This is the first Trek episode ever broadcast in HDTV (High Definition Television).

(The first ever to be filmed in HDTV was Broken Bow.)

QUOTE OF THE WEEK:
"Might as well be 75,000 lightyears."
-- Malcolm Reed... Poor Malcolm, if he only knew what would happen if it was REALLY 75,000 lightyears. Them Kazon are a real pain.

REUSED WINDOWS OF THE WEEK:
Those Romulans sure get around. Apparently, they eventually found Tarquin's home and stole his windows. In Hoshi's first hallucination, you can clearly see the same windows that were in the praetor's room in Star Trek Nemesis.

MOVIE REMINDER OF THE WEEK, PART 1:
This episode shared A LOT of parallels with the movie Beauty and the Beast. Tarquin is clearly the beast. Hoshi would be Belle. The outside is the forbidden area of the house. The crystal ball is like the magic mirror. I've read in interviews that these parallels were intentional.

MOVIE REMINDER OF THE WEEK, PART 2:
I have no proof that this one was intentional but I'd be REALLY surprised if it wasn't. When the shuttlepod starts to drift off of the sphere, Malcolm and Archer try to shoot it down. It then falls and nearly crushes them as they stand there. This is very similar to a scene in the first Men in Black movie. I thought it was a riot. I liked the fact that they had trouble hitting the thing too. Nice to have those human frailties show up every once in a while.

IRRITATING NEIGHBOR OF THE WEEK:
This award goes to our own Cowboy Archer. He's there waiting to get to the sphere and he's bouncing a ball on two walls. It makes a very loud clanging sound. I certainly hope no one lives next door to him. It would be even worse if it was one of the maintenance crew from last week's episode. "First Cowboy Archer makes me get asteroids out of the wall. Then I have to repair the shuttlepod. Now that $%#@er is bouncing a ball on the wall. I just want some sleep!!!"

HOT BABE OF THE WEEK:
I hope I'm not in the minority on this opinion. Hoshi is muy bonita!! Let's see more Hoshi in those nice dresses and nightwear. T'Pol ain't got nothin on this girl.

SHADE OF GREY OF THE WEEK:
I liked Tarquin. He was an interesting character. He wasn't exactly evil, just misguided. Being alone for centuries will do that to you. His ultimatum seemed more like an act of desperation than a truely evil action. He even gave Hoshi the information at the end. I wouldn't mind seeing him again. I wouldn't even mind seeing Hoshi develop a relationship with this guy.

INTERESTING CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT OF THE WEEK:
I've always suspected the things about Hoshi that we were revealed here. About being lonely because of being different. It also makes Hoshi's relationship with Phlox seem even better. Perhaps Phlox is something like Hoshi's grandfather. We even see Archer acting like the protective father when Hoshi first decides to stay with Tarquin.

OVERALL OPINION OF THE WEEK:
I thoroughly enjoyed this one. High quality stuff. Both plots worked nicely for me. I'm really eager to see where this is going. The nature of the expanse seems really interesting.
Bonus Points:
>> MIB reminder.
>> Hoshi talking to Phlox about her probelems.
>> Another sphere! Woo hoo!
>> The whole montage of stuff from previous episodes. Very nice.

Overall I give it a 91%. A-. I liked this one very much.

See ya later
TUE

If I was Hoshi's father I would tell her not to wear such sexy outfits around that lonely Alien guy.

Great overal look and an interesting story.
No way, T'pol much more of a Hottie!

Tarquin can't go home because his people don't like telepaths. But he's not the only telepath in the galaxy. Why can't he find another planet where they'll accept him.
Archer's ball-bouncing reminds me of Toby Ziegler's ball-bouncing on West Wing.

Archer asks T'Pol if maybe Species X made the spheres to *create* the Expanse. Gee, ya think?

Potential continuity anti-nit in the making... As to why nobody knows about the Expanse in (chronologically) later series... Maybe they figure out how to shut down the spheres.

