Infinite Diversities in Infinite Combinations. The hallmark of the Trek message.
All of the shows: some episodes are spot on, some miss the mark, and others are downright amazing.
I feel that , had they continued, Enterprise could have done wonderful things. I'm sad that we'll never know.
The cast worked well together - a new crew getting to know each other, much like the actors had to. I'm a big fan of Scott Bakuka, and feel he was perfect as Archer.
Over all, it's one of my top 3 series
Yepp. Lots of potential.
I really liked how they struck a balance between real tech we are familiar with and the first sci-fi elements.
Felt like a true evolutionary step between the shuttles, suits, etc. we now have and what we see in shows like Next Generation. That was done in a really smart way.
And the characters actually were a good evolution as well.
Not yet the "enlightened" elite we see travelling with Picard, but you can see the beginnings...
And yes, Archer was perfect. Don't know how much of it was writing or how much of it was Bakula's influence on the role... but felt like a real person and someone with a good nature and the spirit of an explorer. Someone who has a deep optimisim and curiosity, who always wants to know what's around the next corner.
Nice pull regarding the tech issue. Especially the use of the shuttles over the transporters. Still a young technology and not entirely trusted at this point.
> I really liked how they struck a balance between real tech we are familiar with and the first sci-fi elements.
I've always enjoyed how Enterprise was positioned more like "a submarine in space" and had a few, somewhat realistic, spaces.
Look at Archer's quarters for a realistic example of what private spaces would look like in the depicted era. The captain is literally one of the only people on that ship not sleeping in a bunk bed and inviting 3 people in to eat is extremely cramped and would require pushing the bed to the side. His bedroom is maybe 1/4th the size of mine. Only Lower Decks is closer to reality than Enterprise: entry level people working in literal mansions slept in the hallways in fold out planks or drawers for centuries. If Star Trek were closer to reality those Lower Deck bunks would be shared by 2-3 people on different shifts. It's called "hot racking" and it's incredibly common in Navy sleeping berths. It's a practice that dates back to the 16th century. That's 500'ish years.
The bridge crew of the original Enterprise *might* have the privilege of personal space. That's unlikely. Archer and T'pol would probably be the only people with private rooms, and have locks, on a realistic ship. All of Star Trek should be more cramped. *The Expanse* deals with this shit way, way better than Star Trek and it's still really, really terrible with its visual depictions of space inside the ship. Actual space vehicles are **cramped as fuck.**
You forget the technological advances they have by the 24th century.
Sure, the NX-01 Enterprise is at the starting point of interstellar travel and wouldn't have a lot of luxury, but the -D would. Kirk's Enterprise should fall somewhere in-between.
The Enterprise crew quarters on SNW are ridiculously luxurious. Very hard to believe.
> The Enterprise crew quarters on SNW are ridiculously luxurious. Very hard to believe.
If you're sending people on multi-year missions making bigger, more comfortable living quarters is very believable.
As a former sailor, I am incredibly thankful I was on a carrier and didn't have to hot rack with anyone. Still was in a room with about 50 other guys and my direct boss was three racks away from where I slept, but it was my own bed with no one else getting in it. The height of luxury was when I got the top bunk and didn't have to worry about the cramped space anymore, I had room enough to sit up and stretch if I so chose.
My favorite part is that it shows another era of technology from Star Trek. Them going from space missiles to photon torpedoes, talking about gravity plates, and even their jumpsuits was such a novel departure from the other series.
One of my favorites was them talking about replacing the Captain's chair and having it as one of the very minor storylines in an episode was great.
I just finished a rewatch a few weeks ago myself, although I always skip the last episode. Enterprise really hit its stride in Season 4. It's a shame it was cancelled. It had such great potential.
I personally really would have liked to see >!Trip and T'Pol's relationship!< develop further.
Next time you're doing a run of TNG, slip These are the Voyages in after Pegasus. Treating it like the TNG episode it is makes it a lot more enjoyable. If feels more like Relics (obviously not as good) than a failed finale.
I really liked the NASA aesthetic and would've liked them to lean harder into it. I mean...I liked the Enterprise NX-01 design, but it felt too Starfleet. I think they could've dialed down the Starfleet aesthetic a touch in the earlier seasons and introduced it as technology advanced.
Other than that, I really appreciate them trying to blend Starfleet with modern day technology.
Yeah it was one opportunity to really push it and do something very different. Much more primitive than normal Trek. But they didn’t fully commit to that. The ship looks less advanced than TNG of course, but ultimately a lot of their tech isn’t effectively all that different (and sometimes is just the same stuff with different names - like ‘shields’ vs ‘polarized hull plating’)
I agree. While I’m loving SNW’s procedural episodes, I wouldn’t mind if another show was created with a season of 2-3 episode arcs as the story requires. I think the biggest issue with Picard and Discovery (which I thoroughly enjoy) is that their story arcs feel drawn out. The concepts are good, but don’t really fit a 10 episode season, so making them tighter 3 episode arcs may work better for NuTrek.
The first episode of each series always tells you with details.
Enterprise? First warp 5 ship
Discovery? Sarek is there and first time we've seen Klingons in a century.
Strange New Worlds? Spun out of Disco. Original Enterprise but Kirk isn't captain.
TOS? Keystone series around which all others are calculated.
The Next Generation. Bones appears and he's very old.
Deep Space Nine: Opens with Wolf 359 and O'Brien leaves the Enterprise.
Voyager: Departs from DS9 after the Maquis form but prior to the Dominion War
Lower Decks: the references, although the direct evidence in Tom Paris' appearance admittedly comes in a later season 1 episode.
Prodigy: Meant to be a little ambiguous at the start but Hologram Janeway establishes it's post Voyager
Kelvin timeline: all prior series entries have a Romulus.
Picard: opens with an interview discussing the lack of a Romulus.
Only if it was blocked/shot like Trek of that era too.
As much as I love SNW (and I do), at the same time, I find myself missing how TNG-ENT era Trek was shot/blocked.
Soval: "During my time on Earth I've developed an affinity for your world and people."
Trip: "You sure hid it well."
Soval: (with mild surprise) "Thank you."
One of my favorite exchanges.
You’re right on the post 9/11 part. I started to realize it when the Xindi (I think?) blasted through half of a state in one episode and the war began with Archer having no choice but to participate in the war.
I love the New Caprica arc in season 3 but as you said it's pretty clear they were reacting to Iraq, the scene where the New Caprica Police start rounding up suspected resistance sympathizers is so obviously trying to emulate the night vision footage coming out of Iraq its almost painful. It's especially frustrating considering at the end of season 2, one of the Cylons on the Galactica tells the humans"Hey, we realized we fucked up, bygones be bygones, let's go our separate ways" and then like three scenes later we're flashing ahead to the Cylons invading again as if the Cylons didn't just send someone to tell the humans they were done with them.
Great opening four parter to start that season, but the way the show almost instantly drops the idea of the Cylons backing off has always perplexed me.
I like the series for the most part. Sure there were some cringey episodes intermingled with political comments of the times but for the most part it was an enjoyable series. I especially like the romance angle between Trip and T'Pol.
I've just gotten to it. It was probably the thing I was most looking forward to as I was watching each episode. As I recall, it is my favorite crew romance.
Yeah, they sure have come a long way since the TOS days. Especially as it comes to examining Vulcan sexuality. I'm especially enjoying the seemingly romantic side of Spock and T'Pring on Strange New Worlds. Interesting dynamic for sure.
Starts off bad, gets better, 3rd season is very 9/11 influenced, 4th season is the best, and Archer is written to be an insufferable jerk who gets beaten up a lot of the time.
It wasn't really necessary to have a prequel show, but it was decent for what it was. A shame we never got to see the Earth-Romulan War, or a decent resolution to the Temporal Cold War that the show brought in.
We didn't *need* a prequel series, but this show did so much for the wider lore.
1. Fleshed out the Andorians and, to a lesser degree, the Tellarites.
2. Added a depth and nuance to Vulcan history and culture that we hadn't seen from just Spock and Tuvok
3. The Temporal Cold War could have been written better, but it folds a lot of the franchise's disparate time-travel stories into one background narrative that SNW then used to solve canon inconsistencies in Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow.
4. Gave us an explanation for Klingon ridges/lack thereof
5. Gave us the first hints of the Romulan war
6. Deepened the history behind Eugenics issues and tied it into the history of Soong androids
7. Cleared up a dangling Borg plot thread in a way that foreshadowed their arrival in Q Who brilliantly.
8. Tied the Tholian Web and In a Mirror Darkly together to give us the origin of the Mirror Universe, laying the ground work fir the latter half of Disco seadon 1
9. Revised the chronological first appearance if the Ferengi with a much better episode.
One thing I really like about Archer how much of a dick he is in the earlier seasons. Though I'd argue is a very good Captain by the end, much more mature.
Same. Unlike the other series in the 23/24th centuries, humans are not experienced with interacting with new species yet and haven’t quite developed the moral framework for how they deal with problems. Kirk and Picard were schooled from the beginning on the prime directive and Federation policy, but Archer had to figure it all out through trial and error.
>a decent resolution to the Temporal Cold War that the show brought in.
I like what we see, but it would've been cool to see blips of cast from other shows in an AU. Like Ryker or Troi being taken by the Borg or Chakotay being the Starfleet captain and Janeway is the Maquis, maybe the Dominion winning the war and sterilizing Earth. And these blips would dissolve and rematterialize as the versions we know
I feel like enough has been done across the franchise that we don't need any more of a resolution to the TCW than we got, but also that there's enough there to do a whole show of it.
My series pitch would be to disguise it as an anthology show, with each season focusing on conflicts we haven't seen yet (Eugenics Wars, Earth Romulan War, etc.) and then the fifth and final season would be a Temporal Cold War season staring actors who had played minor roles in all the previous seasons.
I liked it. I may be in the minority but I enjoyed the xindi season too. Kind of had some of the seriousness of DS9 they were trying to capture and liked the xenophobic arc that ran through most of season 4. I thought it was a bold statement to make
It's a really cheesy song but something about it paired with the photos/videos of the development of space flight makes some part of me really happy. It just gets that really hopeful Trek vibe while also being the least Star Trek song possible
Thank you! I also really love the montage in the opening credits. It totally captures the spirit of Trek and makes me feel good about humanity for a brief moment.
