Review of These Are the Voyages (My Part Two)
Review of These Are the Voyages (My Part Two)
What I didn't like....
The overall plot was simply contrived, boring, somewhat uncharacteristic, and an insult to those that have watched (thus sticking by this show through the good, the bad, and the ugly) the show for four years and expected a real good-bye for the show.
Riker and Troi: However much I liked TNG, should not be on the series finale of a show that they were never a part of. The holodeck storyline is a nightmare. Riker having time to watch a holoprogram while trying to figure out if he should tell Picard his secret is simply ugh. It was a TNG episode hidden in an Enterprise episode. Not only does it take time away from the Enterprise cast, the cast did not have that final scene that brought it all together for everyone to say good-bye. As Georiga said, this idea might have been fine in a middle of a season but certainly not the series finale.
T'Pol: Ugh as well. I think Jolene probably did the best she could with the script but I was absolutly horrified at what they did to this character. At least, since it is the holodeck, we can say that history did not get her right...but this is how history views T'Pol??? Simply ugh. I mean what happened to T'Pol? The majority of the dialogue that came out of her mouth as well as a majority of her actions was so bad that I almost thought this was B&B's revenge for all of Jolene's comments about the show. No other character was portrayed this badly. The writers have established that T'Pol's messing with Trellium-D gave her emotions and yes, serving aboard a human ship for 10 years will make you adapt somewhat but honestly a lot of times it was hard to see the vulcan that she is. I'm not sure that B&B watched this season because she, for the majority of the time, was in emotional control. I agree with Jolene that I do not understand this need to turn her into a human. Vulcans can have emotional depth (just look at Spock even though he is half-human) without becoming emotional like a human. For example, as nice as T'Pol sniffing Trip's old uniform would be nice for a human, that's not T'Pol. (It worked great for Scully to do this to Mulder's clothes but they are both human!) Even after 10 years I don't see that as T'Pol. If they wanted to show her missing Trip perhaps they should have done something else, like her meditating with a picture of him. As much as I love T'Pol opening up to Archer the dialogue about her feelings on missing her Mom...what? It's not something I see a vulcan doing. And what was up with T'Pol wanting to meet Trip's parents? I mean did she not meet them six years ago at the funeral of her and Trip's child? I can't imagine Trip's parents not showing up. The convo between Riker as chef and T'Pol was simply horrific as well. There is no way that anyone can convince me that T'Pol would ever be discussing her feelings with chef. And Riker as chef's kiss on her cheek was ewwwwww. As Joan said I believe, it was skeezy. They writers really messed up with Harbinger (T'Pol sleeping with Trip and the whole Trellium-D fiasco) and this season they really tried to make up for it. I agree with Jolene that to portray T'Pol as a vulcan who wants to be human, who is weak, lost, and confused is really doing the character, the show, and fans a disservice. Some compromises and adaptations are fine. She is serving on a human ship so if she starts to eat with her hands I don't have so much of a problem with that.
Trip's death: Really was this necessary? His actual death was very moving and I can see why they choose Trip. B&B can't see this show ever coming back so why not kill off most people's favorite character. Really to get the emotional depth that the writers and producers failed to produce for the most part among the cast there are only two characters you can kill off: Archer and Trip. These two interacted the most with the majority of the crew. Archer mainly has a connection to all simply by virture of being the captain, and Trip...because well he's just friends with everybody. Trip's death with Archer present (B&B's attempt to recapture the Spock death with Kirk present in ST:II) was moving. However, how dumb was the execution of it. I mean these thugs, who supposedly can't catch up with a starship, manage to sneak up on Enterprise and beam aboard. This is ludocris, and I'm not talking about the singer. Honestly, what are they paying Reed for as their security officer? This makes about as much sense as leaving a male MACO to guard the Orion slave girls when you know the affect they have on men. This has been a problem with the series that they sometimes do illogical things to advance the plot. Also how many times can you "kill" Trip or his clone or future alternate universe self in a show. This has been done at least three times already. Also the only characters we see grieving his loss are Archer and T'Pol. They are the closest to him but still the rest of the crew would be equally as sad. No funeral?????!!!!! Even Spock and Tasha Yar got funerals. B&B just cannot throw a whole bunch of things into an hour program and get a quality episode. It doesn't work that way.
Riker as chef: Please. Although the convo between Trip and Riker was the best out of all the conversations, and there were some nice comments made by the other crew members regarding Trip, I was for the most part horrified by this. Sure, Chef has been mentioned but never seen. But B&B cannnot convince me that the crew was always telling their feelings to chef. That was never established. And although some were nice comments, like Hoshi thinking Trip was cute and about Reed's friendship with Trip, for the most part this was simply drab, uninteresting, and, at least to me, insulting to Trip. It's fine if people choose not to go to college but to paint Trip as a redneck hick, who didn't go to college, and, since he's this naturally talented engineer, got on board the ship by being the Captain's friend...I don't know...I just found this insulting to Trip. Some of it was simply boring. I didn't need a recap by Phlox on the whole Trip/T'Pol romance over neuropressure. The crew should have gotten their proper good-bye to each other and not separately talking about Trip to chef. And Hoshi, the linguistic expert's, comment about how Trip could barely speak English, was just mean. So the guy didn't speak "proper" English. He was entirely understandable. As a linguistic expert you'd think she'd be a little more open to different dilects.