Yeah, TUE the Beauty & the Beast parallels were pretty obvious. I even broke into a few bars of "Be Our Guest".

Hoshi is wondering if she had been exposed to something that could cause her to see things. Well, geee..., there was that DNA altering virus a few eps ago. Surprisingly Phlox doesn't even consider the possibility of a relapse.
(Then again Phlox was also busy with a werewolf in LA, so... ;-)

Why, oh why did Archer leave Hoshi alone? He didn't trust the guy so the least they could have done was left a chaperone. They could have still done the Beauty & the Beast shtick by just having the guy get injured & confined to a room. (Heck, it's not like Malcolm did anything for the rest of the episode. They could have used him.)

Oh, and Tarquin's so lonely why didn't he ask if he could come with Enterprise?

Tarquin, wasn't there a hill named after him? (The Chase)

Did I hear Tarquin mention Hoshi likes Travis?
That would be great, I don't think he had a single line this week.

Regardless of sexy vs not sexy clothing, Hoshi being out of uniform is an error. A Star Fleet Officer would not appear out of uniform in this situation.

Did I hear Tarquin mention Hoshi likes Travis?
That would be great, I don't think he had a single line this week.

I think the point being made was that Hoshi was forcibly thinking about Travis to see if Tarquin/Archer would pick up on it. Was Travis even in the show?

A strong thumbs-up to this episode. I really liked the balance of plots. It might have been nice if they somehow made a connection to the telepaths of Talos IV.

A NIT! When the shuttle departs the first time, you can see the stars streaking by as it departs the docking bay. Yet they are already in orbit around the planet.

I thought the ad was WAY too big for the Zenith HDTV at the beginning. I was afraid it was part of the annoying trend of networks running animated promos during the programs. "On now -- Enterprise. Coming up next, Jake 2.0." Spike TV had the worst one, a guy spray-painting the logo in the corner, repeated once every two minutes! I have the horrible feeling that we'll start seeing ad crawls in the next year or two.

...

The A plot was, like, boring. I mean, how exciting can it be when you figure out the plot before first commercial break (even without reading spoilers) and know more or less precisely that Hoshi is not going to stay, the alien is going to threaten Enterprise... (yawn).

The B plot was, like, total ROTFLMAO.

When Archer phasered that poor thruster, I just sat dumbfounded, looking at shuttle falling down like brick. I still can't understand how it happened... the shuttle was light enough to lift off with only one thruster, and yet it was heavy enough to fall down when that thruster was destroyed?

When Archer phasered that poor thruster, I just sat dumbfounded, looking at shuttle falling down like brick. I still can't understand how it happened... the shuttle was light enough to lift off with only one thruster, and yet it was heavy enough to fall down when that thruster was destroyed?" -- Kazeite

Actually, the fact that it has very little mass is the reason it came back down to the sphere. (TUE gets ready to show off his miniscule physics knowledge) The shuttlepod has very little mass. The sphere has a lot of mass. If the shuttlepod had a lot of mass, the momentum of the thrusters would have kept it moving after getting shot. Since shuttlepods are light (compared to alien spheres) there was very little momentum and thus the shuttlepod did not have the required escape velocity to get out of the sphere's gravitational pull.

I think that's the case anyway.

TUE

The Undesirable Element:
MOVIE REMINDER OF THE WEEK, PART 2:
I have no proof that this one was intentional but I'd be REALLY surprised if it wasn't. When the shuttlepod starts to drift off of the sphere, Malcolm and Archer try to shoot it down. It then falls and nearly crushes them as they stand there. This is very similar to a scene in the first Men in Black movie. I thought it was a riot. I liked the fact that they had trouble hitting the thing too. Nice to have those human frailties show up every once in a while.
----I'm glad I'm not the only one who thought of the first Men in Black movie, when it came to that scene. In fact, I was wondering why both of them were not scrambling out of the way, when the shuttlepod dropped. Though, one nit here, from me, I thought it was Trip instead of Malcolm that helped Archer shoot the pod down. ;) I know, that you know, I'm just a naughty Slinky.
Though, I'm also mostly a clueless Slinky, I had no thought to a Beauty and the Beast wink. I'm losing it big time.

