OEEG: Silent Enemy

Description: So we see Enterprise launch a CGI amplifier to help them better get in touch with everyone back on Earth. I'll admit, I already do like this - finally it starts to feel like we're actually out here on the frontier and not in a van tooling around on the interstate looking for a cool diner to eat at. And to add to that, at less than a minute into the episode they pick up another ship the Vulcans haven't enountered before, so good. What could bring that crashing down?

What do you think: Archer talking. He hails this species that neither humanity nor the Vulcans have encountered before with "This is the Starship Enterprise. How can we be of assistance?" Yeah, um, real historic there. You still haven't put together a standard greeting for new species? You just saying whatever pops in your head? "Hey, this is the Starship Enterprise, and we be fly, dog! We're human, what species is you, bitches?" Well, since he gets no response, we get what you'd expect: Archer talking like they're deaf and/or retarded. They're not answering, which is a bad sign: as we established way back in Fight Or Flight, if we encounter a new ship, and it's scary looking, the aliens are bad guys. Well, this ship is pretty nasty looking (green glow is a dead giveaway), and they're not answering, so yeah, bad guys. We'll soon see that their sensors can't read anything about these guys. Yup, bad guys.

Well, the bad guys eventually turn and run. "Was it something I said?" Archer says with a smirk and a look around at everyone, who are all smiling and nodding. Unfortunately, Archer doesn't get that they're agreeing with him. They gather around the air hockey table and discuss why the aliens might have left. Mayweather muses that maybe they just didn't find Enterprise of any interest. "Us? Not interesting?" Reed says in a subtle mocking tone, though I'm sure Keating was laughing inside at the irony if he'd gotten a look at their ratings.

Oh God, and speaking of not interesting, we enter the pointless subplot. You see, Reed's birthday is coming up, and so they're going to throw a surprise dinner for him, but need to know what his favorite food is. This plot element fits the story about as well as putting a tap dance number in the middle of Best Of Both Worlds. So, the first excursion into this is Archer talking to Reed's parents, where we discover that his father is very, very uppity British. The only thing missing is a monocle and him going "I say, I say" and harumphing. Anyway, his parents don't know what his favorite food is, so Archer goes and tells Hoshi she has to find out what it is. When she protests that she has, you know, a real goddamn job on this ship and needs to actually do it, he just flat out orders her to do it and tells her to make it her top priority. Yes, please stop that task, what was it? Checking to make sure the amplifiers are working properly? Waste of time, figure out what the armory officer likes to nibble on! My God, don't they make a medication for what you have, Archer? Really, why does he bother somebody with important work to do instead of assigning this to some low-rung crewman?

Well, now that that's out of the way, he heads off in his off duty clothes with his dog to go yack with Tucker. Turns out Natalie broke up with him. You remember Natalie? No, neither do I, and I've seen all these episodes two or three times. He blames it on it being a long-distance relationship, although being knocked up by an alien probably didn't help. The scene gets uncomfortable, so Archer changes the subject to Reed again. Archer comments that they don't know much about him - yeah, well, finding out what his favorite food is won't exactly be a window into his soul.

Well, thankfully, the alien ship returns so that something actually interesting can happen. Archer tries more of his random conversation generator with them, and then the aliens scan the ship with a really annoying noise and take a few potshots at them before flying off. It turns out that while the aliens were firing there was a brief time when Reed was able to scan: the aliens are like nothing they've encountered before, and their armor would shrug off Enterprise's torpedoes. They find out that Tucker and twelve other people were nearly killed by one of the shots, and Archer admits they're not ready for some of the threats out here. He decides they'll head back to Earth and get their phase cannons installed to help out. Well, Reed and Tucker aren't happy about that, as they want to do the job themselves. However, Archer knows he's dealing with a catfish-eating good ole' boy and a sexually frustrated armory officer with a messed up home life, and that doesn't exactly inspire confidence in their ability to construct the most advanced and powerful non-nuclear weapon there is. Finally, he agrees to let them start the job, but they're still heading home.