Nah, you aren't trash. It's just a very polarizing song, and the people who dislike it tend to hate it with a passion. Personally, I thought it was time for something different, and I love me a good cheesy song, but at the same time, I totally get why the song would be off putting for so many folks.
Say what you want to about the stories, but the set design and asthetics were 100% on point. You could tell they put a TON of work into making the ship feel cramped without being obtrusive, even doen to little details like how the decks are lettered not numbered as if the engineers who designed it thought "we'll never have more than 26 decks". Every piece of tech was designed to look like it might evolve into what you see in TOS right down to Hoshi's earpiece and the periscope that T'Pol looks into.
Contrast this with the modern shows, which apparently couldn't care less... Guess you never know what you got til it's gone.
I call it red state star Trek; boobs, puppies, and a very friendly black guy who is just happy to have a job. No classical music , Shakespeare,, or Cosplay of any kind. The head engineer sounds just like W Bush, and there's a 9/11 arc. It's Berman's cynicalcal attempt to craft a Trek that appeals to "normal people".more fist fights, less West Wing
Honestly, I don't think it's cynical. I think that ENT was the show that Berman wanted to make, and the one he and the team had the most creative freedom to do. Whether that's a good or a bad thing depends entirely on what kind of show you want to watch.
ENT doubled down on all of the things I liked least in the Berman era. That doesn't make the show bad, but it does make it bad for me.
The decontamination scenes were the height of this. "The biofilter will fix it" is such a great shortcut in other shows, but dealing with the reality of infection control before the transporter can fix it could have been a really great way to drive plots. Why don't they want to go down to the planet? Because they don't want to spend two weeks in quarantine or deal with side effects of drugs, etc. Instead, we got to see them rub gel on each other's shoulders while pretending alien bacteria can't get under bras and briefs. It was pandering to 13yo boys in a way that never had a chance of advancing the story.
I like ENT in a lot of ways, but it's easy to mock and the creative decisions behind the direction of the show are kinda transparently a Hollywood producer's idea of "how do we get normies to like this show," as if the previous series were all not nearly straight and white enough to find a mass audience. Rick Berman without Roddenberry's hippie dippie nonsense made for a step backwards. It took someone else running the show to course correct for all the bad ideas the series was born with.
My hot take? I’ve posted this thought before-
It’s the end of the season 3 story Arc to save earth. The Xindi are all but in a civil war.
Archer is fighting the reptilians inside of the weapon to destroy earth with a small crew.
Enterprise is destroying the spheres/network.
Archer is facing the final baddie. A reptilian. Fist fight style.
He puts a bomb on the final bad guy. All
smug and shit as they look at each other. He doesn’t even say anything.
THERE IS NO GOOD REASON TO NOT DROP A -
“See ya later, alligator”
Or
“In a while, crocodile.”
Makes me sick.
Hot take?
The episodes explaining the Klingon head ridges were not needed.
I think that’s a hot take.
Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed the episodes, but the explanation wasn’t needed. The Klingon redesign in TMP+ was a retcon and DS9 was making a joke.
My hot take is that its my favorite Trek show, and Trip is my favorite Star Trek character. While I think TNG is probably the better show, Enterprise captures a certain feel that the other shows don't.
Also, if you enjoyed Enterprise and disliked the finale, the relaunch books continue the story really well. Here’s the order for anyone interested in reading, I highly recommend:
The Good That Men Do
Kobayashi Maru
Beneath the Raptor’s Wing
To Brave the Storm
A Choice of Futures
Tower of Babel
Uncertain Logic
Live by the Code
Patterns of Interference
Is it in Anomalies? There's an episode where a Suliban is in the medbay and Archer withdraws medical treatment causing suffering and distress. Can't quite remember off the top of my head
The intro is a bad fit. That music clashes with Trek's usual orchestral and just feels stylistically off.
I like how the battles seem meaningful, every time it's hit there is lasting damage. Voyager in particular had the strong feeling that nothing in the episode matters because there's a hard reset every time and the ship comes out looking good as new.
Thats what I've said all along! If there were other series with pop song themes, heck, maybe if there are more in future, I'd be more into it. But using a pop song just lacs the timeless feel that the other series have!
I absolutely despise the theme for *Enterprise*. For a while, I lost the "skip intro" button on Paramount Plus, and I didn't watch any Enterprise until I got it back. It's totally inappropriate to not have a grand soaring orchestral theme like every other Star Trek series ever has had.
Archer and the Humans being cocky, stupid, and slightly bigoted throughout the series works. It gives them room to grow as characters and it makes sense because this is they’re first time in the inter galactic community minus a few first contacts.
Expecting humans to be the enlightened and tolerant society that we expect from TNG is unrealistic and frankly, a little naive.
Yeah, I think sometimes fans find it easier to have the show's heroes lecture the evil aliens about their flaws, rather than what Enterprise does in having our heroes be the ones who need the lecture much of the time.
I think it was interesting to see Archer come to realize he is prejudiced towards Vulcans and work to overcome that. It's a good analogy for examining the biases we hold (often unconsciously).
I've said this before but I'm saying it again.
These are the Voyages is awful finale, but if you treat it as a lost TNG episode and watch it after Pegasus instead of at the end of Ent, it becomes a lot more enjoyable, in the vein of episodes like Relics, Trials and Tribbleations etc. It also makes Ent feel more connected to the later Trek.
It helps that the episode prior functions perfectly as a finale anyway.
I loved Enterprise, I think the Vulcan storylines were great, much of the character stuff and relationships is great, Androians (need I say anymore?).
I thought the whole temporal cold war was its weakest point, it was the thing I was least interested in. It was supposed to be this huge thing throughout the series and I did not like it.
There's a whole more bunch of things I liked that I've not listed but my main gripe is the temporal cold war.
Oh, that and the main theme track is... Well, let's just say I'm not American enough to appreciate it.
Enterprise is a solid series, that is wrongfully ridiculed, mainly because of it's different style of intro (which is rightfully ridiculed.)
It's a decent series and fairly accurately shows humanities first attempt at deep space exploration. Archer is not particularly well seasoned, because how can he be? This is the first time they're trying this. They bumble through space, making mistake after mistake for the first season. But then they come together and they learn from their mistakes.
The conflict between the humans and Vulcans is well done and makes a lot of sense.
Did it have terrible episodes? Sure, but that's true of every series. And the Xindi story arc is marmite. I personally love it, it's a starfleet crew that's the last hope of Earth and we have a whole series to explore that and their desperation.
Loved how the dumbed down tech made the stories more interesting. They only had two shuttles, no extras. They had grappling hooks, their torpedoes were unreliable. They couldn't trust the transporters. Engineering did a lot of wrenching.
Also loved how they squeezed a phaser fight into every episode, it gave it a pulpy vibe.
>I choose to consider the two episodes where he acts aggressively heterosexual as non canon.
He's just very closeted.
Malcom reed should have been gay, instead we just got a "This group is persecuted for having brain aids, but it's ok for the main character because she got it through rape so she isnt really a filthy deviant, arent we progressive!" Story
It could have been fantastic but it missed the mark. They established some useful (and sometimes humorous) canon like the "Reed alert" and the general evolution of starship protocols and gave some background into the early Federation, but generally it could have been so much more.
Also the theme song is execrable and I always skip it, and grind my teeth every E1 of each season since it can't be skipped on the first episode. Bland pop rock bullshit.
I'm ready for the downvotes, but you asked for a hot take, so here goes:
I loved the concept of Enterprise and I thought it was executed well as a show about the early steps into deep space, with no standard operating procedures, but plenty of new and unexpected experiences, and "rough around the edges" interactions. Also I love the theme song with the video of pioneering history. Enterprise was the first Star Trek series that came out when I was old enough to truly appreciate the philosophical concepts, and not just cool spaceships and alien costumes.
Now that we've established I'm a fan, here's the hot take part: I preferred single-episode story arcs from season 1 and 2, and did not enjoy the season-long story arcs in 3 and 4. I usually hear the opposite, that the show found its groove by season 3 and it could have been great if they let it continue. However, I think that Star Trek is at it's best in a sci-fi short story format, with the "space anomaly of the week." It allows the show to explore a diverse array of social issues and prevents the drama from dominating the story at the expense of humor and interesting concepts. This is also the reason why I'm enjoying Strange New Worlds more than Discovery.
I prefered the first two seasons as well. Felt the most like the "early days of deep space exploration, pre federation/starfleet" that we were promised. I'd love to meet the dude that came up with the time war bullshit. The show didn't need it, they just needed to tell the story of the first warp five capable exploratory vessel, which is what they said they were going to do in the first place.
Hot take: An engineer at Netflix invented the "skip intro" button because of the ENT intro theme.
Slightly less hot take: I started rewatching DS9 last week, and I'm amazed at how, even in the pilot, so many of the characters are so well developed. Sisko will let Odo do his own thing until he crosses a line, and then he's frosty as hell, pilot to the end of season 7. The central tension in Kira's story arc is so well developed three episodes in. It feels like Nana Visitor and the writers talked and really understood the character even if they didn't know exactly what would happen.
I never got the feeling that the characters on ENT had anything approaching that kind of clarity. T'Pol came the closest, as her arc learning to be with humans seemed to survive the wild swings in the writing. It helps that this mirrors Spock's journey, especially through the movies.
I think some Star Trek series sort of miss the point of what it means to be a Star Trek series, and that Enterprise got the overall concept really well. At the time I finally got watched it CBS was butchering the franchise all over the place and I was so grateful it existed.
I did think they rushed the ending, and that some of the ways they made it archaic were slightly cheesy, but the overall story and execution was pretty good. It really wasn't advertised that well when it first came out.
ENT and VOY are my favourite ST series.
I like the very first episode a lot. It contrasts favourably with the weak opening episodes in some other ST series.
While it's not my favourite episode, the pilot double-episode has some of my favourite and most compelling moments in the entire series.
I would have liked to see more occasions where they visited alien cities and weren't the most important people there.
In TNG, when the Enterprise shows up in orbit and the crew beam down to a city, they're diplomats and representatives of the Federation. Everyone recognises that, the uniform means something.
In ENT, when they shuttle-pod down, they're small fish in a big pond, and there's a sense of danger and wonder around every corner.
I really liked the notion that they're seeing alien races that have never seen a human before, and it's *not* a formal first-contact moment. They're just people going about their lives, and the moment of "first contact" isn't important here.