That's what I thought, TUE, plus when they finally hit it, it was thrusting the pod in a downward direction.

"Exile" was a decent character story for Hoshi -- and the first character-based story of any kind in a long time. I was let down when it degenerated into the cliched ending I had expected -- the alien had alterior motives and failed to deliver on all that he had promised Archer. And Roxanne Dawson. Wow! What an excellent job she did with the direction, especially the scene with Hoshi seeing herself on all the monitors. She truly is talented. The story, though, was such a rip on "Beauty and the Beast," I was waiting for the the tea kettle and candle-holder to start singing. But after so many Enterprise stories being obvious rips of earlier Star Trek stories, at least now the producers are ripping off Disney. I like it. They're branching out.

Nits and notes:

-- T'Pol's original theory was that the spatial anomalies were caused whenever energy from the two (and only two) spheres intersected. To follow that line of thinking, if there were only one sphere, there would be no anomalies. But Archer made no attempt to disrupt or destroy the second sphere when he and Trip visited it. I was floored. I thought the only reason to seek out the second sphere would be to destroy it and, supposedly, put an end to the spatial anomalies.

-- More about the spheres: Because they are, after all, spherical, wouldn't they emit energy in all directions? In T'Pol's diagrams, the spheres only emitted energy over a 90 degree angle or so.

-- And one more thing: In "Anomaly," it was said the spheres were a thousand years old. The book that the alien gave Hoshi was written in a dead language not used for a thousand years. A connection? Notice that after Archer said, "Who would want to create a web of crippling spheres?" the next thing we saw was a page from the book.

-- The crew's complement is in question again. There were 80-some people on board last season, then with the addition of the troops, it figured to be at least 100. But Hoshi told the alien that there were only "more than 80 people" on the ship.

-- It would have been so much simpler to beam the Xindi artifact to the surface than have Archer return to the ship and retrieve it in the shuttlepod.

-- After T'Pol said Enterprise had stopped 7,500 kilometers from the sphere, Malcolm said, "Might as well be 75,000 light years" -- the same distance that Voyager was thrown from Earth (wink, wink, Roxanne). Buuuuuttttt, once Archer and Trip launch the shuttlepod, Archer gives the distance as 7,900 kilometers.

Trike....And Roxanne Dawson. Wow! What an excellent job she did with the direction, especially the scene with Hoshi seeing herself on all the monitors. She truly is talented.

I second that emotion. I thought the direction and framing of scenes was outstanding, obvious in contrast to how most of the other episodes are shot.

The story, though, was such a rip on "Beauty and the Beast," I was waiting for the the tea kettle and candle-holder to start singing. But after so many Enterprise stories being obvious rips of earlier Star Trek stories, at least now the producers are ripping off Disney. I like it. They're branching out.

The story of Beauty and the Beast has been around far longer than the Disney version, but I get what you mean.

Was anyone reminded of "The Matrix: Reloaded" during the scene with Hoshi in the command centre with her face on all of the monitors? Or is that just me, and I'm just crazy? On second thought, don't answer that. I can't face the truth. :-)

PS: Absotively posilutely splendiferous episode!

Was anyone reminded of "The Matrix: Reloaded" during the scene with Hoshi in the command centre with her face on all of the monitors? Or is that just me, and I'm just crazy? On second thought, don't answer that. I can't face the truth. :-)

Thinking back on it, yes.

I was also reminding of it when she first walks out of the house and see's that she's on a mountain. The establishing shot of the house consistently reminded me of that scene.

An enjoyable episode, if not overly original.

