Enterprise Getting New Aliens, Hairdos, Weapons 619
Steve Krutzler writes "The news about Enterprise's radical "new direction" for its third season is going mainstream on May 10th in TV Guide. Rick Berman reveals that the season finale will bring about major changes in the struggling Star Trek series for next year including new aliens, new weapons, new hairdos and a mission he calls a Star Trek "first."" I've felt like the show has been slipping all season, so here's hoping.
Alien aliens (Score:1, Interesting)
Maybe partly off-topic, but (Score:5, Interesting)
On a side note, I'm willing to give the "new" show a try. The last couple episodes have been pretty good, and it looks like they are making some sort of an effort to address falling ratings and concerns. Of course, if the "new direction" turns out to be a trip straight South, I would bet that Enterprise won't see a 4th season.
I just wish that in terms of production values: 1) They ditch the catsuit for T'Pol. No real Vulcan would dress like that...it's degrading. 2) They would spend a bit more time designing makeup. Bumpy foreheads don't cut it anymore and make the show look quite cheap. 3) The music needs to be a lot more thematic and bombastic. It's been slightly better lately but like the makeup, "sonic wallpaper" doesn't cut it. Give us dramatic, emotional music!
the "problem" with Enterprise... (Score:3, Interesting)
Some thoughts:
-is it because the story predates what people are familiar with?
-is it not faithful to the Trek universe?
I am genuinely curious why do you all hate it so much? Does CleverNickName have any insight?
Re:Borg (Score:5, Interesting)
Even if this ep bombs, there's still some potential here. (Note: I'll never forgive Voyager for pussifying the Borg.)
What this episode proves (assuming a rumor I read is true...) is that Enterprise takes place after the Enterprise-E visited Earth in First Contact. There are a few ramifications here. This closes up most of the continuity holes that people keep bitching about, which means that Enterprise isn't locked any particular chain of events. Earth could go into a bloody war with the Vulcans.
The potential here is that the future of the Federation could be rewritten. Anybody remember "Yesterday's Enterprise" where the Enterprise-C jumped into the future and altered the timeline?
Even more interesting, what if we're watching the chain of events that caused the Federation to behave more like an Empire in the paralell universe that Kirk found himself in due to a transporter accident?
In any case, it's up to to the B&B team to actually make good use of this. I'm not ready to bet money yet. I can say, though, that last night's episode had a rather startling ending. If that's a sign of things to come, then we might start to see DS9's style of drama percolating up to Enterprise. That'd be a welcome evolution for this series. It is a little on the sterile side.
*sigh* (Score:5, Interesting)
I couldn't stand their portrayal in First Contact (the idea of self-aware Borg queens will never sit with me) but at least they retained the menace they kept from Next Generation. Voyager was where they were finally ruined for me; they appeared in a disproportionate number of episodes, becoming less and less menacing, almost comical. This isn't something that has to happen as one grows more familiar with an enemy.
Now in Enterprise, the Borg are showing up yet again, and the audience is already way ahead of the game. I'd like to think that the writers are cleverly establishing the Borg as a hidden, secret determinant of much of humankind's history, with connections and impacts deeper than most realize. I'd like to think that, because it's either that or they've simply run out of ideas.
Re:Haha (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Fire Berman! (Score:5, Interesting)
God, yeah....Berman's idea of a different culture is one with an opressed third gender? Woah! That's innovation! And there's a male and female of the species and they're married? Unbelievable....
I've thought (and still do) that Enterprise had the most potential since TNG, which I rather enjoyed most times. The biggest mistakes have been a) trying to hard to shoehorn foreshadowing of every bloody event in the future into the show, b) slavishly obeying the "resolve in one episode" law (I'm very surprised that Berman's talking about going with a longer story arc - he's said in more than one interview that that was a bad and stupid idea), c) worrying way too much about consistency with the rest of the ST universe.
Theoretically, they were trying to branch out a bit, bring in some new audience to the show. And frankly, the whole ST universe needs a good shaking up. It really wouldn't have hurt them a lot to pay lip service to continuity, but ignore it when it made the story better.
