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Enterprise review: "Anomally".
(Episode 54)
Reviewed by Richard Whettestone.
THE PREMISE: There's an anomally. Some token crewmember dies for the first time. Some pretty good action. And we get to see Phlox's string.
"Anomally"
Written by Mike Sussman
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That wasn't a string. That was a uh, uhm, uh... All right it was a string. You bastard.
We're less than one minute into the episode and what do I see? Doctor Phlox's cages of critters shaking all about because they sense the spacial anomally approaching. But what I saw that I don't think they meant for you to see was the fishing line tied to the corner of one of the cages, as some stage-hand off screen was shaking it back and forth. When the camera moved, the stage-lights reflected off the fishing line.
Someone once said to the ''Jaws'' producers that your special effects are only as good as your worst shot. Because just one shot of a rubber shark ruins the whole movie for you. Yeah, they were right. I couldn't get into anything else in this episode once I knew their 1.7 million dollar budget was absorbed by a fishing line.
Here's a clue. Unless the characters are actually fishing, or I'm watching an episode of 1980's ''The Powers of Matthew Star'' when Matt causes a book to fly off the shelf, otherwise I don't want to see the fishing line.
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Oh my God! It's an inverted Klingon! Oh, wait, I'm sorry. The Captain just spilled his coffee. Never mind.
And even though the Expanse anomallies managed to make the Vulcans go insane and invert the Klingons inside out, the anomallies still managed to not do a single thing to harm any living beings on Enterprise. They only just seem to temporarily bend metal and put it back into shape, drop a book, and spill some coffee. The Enterprise clearly has a hard journey ahead of them.
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 Gold Star Bonus!
Yeah, I'll acknowledge it. The acton was pretty good in this one.
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Oh my God Captain! They killed Crewman... uhm... uh... uhm... Captain they killed a crewman!
It's been a long road, getting from there to here. Boldly going into a new frontier. Dangerous first contacts. More powerful adversaries. Lesser technology to defend yourself. 54 episodes before someone finally dies...
Here it is, kids. Enterprise finally kills off a crewmember. Archer lost his first person under his command. And of course, it was brushed aside as if it was common or no big deal. No funeral. No service. No talk with T'Pol. No realizations hit Tucker. Yeah, Tucker and Reed made a few mentions of it, but that's it. Nothing here. Move along.
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No, honest Captain. I can fly both the Enterprise and the Shuttlepod at the same time. Give me a chance.
What? Shuttlepods are now equipped with their own Phase Cannons? Since when? But suddenly here the Shuttlepod can fire weapons at the door.
And what's the point of whining about the Enterprise having its weapons down if all they needed to do was stick some pilots in the Shuttlepods and have them ride escort? The Enterprise was after all limited to impulse power.
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I sense much fear in you. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering. Suffering leads to mass-marketed franchises.
We've already had the princess that Tucker rescued. Archer was already kidnapped by an Ugnaught. Some of the titles kinda fit in with the ''Star Wars'' theme. And here we have the... Death Star!
But what I really want to see is some alien with a lightsaber ricocheting Reed's phase pistol blasts.
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I'm a grown adult. Only I know Trek best. Besides, viewers are twelve anyway.
What I'm about to say is purely speculation on my part and may be wrong.
I recently found a script on the internet, ''Jason vs. Freddy'', which appears to be a different version of the movie that was produced and released in theatres. The script says it was ''Written by Brannon Braga and Ronald D. Moore''. In the script, there was a dumb Hollywood producer character named Ken Biller who is killed by Jason about ten minutes into the spec movie. Ironically this was the same name of a ''Star Trek'' writer who wrote many episodes of the modern series, including receiving a credit on about three dozen episodes of ''Voyager'', some of which he shares credit with Braga.
Now in this episode we have the first time an Enterprise crewmember is killed. And his name is ''Fuller''. Any connection to ''Star Trek'' writer Bryan Fuller? He not only shares writing credit on about twenty episodes of ''Voyager'', but some of them were with Kenneth Biller, and a few were with Braga.
Maybe it's just a coincidence. Maybe that ''Jason vs. Freddy'' script was a fan lark. But this, along with a lot of anger between many people and B&B, plus the continual firing or exits of writers under the B&B regime, is well enough for me to question such actions and wonder if Braga is having his revenge against former co-workers by killing off characters with their names. It's enough to get my attention. And now it's got yours. You speculate on your own.
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