Episode Report Card Keckler: B+ | 92 USERS: C+ YOU GRADE IT Cap'n Don't Preach
By Keckler | Season 1 | Episode 5 | Aired on 2001.10.17
In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close.Oh, joy. And fecundity. Another episode where Trip gets to be the break-out actor. Except he's more "breakout" in the acne sense than he is in the "trodding the boards in the hopes of a knighthood or at least an Emmy, but I wouldn't say no to a Golden Globe or at least one of those weird MTV-popcorn awards" sense. He's slightly pregnant after spending a weird and wonderful few minutes with his hands dipped in white pebbles while on the first holodeck seen and utilized by Starfleet officers. Ever. He grows nipples on his wrist and let's just hope upon hope that he doesn't start lactating. That could get messy. Want more? The full recap starts right below!
We open with the shower scene from Psycho. Right. In my dreams. Instead of Hitchcock mastery, I've got Cpt. Quantum sluicing himself off in a shower with -- hold on, is that…? It is! Real water. Maybe because I never saw anyone actually soggy in past series, I somehow got entwined with the idea that "sonic showers" didn't really use water. They were kind of like a dry cleaner for your body. You got the dirt off using waves of sonic booms. Or something. But enough of my little Lord Peter Whimsies. There's a clunk from the bowels of the ship, and Cpt. Quantum stops mid-lather in consternation. Slowly, the water around his feet starts to float up in bubbles, and his hairless and bizarrely delicate-boned feet rise in the air as well. Cpt. Quantum grabs onto his IKEA shower door and asks the bridge what's going on. "We are having a little trouble with the gravity plating on E Deck, Sir. I hope it hasn't caused you any inconvenience," Reed reports with typical British "mustn't grumble" complacency. "Oh, no," Cpt. Quantum says, swinging from the shower head to keep himself from bumping into the dirty water bubbles and the ceiling, "not at all; any idea when you might get it back online?" Reed tells him that Trip said "any minute." And, with Three Stooges-like timing, there's another clunk and a grind from the ship, which results in Cpt. Quantum and the water bubbles splattering to the floor of the shower. Ouch. I really hope he didn't pee in the shower, because that would be gross. Even without the gravity bubbles all over the place.
It's been a long brew/Getting from there to here/It's been a long brew/But my time is finally near./And I will see my foam come alive at last/I will touch the sky and they're not going to hold me down no more no they're not going to change my mind/'Cause I've got BEER in my hand/I'm going where my heart will take me/I've got BEER to drink/I can chug anything/I've got strength of the glass/No wine's going to bend or break me/I can reach any tap/I've got beer/I've got beer/Beer in my hand.
It's the shank of the morning, and T'Pol seems to be just pigging out on pallid Vulcan soup at the breakfast buffet. She'll never fit in her costume if she keeps gluttoning on that. "Not a very adventurous breakfast," Crazy Like A Phlox chirps, observing the watery mess. T'Pol tells him needlessly about the traditions of Vulcan food consumption. Is this the same Vulcan broth Ensign Scrunchie (tm Omar) was dabbling with in the last episode? Maybe it's the soup Spock threw at Nurse Chapel when he was hot with the Pon Farring. Phlox reminds her she's not on Vulcan, and should attempt to expand her palate with blueberry pancakes. He thrusts a rolled-up one near her snout, but she recoils and tells him she's gnawed on human food several times: "It didn't agree with me." Is that her way of saying she needed Beano? Phlox tells her she should wait it out: "The Vulcan digestive tract is highly adaptable." T'Pol tells him she prefers the foods she's accustomed to. Phlox says, "There's an old saying: When in Fellebia, do as the Fellebians do." Is that kind of like the old Vulcan proverb: "Only Nixon could go to China"? T'Pukey tells him it's all she can do to keep from retching at the smell of the human food, "eating it is out of the question." Is it just me, or is it a continuity problem that T'Pol has eaten salad, breadsticks, and spicy pasta at the Captain's table in past episodes without much flapping about it? Last I checked, that was all human food.