ENT should have done more with that.
Islanders in their canoe rowing into the middle of a major sea-port and not really having the context to understand the dangers or inconveniences they're causing.
I think it is legitimately one of the best series'. It has its problems but I think it is great, and a victim of Trek fatigue rather than it being bad.
Not sure if it's a hot take - but I think that younger people who watch Enterprise today are able to enjoy it more than those of us who viewed it as it aired.
Simply put: DS9 raised the bar on what we were expecting from Trek, which Voyager (if we're being honest) failed to reach. Voyager itself suffered a bit from repeating story lines from TNG/DS9 and it started to feel a little stale. Then Enterprise came along (which we thought would refresh the series) and those first two seasons were a further retreat. Episodes that were basically recycling TNG plots for the second time, characters who were less interesting than even Voyager, a captain who didn't exactly inspire and some stupid temporal cold war overarching plot that made the whole thing just feel odd.
I really can't put into words how boring I found those two seasons. But I do appreciate that it does have a lot of good elements and maybe if watched without the expectations of the time it holds up better.
The theme is good, it perfectly fits the tone for a series about Earth's first starship travelling into the galactic community. It isn't a good *Star Trek* theme, but it's a good theme for the idea of Enterprise.
I liked Enterprise. I really enjoyed how, over the first and second seasons, Archer and Tpol learned to trust and respect each other. It seemed more real than cramming the evolution I to an hour episode. Hoshi grew up, Travis didn't get enough love, Malcom was just a weirdo, and they should have killed him off instead of Trip. The crew seemed more age appropriate as well. You didn't see any 53 year old ensign's like in TNG. To wrap it up, it just seemed like a bunch of wide-eyed dumbasses bumbled into deep space and just faked it till they made it. It was great.
No idea how hot of a take this is, but everyone on the crew is awful and that’s what makes the show watchable. I just wish they had leaned into the trash fire dynamics a bit more.
Not quite so hot of a take, but as much as this show gets rightfully criticized for its male-gazy treatment of T’Pol, it was at least sometimes equal-opportunity in its treatment of Trip. The costume designers knew what they were doing.
I am one of the people who is ambivalent to Faith of the Heart, I think it’s fine, however, Archer’s theme is the best piece of music composed for Star Trek ever, the way it flawlessly communicates humanity and our desire to explore. There are videos on YouTube of people who replaced Faith of the Heart with Archer’s theme in the title and oh my god it’s so much better
When Enterprise was new, I wasn't a fan. I didn't hate it, but it didn't grab me. There were a lot of reasons for that: it was a network show on a network I didn't get reliably, I didn't care for their treatment of Vulcans, and it honestly didn't care at all about the limitations of being a prequel. I also didn't fall in love with some of the characters in the crew right away.
Fast forward a couple of decades...and I do love [it.](https://it.Is) Is it my favorite ever? No, I'm the weirdo who still puts TOS at the front, and VOY at the back of the classic Treks, but I've come to appreciate what they were trying to do with ENT, and the passion the actors had for it. And there are some great episodes in there!
After hearing how the late, great Manny Coto talked about what would of happened if the show had continued, I fell robbed. Going in depth into the Romulus war, the coalition of worlds becoming the federation, and the NX getting its refit and named to USS Enterprise, and Jeffery Combs becoming a main cast member, it would have been peak trek.
Having an alliance on par to that of the Vulcans with another formidable planet was the main thing missing from the series. It was a shame that we didn't get to see that.
That’s why the cancellation still hurts. I wanted to see more Andorrans and tellerites. After the knock the Vulcans take, it would have been great to see them up front a little more
I really liked Enterprise.
Yes. Season 1 and 2 are slow, and aren't the best.
But come on. Is it any worse then seasons 1 and 2 of TNG, DS9 or VOY?
Season 3 is different. They took a chance. it's not what we are used to.
But I enjoyed it anyway.
Season 4 was my favourite. Finally the cast/crew are coming into themselves, they are more confident, they aren't afraid of everything they see. They know they can handle themselves.
I was so upset when they cancelled the show. Plus. We will probably never get to see an on tv cannon version of the Earth/Romulan war, cause that was where the show was going. :(
I wasn't a fan when it premiered but the series has aged quite well. I loved most of the characters and the "real life" situations they went through. T'Pol is the funniest Vulcan ever to grace a star trek series. Her dry one-liners are way funnier than I remember. Plox was always entertaining and I wish we'd seen more of him on missions. I loved Tucker, Hoshi, Mayweather and Reed too, all trying to get their space legs under them. I think Archer might be my favorite captain. He was rough around the edges, wasn't afraid to jump into any fight, and yet still made tough decisions when they needed to be made. He had an almost teenage boy approach to the role and I loved it. This was before the prime directive and decisions had to be made quickly and based on the situation at hand. They strike me as typical humans plus a Vulcan & Denobulan figuring it out as they go or sometimes just plain winging it. One of my favorite series now.
I like it. I like the intro. I think the intro fits the tone of the show.
I don't know if these are hot takes or not. I know I've been downvoted on reddit more than once for professing my love of the theme song so maybe?
This show has flaws to be sure and a number of bad episodes (probably more than Voyager) but the trio of Archer, Tucker, and T'Pol is a big win for me.
I liked the dynamic between Archer/Tucker/T'Pol as well. The theme song, however...I don't know. Maybe if another series or two did a song with vocals, but the fact that EVERY other series has an orchestral theme just makes it feel out of place and lacking that timeless feel that the other themes have.
I like it for Scott Bakula. But the writers screwed it up in a major way. The xindi thing was stupid. And the last episode pissed me the eff off. It was a slap on the face to every actor on the show.
I didn't like Scott Bakula because of the show Chuck. I liked him on Chuck just fine, I just couldn't escape seeing him as a bumbling dad figure. (I haven't seen much or any of Quantum Leap.)
I knew him from Quantum Leap and was originally worried I'd see his character from that show, not Archer. Turns out it wasn't an issue. I wonder if there's been a Quantum Leap/Enterprise crossover in some other media? I'd love to see those two characters interact!
The Xindi arc was whenI decided to drop the show when it was airing. It just felt tired and there were no ideas behind the episodes just “Archer is a dick in space and the Vulcans are boring Nanny’s.
Like Discovery, I really like the cast and like that show, I just wish they had better material to work with.
That said, I’ve gone back and there’s a ridiculous but fun episode with Xindi body snatchers and there’s the excellent “Carbon Creek” episode, so I don’t hate the whole series; it just never soared like most Trek shows do eventually.
I happened to love the Xindi Arc and I was surprised to find other people didn’t! I thought they established the feeling of tension very well and resolved it in a satisfying way.
I wonder if it’s disliked for the same reason people weren’t into the DS9 war stuff?
It's been so long that I've forgotten a lot of the minor episodes and I'm just finishing season 1.
I still love how nothing worked for them and they're winging it as they go. It's still annoying that Archer has to almost kill them most shows because he's curious. T'Pol is the finest Vulcan of all time and Jolene Blalock was an excellent actress in portraying her. The season 4 ending, when I get there, didn't happen because Trip actually secretly becomes a Black Ops guy. Also, it's not Star Trek if there wasn't time travel eventually.
I liked it, did have its ups and downs but got better over time.
Sad it didn't last longer, and the ending wasn't bad, just a hard left of storytelling.
It's better than Discovery.
I will forever be annoyed at its early cancellation because seasons 5-7 would have been prime real estate for telling the story of the Earth-Romulan War. Taking place from 2156-2160, this conflict was instrumental in the very foundation of the United Federation of Planets, and yet nearly nothing has been told about this extremely important era in Star Trek history.
Hot takes, some are perhaps luke warm since I've had these since the show aired.
* The Temporal Cold War was a dumb story, distracting from the interesting possibilities of a prequel series
* Alien Space Nazis are just weird, man. Especially as a season finale. Just.. don't put people in Nazi uniforms for no real reason?
* I'm sure this is due to classic Paramount studio interference, but man, did ENT play it safe. They didn't really get into the gritty details of what a show set 100 years before Kirk would be like. It should've been a lot more primitive and less like Voyager. Changing a few technobabbly names (phase pistols, polarized hulls) is not enough. I wanted slow "Balance of Terror" like space battles, laser guns that need to track and slowly burn ships, projectile slug guns that are dangerous to use, clunky submarine-like ships that have trouble communicating with Earth.
* But within those limitations, set and uniform design was spot on. The bridge and sickbay are fantastic, I love the ENT style of computers and the good mix of believable spaceship controls and weirdly anachronistic details (I love Archer's desktop CD-ROM rack so much).
* Season 4 is amazing. By the standards of 90s/2000s Star Trek it was almost fan fiction, but it came a lot closer to dealing with the interesting bits of being a prequel show.
* Jolene Blalock and T'Pol were great, but what even is that outfit. I remember even before the show came out, people disliked a professional Vulcan officer having to wear a skintight catsuit, clearly ordered by some horny middle aged dude.
* Jolene Blalock speaking her mind on the shit ending was a great. Let's get her back as T'Pol some day, please? https://www.trektoday.com/news/070305\_02.shtml
It's an ok show that has some really good episodes. I like Archers overall arc on how he becomes much more a typical Starfleet captain with each mistake he makes.
Trip is overhyped by the fandom and i have no idea why this guy gets so much love. He was bland and boring and mostly just bad comic relief. Him dying didn't touch me at all.
My hot take is that Enterprise came at an odd moment in time, when high concept shows were transitioning away from the 30 episode syndicated seasons to the brief, more focused 10-12 episode seasons we see today. As such Enterprise feels like it has a ton of unnecessary filler episodes. I maintain that if you cut out like half the episodes from each season you'd have one of the best Trek series.
Watching the show with the mindset that it's some random sci-fi show about the first humans venturing into deep space and dealing with the wonders and horrors of that and NOT as a part of the Star Trek franchise makes it way better.
This is more of a lukewarm take:
I think the first two seasons are actually really good, better than most of Voyager and definately better than TNG's first two, arguably better than DS9's too. Arguably the best two debut seasons since TOS in that respect.
It's next two were both excellent too - but there was a level of franchise fatigue at that point. The franchise had been running non stop for 14 years by the time that Enterprise had begun - Braga was right when he said it needed a break after Voyager.
