The Expanse - Enterprise

[Alan Bolte]

Spoiler warning, just in case.

Well, thought I ought to tune in for the season finale, even though I've watched perhaps half an episode in the past three months. Wasn't half bad, though I'll probably be convinced otherwise in time.
Nice lead-in to the next season, definitely got the new direction thing going. Conflict between characters, tough choices to make. I especially liked the rising count of dead. Got the whole 'no more bullshit, lock and load' concept down well. Trip may end up being an interesting character, though that's probably too much to ask. We've got Klingons, Suliban, time travelers, a continuation of the main plotline (I think it may actually have one. Here's hoping), and a lot more questions than answers.
Anybody remember who the feds blew to hell during the nextgen/ds9 era? These guys totally new or did we miss something? Several interweaving threads kept it moving. I liked the sequence when Enterprise gets its ass saved by a Sol defense squad. Anyone get a good look at those designs?

Now on to more technical issues. I think we can all agree that tech continuity was FUBAR from the start, and that as much as things can be rationalized there really isn't any point because when time travel is involved, continuity becomes as malleable as B&B like it and there's not a damn thing we can do about it. So the photons loaded in could be given to them by the vulcans, if they had them; they could have been purchased tech; they could have been derived from Klingon tech and their own knowledge of antimatter, etc... but it just doesn't matter that much.
But I do believe I heard the words to the effect that photorps of the era have variable yields up to being able to put a 3 km crater in an asteroid. If I'm using Wong's calculator correctly, and am correctly assuming that that was a 3 km diameter crater, that puts max yield somewhere between 160 kt and 16 Mt, with 610 kt for hard granite. Pretty consistent with later era torps, oddly enough.

Did anyone else catch the snipe about things onscreen looking closer than they are? They really hate us.

edited for readability.

[paladin]

I had a thought about the "new direction" Enterprise is to go in. Maybe B&B have got smart and decided to make the Romulans responsible for the attack. They treated this new race into attacking earth on Their behalf. It would be a good way to tie in the Earth/Romulus War for later in Enterprise.

[seanrobertson]

Spoiler warning, just in case.
Well, thought I ought to tune in for the season finale, even though I've watched perhaps half an episode in the past three months. Wasn't half bad, though I'll probably be convinced otherwise in time.

I won't convince you otherwise, even if I could. I rather liked it After disliking a lot of ENT, I'm happy to have enjoyed a few episodes in a row. Those that I've actually watched, anyway

Anybody remember who the feds blew to hell during the nextgen/ds9 era? These guys totally new or did we miss something? Several interweaving threads kept it moving. I liked the sequence when Enterprise gets its ass saved by a Sol defense squad. Anyone get a good look at those designs?

Nah, I didn't. All of the spoilers online said those ships were "limited to warp 2," but I didn't hear any such thing in the episode itself.

As for the Xindi, yes, they're totally new. They're 3 months away from Earth at warp 4.5 or warp 5, IIRC, and their territory is 3,000 ly across...it's NOT something Picard's UFP would likely overlook.

However, we're told that the Xindi's homeworld is attacked in "about 400 years." The date of tonight's episode was 2153; plus 400 years, that's a good ~70 years after the events of "Star Trek: Nemesis." That doesn't excuse the fact that they should be well inside Federation space, but would at least allow for this uncharacteristic annihilation of their planet to take place without us knowing about it.

Now on to more technical issues. I think we can all agree that tech continuity was FUBAR from the start, and that as much as things can be rationalized there really isn't any point because when time travel is involved, continuity becomes as malleable as B&B like it and there's not a damn thing we can do about it. So the photons loaded in could be given to them by the vulcans, if they had them; they could have been purchased tech; they could have been derived from Klingon tech and their own knowledge of antimatter, etc... but it just doesn't matter that much.

Agreed.

But I do believe I heard the words to the effect that photorps of the era have variable yields up to being able to put a 3 km crater in an asteroid. If I'm using Wong's calculator correctly, and am correctly assuming that that was a 3 km diameter crater, that puts max yield somewhere between 160 kt and 16 Mt, with 610 kt for hard granite. Pretty consistent with later era torps, oddly enough.

Yeah. And this is some 50x more powerful than their old torpedoes.

Whether or not they're that hefty remains to be seen. I don't think Reed of all people would grossly exaggerate, lie, or be ignorant where the yield of his weaponry is concerned, but he has given us different figures for the firepower of the phase cannons before (500 GJ/cannon vs. 80 GJ, respectively...and yes, I know that's not power. Reed's words, not mine).

Perhaps the most powerful yield is something that remains theoretical, or something that requires a very large amount of preparatory work. At this stage, Starfleet and antimatter are still somewhat newly acquainted...they might not've mastered miniaturized magnetic containment fields to go beyond a few milligrams (or whatever), at least in the context of rapidly loading torpedoes for a combat situation.

The simplest explanations require us to step outside of the box and simply say that photorps either:

1--haven't gotten much more powerful until the introduction of quantorps in DS9 (IMO, a rather poor alternative...);

or

2--ENT takes place in a different timeline than the rest of Trek.