When Archer is saying goodbye to Hoshi in Tarquin's sanctuary, Hoshi is not wearing a phase pistol, but she is carrying a bag that she hands to Tarquin. Archer asks Hoshi if she brought a phase pistol. Hoshi nods and says she'll sleep with it under her pillow. Evidently the weapon was in her bag. And she just gave her bag to the unknown-and not-to-be-trusted alien. Apparently Hoshi was a civilian contractor to Starfleet...

Regardless of sexy vs not sexy clothing, Hoshi being out of uniform is an error. A Star Fleet Officer would not appear out of uniform in this situation. - Vicki

Hoshi was going to be staying for 2-3 days for a cultural exchange with an alien species. A variety of attire is not uncalled for in that situation. Also, Archer and Hoshi both recognize that Tarquin is interested in Hoshi, and that they are in need of his help, so a more revealing outfit wouldn't hurt.

When Archer phasered that poor thruster, I just sat dumbfounded, looking at shuttle falling down like brick. I still can't understand how it happened... the shuttle was light enough to lift off with only one thruster, and yet it was heavy enough to fall down when that thruster was destroyed?" -- Kazeite

Actually, the fact that it has very little mass is the reason it came back down to the sphere. (TUE gets ready to show off his miniscule physics knowledge) The shuttlepod has very little mass. The sphere has a lot of mass. If the shuttlepod had a lot of mass, the momentum of the thrusters would have kept it moving after getting shot. Since shuttlepods are light (compared to alien spheres) there was very little momentum and thus the shuttlepod did not have the required escape velocity to get out of the sphere's gravitational pull. - TUE

I was thinking that, if only the downward-directed port-forward thruster fired, the shuttle would roll onto it's starboard side, then it's top, then pin itself upside-down. I couldn't understand why the entire shuttle lifed off the sphere. Also, if the thruster was powerful enough to lift the shuttlepod in this way, it should have blown Tucker well clear of the landing site.

-- T'Pol's original theory was that the spatial anomalies were caused whenever energy from the two (and only two) spheres intersected. To follow that line of thinking, if there were only one sphere, there would be no anomalies. But Archer made no attempt to disrupt or destroy the second sphere when he and Trip visited it. I was floored. I thought the only reason to seek out the second sphere would be to destroy it and, supposedly, put an end to the spatial anomalies.

-- More about the spheres: Because they are, after all, spherical, wouldn't they emit energy in all directions? In T'Pol's diagrams, the spheres only emitted energy over a 90 degree angle or so. - Trike

The first sphere Enterprise encountered was 19 kilometers in diameter, and this sphere was larger, according to Archer. It's not likely that the shuttlepod carried a weapon sufficient to destroy such a large object. Gathering data on the device is a "logical" first step toward finding a way to disable it. I was suprised that Archer did not try to find an access hatch, as they did with the first sphere.

I'd agree that the sphere would radiate energy in all directions. T'Pol's hypothesis was that the intersection of the energy waves from each sphere caused the anomalies, so the diagram she uses only shows the intersection points, and disregards the remainder of the energy as being of no danger to the ship.

Tpooh wrote: Tarquin can't go home because his people don't like telepaths. But he's not the only telepath in the galaxy. Why can't he find another planet where they'll accept him.
He doesn't have a spaceship. His own people seem to have marooned him on this planet. That said, it raises the question of why he didn't leave on the ship of one of his earlier companions.

I think we may be making an unfounded assumption that the spheres are sending out the radiation from their entire surface. T'Pol's intersections would be correct if there are a number of relatively narrow focus projectors spread out over the surface of the sphere.
Or have I forgotten something from an earlier episode?

No, we're just making an unfounded assumption. I brought it up because I thought it might be nit-worthy. I still wonder about it. Is it plausible that the spheres are stationary; that they don't, at the least, revolve? If they do revolve, that would cause the direction of the energy to change if it were not being emitted in all directions.

Maybe it's just me, but I can't seem to remember where the idea of these spheres creating the expanse originated. When I first watched this episode, I thought I may have missed an episode. Can someone refresh me on where Enterprise picked up from, in searching for the sphere?