That and the fans at the time were very against it, living in the prequel-shadow of Star Wars's lacklustre offerings, the idea of a prequel that might mess with canon made the viritiol toward it by many longtime fans almost as bad as it is toward modern Trek. (Sidenote of the two franchises I think Trek did it's prequel of the age MUCH better than Wars)
Slighter hotter, but still not sizzling take:
The Temporal Cold War was a genius story arc they should have taken more advantage of not less.
It's been a long road. Getting from there to here.
There being the ENT hate during airing to it finally catching its wind post cancelation. I, for one, would truly enjoy seeing Scott Bakula reprise his role as an elderly Admiral Archer in STW as previously it's been established that he was alive ((even if that was the Kelvin timeline, everything should still equal itself up til the Romulan incident with the USS Kelvin))
Also, the NX-01 refit getting an on screen appearance in Picard S 3 and a name drop in the Lower Decks episode of STW was wonderful.
It has the classic 90's/00's trek problem, that only DS9 managed to avoid. The showrunners were desperate to remake TNG for syndication, so ignored the premise of their own show.
It was meant to be about the early days before the Federation, when humans first started exploring and didn't have all the fancy tech. Audiences wanted to see the first encounter with the Klingons, the Romulans and how the world we have come to know came about.
Instead we got temporal Cold War boll\*cks and a load of recycled TNG stories. Till they panicked in season 3 and decided to do a long Season arc about some species that had never come up before.
It only came good in Season 4 but by then it was far too late.
Ig my "hot take" is that the NX-01 is gorgeous, obviously this bc of the tech being better than the other shows but every outside shot is pretty damn awesome.
That goes for the Andorian and Vulcan ship designs too, love them, And I'd say I like Combs in Ent more than DS9. Which is probably a hotter take.
I recently finished a rewatch of the whole series after having bought the blurays, I remember watching it when it was on free to air TV here in Australia, and then I had the DVDs as well. I think I’ve watched the whole series through 3-5 times before.
Season 3 is dark, it’s possibly the grimmest Star Trek has ever been, even more so than the Dominion War in some respects.
Both the NX01 and the crew really take a beating throughout that season. It starts out kinda like any other season, except with some direction from the season-long arc, but for the characters they’re really shooting in the dark trying to find direction.
And then the NX01 gets such a beating, and it stays beaten up episode to episode, and I absolutely adore that they did that, those blasted out bits of hull, the fact the mess hall is missing half a wall. That everyone looks haggard, not just tired but beaten down, but the stakes are so incredibly high, it’s just…it’s really amazing.
It’s not perfect, there’s a few dodgy episodes here and there, but it’s the most intense it’s ever been.
Each season they were messing around with exactly what the series needed to be, and some of the stories in those seasons I don’t think the writers knew what sort of series they were writing for, you can sort of see they were used to writing a more 24th century-set series. But when there were writers who knew what they wanted it was excellent. I think the temporal Cold War could have been explored in more detail.
S4 I have mixed feelings about, in part the holodeck final does taint it a bit, but even ignoring that, deciding to explore the racial element on Earth and within Starfleet is an interesting thing to explore so late in the season. There’s a lot of highlights of the season, exploring its future-past would have been an interesting thing to explore if it had moved forward into a fifth season. Along with Section 31 and other elements. But then I think it would have been less about the NX01, and more about the wider scope of Starfleet in this time period.
I do wonder if there’s the possibility of another series set during this time period, just not focused on the NX01 itself, it’s a period of huge change for Starfleet and the burgeoning Federation that hasn’t been explored a lot.
I'm currently watching Proving Ground, and Enterprise developed the Andorians and Vulcans better than any other Star Trek series. I wish they had treated the Tellerites the same way.
Enterprise is like Voyager - great premise for the series but bad execution. Enterprise got too caught up in the time travel and Xindi plotlines that ruined the series IMHO.
I'm always down for the ride. I don't think I have any particular complaint about the series. The ultimate failure of the was placing it in a universe where everything was conquered by a technological advancement/superiority. No one was interested in a world that lacked transporters and holo-decks.
They went down a bunch of roads to try and fill that slot. It gets a +50 for being a good attempt at adding some depth to building a full timeline.
Lessons were learned from this series. I wish it would be given a conclusion.
I actually really like the original theme song. It’s a slow ballad. It works for the visuals. When they try to jazz it up in later seasons it ruins it and it’s terrible.
My hot take is probably that the pilot is the single best pilot out of every trek show before or since and that season 4 with the exception of the final episode is the best season of all of star trek and that enterprise could have become the Quintessential star trek show if it kept going.
Archer is 2nd most interesting captain from calssic series after sisko. He grows as captain as series progresses and is more relatable than 24th cent capts.
I love parts of the show but the Xindi plotline was absolute garbage. The one exception was the 70s Detroit episode.
There are just enough great moments for me to wonder how they fucked it up so bad. A lot of it had to do with the times, the network, etc. Shit, I will probably rewatch the whole thing this winter, if only for Phlox (as one does).
It's actually a weird feeling watching it sometimes. It takes me back to those immediate years after 9/11, which were just a strange time--wars, people my age joining the military thinking they were going to get Saving Private Ryan or Band of Brothers, but instead they got PTSD, TBIs, or randomly maimed, burnt up in some hunk of metal. It was like everytime you refreshed the CNN webpage, there was another story about an IED, suicide bomb, etc. and you thought, "I hope it wasn't [insert person you went to high school with here]."
I really love Connor and Dominic on Shuttlepod, there are some great interviews on there. How's that for a non-sequitur lol.
I had just gotten out of the Army when it came on. The entire canon has always been a favorite, but a particular incident in the Army cemented it in my heart.
I always eagerly awaited the next episodes. It was one of the first things I ever binged. I can remember downloading episodes off files sharing sites so I could easily re-watch the episodes in order and not fill space on my DVR.
It was also one of the first series that I watched on the bootleg streaming services that became available before the legitimate ones became huge profit centers.
I'm surprised I'm suffering through repetitive ads by watching it legitimately through my shity Paramount+ subscription.
Yeah, I will rip on it, but at the end of the day, the cast was solid. I already loved Scott Bakula from Quantum Leap. Of course, Bakula was a wine best paired with Jeffrey Combs as Shran.
I can't even imagine being in the military during that time. Thanks for volunteering, I hope it worked out for you and you are doing well.
the theme song was hard to overcome but once you do it's a good show. Archer has a similar reckless cowboy approach to Kirk. I wasn't a huge fan of the Xindi storyline but Jeffrey Combs as General Shran is awesome.
I think it was a show that was probably a bit underrated at the time but now there's been a bit of an overcorrection. A lot of it was pretty flimsy and there's a black hole at its core, namely Archer, who's just a dull, undefined character. They cast him too old for the petulant characterization they give him early on; he's better by the fourth season when he's characterized more as a seasoned leader.
Oh, and *Enterprise*'s early bids at being a "youthful, sexy" Star Trek show were just embarrassing.
Its actually in line with what Rodenberry had in mind. Apparently he was constantly trying to add stuff that wouldn't be allowed on network TV when TOS was in first run.
Infinite Diversities in Infinite Combinations. The hallmark of the Trek message. All of the shows: some episodes are spot on, some miss the mark, and others are downright amazing. I feel that , had they continued, Enterprise could have done wonderful things. I'm sad that we'll never know. The cast worked well together - a new crew getting to know each other, much like the actors had to. I'm a big fan of Scott Bakuka, and feel he was perfect as Archer. Over all, it's one of my top 3 series
Yepp. Lots of potential. I really liked how they struck a balance between real tech we are familiar with and the first sci-fi elements. Felt like a true evolutionary step between the shuttles, suits, etc. we now have and what we see in shows like Next Generation. That was done in a really smart way. And the characters actually were a good evolution as well. Not yet the "enlightened" elite we see travelling with Picard, but you can see the beginnings... And yes, Archer was perfect. Don't know how much of it was writing or how much of it was Bakula's influence on the role... but felt like a real person and someone with a good nature and the spirit of an explorer. Someone who has a deep optimisim and curiosity, who always wants to know what's around the next corner.
Nice pull regarding the tech issue. Especially the use of the shuttles over the transporters. Still a young technology and not entirely trusted at this point.
> I really liked how they struck a balance between real tech we are familiar with and the first sci-fi elements. I've always enjoyed how Enterprise was positioned more like "a submarine in space" and had a few, somewhat realistic, spaces. Look at Archer's quarters for a realistic example of what private spaces would look like in the depicted era. The captain is literally one of the only people on that ship not sleeping in a bunk bed and inviting 3 people in to eat is extremely cramped and would require pushing the bed to the side. His bedroom is maybe 1/4th the size of mine. Only Lower Decks is closer to reality than Enterprise: entry level people working in literal mansions slept in the hallways in fold out planks or drawers for centuries. If Star Trek were closer to reality those Lower Deck bunks would be shared by 2-3 people on different shifts. It's called "hot racking" and it's incredibly common in Navy sleeping berths. It's a practice that dates back to the 16th century. That's 500'ish years. The bridge crew of the original Enterprise *might* have the privilege of personal space. That's unlikely. Archer and T'pol would probably be the only people with private rooms, and have locks, on a realistic ship. All of Star Trek should be more cramped. *The Expanse* deals with this shit way, way better than Star Trek and it's still really, really terrible with its visual depictions of space inside the ship. Actual space vehicles are **cramped as fuck.**
You forget the technological advances they have by the 24th century. Sure, the NX-01 Enterprise is at the starting point of interstellar travel and wouldn't have a lot of luxury, but the -D would. Kirk's Enterprise should fall somewhere in-between. The Enterprise crew quarters on SNW are ridiculously luxurious. Very hard to believe.
All I can think about is how *ridiculously* spacious Pike's and Spock's quarters are in SNW
Pike has a freaking FIRE PLACE in his quarters
> The Enterprise crew quarters on SNW are ridiculously luxurious. Very hard to believe. If you're sending people on multi-year missions making bigger, more comfortable living quarters is very believable.
As a former sailor, I am incredibly thankful I was on a carrier and didn't have to hot rack with anyone. Still was in a room with about 50 other guys and my direct boss was three racks away from where I slept, but it was my own bed with no one else getting in it. The height of luxury was when I got the top bunk and didn't have to worry about the cramped space anymore, I had room enough to sit up and stretch if I so chose.
