Enterprise S1E17 - Rogue Planet

Enterprise finds a sunless solitary planet with a small group of Eska who are hunting wraiths, an indigenous telepathic shapeshifting species. - Wikipedia

The good:

Very little…seriously, this episode was terrible. Actually, that’s not true. It was a very forgettable filler episode that was made much worse by specific artistic decisions.

The bad:

Archer’s continued tortured discomfort with PR is getting a little old by this point. Just pose for the damn picture and move on. You’re a space captain on a historic mission. NASA astronauts routinely do PR. It’s expected. Get over it.

The “rogue planet” idea was cool for about 3 seconds, until we learned that it had plenty of indigenous plant and animal life. Where to begin…

Hmmm…for arguments sake, let’s allow that a true planet sized body could be rogue...effectively independent of a gravitational orbit around a larger body. If it was big enough, it would retain some kind of atmosphere. If it had a flora/fauna ecosystem, then arguably that atmosphere would be breathable to humans.

HOW DO YOU SUPPORT A LUSH JUNGLE-LIKE ENVIRONMENT WITHOUT SUN TO PROVIDE PHOTOSYNTHESIS?????? If these are crazy space plants that don’t follow the fundamental rules of science, that would bear mention my dear T’Pol.

That was probably the biggest sin of this episode, a basic scientific flaw so glaring and unforgivable that it overshadowed everything else that happened. Furthermore, it was completely unnecessary to the plot.

I seriously feel like this episode was specifically written to showcase the green and red night vision goggles. “Hey, we need a reason why it’s always dark so everyone always has to wear these cool props.” Yeah sure, they look kind of cool. Not cool enough to support an entire 45 minute episode though. They do also serve as a convenient marker for the audience to differentiate the good guys and the bad guys in the dark, but that was self serving since the only reason it was dark so much was to use the goggles.

I’ve used night vision goggle before, and you know what you DON’T need when you use night vision goggles? Flashlights.  The Enterprise crew would not have been able to see anything with the night vision because it would have been blindingly washed out by the flashlights. The only reason they had flashlights was so the audience could see what they were doing.

I am willing to believe that hunting is no longer a major occupation on Earth because of endangered species or overpopulation or gun regulations or whatever. But Archer snottily said that hunting had gone “out of favor”. Meaning, it was considered a backward or barbaric custom. That’s first world arrogance in a nut shell. Everyone in the future has streamlined jumpsuit uniforms and gets their food from a replicator. Lame attempt to make the audience dislike the Eska on principle.

However, the Eska were seriously the worst hunters ever. They sounded totally badass while in camp, but acted like Monty Python when they were in the bush. Maybe that was the point…they were just bullies relying on superior technology. But I don’t want to give the writers on this episode that much credit for nuance and subtlety.

The whole wraith/Yeats poem thing was a weak attempt to make this story seem bigger than it was. Also, it illustrated a recurring Star Trek issue…the height of human culture was apparently achieved by the end of the 20^th century. No musicians, poets or artists have created anything of note since then.

I don’t know, I could rant some more but frankly I’m just tired of thinking about this episode. Definitely a frontrunner for worst of the season.