Enterprise Review: “Anomaly”

In space, no one can hear a theme song…

Anomaly

Cast & Crew

Director: David Straiton
Written By: Mike Sussman

Starring
Scott Bakula as Captain
Jonathan Archer
Connor Trinneer as Chief
Engineer Charles "Trip" Tucker III
Jolene Blalock as Sub-commander
T’Pol
Dominic Keating as Lt.
Malcolm Reed
Anthony Montgomery
as Ensign Travis Mayweather
Linda Park as Ensign Hoshi
Sato
John Billingsley
as Dr. Phlox

Guest Cast
Nathan Anderson as Sergeant Kemper
Ryan Honey as Guard
Ken Lally as Security Guard
Sean McGowan as Hawkins
Julia Rose as McKenzie
Robert Rusler as Orgoth
Kenneth A. White as Engineering Crewman

Airdate Information

Originally Aired: September 17, 2003
Season: Three
Episode: Two
Production: 054

What Happened

The mission to find the Xindi takes a grim turn when Enterprise is crippled by inexplicable, destructive spatial anomalies that distort the laws of physics. With systems down, Ventaxian pirates board and raid valuable supplies from the ship. The crew captures one of the alien marauders and a determined Archer interrogates the prisoner.

Review

It’s funny. I can almost always tell whether or not an episode is written by B&B or not. That doesn’t imply that it’s good, but I can tell the difference.

There are some improvements. Bakula is getting better at being angry, but there isn’t a real urgency to the episode when there really should be.

High Point

Phlox is a miracle worker. Not only did he find Archer’s balls, he reattached them! The airlock sequence was very well done, but would have been better if it had been left out of the preview. Stupid marketers.

Low Point

The MACOs again. Use ’em or lose ’em. This is getting silly.

The Scores

Originality: Nothing stunning, but there is a twist with Archer’s behavior. 3 out of 6.

Effects: As always, great stuff. 5 out of 6.

Story: Like I said before, no real urgency when there needs to be, either from the stolen supplies or from the Xindi threat. 3 out of 6.

Acting: Bakula’s improving little by little. 5 out of 6.

Emotional Response: Give me drama! 3 out of 6.

Production: Nothing stellar, but at least we’re spared the sight of caverns and the like. 4 out of 6

Overall: Step it up boys, you’re losing the patient. 3 out of 6.

Total: 26 out of 42

Episode Media

From StarTrek.com

Next Time on Enterprise (September 24, 2003)

Extinction

On a mission to investigate an abandoned Xindi vessel on a jungle planet, Archer, Reed and Hoshi succumb to a virus that mutates them into a primal life form. Video Preview

Additional Notes and Comments

If you’re interested in what’s in TheAngryMob’s review queue, check out my What’s Coming page.

TheAngrymob

17 replies on “Enterprise Review: “Anomaly””

  1. hmm…

    On a mission to investigate an abandoned Xindi vessel on a jungle planet, Archer, Reed and Hoshi succumb to a virus that mutates them into a primal life form.

    And then Data’s the only one not affected, so he has to synthesize some sort of spray to use on the other crew members, right? Doesn’t this sound familiar?

    • Re: hmm…

      And then Data’s the only one not affected, so he has to synthesize some sort of spray to use on the other crew members, right? Doesn’t this sound familiar?

      Been there…mutated that.

      Or maybe Archer will transport down into a mine with a mysterious gas that turns him into a troglodyte miner….or maybe…or maybe…ohhh fuck it…Smallville’s season opener is next week. Wanna guess what I’m watching?

    • Re: hmm…

      And then Data’s the only one not affected, so he has to synthesize some
      sort of spray to use on the other crew members, right? Doesn’t this
      sound familiar?

      I thought breaking the Warp 10 barrier mutated you into your primal life
      form, so that you could mate with your captain. But, yes, very familiar.

      • Re: hmm…

        And then Data’s the only one not
        affected, so he has to synthesize some
        sort of spray to use on the
        other crew members, right? Doesn’t this
        sound familiar?

        I thought breaking the Warp 10 barrier
        mutated you into your primal life
        form, so that you could mate with
        your captain. But, yes, very familiar.

        Not, that evolves you to the future of humanity, wich is, apparently, a
        big salamander. Go figure.

  2. Canna change the laws of physics, cap’n!
    I loved the way Trip and the rest of the engineering crew were standing about in regular uniforms while great spouts of energy were shooting out of the warp core. Shouldn’t they have been wearing insulated suits or something? Well, I guess not since Trip used the lightning bolts later on to stop the aliens from advancing and not one of them became a walking electrode either.