So, Reed starts briefing the engineering team, which includes Ens. Ben Stiller, on what they are and what they need to do. Tucker gives them a pep talk, as indicated by the pep talk music playing in the background, and set them to it. And while they're getting all set to do their A-Team thing, we head off for the most pointless diversion possible: yes, Hoshi's Operation Favorite Food. She's talking to Reed's sister, and honestly, it's impossible for me to summon the will to give a damn about this. Man, it must suck to be Linda Park, having no lines that don't involve the comm or being afraid, and when it does come up where she gets to do extra, it's idiotic dialogue like this. I'm sure she was reflecting on how well all those acting classes prepared her for asking about pizza. Still, at least one thing comes out of this: we learn he went to a restaurant with food he didn't like because of the waitress, so it looks like he's probably not gay... I guess Hoshi can narrow this down to non-gay foods then.

No no no, it's still not over! Now she's down in the mess hall talking to Reed about food. Jesus Christ, what is this series' obsession with what people eat?! Hey, you want to know what, creators of Enterprise? I have no idea what Picard's favorite food is, I have no idea what Kirk's favorite food is, I have no idea what Ben Sisko's favorite food is (though I know it's likely Creole because that's what his father made), and Janeway subsists solely on coffee and Marlboro's, so guess what, we don't need to know his favorite food! Give it a rest, please! So Hoshi tries to get it out of him and accidentally comes on to him. Reed turns her down because he's only probably not gay, there's still a chance he might be. Hoshi leaves, accompanied by the "you're a screw-up" tuba playing.

Finally, finally, we get back to the main plot. The aliens sneak up on Enterprise, but even when ready for them power is knocked offline and the aliens send over a pod. We get a brief glimpse of them as the walk up the hall like Shaggy from Scooby Doo before they take out two nameless crewmen. Archer soon finds their flashlights, which leads him and his security team to the aliens, who are doing something with the unconscious guys. Archer tries to call them off, but they refuse, so he blasts one (guess her learned something against Silik), but it has no effect. He switches over to kill, still nothing. So when the aliens saunter off he runs up the corridor and turns the corner, pointing the phaser... um, why? If you wanted to do that, at least have one of the other guys give you his; maybe two phase pistols can get through, but you already know one won't. Archer calls Phlox and tells him to come down. The ship has been shot, is dead in space, and all the power's out, so Phlox naturally sounds completely nonchalant about it all. Wow, nothing can get in the way of his good mood.

So the aliens leave, return to their ship, and for good measure, take out one of the nacelles. We soon see the injured crewmen laid out in Sickbay while Phlox tries to get them back into shape, but their brains are pretty messed up at the moment. Tucker also reports that it'll take days to be able to go to warp, but will have impulse back pretty soon, which he calls good news. Yeah, I guess, though comparing warp and impulse is like comparing a jet and a skateboard. Mayweather suggests that they try to raise the Vulcan high command to send some help, a suggestion that Archer responds to with visibly restrained scorn. However, even a man messed up enough to tell Hoshi to stop working on long-range communication to figure out what the armory officer likes to eat realizes that they probably shouldn't just die for no reason, so he tells Hoshi to put aside her top priority assignment and raise Vulcan before they're blown to atoms. However, turns out they can't raise Vulcan. You might think it was because of neglect while Archer had her off doing something pointless, but no, it's because the amplifiers have been blown up. Wow, Enterprise's getting its ass kicked on every turn.

Reed takes some time to chew out Ben Stiller for misspeaking, then heads into a little tunnel with Tucker so he can get a nasty shock... I mean Reed getting an electric shock, not Tucker getting a... never mind, you know what I mean. The two argue for a bit about how to install the cannon to do the most damage without the risk, and Tucker finally pulls rank and says to do it his way. By the way, we soon discover that the warp core is still offline, so why on Earth are they messing about with the phase cannons? What good is it going to be to have the weapons if there's nothing to power it? So Archer and Tucker head up to the warp core and start bantering while they fix it. Archer eventually comments that this time they won't be leaving before they're ready, to which Tucker asks if his ears are looking pointier than usual. For a supposedly evolved species, they sure do love their racism. I can't believe any of these people would later stand in the way of Terra Prime given how openly bigoted they are.

Still, I will give this scene the following point: Archer finally looks back and realizes what a jackhole he's been. He admits he rushed them out of Spacedock because he had something to prove, and should've waited until they were ready. Tucker counters this by saying that the old astronauts took risks, and it was part of being in space. Yeah, but there is kind of a difference between a risk that comes with going into space and a risk that comes from being ill-prepared because of ego. I'm not prithy to NASA documents, but I'm pretty sure Neil Armstrong never told Deke Slayton, "Yeah, we could launch in September, but I'm worried my penis isn't big enough. Send us up now, to hell with this testing crap."

