Description: So, the second half of the pilot, and the bad guys drag Archer's dumb ass back to a holding cell where T'Pol and Tucker are already imprisoned. Hoshi is tossed inside, and he's led off again to meet Sarin. It's an interesting encounter where she kisses him and then turns green and lumpy, making it the fastest STD ever known. Sarin reveals that she is a Suliban but does not agree with the direction of the ones who captured Klaang, so she had given information to Klaang. It was supposed to prove that the Suliban were attacking ships in Klingon space in the hopes of causing war among the different factions, but the poor dumb bastard went on got himself caught. It turns out that the Suliban aren't making these decisions themselves, but answer to shimmering Darth Sidious-like guy. There's a "temporal cold war" going on, which, well, I don't know what to tell you. The most logical description for a temporal cold war would be a time-based equivalent to the Cold War that existed between the Soviet block and Western powers, which included inciting or involvement in civil war between those powers rather than direct involvement. This would logically describe what was taking place, the encouragement of a civil war amongst the Klingons (but really, like the Klingons need much encouragement). Of course, you can guess how long logic is going to be a factor in this...

Before any more can be explained Blue Man Group shows up and begins shooting people. In a particularly hilarious bit, T'Pol, Tucker, and Hoshi all stand near the entrance to their cells, then leap back every time a shot is fired, only to go right back to the entrance again. It's kind of like watching a monkey repeatedly stick a butterknife in a light socket. Before this silliness can get old, Sarin finishes off the bad guys in that area, then frees and arms our simian crew so they can take her to Klaang on their ship. However, her job now done, Sarin must perish, but not before talking to Archer because, hey, good guys don't just die instantly.

Up on the roof of this dump, our intrepid heroes stumble about in the snow. Just the sight of them reminds you of turkeys that drown in rainstorms by looking straight at the sky. Tucker tells them to go one way to get to their pod, but T'Pol says it's another way, and Archer backs her up. He may hate and belittle Vulcans, but at the end of the day, he knows who's the race of geniuses and who was arrested for trying to have sex with a basset hound. Mayweather and Reed have already made it back, communications are difficult because of all the, um, snow. And, on top of everything else, the pod isn't there AND they get ambushed. Boy, T'Pol must feel really stupid right now; getting outsmarted by Tucker is... well, that really just kind of speaks for itself, doesn't it.

As the firefight breaks out, T'Pol spots the shuttle. The way this is handled, we really have no idea if they've circled back, or if the shuttle was just slightly out of sight before Hoshi and Tucker had their meltdown. I suppose it really doesn't matter, so long as the episode moves forward. Reed, being an experienced security and tactical officer, looks at the weapons discharges and concludes that there must be lightning in the snowstorm. Before I can even laugh at his incompetence, Mayweather says that he can't find the crew because he can't isolate human biosigns, requiring Reed to point out that he could try looking for Vulcan biosigns. And remember, these are the ones smart enough to evade capture. Finally, realizing what exactly she's dealing with in these two maroons, T'Pol just knocks on the window. They fly her over to help the rest get out, but before she can a ship's exhaust sends her flying across the snow like a buxom hockey puck. At this, Archer scoops up her gun and is literally doing the two-fisted gunner routine, acting all macho and crap. Because there's a tiny amount of justice in the universe -even the Star Trek universe- his machismo promptly gets him shot. Of course, he's a good guy, so the shot is to the leg and only succeeds in causing a small second degree burn (reminiscent of a similar scene in Voyager's State Of Flux, where Chakotay is shot in the chest with a deadly weapon and only winds up with a limp). Compare this shit to Deep Space Nine, where under similar circumstances Nog wound up losing the leg, and you'll see why I'm far more forgiving of that series failings.

Archer's dragged on board and they quickly employ the first aid of putting a thin layer of gauze that's roughly half the size of a dollar bill to the wound, thus showing how far we've truly come in the two centuries between now and then. T'Pol stands over Archer's whimpering form and takes command of the Enterprise, prompting Archer to have a flashback. He's flying that model starship around that he built with his father, with some expected foreshadowing of things Archer's going to say later ("straight and steady" and "you can't be afraid of the wind"). Then he spots T'Pol standing there in her uniform, which exists pretty much solely to provide a WTF? moment.

And now comes the part where we are forced to ask the producers "What were you thinking?" Of course, we do know what, though it doesn't offer much help. Apparently T'Pol and Tucker were exposed to something, and thus must stand in a decontamination room, rubbing oil all over their svelt forms while stripped to their scivvies. The scene is taken even further with constant close-up shots of where they're rubbing themselves. And on top of that, T'Pol in her crop top is sporting a pair of visible nipples you could hang a coat on. This is the way this new take on Trek was going to be more adult, by being, ya know, more adolescent. Trying to draw in the Baywatch crowd is not a good thing; it means you've got to write down to people who can be entertained by a show about the daily rigors of being a life guard. Like C. S. Strowbridge says, if I want porn, I want good porn, and if I want TV, I want good TV; don't give me bad TV that's masquerading as bad porn, it accomplishes nothing. To try to offer some kind of flimsy justification for the inclusion of this gratuitous scene, T'Pol and Tucker argue about what's going on, and rest assured that nothing is more complementary to a scene of overt sexual teasing than petty bickering and whining. It'd be like watching a porn video where the girl spends most of the time complaining about the upholsetery.