    Then there was the floating cup of coffee that Archer had in his office. No sane person, little lone a trained space captain is going to just leave fluids floating about a space ship, it’s hazardous to the systems.

    Finally, who didn’t love Porthos doing his Lassie impression at the beginning of the episode, eh? WoooOOOoooOOo! What’s that Porthos? T’Pol’s fallen into a spacial anomaly and she’s not wearing her top?

    Okay, those’re my gripes this week ;)

    • Re: Canna change the laws of physics, cap’n!
      Downloading this episode at the moment…

      Saw the first one last night. Not entirely sure why I bother, maybe I should be going after the mysteriously hard-to-find Stargate SG-1 season seven episodes instead. Enterprise has not improved a jot this season. And I’ve got DS9 season four on DVD now, so I don’t even need to watch it to get my Trek fix.

      I loved the way Trip and the rest of the engineering crew were standing about in regular uniforms while great spouts of energy were shooting out of the warp core. Shouldn’t they have been wearing insulated suits or something? Well, I guess not since Trip used the lightning bolts later on to stop the aliens from advancing and not one of them became a walking electrode either.

      Then there was the floating cup of coffee that Archer had in his office. No sane person, little lone a trained space captain is going to just leave fluids floating about a space ship, it’s hazardous to the systems.

      Finally, who didn’t love Porthos doing his Lassie impression at the beginning of the episode, eh? WoooOOOoooOOo! What’s that Porthos? T’Pol’s fallen into a spacial anomaly and she’s not wearing her top?

      Okay, those’re my gripes this week ;)

  3. Been Down So Long It Looks Like Up To Me
    I thought this was a good ep, in a relative sense. Archer actually displayed something that could be mistaken for character development. There was reference to past events (Vulcan back sex) and foreshadowing of future ones (“this is looking more and more like a one way trip”….get the double entendre?). Enterprise is far from cured, but at least the malignancy didn’t grow this week. Next week, however, sounds like it’s gonna suck the big one. Sigh. Undoubtedly we’ll have the evil twin ep the following week.

  4. The end, put not a spoiler
    Was this the first time that they addressed the computer through voice command? I can’t think of them having done it before. Then again, I’m a bit rusty on my TOS, but I can’t remember them doing it either.

    • Re: The end, put not a spoiler

      Was this the first time that they addressed the computer through voice command? I can’t think of them having done it before. Then again, I’m a bit rusty on my TOS, but I can’t remember them doing it either.

      In TOS they regularly talked to the compter using voice commands (which was a totally eye opening concept in the 60’s BTW where using an ASR33 teletype was high-tech). In fact, a small subplot of one TOS episode involved the computer getting a tune-up by some programmers on an all-woaman planet and starts to refer to Kirk as “Honey” much to his dismay.

    • Re: The end, put not a spoiler

      Was this the first time that they addressed the computer through voice command? I can’t think of them having done it before.

      Yeah, this was the first time they’ve used voice command on Enterprise. Notice that it was done in the “situation room” which had just been installed with “state of the art” equipment. Maybe it’s a new advance in human technology

    • Re: The end, put not a spoiler

      Was this the first time that they addressed the computer through voice command? I can’t think of them having done it before. Then again, I’m a bit rusty on my TOS, but I can’t remember them doing it either.

      I seem to recall that they have been doing things like, “computer, pause recording” since the beginning.

      • Re: The end, put not a spoiler

        Was this the first time that they addressed the computer through voice command? I can’t think of them having done it before. Then again, I’m a bit rusty on my TOS, but I can’t remember them doing it either.

        I seem to recall that they have been doing things like, “computer, pause recording” since the beginning.

        You’re right… I think the distinction here should be placed on the computer talking back.. so far in this show the computer doesn’t talk. I’d say that since we have voice recognition today, it’s no suprised that we’d have it in 100 years.

  5. not enough credit for this one…
    While this was not up to good trek standards, this episode was quite a bit better than the season premiere. I liked the chase in general, especially the big sphere base. It’s an unexplainable thing, but that doesn’t remove the likelyhood of it existing, and it adds some mystery, which is badly needed.

    Also I liked the encounter with the aliens. I thought that Archer’s performance was a little better, but still a little unbelievable when he was “torturing” the alien. I still can’t picture him killing someone for information, especially after the first two seasons where the made him look like such a good boyscout.

    • Re: not enough credit for this one…

      I still can’t picture him killing someone for information, especially after the first two seasons where the made him look like such a good boyscout.

