Episode Report Card Keckler: B- | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT A Sexperiment in Criticism
By Keckler | Season 3 | Episode 15 | Aired on 02.10.2004
In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close.Lord, where to begin? Okay, Sexual Tension Pair One: T'Pol learns from Phlox (who is SUCH an instigator, by the way!) that Trip's been Nudging Neural Nodes with a female Uh-Oh named Amanda. Since Amanda's been complaining of headaches lately, T'Pol tells Trip to knock it off because he's only a novice and likely to paralyze the buck-toothed Uh-Oh. Trip thinks T'Pol is jealous, T'Pol thinks Trip is jealous -- especially after she tells him about Sim asking her to go with him -- and then they have sex. I'm not joking. Sexual Tension Pair Two: Reed is annoyed that Uh-Oh Hayes wants to train the ranking officers in hand-to-hand stuff. After making a fool of himself many times, Reed finally dances in front of a mirror and engages Hayes. They manage to beat each other's faces in right before the ship goes on tactical alert. And then they have sex. Okay, that time I was joking. Or, was I? Meanwhile, Quantum brings aboard some dying alien who needs a Lubriderm drip in the worst way. But then, suddenly, the alien gets stronger, attacks Phlox, runs through walls, and tries to fist the warp core. Reed reverses some polarity, which saves the day and kills the alien some more. By the last gasp of the alien's breath, Quantum is made aware that the alien and the rest of his dry, patchy skin ilk are somehow connected to the Xindi and human destruction. Yeah, I don't really get it either. Want more? The full recap starts right below!
Eh. I don't know what to say. Dr. Mathra hated it, and my father-in-law sent me an email entitled "Enterprise without pity," and the content was, "I sure hope you'll blast last night's Enterprise episode as being awful. To have three plots going, all of them weak, is a throwback to their first year of poor episodes. Have no mercy." Well, the PhDs in the family cry foul, the boards cry fair, and I'm just crying with confusion. Either my standards have dropped so low that I can't recognize suckage any more, or I liked it. I'm still not really sure which it is, but then I've been pretty light-headed the last few days.
Sex? No sex? No sex? Sex? My side! Your side! Your side! My side! I really don't care about the ins and outs of Pon Farr anymore, mainly because even if there's canon proof anywhere that Vulcans can have sex outside of the seven-year cycle, that's not necessarily going to stop the writers from ignoring that canon, especially since T'Pol is quickly becoming the Rebellious Vulcan Teenager. Maybe it's the stomach virus talking, but I'm so completely exhausted by the argument that I don't think I even have an opinion any more. They had sex. Fine. It was actually treated with more maturity than I ever expected it to be.
Last week there were no previouslies, so they decided to make it up in spades over diamonds this week and show clips from the whole season.
Trip is massaging somebody's foot and commenting that Reed is a tough cashew to crack. Just by virtue of not seeing the foot's face when Trip asks, "That feel okay?" I knew immediately that this wasn't T'Pol. I also got righteously indignant that Trip was whoring around his Neural Node Nudges. That anything on this show should make me righteously indignant other than boring plots and canon violations really scares me. The foot twitches, and Trip looks back to say, "I thought you said you weren't ticklish." The camera pans the length of NoT'Pol's body, and we see a buxom brunette with two Chiclet-sized front teeth. "I didn't used to be," Not'pol says stoically. Eh -- something about this chick's delivery really bugged me from the start. Trip examines the well-manicured foot (emery boards, pumice stones, and French pedicures come standard for Uh-Ohs, apparently) and thinks he's doing it wrong. Not'pol suggests a different position. "Posture?" Trip corrects. "Sure." Trip helps Not'pol up and invites her to sit on the bed. Damn -- this one's got some upper arms! Good; it would be stupid for an Uh-Oh to be as twigged out as T'Pol. Although it bugs me that the "skinny girl" beats out the "normal-sized girl" in the end. Trip moves Not'pol's long brown hair to one side, and she thrusts her dinners forward and pouts her lips. She says that she gets the feeling Reed really hates all the Uh-Ohs. Trip makes excuses for his little buddy, touches her upper arms, and tells Not'pol to relax. Trip then begins to poke at her. "Feels greeeat," Not'pol drawls -- but not in any sort of Southern drawl that you'd expect someone who grew up a few kilometers away from Trip to have. It was more "I'm going to do my sexy, bored, languid voice in which I'm too sexy-lazy to really enunciate." Not'pol wishes the Neural Node Nudges could be part of their training. She and Trip discuss how oddly rigid Reed and Uh-Oh Hayes are. Match made in heaven, are they? "They're definitely cut from the same cloth," Not'pol says. Yeah, brocade.
Trip pushes some more, and as his hands are wrapped around her ribcage, his fingers look dangerously close to dinner time. "How's it feeling?" Trip asks again. "Still great," Not'pol smirks. "How would it feel if I had sex with you?" the Mad Dr. Mathra asks, disgustedly. Trip moves his hands back to Not'pol's arms and says, "There!" Not'pol scriggles around on the bed and says she feels very well rested. Trip is happy she's so satisfied. Not'pol isn't quite satisfied, which must be why she kisses him. When she pulls away, Trip says, "Well." Not'pol says, "Well." Algonquin Round table, these two. With difficulty, Not'pol pulls her big lips over her big teeth and smiles oddly. "That was...unexpected," Trip says. "Nothing wrong with unexpected," Not'pol says. Except when it gets Trip pregnant. "No, no," Trip agrees, "with a little warning." Not'pol looks at him out of half-closed eyes and says, "Consider that a little warning," and she drops her chin and looks up at him, "For next time." Okay, I don't like her -- she's very predatory and a bit bitchy. It's too bad. She leans forward to Trip again in that "sensual" fake-out people only do on TV as she gets up from the bed and saunters out. Trip's all, "Damn, girl!" as his mouth hangs open, losing him major IQ points.