Archer and T'Pol's argument over whether or not to help Shran: I don't know why but this felt off to me. Do we always need to range between slightly argumentative/angry Archer to really argumentative/angry Archer? I just felt that Archer's whole, "you've never trusted Andorians speech" thing just wasn't working for me. It's already been established that Archer has worked past his feelings regarding vulcans thanks to T'Pol so I didn't see any need to rehash this.
We never get to hear Archer's speech: You build it up an entire episode and we never get to hear it? I'm thinking this is probably because Archer had a rousing speech the last ep and they didn't want to do it again. Still it's like having a big build up and then....
Placement of the crew at the speech: Okay T'Pol wants to stay in the "prep" room for Archer's speech, fine and sweet with me. This means she's there for Archer before and after the speech. But the "you never did like crowds did you speech" seem to come out of left field for me. But what I was insulted by was the seating arrangements for Hoshi, Reed, and Travis. The nosebleed section? Honestly. Although Archer is very important and should get credit where credit is due, so should his crew. I think Archer would have made sure his crew was right there with him, front and center, since he's so humble. He knows one man hasn't done this alone, thus the hugging of T'Pol-his right hand-his first officer, and the crew should have been in better seats. I think B&B wanted it to be funny per Reed's comment, but it wasn't. It fell flat.
Shran's daughter kidnapped: Sure the kid calling Archer pinkskin was cute and Shran is great, but this plotline was so drab and pointless. So much for Talas being the love of his life it seems. Hey, if he falls in love and gets married, more power to him, but the story line was weak and shouldn't have been in the series finale. And maybe it's me, cause I lost track, but I think it was Shran who owed Archer and not the other way around correct? I mean it was Archer who save the beginning of the conference and helped Shran find the Aenar responsible for destroying ships via the Romulans.
Archer's line to Trip about "To the Next Generation:" However much I like their friendship and them sharing a drink, ugh line especially in light of the entire episode.
Troi's comments on Enterprise: Sure they would have been funny, but they just came off disrespectful in this. Sure the cabins are small by their standards and yes Archer does NOT have a fish.
Who's sticking with Archer: It was nice to see that Reed and Mayweather are going to try to stick by the Captain, but how about the rest of the crew?
Okay, that's all the dislikes I can think of off the top of my head LOL... If I think of more I'll add them...
What I didn't like....
The overall plot was simply contrived, boring, somewhat uncharacteristic, and an insult to those that have watched (thus sticking by this show through the good, the bad, and the ugly) the show for four years and expected a real good-bye for the show.
Riker and Troi: However much I liked TNG, should not be on the series finale of a show that they were never a part of. The holodeck storyline is a nightmare. Riker having time to watch a holoprogram while trying to figure out if he should tell Picard his secret is simply ugh. It was a TNG episode hidden in an Enterprise episode. Not only does it take time away from the Enterprise cast, the cast did not have that final scene that brought it all together for everyone to say good-bye. As Georiga said, this idea might have been fine in a middle of a season but certainly not the series finale.
T'Pol: Ugh as well. I think Jolene probably did the best she could with the script but I was absolutly horrified at what they did to this character. At least, since it is the holodeck, we can say that history did not get her right...but this is how history views T'Pol??? Simply ugh. I mean what happened to T'Pol? The majority of the dialogue that came out of her mouth as well as a majority of her actions was so bad that I almost thought this was B&B's revenge for all of Jolene's comments about the show. No other character was portrayed this badly. The writers have established that T'Pol's messing with Trellium-D gave her emotions and yes, serving aboard a human ship for 10 years will make you adapt somewhat but honestly a lot of times it was hard to see the vulcan that she is. I'm not sure that B&B watched this season because she, for the majority of the time, was in emotional control. I agree with Jolene that I do not understand this need to turn her into a human. Vulcans can have emotional depth (just look at Spock even though he is half-human) without becoming emotional like a human. For example, as nice as T'Pol sniffing Trip's old uniform would be nice for a human, that's not T'Pol. (It worked great for Scully to do this to Mulder's clothes but they are both human!) Even after 10 years I don't see that as T'Pol. If they wanted to show her missing Trip perhaps they should have done something else, like her meditating with a picture of him. As much as I love T'Pol opening up to Archer the dialogue about her feelings on missing her Mom...what? It's not something I see a vulcan doing. And what was up with T'Pol wanting to meet Trip's parents? I mean did she not meet them six years ago at the funeral of her and Trip's child? I can't imagine Trip's parents not showing up. The convo between Riker as chef and T'Pol was simply horrific as well. There is no way that anyone can convince me that T'Pol would ever be discussing her feelings with chef. And Riker as chef's kiss on her cheek was ewwwwww. As Joan said I believe, it was skeezy. They writers really messed up with Harbinger (T'Pol sleeping with Trip and the whole Trellium-D fiasco) and this season they really tried to make up for it. I agree with Jolene that to portray T'Pol as a vulcan who wants to be human, who is weak, lost, and confused is really doing the character, the show, and fans a disservice. Some compromises and adaptations are fine. She is serving on a human ship so if she starts to eat with her hands I don't have so much of a problem with that.