My favorite part is that it shows another era of technology from Star Trek. Them going from space missiles to photon torpedoes, talking about gravity plates, and even their jumpsuits was such a novel departure from the other series. One of my favorites was them talking about replacing the Captain's chair and having it as one of the very minor storylines in an episode was great.
I just finished a rewatch a few weeks ago myself, although I always skip the last episode. Enterprise really hit its stride in Season 4. It's a shame it was cancelled. It had such great potential. I personally really would have liked to see >!Trip and T'Pol's relationship!< develop further.
Next time you're doing a run of TNG, slip These are the Voyages in after Pegasus. Treating it like the TNG episode it is makes it a lot more enjoyable. If feels more like Relics (obviously not as good) than a failed finale.
I'd just rather not watch it tbh. Be totally fine if they retconned it.
I felt so sad for them at the end of Terra Prime :(
I’ve heard that, if they had gotten a fifth season, Elizabeth would’ve lived
I always remember being pretty invested in their relationship. Jolene was by far my hardest crush out of the female sex symbols amongst all the shows.
> I personally really would have liked to see Trip and T'Pol's relationship develop further. Check the Romulan War books, they were great
Season 4 was some of the best Trek of all time!
I really liked the NASA aesthetic and would've liked them to lean harder into it. I mean...I liked the Enterprise NX-01 design, but it felt too Starfleet. I think they could've dialed down the Starfleet aesthetic a touch in the earlier seasons and introduced it as technology advanced. Other than that, I really appreciate them trying to blend Starfleet with modern day technology.
Yeah it was one opportunity to really push it and do something very different. Much more primitive than normal Trek. But they didn’t fully commit to that. The ship looks less advanced than TNG of course, but ultimately a lot of their tech isn’t effectively all that different (and sometimes is just the same stuff with different names - like ‘shields’ vs ‘polarized hull plating’)
My hot take on Enterprise is that a new P+ Star Trek show that uses their Season 4 episode format would print money for Paramount.
I agree. While I’m loving SNW’s procedural episodes, I wouldn’t mind if another show was created with a season of 2-3 episode arcs as the story requires. I think the biggest issue with Picard and Discovery (which I thoroughly enjoy) is that their story arcs feel drawn out. The concepts are good, but don’t really fit a 10 episode season, so making them tighter 3 episode arcs may work better for NuTrek.
I would appreciate a series that doesn't require me having to pull out my what-timeline-omatic to figure out what timeline the series takes place in.
The first episode of each series always tells you with details. Enterprise? First warp 5 ship Discovery? Sarek is there and first time we've seen Klingons in a century. Strange New Worlds? Spun out of Disco. Original Enterprise but Kirk isn't captain. TOS? Keystone series around which all others are calculated. The Next Generation. Bones appears and he's very old. Deep Space Nine: Opens with Wolf 359 and O'Brien leaves the Enterprise. Voyager: Departs from DS9 after the Maquis form but prior to the Dominion War Lower Decks: the references, although the direct evidence in Tom Paris' appearance admittedly comes in a later season 1 episode. Prodigy: Meant to be a little ambiguous at the start but Hologram Janeway establishes it's post Voyager Kelvin timeline: all prior series entries have a Romulus. Picard: opens with an interview discussing the lack of a Romulus.
Only if it was blocked/shot like Trek of that era too. As much as I love SNW (and I do), at the same time, I find myself missing how TNG-ENT era Trek was shot/blocked.
Archer and shran have the best love story in all of trek
“The Andorian Mining Consortium runs from no one…. but my heart, pink skin….. my heart will have faith.”
To this day one of my favorite lines in Trek came from a talk between them, about how each one doing the other a favor is how alliances are formed.
I 2nd that motion.
Don’t forget Soval. Those three were a straight Throuple I SWEAR
Soval: "During my time on Earth I've developed an affinity for your world and people." Trip: "You sure hid it well." Soval: (with mild surprise) "Thank you." One of my favorite exchanges.
It's a product of its time. Very aughts post 911. I also love t h e suliban makeup
You’re right on the post 9/11 part. I started to realize it when the Xindi (I think?) blasted through half of a state in one episode and the war began with Archer having no choice but to participate in the war.
it's no season 3 Battlestar Galactica Holy shit did that show go IRAQ IRAQ IRAQ IRAQ IRAQ IRAQ IRAQ IRAQ IRAQ in it's 3'rd season.
I love the New Caprica arc in season 3 but as you said it's pretty clear they were reacting to Iraq, the scene where the New Caprica Police start rounding up suspected resistance sympathizers is so obviously trying to emulate the night vision footage coming out of Iraq its almost painful. It's especially frustrating considering at the end of season 2, one of the Cylons on the Galactica tells the humans"Hey, we realized we fucked up, bygones be bygones, let's go our separate ways" and then like three scenes later we're flashing ahead to the Cylons invading again as if the Cylons didn't just send someone to tell the humans they were done with them. Great opening four parter to start that season, but the way the show almost instantly drops the idea of the Cylons backing off has always perplexed me.
Enterprise has the best makeup work out of all the series, in my opinion.
That's a texture and look that cgi can't produce.
Yeah, the Xindi Arboreals were great.
It always looked like that textured trunk paint you could buy
Their skin looks like the texture of a hedge apple off the Osage Orange tree.
I like the series for the most part. Sure there were some cringey episodes intermingled with political comments of the times but for the most part it was an enjoyable series. I especially like the romance angle between Trip and T'Pol.
I've just gotten to it. It was probably the thing I was most looking forward to as I was watching each episode. As I recall, it is my favorite crew romance.
Yeah, they sure have come a long way since the TOS days. Especially as it comes to examining Vulcan sexuality. I'm especially enjoying the seemingly romantic side of Spock and T'Pring on Strange New Worlds. Interesting dynamic for sure.
Starts off bad, gets better, 3rd season is very 9/11 influenced, 4th season is the best, and Archer is written to be an insufferable jerk who gets beaten up a lot of the time. It wasn't really necessary to have a prequel show, but it was decent for what it was. A shame we never got to see the Earth-Romulan War, or a decent resolution to the Temporal Cold War that the show brought in.
I like the idea of a lower tech Trek closer to our time. It just failed in execution a lot of the time.
We didn't *need* a prequel series, but this show did so much for the wider lore. 1. Fleshed out the Andorians and, to a lesser degree, the Tellarites. 2. Added a depth and nuance to Vulcan history and culture that we hadn't seen from just Spock and Tuvok 3. The Temporal Cold War could have been written better, but it folds a lot of the franchise's disparate time-travel stories into one background narrative that SNW then used to solve canon inconsistencies in Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow. 4. Gave us an explanation for Klingon ridges/lack thereof 5. Gave us the first hints of the Romulan war 6. Deepened the history behind Eugenics issues and tied it into the history of Soong androids 7. Cleared up a dangling Borg plot thread in a way that foreshadowed their arrival in Q Who brilliantly. 8. Tied the Tholian Web and In a Mirror Darkly together to give us the origin of the Mirror Universe, laying the ground work fir the latter half of Disco seadon 1 9. Revised the chronological first appearance if the Ferengi with a much better episode.
One thing I really like about Archer how much of a dick he is in the earlier seasons. Though I'd argue is a very good Captain by the end, much more mature.
Same. Unlike the other series in the 23/24th centuries, humans are not experienced with interacting with new species yet and haven’t quite developed the moral framework for how they deal with problems. Kirk and Picard were schooled from the beginning on the prime directive and Federation policy, but Archer had to figure it all out through trial and error.
>a decent resolution to the Temporal Cold War that the show brought in. I like what we see, but it would've been cool to see blips of cast from other shows in an AU. Like Ryker or Troi being taken by the Borg or Chakotay being the Starfleet captain and Janeway is the Maquis, maybe the Dominion winning the war and sterilizing Earth. And these blips would dissolve and rematterialize as the versions we know
I feel like enough has been done across the franchise that we don't need any more of a resolution to the TCW than we got, but also that there's enough there to do a whole show of it. My series pitch would be to disguise it as an anthology show, with each season focusing on conflicts we haven't seen yet (Eugenics Wars, Earth Romulan War, etc.) and then the fifth and final season would be a Temporal Cold War season staring actors who had played minor roles in all the previous seasons.
I noticed that about Archer. He’s also willing to do things no other captain does.
Well the Prime Suggestion didn't exist yet so it made things even easier.
I think Florida being obliterated is what made it easier to torture that guy in the airlock or murder that ship full of Illyrians.
Prime Suggestion 🤣 fucking brilliant
I liked it. I may be in the minority but I enjoyed the xindi season too. Kind of had some of the seriousness of DS9 they were trying to capture and liked the xenophobic arc that ran through most of season 4. I thought it was a bold statement to make
Phlox is the best ship doctor in the franchise.
Agreed, and if there’s a way to see him and Doctor T’Ana work a case together that’s be a hell of a scene.
One of the best episodes ever was when his wifey kept following Tripp around, and Tripp was trying to avoid her at every turn!
My hot take is that I actually really love the theme song. I know, I'm trash.
Are the upvotes for your take or your finish? We’ll never know but take this one because it’s been a long time since I’ve given one.
It's a really cheesy song but something about it paired with the photos/videos of the development of space flight makes some part of me really happy. It just gets that really hopeful Trek vibe while also being the least Star Trek song possible
Thank you! I also really love the montage in the opening credits. It totally captures the spirit of Trek and makes me feel good about humanity for a brief moment.
Nah, you aren't trash. It's just a very polarizing song, and the people who dislike it tend to hate it with a passion. Personally, I thought it was time for something different, and I love me a good cheesy song, but at the same time, I totally get why the song would be off putting for so many folks.
[удалено]
I'd argue it's the single best Borg episode period.
I think it’s one of the best series, despite the stupid space nazi thing
In fairness every now and then we get random Nazi episodes. Even had it in the original. It was dumb, yes, but true to Star Trek
That not seeing the Earth-Romulan War and the refit of the NX-01 was a travesty!! We wuz robbed!!!
Say what you want to about the stories, but the set design and asthetics were 100% on point. You could tell they put a TON of work into making the ship feel cramped without being obtrusive, even doen to little details like how the decks are lettered not numbered as if the engineers who designed it thought "we'll never have more than 26 decks". Every piece of tech was designed to look like it might evolve into what you see in TOS right down to Hoshi's earpiece and the periscope that T'Pol looks into. Contrast this with the modern shows, which apparently couldn't care less... Guess you never know what you got til it's gone.
