Fight or Flight

episode #2: "Fight or Flight"

Thought of the Day
The entire crew (or so it seems) is worried about the fate of the communications officer's pet slug. The entire crew, that is, except for the captain, who's crawling around on the deck trying to find a squeak.

This ship needs a holodeck, stat.

First Impressions
Second episode blues? It's hard to tell when the plot takes so long to get moving.

Second Impressions
Points to the BermanBraga Entity for letting Hoshi take centre stage in the second episode. Somewhat creepy, character-driven resolution, but the crew is still finding their feet.

Quick Summary
Hoshi is unhappy on Enterprise, where she's freaked out by the general in-space-ness of it all. The Plot Device Of The Week™ eventually kicks into gear; Hoshi overcomes her problems and resolves the Metaphor Of The Week™.

Settling In: the second episode slump
Trek's second episodes rarely go down well -- "The Naked Now," some DS9 story (don't give me that look, it was either "Past Prologue" or "A Man Alone". And judging by the titles, I'd put my money on "Past Prologue".) Voyager's second episode, "Parallax", featured some good Janeway-Torres interaction, but was stilted and technobabble heavy.

"Fight or Flight" is probably the best second episode so far. That's partially due to the canny character-focus -- Hoshi was irritating enough in "Broken Bow" that, of all the characters, she was most in need of a story to herself. She gets that here, although not to the exclusion of the other characters.

The Big Cheese
Archer still doesn't have my vote for Captain of the Week yet, and probably won't have it for a while. (I had the thrill of seeing 5 episodes in one day, so I can say with authority: things aren't looking up.) He's a little … off. T'Pol found him crawling around on the floor, for heaven's sake! He seems to lack the inherent dignity which a captain should have naturally (IMHO).

His later scene with T'Pol in the dining room was somewhat bizarre; why does he react so strongly when she recommends leaving? It was perfectly clear -- even without my top secret guide to Trek Plot Devices™ -- that the Evil Aliens Of The Week™ would be back. His reaction was excessively strong -- interesting to watch, but strange.

And speaking of strange -- he doesn't have an Official Drink™ yet, but he does eat cheese. Could cheese be the new coffee? You heard it here first, Trekkie Foodies.

In terms of acting -- well, let's just say that Bakula is the true heir to the William Shatner Style.

Good ol' #1
Ah, T'Pol. You were so much fun to watch in the pilot. Why are you so irritating this week?

I can't really put my finger on this, but she did bug me … if I watched it again, I could probably pin it down… let's just say that I had to make a conscious effort not to get irritated whenever T'Pol spoke.

Da Tripmeister
(I know, I know, it's awful. But I couldn't come up with anything better.)

Trip came across pretty well here. His scenes with Hoshi and Phlox were both entertaining, although I'm sure he was really more interested in Hoshi than her slug…

Trip comes across as a caricature a lot of the time, but he is quite appealing here.

Plot Girl
This is a Hoshi story, and a well timed one. Hoshi is a difficult character -- there's a great deal of realism in her, but not the kind of realism that people want to see every week. Fearless people are more entertaining than characters who "scream like a girl" at little things like rooms full of corpses.

She's just a little too much like you and me, you know?

And yet … here, Hoshi is alternately irritating and appealing. Fortunately, the final impression is a good one -- this is an intelligent woman who recognises her flaws and seeks to deal with them. She's a girlie chickie, the kind who's not always seen in science fiction in this era of catsuited, leather-wearing Chicks With Guns™. Linda Park is very charismatic, and she plays Hoshi well.

Of course, now that Hoshi's overcoming her problems, it would be cool to see them putting Park's *very* impressive stunt-fighting credentials to work.

I've heard there are other characters, too…
Phlox, Mayweather and Reed could all do with some fleshing out, although seven years of Voyager mean that I have Phlox pretty much pinned down.

Phlox and Reed are probably my favourite characters so far -- Phlox because he's unpredictable -- sure, he's Neelix-like, but damn, I didn't expect him to be offering to feed the slug to the bat -- and because John Billingsley really does have a lovely, lovely voice.

Funnily enough, Reed is in my good books for much the same reason. Dominic Keating is mighty cute, and he has a great accent. "Likes blowing things up" isn't really much of a character description, but it's still fun.

Mayweather … well, he's also cute, he's an optimist and he and Reed are probably the Tom and Harry of Enterprise. Character story, please.

Good dogs go to Heaven … bad dogs get cheddar!
At Jemima's request, I'm now devoting more time to Porthos's character development.

Despite his puppy-like good looks, Porthos has shown a disturbing fascination with self-destruction. He's flirting with danger, eating that cheese … I hope that these tendencies are addressed in future. There's a streak of darkness in Porthos, and I'm expecting lots of angst fic in response.

Smells like teen fanfic…
"Crewmen Bennett and Hayden over there--do you see them? If I'm not mistaken they are preparing to mate. Do you think they might let me watch?"

Ah Phlox, you asexual devil, you.

I wonder how asexuals (androgynes?) are summarised in ASC codes?

Plot Of The Week™
The slug metaphor was cute, not particularly subtle, but not unforgivably bad. I wouldn't have used it, but then, Brannon's never consulted me on such decisions.

(Pity.)

The plot took a bit of time to get moving, but it was good to see the scenes that led up to it -- the slug, Hoshi's discomfort with shipboard life, Malcom's weapons tests, the crew's general boredom. They have a maximum speed of Warp 5. There's gonna be more downtime than in other Treks.

The scenes aboard the alien ship were genuinely creepy. Even the scenes without corpses were slightly disturbing -- for example, the alien's log forming aa baritone backdrop to Trip and Hoshi's discussion. It was very well executed.

The final conflict lacked tension, but I appreciated the emotional resonance of the character-driven resolution. I loved Voyager, I still do, but this was a pleasant change from Voyager's regular Technobabble Shortcuts™.

Overall
Call it a B. It lacked the flair of "Broken Bow", but it's a decent hour of television.

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