      Well, there was the time he let Phlox talk him into letting a genetic disorder continue to kill off a race, so that some other race on the planet might someday be smarter. Such a nice guy.

      • Re: not enough credit for this one…

        Well, there was the time he let Phlox talk him into letting a genetic disorder continue to kill off a race, so that some other race on the planet might someday be smarter. Such a nice guy.

        I think I could enjoy an “Evil Archer”. There’s never really been a bad-boy type character in a position of power that was actually bad (Janeway always had some sort of lame excuse for her killing sprees – you know, like “We have to get home! They’re just Borg!”). Archer committing genocide on the Xindi would be a heck of a way to start something like, say, the Romulan or Klingon War.

        My god… I can’t believe that I still, somehow, think that they’re going to dovetail back into continuity….

  6. I miss the cynics corner…
    ahh its nice to come back to see trekkies bitching about star trek,
    The genius behind B&B is they have found a new audience to appeal to, they KNOW star trek has exhausted every plot imanginable, Kirk found HOW many paralell earth worlds? he managed to save teh indians fight the nazis and beat the romans, not to mention whoop ass as a gangster, Then in STNG starting in episode 1 picard went of on a daily tirade about humanity the meaning of life and temporal what not, (By the way that was troi’s fault, she said and i quote “You’re the captain you have the right to make speeches”)Don’t get me wrong, picard was teh man, in his aristocratic dry way, i mean who Doesnt love him and those kids singing “Frere jacque while climbing up a turboshaft? r his amazing fisticufs with his brother? aside fromt ehse moments though, TNG was a mess of prime directive temporal anomaly, and Q being a dipshit episodes. Deep space nine tried to be badass with their galactic war stuff but you could tell they were making it up all along, especially since they started their war pretty much in synch with babylon 5 and in typical star trek fashion, resolved the whole three season war in the last fifteen minutes of the last episode. Then voyager, I mean GEEZ! They rationalized everything in that show, janeway punked her way through the delta quadrant, beating up on the waeker aliens, somehow whooping the the more powerful ones, damn she even bitched Q out on a regular basis, yet never managed to get him to send her home. And then finally that season also was totally resolved in the last twenty minutes of the last episode. My prediction or enterprise is oh wait, they don’t HAVE a season goal.
    Classic trek, i was seek out new life, go where no man has gone before (translation, Kirk pulls a 007 and bangs everyone in sight) Picard was all about “boldly go where no ONE has gone before ” (Translation, create a politically correct morally sound philosophically challenging resolution for every problem.)
    Deep space nine, remember when Q met ben sisko? what did Ben do? tahts the whole series, seek out new life and smack it in the face. voyager continues the degradation with “we’re stuck here and we want to go home”
    Bsed on all of this, why is it such a surprise that enterprise has no over riding theme4 except for, “its been a long road?” Come on gus, if we have faith o the aheart nothings gonna bend or break us! so we dont need plots, character developement, continuity or any other “rules” we can shoot from teh hip, make it up as we go and through a perverse twist of logic, it STILL its the theme, and therefore, the continuity is intact, the characters are as developed as they need to be and the plots are relevant to each other!
    personally i watch enterprise, because i cant wait to see what they’ll do next. iw atch wrestling to, because i want to see how rediculous they will get, who’s gonna hit whos wife with a chair, whos gonna get beaten in the aprking lot etc. Enterprise is the wwf of star trek, anything goes, whether its Tpol randomly taking her shirt off and doing an herbal essence commercial, the Gay captain suddenly turning macho, the Man Who Got pregnant suddenly becoming a dark and sinister character or Tackleberry, uh I mean Malcolm, getting upstaged by the leftover navy Seals from the Rock, who are apparently now regulars on the show. This post is getting long, but to sum it up, i don’t think enterprise is MEANT to be taken seriously, its not a work of art, its typical of pop culture. if you’re looking for good sci fi, try stargate sg-1, at least theres still some science in there, but star trek has created is own world so thoroughly based on theories and pseudo fact taht you wont see any real science in there anymore, all you see is a ludicrous attempt at entertainment, and in the end, isn’t that good enough?
    The answer is no, but deal with it

  7. Kick some more a$$, Archer!
    Either that or take some Zoloft. :)

    I’m glad to see archer as a maniacal, insensitive boob who’s willing to
    put someone in an airlock and nearly suffocate an enemy. Yeah, that’s
    what’ll save this series!

    Actually this wasn’t a bad episode, especially since Bakula has learned
    how to act pi$$ed off and maniacal. I’ll make sure to watch ep. 3 this
    weekend.

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