Oh, yeah, and fire Berman. Get someone in there who can write a story without resorting to travel to other timelines.
Star Trek's 9/11 (Score:2, Interesting)
The Xindi attack is obviously a rehash of 9/11. This whole thing is just a cheap shot against the War on Terrorism.
Just substitute the "Xindi" for Arabs. The "Arabs" attacked America on 9/11. The Xindi attacked Earth in the Star Trek future. Note that the Trek producers call the Xindi attack "preemptive." That's how Bush referred to the Iraq war. Berman is turning Star Trek into utterly non-subtle hard left political correctness run amok.
SPOILERS. Here's what will happen. I guarantee this. It's so predictable. First, Archer will angrily make a military foray against the Xindi, determining to wage his own preemptive strike. He will look with disdain and haughtiness at all diplomatic solutions. But his military efforts will prove fruitless. He will only succeed in killing a lot of civilians. Then, there will be a big moment that hammers the "cycle of violence" fallacy home with an opprobrious sledgehammer. Then, Archer will realize that the only way to stop the "cycle of violence" is to hang out with the Xindi in their bars and holy places and become friends with them, and even take up their traditional practice of basket weaving or whatever. Unfortunately, Archer's "epic lesson" (of LIES!!) will be forgotten by an arrogant Federation. Then, in the next TNG movie the Xindi will attack again! (Well shucks, like that isn't obvious.) That's when Picard must go through the same process that Archer went through. Fortunately, Kirk's legacy will be dead and so there will be no unnecessary blastings. And of course, the Xindi will turn out to be fundamentally friendly. As for why they blew up a large chunk of planet Earth, well, hey, you can't blame them for that! At the time, the Xindi were led by Republicans! They were warlike and militaristic. They thought that was the best way of protecting themselves, by striking first! Only Jonathan Archer taught them how to live in peace.
Give me a break.
I used to like Star Trek. Now, I can't tolerate it. No matter how much Star Trek there is on TV or in the movies, that won't change the fact of how, for example, little Iraqi children will no longer have to endure electric drills being pushed through their wrists while their parents are forced to watch.
Rick Berman, you are a loser.
I'm sure someone will say something like, "Hey, how do you know this isn't a return to TOS, and epic space battles? Why do you assume that this will be antiwar propaganda?" Hey, buddy. This is Star Trek. It's wussy sci-fi.
The crew must die (Score:3, Interesting)
If they want the show to have some dignity, the whole crew should die. I really mean die. It's not like that sort of thing doesn't happen in experimental spaceship programs, especially when those ships are getting shot at. Maybe Mayweather could live, because I like him. But the rest should die. The ship should be rebuilt and taken over by a more interesting crew, and they should get some less open-ended missions, something better than "go out there and look around." (Realistic example: espionage on the Klingons, acquisition of advanced tech from other races who are willing to deal, support of Earth-friendly regimes in space, etc.)
The whole point of flashing back to the pre-federation days with the show is that they don't have to be so goody-goody, especially when it seems like all of space is out to get the Earth's goods.
I also really hate the fact that on our first voyage into deep space, we pick fights and don't get our asses handed to us in the first milisecond. How likely is that? Many of these hostile races have been fighting in interstellar space for generations. The Enterprise is the first ship we built which is sturdy enough to take us really far. But to pretend that this reconissance ship could fight a battle in deep space is like thinking the Aztecs could have challenged the British navy with a paddleboat and a harpoon.
That's why I think it's very realistic that they would all die. And, it would improve the show. It would be just the sort of bold, interesting move Berman is advertising, but won't deliver.
The Eugenics Wars (Score:4, Interesting)
I agree with those saying there's been no imagination in coming up with new Star Trek series. They are all carbon copies of each other, with the possible exception of DS9.
In the vein of different Star Trek stories, has anyone read the novel(s) "The Eugenics Wars: The Rise and Fall of Khan Noonien Singh?" It's in two parts, and I'm impatiently waiting for the second to appear in paperback.