Anomaly. When they found the first sphere mention was made about a connection to the anomalies. (I wondered on that board why they didn't just shut the sphere down after that theory.)

So, I hate to be the one to throw the cold water around, but... let me put it this way: during the ep, I saw a lot of UPN promo spots plugging Season 3 as "the most exciting season of Trek in years!" And yet, somehow the conflict between that statement and this episode didn't make the television explode.

This ep was boooooooooooooooring! The A-plot was painfully familiar and while the B-plot had some useful information in it, it wasn't really that exciting in and of itself, and it was wrapped up a bit too early. Sigh.

Three things I liked:
3) As stated above by numerous people, Roxanne Dawson's got that whole "directing" thing down cold.
2) The effects budget still hasn't run out! (or has it? read below...) The bits with the ladder in engineering flipping out and with Archer's water polo ball sticking to the wall were both awesome.
1) The big question of the B-plot, buried in all of the Telestalking, is rather intruiging. Someone purposefully constructed these spheres to crank out the anomalies and create the Delphic Expanse. Why?

Three things I didn't like:
3) So... I guess T'Pol is cured now. Sigh.
2) Apparently the effects budget is starting to be stretched after all. Many of the shots in the sequence where Hoshi was using the telepathic antenna were reused from previous eps- the biggest one I caught was the erupting asteroid from "Breaking the Ice," but I'm rather sure there were others.
1) Oh, Hoshi... By which I mean, Oh, Linda Park... I imagine you can actually act. If you really want your post-Trek career to take off, you should probably use the episodes that are heavy on your character as an opportunity to shine, rather than phoning everything in. Blargh.

Other notes (and not many of them, as I'm so late):

So, we're supposed to buy that Hoshi, without any equipment, can pick up a book made by an alien culture in a dead language and start reading it right away? This is a considerable stretch.

Oh, and speaking of that book, this may or may not be a nit, depending on your pickyness. The shots of the writing appear to show that it uses a top-to-bottom format- you start with the first collum (whichever that is), read down, and move to the next. But the book is bound much like a human book, with the binding you'd expect from a left-to-right or right-to-left system. There's no reason why it can't be like this, of course, but it would've been a nice touch for the book to be bound at the "top."

I've got no beef with Hoshi wearing civilian clothes while staying with Tarquin, but her choice of clothing struck me as ill-advised. The costumers lose another chance to show that subtle=sexy. Rats.

In closing, I hope the B-plot info goes somewhere. Somewhere far, far away from the rest of this episode. Grade: C.

Sparrow 47: So... I guess T'Pol is cured now. Sigh.

Dan Gunther: I'm not sure to what you are referring... If you mean the disease she was revealved to have in "Stigma," while they haven't mentioned it since then, we don't know that she's been cured. If you're referring to her innate Vulcan "allergy" to Trellium D, this episode in fact says that she is still susceptible to its effects. Or do you mean she is over her display of the Trellium D symptoms from last week's episode? If so, I don't see why it's a surprise, since Phlox said she would regain her emotional control in a matter of days.

I meant the Trellium-D allergy. I was hoping that the bit where she said it would take her time to regain control was part of a larger dream sequence, but, alas.

Ah. Gotcha, sorry 'bout that! That would've been cool, but I doubt the writers would ever be that brave... well, maybe the writers, but the producers would've vetoed it, alas.

Tarquin comes from a planet where one in 50 million is born telepathic, and telepaths are pariahs. But his parents just happen to have a handy-dandy telepath tool to give him. Where do you suppose they got it? Is there a telepath underground? If so, why is he alone?

Hoshi: "Captain, someone's been appearing in my quarters and talking to me."
Archer: "Malcolm, increase security, and get Hoshi a TAPE RECORDER."

Oh, wait. That would be reasonable precaution that any fool could think of. (Shut up.)

Ya know... If'n I was a captain flying around in an area of space that's warping my ship and could potentially kill my crew, I'd be for blowing those alien spheres too.