Elsewhere in Sickbay, Dr. Phlox has moved beyond the primitive piece of gauze on Archer's leg and has instead attached a large booger to it. When he awakens he discovers that Tucker had convinced T'Pol to continue the search for the Suliban. Thanks to her help they manage to discover the warp trails of multiple Suliban ships, and this time no one tells her to kiss their ass. Meanwhile Archer is in his quarters, giving a log entry and talking to his dog a lot. Much like Chakotay developing a limp after being shot in the chest, Archer has developed some kind of congestion after being shot in the leg; must be some new sniffle gun or something, but he sounds like he needs a box of tissues. T'Pol calls him to the bridge to look at the gas giant where they've lost the ship. Archer politely asks T'Pol if she can help them again- oh no, wait, that's not accurate. In actual fact, he acts like a dick, but she helps out anyway, and they track fourteen ships, all Suliban, and they follow since, after all, what could go wrong?

Then the head of Blue Man Group is talking to Sidious some more. My initial review of this episode was a scant two weeks after the broadcast of the pilot back in 2001, before I redid all the episodes in the more in-depth style that's here now. Originally, lacking anything else to use, I simply referred to this gentleman as "future guy." Well, it's amazing what half a decade does, because now with the series over and the secrets revealed we know that this is... "future guy."

It is so sad when my sarcasm becomes fanon.

Anyway, future guy asks the Suliban guy about what's going on, and the answer is constantly that he doesn't know, so much so that on rewatching it we mentally added it back in.

"Did Sarin give them anything?"
"I don't know."
"What do you know?"
"Uh, I don't know."

Watching this is just like trying to get answers out of my kids. Future guy, likewise annoyed, tells him that Enterprise has to be stopped because, ya know, he's the villain and it's his job to give orders like that.

Enterprise flies into the gas giant looking for bad guys, and the ship starts bumping around. Because Hoshi's character arc is centered around whining she offers some comments. However, since it's that the chairs should have seatbelts, you can't really fault her. I mean, it's a pretty damn basic bit of safety equipment; no wonder the Vulcans didn't trust these monkeys with warp drive. They find a big structure with thousands of people on board, so the bad guys start firing on them. Tucker immediately calls to the bridge, saying that they're taking damage and wants to know what's going on. How about you just fix the ship, you dumb cracker. Archer takes Enterprise up into a different layer of the atmosphere to hide for the moment, then T'Pol calls him over. The structure is actually a whole bunch of Suliban ships all locked together with magnets. Hoshi finds a biosign that isn't Suliban, so they might have found Klaang. Reed suggests transporting him out, but Archer's afraid of using it on people, so they go charging down towards a group of Suliban ships, and then-

And then we get to hear the silliest line that will constantly be said throughout this series: "Hull plating is off-line." "Hull plating" as the name implies, is a physical object; saying that it's off-line makes as much sense as him saying "chair off line," and Archer just falls flat on his ass. The reason for this ludicrous line is that, since there's no forcefield, the ship needs to use armor. However, armor isn't science fictiony enough for Star Trek, especially a Star Trek with flesh-healing boogers and prominent erect nipples, so they had the idea of "polarizing the hull." According to behind the scenes material, the basis for this is supposed to be the real world development of a ceramic that develops greater hardness while an electrical current passes through it. I haven't personally heard about this, though I'll admit that my last Material Science course was in 1992, and mostly I remember Young's Modulus and that my professor had nice boobs. But regardless, even if we accept this idea, it's not going to work the same way as shields do. All the polarizing does is make it stronger; if they blast it until it goes "off line," guess what, it's broken! You're not going to be able to get it back on line no matter what the captain shouts at you because it's busted. So, this isn't a new series, it's the old series with new words added in that don't make any sense AND sound moronic when you say them out loud. "Wall is off line! AH!"

Incidentally, what would have been a great sign that they were stepping away from the old Trek like they kept saying would be to embrace the ceramic idea. Ceramics offer many advantages in the real world, like engines that so far can only be built in a laboratory but are more fuel efficient and weigh less than metallic engines (difficulty in mass-producing these parts with the precision and tolerances required is what keeps them from being used at the moment). Imagine if the Enterprise had a ceramic hull, with a look like nothing Voyager, Next Gen, or DS9 gave us, that could have really set them apart. Nope! Stay the course, pal, stay the course.