Well, having reflected on how taking risks is worth it, Tucker goes down and tells Reed he can do his nitro-burning whatjamadoodle stuff to make the phase cannons super-powerful. So Archer takes them over to a moon to test them out, and tells Reed to just shave a few meters off the top of a mountain. Well, this is Reed we're talking about, so instead it completely blows up the mountain and the crater and blows the crap out of Enterprise as well. Oops. However, it turns out that this may not be Reed's messed-up upbringing at work, but rather that of the aliens. Turns out they left a device in the pod bay and it's not only monitoring everything, but was what overloaded the phase coils to damage the ship. Archer heads over to a camera, and tells the aliens that they won't run from a fight, that they'll protect Enterprise any way they can, and blasts the device.

And now Archer's journey is complete. An enemy ship has tracked them down, disabled their ship, boarded them, caused brain damage to two members of his crew, and made it clear they're not going to stop, and to this, Archer replies that he will do whatever it takes to protect Enterprise. Congratulations, you now finally, finally understand exactly what those people on the freighter were going through, captain. True, you could argue that he's not at the point of revenge yet, but then, this has only been a few days, not a lifetime. Archer, you don't seem quite as evolved as you might like to talk from where I'm sitting.

And then- Oh - my - God. You know, for a while there, I actually forgot. I actually forgot we had this idiotic subplot about Reed's favorite food. What kind of moron actually thought that as the ship stands at the cusp of a battle with an enemy that has defeated them on every turn that we should get sidetracked into this meaningless drivel? Dear Lord... it's like someone in the middle of Q Who, while they were worrying about the Borg, to frett about getting a mute for Riker's trombone. I can't believe it... how can you have an episode with an enemy this powerful and menacing and still manage to f*ck it up? So Hoshi is down to asking Phlox, as she knows he's most likely to provide the wrong kind of information, and of course, that's what he does. However, he decides to look into the confidential medical records, because if you can't break doctor-patient privelege for a surprise birthday party, when the hell can you? So they figure out through a medical check that it's likely pineapple. Great, feel free to write this case up in the New England Journal Of Nobody Cares.

Great, now that that crap is out of the way, back to the real story. The aliens show up again, so Archer, being so much more evolved than Ryan from Fortunate Son, decides to turn about and face them down rather than trying to evade them. The aliens, knowing just how to push Archer's buttons, finally make contact, but by using his image from earlier when he spoke to them, so that he is in effect telling himself that Enterprise needs to surrender because it's defenseless. Archer tells Reed to blow the piss out of them, but the cannons don't do any real damage. Whoopsie. Archer wants to know why they can't do what they did yesterday, and Reed explains that that happened because of an overload. Being the captain, Archer quickly decides to overload again, but Reed says that would likely take out two decks, that would be a bad move. Archer insists even when Reed tries to talk him out of it. Again, Reed, a man whose daddy issues have turned him into a weapon-crazed boy-woman thinks it's a bad idea, but Archer insists they do it anyway. Of course, because Archer's got his name in the main credits, he's not obsessed like Ryan, he's just dedicated.

Fortunately, Tucker's on hand to provide a technobabble way out and figures he can channel the recoil into gravity plating and structural integrity and whatever else it'll take to justify this big boom. So they do that and blast the ship good, then follow up with some torpedoes that really kick its ass, and the aliens run off. Well, with that all worked out, Archer decides not to head back to Earth since they seem to have things pretty well in hand. Hoshi does, however, point out that by coming back as far as they have, they can drop a subspace amplifier, so Archer tells her to get on it. But don't forget what you're top priority is, Hoshi! Yup, that's right. So, in the meantime, Archer celebrates in the only way street crazies know: booze! Oh, and Reed gets a pineapple cake, as the best way to cap an episode about overcoming a potentially mortal enemy.

Comments: Rating this episode is so hard, because when it's good, it's really good, and when it's not, it's exasperating. What also goes in the exasperating pile is that these bad guys were just the bad guys of the week - we won't see them again. The most we'll get is another group of ships that might be them, but we don't know, and in any case, that won't be until the end of season three.

Hey look, suspense! Bam bam bam!!!

Rating: 5

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