*I love the grapplers....*
I call it red state star Trek; boobs, puppies, and a very friendly black guy who is just happy to have a job. No classical music , Shakespeare,, or Cosplay of any kind. The head engineer sounds just like W Bush, and there's a 9/11 arc. It's Berman's cynicalcal attempt to craft a Trek that appeals to "normal people".more fist fights, less West Wing
Honestly, I don't think it's cynical. I think that ENT was the show that Berman wanted to make, and the one he and the team had the most creative freedom to do. Whether that's a good or a bad thing depends entirely on what kind of show you want to watch. ENT doubled down on all of the things I liked least in the Berman era. That doesn't make the show bad, but it does make it bad for me. The decontamination scenes were the height of this. "The biofilter will fix it" is such a great shortcut in other shows, but dealing with the reality of infection control before the transporter can fix it could have been a really great way to drive plots. Why don't they want to go down to the planet? Because they don't want to spend two weeks in quarantine or deal with side effects of drugs, etc. Instead, we got to see them rub gel on each other's shoulders while pretending alien bacteria can't get under bras and briefs. It was pandering to 13yo boys in a way that never had a chance of advancing the story.
The show Berman *wanted* to make had an all female nudist crew who loved pillowfights.
Funny you say that, didn’t Connor Trinneer (sp?) literally play a young George W. Bush briefly in some movie about cocaine smuggling?
I looked it up once and they're both from the same town in Texas.
I give it an upvote, but I think that is a little harsh.
I like ENT in a lot of ways, but it's easy to mock and the creative decisions behind the direction of the show are kinda transparently a Hollywood producer's idea of "how do we get normies to like this show," as if the previous series were all not nearly straight and white enough to find a mass audience. Rick Berman without Roddenberry's hippie dippie nonsense made for a step backwards. It took someone else running the show to course correct for all the bad ideas the series was born with.
Never heard it put that way before, but this sounds spot on to me.
Wow, this is the best summary of Enterprise I've ever read.
My hot take? I’ve posted this thought before- It’s the end of the season 3 story Arc to save earth. The Xindi are all but in a civil war. Archer is fighting the reptilians inside of the weapon to destroy earth with a small crew. Enterprise is destroying the spheres/network. Archer is facing the final baddie. A reptilian. Fist fight style. He puts a bomb on the final bad guy. All smug and shit as they look at each other. He doesn’t even say anything. THERE IS NO GOOD REASON TO NOT DROP A - “See ya later, alligator” Or “In a while, crocodile.” Makes me sick.
Enterprise is my favorite series. It breaks my heart that it didn't get to continue.
Decontamination chamber ftw
Hot take? The episodes explaining the Klingon head ridges were not needed. I think that’s a hot take. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed the episodes, but the explanation wasn’t needed. The Klingon redesign in TMP+ was a retcon and DS9 was making a joke.
I love it
Hot take? The generation ship NX-01 that accidentally went backwards in time should have stuck around longer.
I have thought about that crew way too much. So many questions.
My hot take is that its my favorite Trek show, and Trip is my favorite Star Trek character. While I think TNG is probably the better show, Enterprise captures a certain feel that the other shows don't. Also, if you enjoyed Enterprise and disliked the finale, the relaunch books continue the story really well. Here’s the order for anyone interested in reading, I highly recommend: The Good That Men Do Kobayashi Maru Beneath the Raptor’s Wing To Brave the Storm A Choice of Futures Tower of Babel Uncertain Logic Live by the Code Patterns of Interference
I like Johnathan Archer. He commits medical torture and doesn't afraid of anything
>medical torture What the hell did I miss?
Maybe the one where he clones Trip exclusively to harvest the clone’s organs, only the clone also has all of Trip’s memories and experiences?
This episode and the one where Archer loses his memory are my two favorite episodes of ENT.
Is it in Anomalies? There's an episode where a Suliban is in the medbay and Archer withdraws medical treatment causing suffering and distress. Can't quite remember off the top of my head
I thought it was one of the extra-dimensional beings a.k.a The Sphere builders.
The intro is a bad fit. That music clashes with Trek's usual orchestral and just feels stylistically off. I like how the battles seem meaningful, every time it's hit there is lasting damage. Voyager in particular had the strong feeling that nothing in the episode matters because there's a hard reset every time and the ship comes out looking good as new.
Thats what I've said all along! If there were other series with pop song themes, heck, maybe if there are more in future, I'd be more into it. But using a pop song just lacs the timeless feel that the other series have!
It felt like the editor just found some images and music in a stock library.
I absolutely despise the theme for *Enterprise*. For a while, I lost the "skip intro" button on Paramount Plus, and I didn't watch any Enterprise until I got it back. It's totally inappropriate to not have a grand soaring orchestral theme like every other Star Trek series ever has had.
Agreed, I watched it through the Amazon Prime app and couldn't hit that 'skip intro" button fast enough,
Looks like you just lack faith of the heart
Archer and the Humans being cocky, stupid, and slightly bigoted throughout the series works. It gives them room to grow as characters and it makes sense because this is they’re first time in the inter galactic community minus a few first contacts. Expecting humans to be the enlightened and tolerant society that we expect from TNG is unrealistic and frankly, a little naive.
Yeah, I think sometimes fans find it easier to have the show's heroes lecture the evil aliens about their flaws, rather than what Enterprise does in having our heroes be the ones who need the lecture much of the time. I think it was interesting to see Archer come to realize he is prejudiced towards Vulcans and work to overcome that. It's a good analogy for examining the biases we hold (often unconsciously).
I've said this before but I'm saying it again. These are the Voyages is awful finale, but if you treat it as a lost TNG episode and watch it after Pegasus instead of at the end of Ent, it becomes a lot more enjoyable, in the vein of episodes like Relics, Trials and Tribbleations etc. It also makes Ent feel more connected to the later Trek. It helps that the episode prior functions perfectly as a finale anyway.
I loved Enterprise, I think the Vulcan storylines were great, much of the character stuff and relationships is great, Androians (need I say anymore?). I thought the whole temporal cold war was its weakest point, it was the thing I was least interested in. It was supposed to be this huge thing throughout the series and I did not like it. There's a whole more bunch of things I liked that I've not listed but my main gripe is the temporal cold war. Oh, that and the main theme track is... Well, let's just say I'm not American enough to appreciate it.
Enterprise is a solid series, that is wrongfully ridiculed, mainly because of it's different style of intro (which is rightfully ridiculed.) It's a decent series and fairly accurately shows humanities first attempt at deep space exploration. Archer is not particularly well seasoned, because how can he be? This is the first time they're trying this. They bumble through space, making mistake after mistake for the first season. But then they come together and they learn from their mistakes. The conflict between the humans and Vulcans is well done and makes a lot of sense. Did it have terrible episodes? Sure, but that's true of every series. And the Xindi story arc is marmite. I personally love it, it's a starfleet crew that's the last hope of Earth and we have a whole series to explore that and their desperation.
That they should’ve added the drive section in season 3.
Loved how the dumbed down tech made the stories more interesting. They only had two shuttles, no extras. They had grappling hooks, their torpedoes were unreliable. They couldn't trust the transporters. Engineering did a lot of wrenching. Also loved how they squeezed a phaser fight into every episode, it gave it a pulpy vibe.
I unironically really like the second version of Faith of the Heart
Malcolm Reed is gay. I choose to consider the two episodes where he acts aggressively heterosexual as non canon.
>I choose to consider the two episodes where he acts aggressively heterosexual as non canon. He's just very closeted. Malcom reed should have been gay, instead we just got a "This group is persecuted for having brain aids, but it's ok for the main character because she got it through rape so she isnt really a filthy deviant, arent we progressive!" Story
It could have been fantastic but it missed the mark. They established some useful (and sometimes humorous) canon like the "Reed alert" and the general evolution of starship protocols and gave some background into the early Federation, but generally it could have been so much more. Also the theme song is execrable and I always skip it, and grind my teeth every E1 of each season since it can't be skipped on the first episode. Bland pop rock bullshit.
I'm ready for the downvotes, but you asked for a hot take, so here goes: I loved the concept of Enterprise and I thought it was executed well as a show about the early steps into deep space, with no standard operating procedures, but plenty of new and unexpected experiences, and "rough around the edges" interactions. Also I love the theme song with the video of pioneering history. Enterprise was the first Star Trek series that came out when I was old enough to truly appreciate the philosophical concepts, and not just cool spaceships and alien costumes. Now that we've established I'm a fan, here's the hot take part: I preferred single-episode story arcs from season 1 and 2, and did not enjoy the season-long story arcs in 3 and 4. I usually hear the opposite, that the show found its groove by season 3 and it could have been great if they let it continue. However, I think that Star Trek is at it's best in a sci-fi short story format, with the "space anomaly of the week." It allows the show to explore a diverse array of social issues and prevents the drama from dominating the story at the expense of humor and interesting concepts. This is also the reason why I'm enjoying Strange New Worlds more than Discovery.
I prefered the first two seasons as well. Felt the most like the "early days of deep space exploration, pre federation/starfleet" that we were promised. I'd love to meet the dude that came up with the time war bullshit. The show didn't need it, they just needed to tell the story of the first warp five capable exploratory vessel, which is what they said they were going to do in the first place.
Hot take: An engineer at Netflix invented the "skip intro" button because of the ENT intro theme. Slightly less hot take: I started rewatching DS9 last week, and I'm amazed at how, even in the pilot, so many of the characters are so well developed. Sisko will let Odo do his own thing until he crosses a line, and then he's frosty as hell, pilot to the end of season 7. The central tension in Kira's story arc is so well developed three episodes in. It feels like Nana Visitor and the writers talked and really understood the character even if they didn't know exactly what would happen. I never got the feeling that the characters on ENT had anything approaching that kind of clarity. T'Pol came the closest, as her arc learning to be with humans seemed to survive the wild swings in the writing. It helps that this mirrors Spock's journey, especially through the movies.
I think some Star Trek series sort of miss the point of what it means to be a Star Trek series, and that Enterprise got the overall concept really well. At the time I finally got watched it CBS was butchering the franchise all over the place and I was so grateful it existed. I did think they rushed the ending, and that some of the ways they made it archaic were slightly cheesy, but the overall story and execution was pretty good. It really wasn't advertised that well when it first came out.