Reed uses a grappler to grab one of the little pod-like ships flying around and pulls it on board. The plan is that Tucker is going to fly the ship in and out, even though he can't remember how the controls work repeatedly during the training by Mayweather. This doesn't change the fact that Archer denies Mayweather's request to fly the ship instead, saying that Tucker's going to do it, which just goes to show that even in the future qualified black men will be passed over for a dumb redneck. By the way, this scene helps put Tucker over the top to win the coveted Most Annoying Character award for this episode. Watching Mayweather trying to teach him how to properly fly the ship is like teaching a frog how to drive stickshift. Then he responds with a redneck "How hard can it be?" that has just the right tone to fit "Hey, hold my beer while I try this." Are you hearing the banjo music as well? Keep in mind that this is the fella that couldn't fly the shuttlepod around Enterprise in drydock without banging into it, and Archer's still letting him fly this mission. His nipples must taste like candy, that's the only explanation.

T'Pol tries to convince Archer to get assistance from the Vulcans, but he refuses for no good reason except human pride. He follows it up by saying that her concern is a sign of emotion, which shows why he's such a dick sometimes. The difference between the Vulcans and the Borg is that the Borg use pure logic (well, your mileage may vary) while the Vulcans temper logic with ethics and morality. Before the discussion can really get under way, Reed comes in. He's magiced up an anti-maglock device for them to use to take the big array apart, and he gives Archer some phase pistols to use. The Suliban goes flying down there with Tucker at the controls, which is rather like watching those videos of chimps in aircraft simulators. Tucker brings the co-axial ports on line, which is great because that means now we get cable and can tune in some Mythbusters or something.

Anyway, there's banging and explosions and shit up on Enterprise, serious enough that someone begins spraying a fire extinguisher from behind the wall. Down on the structure, Archer and Tucker find Klaang. There's no guard since it's not as if he's an important prisoner or anything. Tucker unlocks him, but I guess Klaang realizes that a competent black man was passed over for this cracker, because he immediately begins kicking Tucker's ass. After Archer convinces Klaang to stop (with a phase pistol, of course) they head out into the corridor, and now the guards come back from their piss break or whatever and start fighting. Klaang's unarmed, but a guard makes the mistake of getting within arms reach, and what follows looks less like a physical fight and more like a prelude to prison rape. Archer sets off the magic maglock thing so that the structure falls apart. He's stuck on board what's left of the station while Tucker flies Klaang back to Enterprise amidst the empty ships. It's the closest we've come to something cool, so I'm awarding it best moment.

In my initial review I stated that Archer stayed behind for no real reason, but on rewatching it I gave them the benefit of the doubt and said that maybe there was only room for two. But then Hoshi says that she's only reading two life signs, and this big argument takes place, so it seems that cynicism was right the first time: Archer stayed behind because he's a dumbass. So he's wandering around until he gets some kind of The Doors messed up image on his cellphone. This is probably bad news, so Archer heads straight for it and winds up in the funky future chamber disco room. The head Suliban shows up and there's the usual verbal sparring. Archer does his Matrix impression to avoid being shot by his own gun. Things eventually resort to a fistfight which, naturally, our hero loses, but luckily Enterprise beams him back right before being shot, so it's all good.

The Enterprise crew brings Klaang back to his homeworld, alive as promised. It turns out that the message was hidden in his blood, so a corpse would have worked just as well, but whatever. It replaced one of the chemical bases in his DNA, which is another one of those "sounds good but is actually stupid" bits. Either they did it to every strand of DNA in his body, in which case he'd almost certainly die, or they did it to just one, and the Klingons just happened to grab the one cell that had it when they cut his hand. Whatever, the episode's almost over, I'm not going to quibble any more of this idiocy.

Back on the ship, Archer tells T'pol and Tucker that Enterprise is being ordered to continue exploring in deep space. Tucker's grinning like he just trapped a prize raccoon and heads off to celebrate in whatever manner his people deem best. Archer, on the other hand, recognizes that he's been a dick, and asks T'Pol if she would request to stay on board. He can't ask himself because of that arrogance of his, but whatever, T'Pol's willing to do so, if only to surround herself with those who will better appreciate her breasts. Archer heads out onto the ship, and we're treated to the Archer speech. Archer, as we'll come to discover, gives speeches really badly, but that won't stop him, and like a slow-motion car accident, no one can turn away. He's kind of like a subdued version of the Tick.

And that prediction from earlier, about Archer saying things his father said, yup, that happens now. What compounds it is that it involves flying through an ion storm, but luckily Archer has "you can't be afraid of the wind," in his verbal repertoire. Yeah, well, I don't think the old man meant for you to fly that thing into a tornado either, dumbass.

Isn't she lovely
Isn't she wonderful
Isn't she precious
Less than one minute old
I never thought through love we'd be
Making one as lovely as she
But isn't she lovely made from love

Rating: 6

Star Trek, and all related characters are property and trademark of Paramount Pictures.
The views expressed herein are those of the author and do not reflect the views of anyone
connected with Star Trek: Enterprise, or the staff and management of Paramount Pictures.
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"I don't know." Head Suliban