TV Review: "Enterprise," season four
| Published 12/03/04

Graphic by: Doni Neel

During season three of Enterprise, Manny Coto, who had been a producer on the short lived Showtime series Odyssey 5, came aboard, penning some of the season’s most acclaimed episodes. Then towards the end of the season it was announced that Coto would become an executive producer and would handle the day-to-day tasks that come with running the show. He replaced Brannon Braga, who had been show runner from the series’ beginning. This move was greeted with much happiness by fans, who blamed Braga for the show’s lack of quality.

Also Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stevens, who have written several Trek novels, were brought on to the staff as script consultants. Coto and his writing staff wasted no time in his new position, and let slip some of their ideas for the upcoming season: a Vulcan civil war, T’pau, the Eugenics Wars, the Andorians, the Tellarites and the Romulans. This whipped the fans into even more of a frenzy. So how has all of this translated in to actual product? Quite well, actually.

Last season, the show did a season-long story arc, which resulted in a mixed-bag: some episodes were golden and advanced the plot, and others just seemed like filler. This season the emphasis has shifted towards mini story arcs, consisting of three episodes each; with the occasional stand alone for good measure.

The first two episodes, "Storm Front I and II," resolved the (out of left-field) cliffhanger that ended last season. It also tied up a loose end that had been dangling since the series’ beginning, the Temporal Cold War. The third episode, "Home," was a stand alone, setting up some ideas and themes that will (hopefully) be explored in later episodes. For many, the real season four began with the fourth episode, "Borderland."

This episode was notable for several reasons. First and foremost, Brent (Data) Spiner in a guest role, played Arik Soong, an ancestor of Data’s creator—Dr. Noonian Soong. The episode and the two that followed it contained all sorts of nods to Trek continuity, such as the Eugenics Wars and the Orion Pirates (and the Orion Slave Girls). The episodes themselves were good, not great. I felt like the Orions were shoehorned in to please fans (they were only in the first episode), but it was still cool seeing them nonetheless. The Augments, products of the aforementioned Eugenics Wars, weren’t really developed that well in terms of characterization, and Spiner wound up stealing up practically every scene he was in. Of course seeing as how good his performance was, this writer isn’t complaining.

So what will future story-arcs yield? Well, the next one after the Augments arc concerns a Vulcan civil war of sorts. One criticism that has been leveled at the show has been it’s depiction of Vulcans as haughty, arrogant and condescending. Many attributed this to bad writing, but a reason is going to be revealed for this: many Vulcans have strayed from the teaching of Surak (the founder of Vulcan’s logic-heavy philosophy) and by arcs-end, we’ll be seeing the classic Vulcans that we know and love. We’ll also get to meet the creator of the transporter in a stand alone episode, and an arc to air next year will bring the Tellarites into the mix.

Enterprise airs Friday nights at 8 on UPN.

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