The Good: Continuity within Enterprise, Decent special effects.
The Bad: Utter lack of character development, No decent performances, Blah plot
The Basics: When the best one might hope for from an episode of Enterprise is that John Billingsley is convincing as Phlox while Archer and T’Pol stumble around ridiculous plotlines, one gets “Bounty.”
Fans of Enterprise (and I have found incredibly few in my travels at conventions) tend to enjoy the show without much respect for how the episodes fit into the rest of the franchise. As such, Enterprise fans seem to be much less discriminating about things like Jolene Blalock’s acting – she is much more expressive than almost anyone else who plays a Vulcan in the franchise – and major continuity issues. “Bounty” does not have any huge franchise continuity issues – except that yet again pon farr is referenced decades in advance of “Amok Time” (reviewed here!) – and it actually works well in combination with the early episode “Judgment” (reviewed here!). While “Judgment” might have had some serious issues (which do carry into “Bounty”), “Bounty” has good internal continuity . . . which just means that it’s fine as Enterprise, but terrible as Star Trek!
“Bounty” is notable for fans of the franchise as the first appearance of the Tellarites, the porcine race that popped up as disagreeable antagonists in “Journey To Babel” (reviewed here!) and have never scored a significant role in the franchise since. The episode is notable to those who are only a fan of Enterprise in that it features Jolene Blalock’s T’Pol stripped down to shorts and a bra, salacious camerawork by Roxann Dawson, and a shot or two of cameltoe. So, “Bounty” is not an extraordinary episode on any front.
The Enterprise is exploring an alien planet when a strange ship suddenly appears and demands communications with Archer. The Vulcan database identifies the ship as Tellarite and when the Captain, Skalaar, invites Archer down to the planet where he will act as a tour guide, Archer and Trip are ambushed at the airlock. Archer is abducted and when he awakens, Skalaar reveals he is simply a bounty hunter, who is taking Archer to the Klingon Empire for extradition. While T’Pol and Phlox are caught in quarantine following their infection on the planet by a small parasite, Skalaar’s ship is attacked by another bounty hunter, Kago-Darr.
T’Pol begins going through pon farr, the Vulcan mating time, as an artificial by-product of the parasite and its treatment. Surviving the attack by Kago-Darr, Skalaar and Archer work to repair Skalaar’s shuttle. There, Archer learns that Skalaar’s ship is impounded by the Klingons and he tries to sabotage Skalaar’s shuttle. When the shuttle reaches a trading depot, Skalaar learns that his prized ship has been stripped for parts and is not all that he remembers it to be. Archer talks Skalaar into swindling the Klingon Captain, Goroth. With T’Pol escaping quarantine, Phlox and Reed hunt her down and Archer tries to save his own skin and Skalaar’s.
“Bounty” is plotted in a way that is thoroughly blasé. The episode, when it focuses on Archer, is dull and when it focuses on T’Pol is ridiculous. Either way, neither plotline has a significant character presence. Archer does not grow or develop and T’Pol is acting entirely uncharacteristic. The concept allows Blalock to play T’Pol as a parody of T’Pol. She is emotional, sexually aggressive, and flirtatious; while this might be an interesting twist for the character, because Blalock seldom has all of the emotional restraint required for a Vulcan character.
On the main plot front, Archer is caught in a situation that is very straightforward. He is captured and he works to get released. “Bounty” does not further Archer’s character in any meaningful way. The episode does not reveal him to be especially resourceful or interesting and he only really makes it out alive through the lack of killer instinct from Skalaar. That fact, and the fact that the guest stars – most notably Jordan Lund and the awesome Star Trek alumni Robert O’Reilly – thoroughly steal the spotlight further undermines “Bounty.”
“Bounty” ends up as an unremarkable episode that has a simple plot, performances that are underwhelming and a complete absence of genuine character development.
The three biggest gaffes in “Bounty:”
3. Archer defeats a Klingon in hand to hand combat and escapes from rolling away from shots from two Klingon disruptors, which is utterly unrealistic in every possible way,
2. The Klingon ship that Captain Archer is transferred to bears absolutely no resemblance to any other Klingon ship or shuttle ever seen. In fact, it looks remarkably like a Romulan ship, which makes no sense at all,
1. Skalaar references Archer as the man who escaped Rura Penthe. That means that the rumor of Archer’s escape made it out of the Klingon Empire. As a result, there is no reason that by Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country (reviewed here!) the prison planet would be considered escape-proof.
[Knowing that single episodes are an inefficient way to get episodes, it's worth looking into Star Trek: Enterprise - The Complete Second Season on DVD or Blu-Ray, which is also a better economical choice than buying individual episodes. Read my review of the sophmore season here!
Thanks!]
For other works with Jordan Lund, please visit my reviews of:
Rumor Has It . . .
The Story Of Us
The American President
“The Storyteller” - Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
“Redemption, Part 2” - Star Trek: The Next Generation
2/10
For other Star Trek episode and movie reviews, please visit my Star Trek Review Index Page!
© 2013 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
| | |
No comments:
Post a Comment