I know this is just slightly off-topic, but I must talk about it!
The story (obviously) follows the life of Khan. However, in an absolute stroke of genius, the writer also included the character of Gary Seven, the mysterious alien-bred human introduced in the original series. The episode was clearly being set up to be spun off, but never did.
As I said before, I think that putting Gary Seven and Khan on the same stage (or rather, realizing that they would have been contemporaries) was a stroke of genius. They're both genetically enhanced, but with completely opposite political and personal ideologies.You could not ask for two men more perfectly crafted to oppose each other in a dramatic conflict.
Gary Seven was sent to Earth to quietly pull strings and guide world events for the betterment of the human race. Khan actually has similar motives, but intends to fix the world by forcibly taking control of everything. He's not the obsessed villain of ST:TWOK (not yet, anyway), and he's a thoroughly believable character.
It's amazing that the stage, the plot, and the characters for this story could all emerge by accident! When you realize they were on the same planet at the same time, you realize they must have butted heads.
Make a miniseries of this, I say. I'd be all over it.
BTW, if you haven't read the book, I highly recommend it. There's a little bit of gratuitous reference-dropping, but I have nothing else bad to say about it. Read it!
Enterprise is nothing but left-wing propaganda (Score:3, Interesting)
The only way this show can be "fixed" is to get rid of whoever is writing that kind of crap and replace them with real writers.
Lee
Re:Borg (Score:3, Interesting)
There's no indication that this is the case with the Archer timeline, but as Berman has clearly demonstrated (assuming that Earth really does get wasted big-time next season) THIS IS NOT THE SAME TIMELINE AS KIRK/TNG. Ergo, the future in Enterprise is NOT the same TNG we all know and love (or in the case of Voyager, hate with a rabid mania.)
I think this is a GOOD thing, as it gives Berman a lot of freedom to play with. The question is whether he's actually making good use of that freedom...
Re:Borg (Score:3, Interesting)
Take "Yesterday's Enterprise". If the Enterprise-D had never helped the Enterprise-C in the "original" timeline, wouldn't the C have been destroyed? They were on the verge of destruction before they went forward in time. My understanding was that history had never really been rewritten, except for the short span of time where the "C" had gone into the future. When the "C" went back, they eventually caused the Klingon-Federation peace treaty and the normal timeline was made possible. Nothing the "C" did has caused the normal timeline to be any different from our perspective. Any evidence of Tasha Yar existing in the past was erased as far as the Federation knew until Sela Yar made her appearance later.
Also, in the "Voyage Home", the Enterprise crew didn't make any changes to the past that we'd be aware of. A couple of whales and a whale researcher disappeared. Kirk sold off his pair of glasses, which he later re-acquired as antiques. Scotty gave away transparent aluminum technology, but then points out that maybe the guy he gave it to was recorded as the inventor anyway.
And in "First Contact", we don't really know that history turned out to be any different than the way the Next Generation crew had originally perceived it. There hasn't (yet) been any evidence of it. Cochrane did everything they remembered him doing. And in all the cases where they divulged the future to Cochrane, it might have made him do all the things they remembered him to have done.
The only case I remember of a non-sustaining loop in time was that TNG episode where the Enterprise-D kept getting destroyed until Data figured out what message to send back to get them out of the loop. That might establish the possibility in Trekdom that history can be rewritten. All that Star Trek series might just be one iteration of that non-sustaining loop.
That would be really lame of B&B to do this. But I wouldn't put it past them. They've already demonstrated that they have little regard for Roddenberry's work. Hasn't Braga been quoted as saying that he didn't like the original Star Trek series? Honestly, if those guys want to rejuvinate Star Trek they don't need to rewrite Star Trek history. They could try sticking to the spirit of Star Trek instead of just recycling old plots and techonobabble. How often did the original Star Trek revisit planets or mention the events of previous episodes? Star Trek 2 might have been the first time that's happened.