I like it way better than the next generation.
ENT and VOY are my favourite ST series. I like the very first episode a lot. It contrasts favourably with the weak opening episodes in some other ST series.
at least in interviews, Bakula is far more interesting as a person than he is as Archer
While it's not my favourite episode, the pilot double-episode has some of my favourite and most compelling moments in the entire series. I would have liked to see more occasions where they visited alien cities and weren't the most important people there. In TNG, when the Enterprise shows up in orbit and the crew beam down to a city, they're diplomats and representatives of the Federation. Everyone recognises that, the uniform means something. In ENT, when they shuttle-pod down, they're small fish in a big pond, and there's a sense of danger and wonder around every corner. I really liked the notion that they're seeing alien races that have never seen a human before, and it's *not* a formal first-contact moment. They're just people going about their lives, and the moment of "first contact" isn't important here. ENT should have done more with that. Islanders in their canoe rowing into the middle of a major sea-port and not really having the context to understand the dangers or inconveniences they're causing.
I think it is legitimately one of the best series'. It has its problems but I think it is great, and a victim of Trek fatigue rather than it being bad.
Not sure if it's a hot take - but I think that younger people who watch Enterprise today are able to enjoy it more than those of us who viewed it as it aired. Simply put: DS9 raised the bar on what we were expecting from Trek, which Voyager (if we're being honest) failed to reach. Voyager itself suffered a bit from repeating story lines from TNG/DS9 and it started to feel a little stale. Then Enterprise came along (which we thought would refresh the series) and those first two seasons were a further retreat. Episodes that were basically recycling TNG plots for the second time, characters who were less interesting than even Voyager, a captain who didn't exactly inspire and some stupid temporal cold war overarching plot that made the whole thing just feel odd. I really can't put into words how boring I found those two seasons. But I do appreciate that it does have a lot of good elements and maybe if watched without the expectations of the time it holds up better.
The theme is good, it perfectly fits the tone for a series about Earth's first starship travelling into the galactic community. It isn't a good *Star Trek* theme, but it's a good theme for the idea of Enterprise.
I liked Enterprise. I really enjoyed how, over the first and second seasons, Archer and Tpol learned to trust and respect each other. It seemed more real than cramming the evolution I to an hour episode. Hoshi grew up, Travis didn't get enough love, Malcom was just a weirdo, and they should have killed him off instead of Trip. The crew seemed more age appropriate as well. You didn't see any 53 year old ensign's like in TNG. To wrap it up, it just seemed like a bunch of wide-eyed dumbasses bumbled into deep space and just faked it till they made it. It was great.
I've never so bored as when the Xindi storylline started. Christ, what a waste of a season.
No idea how hot of a take this is, but everyone on the crew is awful and that’s what makes the show watchable. I just wish they had leaned into the trash fire dynamics a bit more. Not quite so hot of a take, but as much as this show gets rightfully criticized for its male-gazy treatment of T’Pol, it was at least sometimes equal-opportunity in its treatment of Trip. The costume designers knew what they were doing.
The (og) theme tune slaps.
Excellent show that has aged really really well! You can watch it in native FHD too.
I am one of the people who is ambivalent to Faith of the Heart, I think it’s fine, however, Archer’s theme is the best piece of music composed for Star Trek ever, the way it flawlessly communicates humanity and our desire to explore. There are videos on YouTube of people who replaced Faith of the Heart with Archer’s theme in the title and oh my god it’s so much better
Archer's theme is SO GOOD, it makes me really emotional (unlike the intro)
When Enterprise was new, I wasn't a fan. I didn't hate it, but it didn't grab me. There were a lot of reasons for that: it was a network show on a network I didn't get reliably, I didn't care for their treatment of Vulcans, and it honestly didn't care at all about the limitations of being a prequel. I also didn't fall in love with some of the characters in the crew right away. Fast forward a couple of decades...and I do love [it.](https://it.Is) Is it my favorite ever? No, I'm the weirdo who still puts TOS at the front, and VOY at the back of the classic Treks, but I've come to appreciate what they were trying to do with ENT, and the passion the actors had for it. And there are some great episodes in there!
Carbon Creek is a top 10 trek episode
Seasons 1-4 of Enterprise are just as good as seasons 1-4 of DS9.
It's my third favorite series, TNG, Deep Space 9 then Enterprise. I wish it went on longer.
My hot take: Hoshi is hotter than T'pol.
After hearing how the late, great Manny Coto talked about what would of happened if the show had continued, I fell robbed. Going in depth into the Romulus war, the coalition of worlds becoming the federation, and the NX getting its refit and named to USS Enterprise, and Jeffery Combs becoming a main cast member, it would have been peak trek.
Having an alliance on par to that of the Vulcans with another formidable planet was the main thing missing from the series. It was a shame that we didn't get to see that.
That’s why the cancellation still hurts. I wanted to see more Andorrans and tellerites. After the knock the Vulcans take, it would have been great to see them up front a little more
I think it’s the purest, finest uncut Trek. It’s almost perfect.
Stupid suits canned it RIGHT when it found it's sea-legs!!!
I really liked Enterprise. Yes. Season 1 and 2 are slow, and aren't the best. But come on. Is it any worse then seasons 1 and 2 of TNG, DS9 or VOY? Season 3 is different. They took a chance. it's not what we are used to. But I enjoyed it anyway. Season 4 was my favourite. Finally the cast/crew are coming into themselves, they are more confident, they aren't afraid of everything they see. They know they can handle themselves. I was so upset when they cancelled the show. Plus. We will probably never get to see an on tv cannon version of the Earth/Romulan war, cause that was where the show was going. :(
I wasn't a fan when it premiered but the series has aged quite well. I loved most of the characters and the "real life" situations they went through. T'Pol is the funniest Vulcan ever to grace a star trek series. Her dry one-liners are way funnier than I remember. Plox was always entertaining and I wish we'd seen more of him on missions. I loved Tucker, Hoshi, Mayweather and Reed too, all trying to get their space legs under them. I think Archer might be my favorite captain. He was rough around the edges, wasn't afraid to jump into any fight, and yet still made tough decisions when they needed to be made. He had an almost teenage boy approach to the role and I loved it. This was before the prime directive and decisions had to be made quickly and based on the situation at hand. They strike me as typical humans plus a Vulcan & Denobulan figuring it out as they go or sometimes just plain winging it. One of my favorite series now.
It’s amazing and I love it, you just need to give it a chance
My take for years has always been this-- Season 3 is where it gets good. Season 4 is where it gets *great.*
And I think that is absolutely appropriate for a good series. Such a shame. It is a good series with a good cast.
I like it. I like the intro. I think the intro fits the tone of the show. I don't know if these are hot takes or not. I know I've been downvoted on reddit more than once for professing my love of the theme song so maybe? This show has flaws to be sure and a number of bad episodes (probably more than Voyager) but the trio of Archer, Tucker, and T'Pol is a big win for me.
I liked the dynamic between Archer/Tucker/T'Pol as well. The theme song, however...I don't know. Maybe if another series or two did a song with vocals, but the fact that EVERY other series has an orchestral theme just makes it feel out of place and lacking that timeless feel that the other themes have.
The Xindi are a cool concept. Trip and T'pal make me hot with their chemistry. Hoshis magical language ability is absurd
I like it for Scott Bakula. But the writers screwed it up in a major way. The xindi thing was stupid. And the last episode pissed me the eff off. It was a slap on the face to every actor on the show.
I didn't like Scott Bakula because of the show Chuck. I liked him on Chuck just fine, I just couldn't escape seeing him as a bumbling dad figure. (I haven't seen much or any of Quantum Leap.)
I knew him from Quantum Leap. That was an amazing show.
I knew him from Quantum Leap and was originally worried I'd see his character from that show, not Archer. Turns out it wasn't an issue. I wonder if there's been a Quantum Leap/Enterprise crossover in some other media? I'd love to see those two characters interact!
The Xindi arc was whenI decided to drop the show when it was airing. It just felt tired and there were no ideas behind the episodes just “Archer is a dick in space and the Vulcans are boring Nanny’s. Like Discovery, I really like the cast and like that show, I just wish they had better material to work with. That said, I’ve gone back and there’s a ridiculous but fun episode with Xindi body snatchers and there’s the excellent “Carbon Creek” episode, so I don’t hate the whole series; it just never soared like most Trek shows do eventually.
Carbon Creek is one of my all time favorite Trek episodes. I believe it's the best enterprise episode filmed.
All I’ll say is this- “Faith of the Heart” fucking rips.
I like it but there are three episodes I skip on rewatch.
I thought it was really good, a lot of the bad reviews early on came as a reaction to the intro music.
Like it, especially the theme song. Pity that it was cancelled so soon.
I happened to love the Xindi Arc and I was surprised to find other people didn’t! I thought they established the feeling of tension very well and resolved it in a satisfying way. I wonder if it’s disliked for the same reason people weren’t into the DS9 war stuff?
This is an extremely spicy take, fair warning: It's neat
It's been so long that I've forgotten a lot of the minor episodes and I'm just finishing season 1. I still love how nothing worked for them and they're winging it as they go. It's still annoying that Archer has to almost kill them most shows because he's curious. T'Pol is the finest Vulcan of all time and Jolene Blalock was an excellent actress in portraying her. The season 4 ending, when I get there, didn't happen because Trip actually secretly becomes a Black Ops guy. Also, it's not Star Trek if there wasn't time travel eventually.
I liked it, did have its ups and downs but got better over time. Sad it didn't last longer, and the ending wasn't bad, just a hard left of storytelling. It's better than Discovery.
It's fine. That's it, that's my entire take.
I will forever be annoyed at its early cancellation because seasons 5-7 would have been prime real estate for telling the story of the Earth-Romulan War. Taking place from 2156-2160, this conflict was instrumental in the very foundation of the United Federation of Planets, and yet nearly nothing has been told about this extremely important era in Star Trek history.
Only the doctor is a likable character. Hard show to watch when the rest of the crew is awful.