But then... Oh dear... That would probably end the whole Xindi problem, force the writers to become ingenius again and we wouldn't want _that_ to happen!

But when all else fails, we have the good old Temperal Cold War and flawed time travel to fall back on for upcoming episodes. Right?

---Critique:
---A valiant attempt at long-overdue character exploration without the earnestness or resonance needed to pull it off.
---This is the first episode that truly tried to get into Hoshi’s character, something I feel was not accomplished by Fight or Flight, Sleeping Dogs or Vanishing Point. I say “try,” because the episode commits the basic storytelling mistake of telling us what a character’s emotional arc is, rather than showing it through their actions. The episode wants to explore how isolated Hoshi is. Fine. That’s a good thing. The problem is that it does this by merely having Tarquin say what her problem is, effectively taking a dramatic shortcut. This conflict would’ve been far better served if the episode actually made Tarquin an appealing character that Hoshi might actually have been drawn to, rather than clingy nebbish who essentially stalks her. By making him such an unappealing loser, rather than someone who could actually provoke an admission of loneliness from Hoshi, there is never any tension that his offer to her holds any appeal, and having him try to strongarm her and her crew into forcing her to stay with him by the end of the episode, it makes it too easy for her to reject him. The character arc would’ve resonated far more if we actually got some sense, from this episode and ones preceding it, that Hoshi actually felt isolated from the crew, but previous episodes show her socializing with the other crew members, eating with them in the Mess Hall, sharing a friendshi with Travis, etc. As such, it just didn’t ring true.
---Other miscellaneous things I liked: Tarquin’s makeup was well-done, even if it was mostly to underscore how he wasn’t a handsome guy Hoshi would go for. The fact that the anomalies are producing more permanent damage, like that ladder that got twisted out of shape, is good. And of course, the ending was nicely done.

---Notes:
---We learn from Tarquin in Act 2 that Hoshi studied languages from private tutors as a child, and that she thought it was perfectly natural to pass entire days by herself.

---Terms:
Vulcan root leaves Plant material that Phlox mentions to Hoshi in Act 1.
Tarquin The telepath and psychometrist who contacts Hoshi in the episode. A rare exception for his people, for whom telepaths are only one in fifty million, he requires the football-sized crystal on his desk to use his powers in a long-range manner.
Fiorella’s Italian restaurant on Fountain Street in San Francisco whose pizza Hoshi was fond of, as Tarquin mentions during his dinner with her in Act 2.
Aracon System Planetary system from which Tarquin offers Hoshi a desert in Act 2.
Sooda Noodles Food that Hoshi’s grandmother tried to feed her as a child, which Hoshi tried to avoid by feigning illness, as Tarquin mentions during their dinner in Act 2.
Morianna Taal Tarquin’s first companion, whose grave Hoshi finds outside Tarquin’s residence in Act 3.
Michio Hoshi’s grandfather, whom Tarquin mentions in Act 3 as the last person Hoshi was truly close to, and who died “a long time ago.”