But I'm not saying that every episode should be independant. Babylon 5's strength was that hardly anything happened in an episode that wasn't important later on. But even Babylon 5 had a introduction, middle, and conclusion. It was like a novel told over 5 years. But there was a real ending, and the ending had signficance. But Star Trek just drags on now. If B&B want creative freedom, maybe they shouldn't have made a show that occurs between First Contact and the original Star Trek. Haven't we explored Vulcans to death by now? It was interesting the first time around with Spock, and probably because he was only half Vulcan.
Star trek first (Score:2, Interesting)
Forehead mods and smoothness (Score:3, Interesting)
My first main beef is that nigh every alien species is just a human with a funny forehead or nose...no creativity.
My second beef is just about every alien world (cheap sets) is a semi-desert planet with what look like mud huts with technology dried into the walls, or some leftover hippie commune looking place. Can't they find a city like NYC or something on some Class M?
That aside, since this is star trek afterall, my main problem with Enterprise is how smoothly the ship seems to run. Basically our first big ship and it has less problems than the Red Dwarf.
Pussifying the Borg (Score:5, Interesting)
Dude, Voyager didn't pussify the Borg -- Next Gen did it.
Remember when we first saw them, and they were all bad ass? They were adjusting their shields for different phaser frequencies and stuff?
Then there was that whole Locutus thing . . . man, that sucked for us.
But through it all, the Borg were kicking ass, and not even bothering to take names . . . until some last-season Next Gen episode (forgive me or not knowing the title) where all it took to kill a Borg was popping the little tube out of its face.
What?!
From certain death for all humans, to falling down in a spray of liquid nitrogen just like that?
Worst. Screwing up of a cool bad guy. EVER.
mmm...where have I seen this before, I wonder ? (Score:3, Interesting)
a mysterious probe from space will blast a swath of destruction across North and Central America, causing epic explosions and annihilating everything between Florida and Venezuela," according to the article. "As viewers will learn, this is a preemptive strike by an alien race known as the Xindi (that's Zin-dee)
Well, at last Star Trek catches up with Space Battleship Yamato/Star Blazers. There was no other way to go for the show to keep it going. As a reminder, the 1st season of SBY has the following story:
In the year 2199, Earth is under attack by the mysterious planet Gamilon. Planet bombs destroy all of Earth's surface, forcing people to live underground. Radiation from the bombs is everywhere, and life on Earth has one more year left. All Earth space fleets are destroyed. A mysterious message arrives from Iscandar, probing Earth people to travel 248,000 light years across space to get the Cosmo DNA machine which will remove the radioactivity and restore the planet in its former state. Since Earth has no other spaceships, they retrofit the Yamato for space travel, fitting the wave motion engine (blueprints of it were sent along with the message) so they can warp through space, and also converting it to the wave motion gun which blasts a huge planet-destroying beam but leaves the ship helpless for a few minutes.
I keep mentioning Space Battleship Yamato here in Slashdot for younger people to learn that the wonderous things they see today or tomorrow have been established 30 years ago. Many anime cliches (for example, the hero, his best friend and rival, his girlfriend, the wise but sick captain, the cyborg mechanic, the megalomaniac alien emperor bent on destroying Earth) have been introduced en mass in SBY. There is a rumour that George Lucas was heavily inspired by it during his early trip in Japan before he wrote Star Wars.
As you can see from the above text, the few lines of the SBY scenario already sound more interesting than the new Enterprise. There is no other way to go for Star Trek in my opinion, cause they have played almost every card, except the "alien invasion" plot. Now it's time for the real Star Trek: huge battles and an epic race to save Earth from destruction.
By the way, if SBY sounds similar to the plot in Babylon 5's Crusade, it's because it is. They have stolen heavily from Yamato.
Finally, they could throw some bits of Robotech in the Enterprise, huge robots transforming, you know the stuff. Whatever they do, I bet there's gonna be more interesting than ever.
Star Trek: No Heart, No Soul. (Score:2, Interesting)
The whole Star Trek franchise is lame. So-called "aliens" from another universe look more normal than most high school kids these days.