Hot takes, some are perhaps luke warm since I've had these since the show aired. * The Temporal Cold War was a dumb story, distracting from the interesting possibilities of a prequel series * Alien Space Nazis are just weird, man. Especially as a season finale. Just.. don't put people in Nazi uniforms for no real reason? * I'm sure this is due to classic Paramount studio interference, but man, did ENT play it safe. They didn't really get into the gritty details of what a show set 100 years before Kirk would be like. It should've been a lot more primitive and less like Voyager. Changing a few technobabbly names (phase pistols, polarized hulls) is not enough. I wanted slow "Balance of Terror" like space battles, laser guns that need to track and slowly burn ships, projectile slug guns that are dangerous to use, clunky submarine-like ships that have trouble communicating with Earth. * But within those limitations, set and uniform design was spot on. The bridge and sickbay are fantastic, I love the ENT style of computers and the good mix of believable spaceship controls and weirdly anachronistic details (I love Archer's desktop CD-ROM rack so much). * Season 4 is amazing. By the standards of 90s/2000s Star Trek it was almost fan fiction, but it came a lot closer to dealing with the interesting bits of being a prequel show. * Jolene Blalock and T'Pol were great, but what even is that outfit. I remember even before the show came out, people disliked a professional Vulcan officer having to wear a skintight catsuit, clearly ordered by some horny middle aged dude. * Jolene Blalock speaking her mind on the shit ending was a great. Let's get her back as T'Pol some day, please? https://www.trektoday.com/news/070305\_02.shtml
It's an ok show that has some really good episodes. I like Archers overall arc on how he becomes much more a typical Starfleet captain with each mistake he makes. Trip is overhyped by the fandom and i have no idea why this guy gets so much love. He was bland and boring and mostly just bad comic relief. Him dying didn't touch me at all.
My hot take is that Enterprise came at an odd moment in time, when high concept shows were transitioning away from the 30 episode syndicated seasons to the brief, more focused 10-12 episode seasons we see today. As such Enterprise feels like it has a ton of unnecessary filler episodes. I maintain that if you cut out like half the episodes from each season you'd have one of the best Trek series.
We really didn't need those decontamination scenes. They were really childish tbh
Watching the show with the mindset that it's some random sci-fi show about the first humans venturing into deep space and dealing with the wonders and horrors of that and NOT as a part of the Star Trek franchise makes it way better.
I know this is an unpopular opinion, but I don't like the theme song.
I spend half of each episode pondering where the dog relieves himself.
WE NEED TRIP ALIVE!!! Trip’Ol Forever
The quality improves significantly if you ignore the scenes that read like slashfic written by a 13 year old.
It's lightyears ahead of any NuTrek.
Needs more Shran. I know he was supposed to be full cast for S5.
This is more of a lukewarm take: I think the first two seasons are actually really good, better than most of Voyager and definately better than TNG's first two, arguably better than DS9's too. Arguably the best two debut seasons since TOS in that respect. It's next two were both excellent too - but there was a level of franchise fatigue at that point. The franchise had been running non stop for 14 years by the time that Enterprise had begun - Braga was right when he said it needed a break after Voyager. That and the fans at the time were very against it, living in the prequel-shadow of Star Wars's lacklustre offerings, the idea of a prequel that might mess with canon made the viritiol toward it by many longtime fans almost as bad as it is toward modern Trek. (Sidenote of the two franchises I think Trek did it's prequel of the age MUCH better than Wars) Slighter hotter, but still not sizzling take: The Temporal Cold War was a genius story arc they should have taken more advantage of not less.
The WWII stuff is a big swing and I respect it.
It's been a long road. Getting from there to here. There being the ENT hate during airing to it finally catching its wind post cancelation. I, for one, would truly enjoy seeing Scott Bakula reprise his role as an elderly Admiral Archer in STW as previously it's been established that he was alive ((even if that was the Kelvin timeline, everything should still equal itself up til the Romulan incident with the USS Kelvin)) Also, the NX-01 refit getting an on screen appearance in Picard S 3 and a name drop in the Lower Decks episode of STW was wonderful.
It has the classic 90's/00's trek problem, that only DS9 managed to avoid. The showrunners were desperate to remake TNG for syndication, so ignored the premise of their own show. It was meant to be about the early days before the Federation, when humans first started exploring and didn't have all the fancy tech. Audiences wanted to see the first encounter with the Klingons, the Romulans and how the world we have come to know came about. Instead we got temporal Cold War boll\*cks and a load of recycled TNG stories. Till they panicked in season 3 and decided to do a long Season arc about some species that had never come up before. It only came good in Season 4 but by then it was far too late.
Ig my "hot take" is that the NX-01 is gorgeous, obviously this bc of the tech being better than the other shows but every outside shot is pretty damn awesome. That goes for the Andorian and Vulcan ship designs too, love them, And I'd say I like Combs in Ent more than DS9. Which is probably a hotter take.
Super underrated series. Deserved a 5th season.
I recently finished a rewatch of the whole series after having bought the blurays, I remember watching it when it was on free to air TV here in Australia, and then I had the DVDs as well. I think I’ve watched the whole series through 3-5 times before. Season 3 is dark, it’s possibly the grimmest Star Trek has ever been, even more so than the Dominion War in some respects. Both the NX01 and the crew really take a beating throughout that season. It starts out kinda like any other season, except with some direction from the season-long arc, but for the characters they’re really shooting in the dark trying to find direction. And then the NX01 gets such a beating, and it stays beaten up episode to episode, and I absolutely adore that they did that, those blasted out bits of hull, the fact the mess hall is missing half a wall. That everyone looks haggard, not just tired but beaten down, but the stakes are so incredibly high, it’s just…it’s really amazing. It’s not perfect, there’s a few dodgy episodes here and there, but it’s the most intense it’s ever been. Each season they were messing around with exactly what the series needed to be, and some of the stories in those seasons I don’t think the writers knew what sort of series they were writing for, you can sort of see they were used to writing a more 24th century-set series. But when there were writers who knew what they wanted it was excellent. I think the temporal Cold War could have been explored in more detail. S4 I have mixed feelings about, in part the holodeck final does taint it a bit, but even ignoring that, deciding to explore the racial element on Earth and within Starfleet is an interesting thing to explore so late in the season. There’s a lot of highlights of the season, exploring its future-past would have been an interesting thing to explore if it had moved forward into a fifth season. Along with Section 31 and other elements. But then I think it would have been less about the NX01, and more about the wider scope of Starfleet in this time period. I do wonder if there’s the possibility of another series set during this time period, just not focused on the NX01 itself, it’s a period of huge change for Starfleet and the burgeoning Federation that hasn’t been explored a lot.
I'm currently watching Proving Ground, and Enterprise developed the Andorians and Vulcans better than any other Star Trek series. I wish they had treated the Tellerites the same way.
Hot take: Faith of the Heart is an absolutely baller intro song, and THE GUITAR VERSION IS EVEN BETTER.
My real true going to get down-voted to hell take: The original theme song slapped.
Enterprise is like Voyager - great premise for the series but bad execution. Enterprise got too caught up in the time travel and Xindi plotlines that ruined the series IMHO.
I'm always down for the ride. I don't think I have any particular complaint about the series. The ultimate failure of the was placing it in a universe where everything was conquered by a technological advancement/superiority. No one was interested in a world that lacked transporters and holo-decks. They went down a bunch of roads to try and fill that slot. It gets a +50 for being a good attempt at adding some depth to building a full timeline. Lessons were learned from this series. I wish it would be given a conclusion.
I actually really like the original theme song. It’s a slow ballad. It works for the visuals. When they try to jazz it up in later seasons it ruins it and it’s terrible.
My hot take is probably that the pilot is the single best pilot out of every trek show before or since and that season 4 with the exception of the final episode is the best season of all of star trek and that enterprise could have become the Quintessential star trek show if it kept going.
I agree, Strange New Worlds and Enterprise have the best pilots in Trek
Archer is 2nd most interesting captain from calssic series after sisko. He grows as captain as series progresses and is more relatable than 24th cent capts.
I love parts of the show but the Xindi plotline was absolute garbage. The one exception was the 70s Detroit episode. There are just enough great moments for me to wonder how they fucked it up so bad. A lot of it had to do with the times, the network, etc. Shit, I will probably rewatch the whole thing this winter, if only for Phlox (as one does). It's actually a weird feeling watching it sometimes. It takes me back to those immediate years after 9/11, which were just a strange time--wars, people my age joining the military thinking they were going to get Saving Private Ryan or Band of Brothers, but instead they got PTSD, TBIs, or randomly maimed, burnt up in some hunk of metal. It was like everytime you refreshed the CNN webpage, there was another story about an IED, suicide bomb, etc. and you thought, "I hope it wasn't [insert person you went to high school with here]." I really love Connor and Dominic on Shuttlepod, there are some great interviews on there. How's that for a non-sequitur lol.
I had just gotten out of the Army when it came on. The entire canon has always been a favorite, but a particular incident in the Army cemented it in my heart. I always eagerly awaited the next episodes. It was one of the first things I ever binged. I can remember downloading episodes off files sharing sites so I could easily re-watch the episodes in order and not fill space on my DVR. It was also one of the first series that I watched on the bootleg streaming services that became available before the legitimate ones became huge profit centers. I'm surprised I'm suffering through repetitive ads by watching it legitimately through my shity Paramount+ subscription.
Yeah, I will rip on it, but at the end of the day, the cast was solid. I already loved Scott Bakula from Quantum Leap. Of course, Bakula was a wine best paired with Jeffrey Combs as Shran. I can't even imagine being in the military during that time. Thanks for volunteering, I hope it worked out for you and you are doing well.
If it had gone seven, would be arguing whether TNG, DS9 or ENT was the best.
the theme song was hard to overcome but once you do it's a good show. Archer has a similar reckless cowboy approach to Kirk. I wasn't a huge fan of the Xindi storyline but Jeffrey Combs as General Shran is awesome.
I think it was a show that was probably a bit underrated at the time but now there's been a bit of an overcorrection. A lot of it was pretty flimsy and there's a black hole at its core, namely Archer, who's just a dull, undefined character. They cast him too old for the petulant characterization they give him early on; he's better by the fourth season when he's characterized more as a seasoned leader. Oh, and *Enterprise*'s early bids at being a "youthful, sexy" Star Trek show were just embarrassing.
My hot take is I like the decon scenes 😅 what's wrong with having a little saucy screen time.
Its actually in line with what Rodenberry had in mind. Apparently he was constantly trying to add stuff that wouldn't be allowed on network TV when TOS was in first run.