Trip's death: Really was this necessary? His actual death was very moving and I can see why they choose Trip. B&B can't see this show ever coming back so why not kill off most people's favorite character. Really to get the emotional depth that the writers and producers failed to produce for the most part among the cast there are only two characters you can kill off: Archer and Trip. These two interacted the most with the majority of the crew. Archer mainly has a connection to all simply by virture of being the captain, and Trip...because well he's just friends with everybody. Trip's death with Archer present (B&B's attempt to recapture the Spock death with Kirk present in ST:II) was moving. However, how dumb was the execution of it. I mean these thugs, who supposedly can't catch up with a starship, manage to sneak up on Enterprise and beam aboard. This is ludocris, and I'm not talking about the singer. Honestly, what are they paying Reed for as their security officer? This makes about as much sense as leaving a male MACO to guard the Orion slave girls when you know the affect they have on men. This has been a problem with the series that they sometimes do illogical things to advance the plot. Also how many times can you "kill" Trip or his clone or future alternate universe self in a show. This has been done at least three times already. Also the only characters we see grieving his loss are Archer and T'Pol. They are the closest to him but still the rest of the crew would be equally as sad. No funeral?????!!!!! Even Spock and Tasha Yar got funerals. B&B just cannot throw a whole bunch of things into an hour program and get a quality episode. It doesn't work that way.
Riker as chef: Please. Although the convo between Trip and Riker was the best out of all the conversations, and there were some nice comments made by the other crew members regarding Trip, I was for the most part horrified by this. Sure, Chef has been mentioned but never seen. But B&B cannnot convince me that the crew was always telling their feelings to chef. That was never established. And although some were nice comments, like Hoshi thinking Trip was cute and about Reed's friendship with Trip, for the most part this was simply drab, uninteresting, and, at least to me, insulting to Trip. It's fine if people choose not to go to college but to paint Trip as a redneck hick, who didn't go to college, and, since he's this naturally talented engineer, got on board the ship by being the Captain's friend...I don't know...I just found this insulting to Trip. Some of it was simply boring. I didn't need a recap by Phlox on the whole Trip/T'Pol romance over neuropressure. The crew should have gotten their proper good-bye to each other and not separately talking about Trip to chef. And Hoshi, the linguistic expert's, comment about how Trip could barely speak English, was just mean. So the guy didn't speak "proper" English. He was entirely understandable. As a linguistic expert you'd think she'd be a little more open to different dilects.
Archer and T'Pol's argument over whether or not to help Shran: I don't know why but this felt off to me. Do we always need to range between slightly argumentative/angry Archer to really argumentative/angry Archer? I just felt that Archer's whole, "you've never trusted Andorians speech" thing just wasn't working for me. It's already been established that Archer has worked past his feelings regarding vulcans thanks to T'Pol so I didn't see any need to rehash this.
We never get to hear Archer's speech: You build it up an entire episode and we never get to hear it? I'm thinking this is probably because Archer had a rousing speech the last ep and they didn't want to do it again. Still it's like having a big build up and then....
Placement of the crew at the speech: Okay T'Pol wants to stay in the "prep" room for Archer's speech, fine and sweet with me. This means she's there for Archer before and after the speech. But the "you never did like crowds did you speech" seem to come out of left field for me. But what I was insulted by was the seating arrangements for Hoshi, Reed, and Travis. The nosebleed section? Honestly. Although Archer is very important and should get credit where credit is due, so should his crew. I think Archer would have made sure his crew was right there with him, front and center, since he's so humble. He knows one man hasn't done this alone, thus the hugging of T'Pol-his right hand-his first officer, and the crew should have been in better seats. I think B&B wanted it to be funny per Reed's comment, but it wasn't. It fell flat.
Shran's daughter kidnapped: Sure the kid calling Archer pinkskin was cute and Shran is great, but this plotline was so drab and pointless. So much for Talas being the love of his life it seems. Hey, if he falls in love and gets married, more power to him, but the story line was weak and shouldn't have been in the series finale. And maybe it's me, cause I lost track, but I think it was Shran who owed Archer and not the other way around correct? I mean it was Archer who save the beginning of the conference and helped Shran find the Aenar responsible for destroying ships via the Romulans.
Archer's line to Trip about "To the Next Generation:" However much I like their friendship and them sharing a drink, ugh line especially in light of the entire episode.
Troi's comments on Enterprise: Sure they would have been funny, but they just came off disrespectful in this. Sure the cabins are small by their standards and yes Archer does NOT have a fish.
Who's sticking with Archer: It was nice to see that Reed and Mayweather are going to try to stick by the Captain, but how about the rest of the crew?
Okay, that's all the dislikes I can think of off the top of my head LOL... If I think of more I'll add them...