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Star Trek Ent - Season 1 - Episode 21

Star Trek Ent - 1x21 - Detained

Originally Aired: 2002-4-24

Synopsis:
Archer and Mayweather are detained by the Tandarans in a Suliban internment camp. Learning of the Suliban's persecution by the Tandarans, Archer enlists the aid of Enterprise and his crew. [DVD]

My Rating - 5

Fan Rating Average - 5.01

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Problems
- This isn't the first case of this, but I wonder how an alien nursery rhyme translated by the universal translator retains its rhyme.
- Enterprise is 5.2 light years away from the prison, but reaches it in only a few days. That would have required a speed of a lot faster than warp 5.
- So the shuttlepods have phase cannons now?

Factoids
- Dean Stockwell who plays Colonel Grat in this episode is old friend of Scott Bakula (Captain Archer). The two friends starred on Quantum Leap for many years.
- The Suliban homeworld became uninhabitable 300 years ago.

Remarkable Scenes
- Trip: "A Vulcan lawyer? We'd be better off getting the electric chair."
- Colonel Grat interrogating Archer about the Cobal and the Temporal Cold War.
- T'Pol toying with Colonel Grat.
- Reed to Travis: "You look worse than I do."
- Reed's boyish smile as he destroys the door.
- The shuttlepod strafing the prison.

My Review
This episode gives us some nice background on the Suliban race, as well as a possible explanation for their extinction in the 23rd and 24th centuries. Since their homeworld became uninhabitable 300 years ago, they're nomadic, and they're being discriminated against en masse, I imagine that mass genocide might have wiped out most of their race. Now all that's left is to find out why the Denobulans are extinct in the 23rd and 24th centuries. ;) In any case, it seems not all Suliban are members of the Cabal, which is understandable. It seems Enterprise has meddled in the affairs of another sovereign alien species, but at least it was for a good cause. Racial discrimination sucks. Which reminds me, I love the scene when Travis got accused of being racist against Suliban. There's a certain irony to that scene. Travis, a man whose race was discriminated against hundreds of years ago, now is accused of repeating the mistakes his ancestors fought against. Obviously, Travis wasn't being a racist, but I still found the scene ironic. I also enjoyed seeing Travis take a more active role after he'd been thoroughly underused in the last several episodes. Overall, I'm glad to see an episode that isn't below average for the first time in a long while.

The following are comments submitted by my readers.

  • From Zorak on 2016-09-24 at 9:32am:
    I have pretty much enjoyed every episode of Enterprise so far, but things are starting to get really repetitive. They take a situation with a LOT of grey area and Archer arbitrarily decides which side is 100% good and which side is 100% evil with almost no understanding of the situation at large and then proceeds to force his will onto both sides, often using violence, trickery and coercion to get his way.

    I'm starting to see why this show has the reputation it does. Archer is setting himself up as judge, jury and executioner for the galaxy. How is Earth not at war with every species around by now?

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