The production staff person in charge of the on-set thermostat is really lonely
In the teaser, we see Hoshi’s reflection in her bathroom mirror, and her tanktop is smooth. Then Tarquin asks if she can understand him, and then says, “I think you do.” As he says, “I think you do,” she turns, and suddenly her nipples are poking out through her tanktop, even though it’s just eight seconds after the mirror shot.
Don’t you just hate it when stalkers have no manners?
In the opening shot of Act 2, Tarquin introduces himself to Archer, Hoshi and Reed by name. Wouldn’t he have told Hoshi his name earlier during one of his telepathic encounters with her? I know he didn’t want to give them everything he had on the Xindi, but if he was desperately trying to form a rapport with her to convince her captain to come to him, shouldn’t he have at least given her his name?
The Universal Language of Missed Opportunities
Tarquin tells Hoshi in Act 3 that the egg-shaped crystal he uses allows him to extend his telepathy. He then offers to let Hoshi try it, and the last images she sees is of a Xindi Reptilian member of the Xindi Council. So this thing not only extends telepathic abilities, but actually grants them to people who don’t have them naturally. Why doesn’t Hoshi ask Tarquin if she can scan it or lend it to her crew so that they can duplicate it?
It’s like the shuttlepod is on a yo-yo diet, or something
Does the Sphere have Earth-level gravity on its outer surface? If it’s like the Osaarian Sphere in Anomaly, then it’s about 19 kilometers in diameter, but the fact that Archer and Reed are able to walk on its surface as if on Earth suggests that it does, as does the fact that the shuttlepod comes crashing down back to it after its port thruster is taken out. But if it has Earth-level gravity, how could the firing of its port thruster by itself have caused it to fly off in the first place?
It’s programmed not to land on regular characters
After taking out the shuttlepod’s thruster, the shuttlepod comes crashing back down to the Sphere, and neither Archer nor Trip scatter to avoid it, somehow knowing that it’ll stop before it crushes them.
I just love multiple choice questions…
How dumb is Tarquin for leaving the telepathic crystal out in the open where Hoshi can grab it, and even walking away from it, allowing her to grab it and threaten to destroy it?

A good, solid episode: along with Anomaly, the best of this season so far. Maybe (\double entendre on) the creators have figures out that huge alien spheres make good shows. (\double entendre off)

I thought the scene where Archer and Trip shoot the shuttle down was fairly realistic, physics-wise: the Sphere has just enough gravity to pull it back but not enough to keep it from propelling away on just one thruster. As for Archer and Trip acting as though the Sphere has Earthlike gravity, didn't you hear the telltale thunk-thunk of magnetic boots as seen in First Contact?

I also was slightly disappointed that T'Pol's psychosis wasn't still there, but they did refer to it when talking about the Trellium. Also how they dealt with the Sphere seemed consistent with Anomaly, with the cloaking field etc.

I noticed the similarity with "Beauty and the Beast", of course, but at least it didn't have a too-happy ending. One wonders if we'll see Tarquin's race again...

Which reminds me. Tarquin?!! Why does an alien have an English name?! (Maybe it's really spelled Ptaarcwynn? )

All in all, a decent episode - though Travis' sum total line was "Yes, sir." If he carries on at this rate he'll win the coveted "Troi in Aquiel Prize for Miniscule Dialogue".

A MSTing:
Archer/Tarquin: I'll tell Travis...
Hoshi: I was just thinking about Travis!
Archer/Tarquin: Really? The producers and writers don't, so why should you?

Which reminds me. Tarquin?!! Why does an alien have an English name?! (Maybe it's really spelled Ptaarcwynn? )

To be honest, his first name is "Grandmoff".

I had no idea Tarquin was an English name.

But really...the best of the season along with Anomaly? Ugh.

Yes, I know. Funny how watching VOY and ENT for a while can dramatically lower your Good Episode Threshold (G.E.T.)

N.B. All the Enterprise-bashing club, check out my New Enterprise Theme Song (sung by Travis and the Extras on the 'Lines You Will Never Hear On Star Trek 34' board. I have to admit I was inspired by Travis' moving dialogue in this very episode.

Which reminds me. Tarquin?!! Why does an alien have an English name?! (Maybe it's really spelled Ptaarcwynn? )

If it's spelled that way he's probably Welsh!

I would guess that would be more like "Tar Llun" but I don't know, I'm no pronunciation contortionist.

I liked it. We need more Hoshi stories, I like learning things about her character and seeing how far she's come from the nervous, reluctant individual she was at the beginning of the series. The pod situation with Archer and Tucker was good too. The only disappointing part is that Tarquin turned out to be a little malevolent. There's always something secret about the guest stars, isn't there? Why can't they ever be genuine?

I wonder why Tucker didn't try to grab the shuttlepod when it started floating upward. He could've made it in, couldn't he? Then again, if they don't let it float upward, we don't get the great scene of it crashing back down.

