellie Waymire, she passed not long after aged 36 from a
long term heart problem.

Shadows of P'Jem
Another world another first contact which goes poof when the shuttle is shot down
and Archer and T'Pol are captured by opponents to the current government which
is supported by the Vulcan high command. Held for ransom the Vulcans interpose
themselves but things get really complicated when the Andorians led by Shran
rescue them and then all hell breaks out and T'Pol is seriously wounded.
Fantastic to see the Andorians once again and the conflict between them and the
Vulcans is one of the high points of the first season, fun to see Archer and T'Pol
handling captivity.

Sleeping Dogs
A Klingon ship is discovered in a gas giant deep in the atmosphere, a shuttle is
sent down in an attempt to rescue the occupants whose weak life signs are being
detected. There is however one active survivor who slaps down Reed and escapes
in the shuttle and then has to be convinced by Archer they did not attack the ship
and have no designs on the technology.
Once again the writers are doing well re-introducing a canon species into the first
season, they really should have concentrated more on the core species.

Shuttlepod One
Trip and Reed are running tests on a pod and they discover wreckage in an asteroid
field some of it belonging to the Enterprise. Faced with limited resources and no way
to contact Starfleet it looks bleak and while Trip keeps busy trying to repair the
shuttle systems Malcolm decides to record farewells to his former girlfriends to such an
extent Trip could very well kill him before they run out of air.
The fun really starts when they open the bottle of booze and get drunk, hilarity ensues
and for a bottle episode it works just so well.