Episode Report Card Strega: F | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Strifeboat
By Strega | Season 1 | Episode 16 | Aired on 02.12.2002
Trip announces that he's got the receiver working again, but they still can't transmit anything. Malcolm returns to his seat and asks if Trip's detected some company out there. Trip says no, and claims that the static is just "the sound of the galaxy laughing at [them]." The galaxy is certainly more easily amused than I am. The ship suddenly shakes as if it's hit something, and Trip tells Malcolm that it feels like the same thing that knocked out the sensors. Wasn't Malcolm there when that happened? Does he need to be reminded? Malcolm checks a screen and reports that something's punctured the hull, and they're losing atmosphere. I wonder if they collided with Roddenberry's ashes. Since their sensors are still out, Trip and Malcolm resort to staring around as if they're going to spot a tiny pinhole. Trip pulls open a panel in the ceiling and explains that "it's nitrogen for the coolant tanks" as he opens a valve. Hazy fog quickly fills the cabin. Brrr. Trip closes the valve, and they start playing "spot the hole" again. After watching the fading clouds of nitrogen whirl around, each of them finds holes at opposite ends of the cabin, so they plug the spots with fingers while trying to figure out what to do. Malcolm says that there's some sealant in a storage bin, but that's out of reach. After looking around, Malcolm spots the remains of their dinner, and asks Trip to pass the meatloaf. Ew, they left their dirty plates just sitting around all night. Trip plays Twister with himself, lifting the tray from the couch with his feet, then dropping it to the floor and sliding it over. Malcolm scrapes some of the mashed potatoes onto his shoe, then scoops it up and uses it to plug the hole. Then he goes over, gets the sealant, and he and Trip plug the holes with something more reasonable. Wait, no, I'm wrong. He just crosses the cabin and repeats the mashed potato maneuver with the other hole. The guys get to relax for about five seconds before Malcolm checks a screen and reports that one of the oxygen cylinders was also punctured. He sighs and says, "We've got less than two days of air left." Two days? Oh my Lord, that's awful. I can't put up with two more days' worth of bickering.
After the commercials, Malcolm's brushing some rubber cement over the holes in the plot...er, "cabin." He's also griping because "the skin of this pod is designed to deflect a meteor five times the size of this hole." Trip wonders if something similar led to the destruction of the Enterprise. There's some strange stream-of-consciousness bickering that starts with Malcolm being pessimistic and ends with Trip reminiscing about a bar he used to visit while in Starfleet. I think I got whiplash just listening to that. Trip goes on about a waitress there he used to date: "We had it all figured out: where we'd live, how many kids we were gonna have. Ah, Ruby, whatever happened to you?" He doesn't know? Did she just vanish one day, and he never looked into it? And am I the only one thinking her last name was "Tuesday"? I'm full of questions. Malcolm seems to recognize the name, and when asked if he knew her, he volunteers, "I knew her more times than I can remember." Nice. Hey, Trip? If Ruby mysteriously vanished, maybe Malcolm was the last person to see her alive! You might be trapped in space with Ruby's demented killer! Yikes! Malcolm observes that they have something in common after all -- ew. Trip changes the subject, several minutes too late, by asking, "Would another half day be worth freezin' your butt off?" Trip claims that they can reroute power from the heater to the "oxygen recyclers" to gain some more time. Malcolm agrees that it's worth it to prolong their lives, and then hangs up a mirror and starts to shave. Guys, have you ever noticed how strange this show is? Malcolm explains that an officer is always "well groomed," which Trip takes as a sign that Malcolm's cheered up a bit. Until Malcolm adds, "I was thinking about what our corpses would look like when they're eventually found." Oh, here we go. Trip rolls his eyes and says, "If I remember my honors biology course correctly, your hair and nails keep growing for quite a while after you're dead."