One of the reasons Hoshi used to justify going to Tarquin is that he said he was horrified that the Xindi attacked Earth and killed 7,000,000 people. Does it not occur to her that he was lying about his feelings?

Is it just me or did Spikey seem to be wearing pajamas when Hoshi, Reed, and Archer go down to the planet the first time? I know he's an alien, but it looked weird.

The anomalies are awesome. First the coffee from a few eps ago, and now the water polo ball. I love it.

Well, we get to see another conn officer. Though I wish we could've seen one in another episode. Travis was hardly in this one.

Pizza on a silver platter. I laughed.

I did like that Hoshi was thinking about Travis in particular when she was talking about saying good bye to her friends. It would be nice to actually see that friendship onscreen though.

TUE: HOT BABE OF THE WEEK:
I hope I'm not in the minority on this opinion. Hoshi is muy bonita!! Let's see more Hoshi in those nice dresses and nightwear. T'Pol ain't got nothin on this girl.
Very much agreed.

Dan Gunther: Was anyone reminded of "The Matrix: Reloaded" during the scene with Hoshi in the command centre with her face on all of the monitors?
Yes

Luigi Novi: Tarquin tells Hoshi in Act 3 that the egg-shaped crystal he uses allows him to extend his telepathy. He then offers to let Hoshi try it, and the last images she sees is of a Xindi Reptilian member of the Xindi Council. So this thing not only extends telepathic abilities, but actually grants them to people who don’t have them naturally. Why doesn’t Hoshi ask Tarquin if she can scan it or lend it to her crew so that they can duplicate it?
Do they have the tech to duplicate an object like that? I guess they could always try.

"It then falls and nearly crushes them as they stand there. This is very similar to a scene in the first Men in Black movie." TUE

I was actually reminded of the first, and best, Batman movie when he tells the Batmobile to stop and it does inches away from him and he doesn't budge.

"Hoshi is muy bonita!! Let's see more Hoshi in those nice dresses and nightwear. T'Pol ain't got nothin on this girl." TUE

Although I agree that Hoshi easily pulls off being cute and sexy at the same time, T'Pol has plenty on her, namely about two cup sizes and I'm not much of a breast man.

I don't really see any evolutionary reason for Tarquin to have those crab-like claws on his head. I doubt he uses them to eat, or provide him with any advantages considering he's more evolved than most of his people. Also, when he projected a human form, that actor looked familiar. Was he on Trek before?

Once again I'll say that those shuttlepods are tough little buggers.

LUIGI NOVI said: In the teaser, we see Hoshi’s reflection in her bathroom mirror, and her tanktop is smooth. Then Tarquin asks if she can understand him, and then says, “I think you do.” As he says, “I think you do,” she turns, and suddenly her nipples are poking out through her tanktop, even though it’s just eight seconds after the mirror shot.

Luigi this is exactly the kind of good catch that made me such a fan of Phil F's (The Chief) Nitpicker books. No, not reference to nipples, but the catching of those funny changes during scenes (ie: character had watch on during scene, no watch in hallway, then watch back on as enters room -- just an example).

I did have the thought that -- at hearing a strange voice in her empty room -- perhaps all of Hoshi stiffened in fear.

I used to be really active on this board, and am a Trek fan from waaay back, but basically quit watching a lot of DS9 and Voyager due to having a small child. I watched the first Enterprise season and half of second, but then we became self-employed and gave up cable as a personal budget cut (therefore, no more UPN).

Now as a family, we're watching Enterprise together on DVD. I enjoy everyone's posts from so long ago and hope everyone's still out there.

Luigi this is exactly the kind of good catch that made me such a fan of Phil F's (The Chief) Nitpicker books. No, not reference to nipples, but the catching of those funny changes during scenes

Yea now see I like it because we're talking about nipples and any chance to talk about Linda Park's body is great by me. He he he