Episode Report Card Keckler: C- | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Unfrozen Caveman Captain
By Keckler | Season 3 | Episode 3 | Aired on 09.23.2003
Sh'pod Two scans the surface with a spotlight. Trip says there's not much in the way of landing strips for them, so he hopes his accompanying Uh-Ohs are up for a walk in the woods.
T'Pol and the Hill People note the sh'pod's approach. T'Pol tries to explain that they won't hurt them if she talks to them, but Loathe-ar grabs her and lugs her off through the jungle. The other Hill People follow.
EV-suited Trip and Uh-Ohs look for their crewmembers.
With cheap Predator eyesight -- it looks like they could only afford red and not the entire spectrum -- Loathe-ar watches Trip and the Uh-Ohs. Hill Person Reed jumps out of hiding at one of the Uh-Ohs and then runs away. Trip turns the Uh-Oh over and says, "Chang!" I wonder if that's really Daniel Dae Lewis in there or if they just want us to think that's him. There is absolutely no way we can know for certain. It was probably cheaper for them to put an extra in a suit and call him "Chang" than to actually get Daniel Dae Lewis on the set for such a minimal role. Hill Person Reed leaps again, and Trip fells him with a phaser blast. Loathe-ar joins in on the attack and starts smacking his Chief Engineer around with a log. Trip sustains a crack in his visor. T'Pol runs in to stop him, so Loathe-ar raises the log at her. She asks if Loathe-ar doesn't recognize Trip. Another Uh-Oh runs toward them, so Loathe-ar takes off into the brush again. T'Pol tells Trip to take Reed to Sickbay and says she's staying with Loathe-ar. She runs after her caveman lover, while Trip can only watch as his Neural Node Nudging sessions go down the drain.
Enterprise. Hill Person Reed freaks out in decon, because he wasn't given a shapely Vulcan to gel down with. Phlox studies him as Trip walks in and comments that Hill Person Reed didn't even recognize him. Phlox says Hill Person Reed's blood is "swarming" with a mutagenic virus that was designed to rewrite the DNA of a host and transform any infected humanoid into another species. Trip wonders about T'Pol's less-than-Neanderthal appearance. Phlox extrapolates that her Vulcan blood K cells have the ability to neutralize the pathogen. Hello, antidote. Phlox says he needs an active sample of T'Pol's DNA to mix up the antivirus as soon as possible. May-You-Snooze-You-Lose announces that two ships are on an intercept course. Trip gets back to the Bridge.
Bridge. The captain of the other ship tells Trip he's in restricted space. "Sorry," Trip says flatly, "it wasn't very well marked." Was it marked at all? The captain tells him he's got an infected crewmember, his ship's under quarantine, and he should prepare to be boarded. Trip clenches his jaw and purses his lips. Well, it's better than furrowing.