I can cite lots of examples for the latter, as I'm sure many others could too. It really makes a lot of sense when comparing TOS to ENT, especially, though I don't like running with something so hypothetical.

At this stage, I'm more interested in going back and getting a look at that retro Klingon BoP. I am a KBoP FANATIC. I love the original Nilo Rodis/Bill George design to the point of near obsession, I dunno why; I simply always have, even when I intensely disliked most Star Trek in the late 80's.

[The Silence and I]

Did anyone else catch the snipe about things onscreen looking closer than they are? They really hate us.

Wow.





That *might* redeem so much of Ent. for me it is not even funny. I have not seen the episode, could someone elaborate?

This could answer (~canonically) many of the issues with range I have.
For example, in Nemesis the Ent-E is nowhere to be seen when the Scimitar blows up, yet was sitting-powerless-in front of it minutes before... it almost couldn't have moved.
And in The Survivors I am fairly sure there is a rather large contradiction between the view screen and the external view early in the episode. Something like they had to magnifiy the view several time to see the Husnok ship, and then an immediate cut to external shows both ships close together... or something along those lines. There are others, but I don't want to hijack this thread too much (sorry, I couldn't help myself )

[Howedar]

Is it conceivable that these Xindi came through some wormhole from an area which is in fact a very great distance away from Earth? They could still be outside of TNG Federation boundries.

I havne't seen the episode yet, so I don't know if this is possible or not.

[seanrobertson]

Is it conceivable that these Xindi came through some wormhole from an area which is in fact a very great distance away from Earth? They could still be outside of TNG Federation boundries.

I havne't seen the episode yet, so I don't know if this is possible or not.

Sadly, no

The NX-01 is able to reach Xindi space within a couple of months' travel at warp 5. I dunno how fast that is, but it's got to be pretty dinky next to warp 8, 9, and on up.

What I'm thinking is that the Xindi are, in fact, future Federation members--potentially very strong ones in fact. There are plenty of unnamed races we've seen in the films and other series...they could be one of them.

That of course requires that the probe itself isn't Xindi, or isn't actually launched by the Xindi. Perhaps it uses stolen Xindi tech.

I explain my "theory" in the other current ENT thread. It's probably nuts, but it's the only thing I can come up with short of saying that ENT takes place in some kind of alternate reality.

[Burak Gazan]

The good:
Viking Duras finally getting his ass blasted to plasma by the Big-E ; was I the only one when Archer started testing photons at low settings that was jumping up and down saying "screw that, max yield, vaporize this dimwit!"
Writers finally dawning on them that starships are capable of manuever in 3 dimensions (even if only a loop, it was about time!)
Good ole boy Trip may be gone for good, but if he can be as hard nosed as Scotty was in command situations, give us more of this.

The Bad:
Pal and I had same thought : how come the trench carved out by the Xindi beam-o-death didn't fill in with water? Casualties aside, at least Florida now has a channel similar to Houston
And why did the pod/deathray come apart/jettison and splash down in central Asia? Never explained really, and we never got a really good look at the corpse.


Interesting thought: when the Vulcan Ambassador was showing tapes of a Vulcan-crewed ship going bananas, I wondered if these Bad Guys (tm), with playing with time travel, had regressed the crew to ancient times -- be interesting to see if it comes up again or was just a throwaway filler scene.

Dare we hope for the future on Enterprise? Jury is out, but this looks to have some potential if they follow it along.

[TrailerParkJawa]

I missed the first part where the Earth is attacked, so I will try to catch it on Sunday. I have to agree, this episode was not half bad. Basically, I found it to be entertaining.

Now, what I am wondering is if the actions of the Enterprise will somehow backfire and leed to the formation of the Prime Directive. ???

As for other parts of the show, I liked the defending ships in the Terran system. It seems like they are speeding up the battles. It looks cool.

I could have done without the low yield blasts of photon torpedoes. I mean this is the second time the ship attacked, you. Waste them! No questions asked.

[Jason von Evil]

Missed the attack too, damn bodily functions.

Anyways, two of those Earth vessels that helped Enterprise looked like NX's. I loved the L4 manuever, never thought I'd see any SF ship other than a Defiant do that. The US now has two Grand Canyons, courtesy of some pissed off aliens.

I think the reason why the probe crashed was probably because it's uber carving beam of doom and propulsion system were tied into the same power source and the beam used up all the power.

There is another theory I have though. Remember that one old episode of TOS, with that fake Andorian who was working for the Orion Syndicate to try and prevent this one race from being voted into the Federation? The OS sent a ship to attack Enterprise in that episode and that ship apparently only had enough fuel to get to Enterprise, but not enough to return. Maybe the probe was the sameway.

[Drach]

My thoughts on the timeline in Ent basically is this. We know of at least two people that became aware of future tech in First Contact. Plus the Borg attack on Earth probably at least got a few others thinking what those enrgy bolts may be.

Is it possable that Enterprise is a result of a inadvertantly contaminated time line?

[El Moose Monstero]

Doesnt that throw out the whole 29th century time police thing? You'd think that either Picard would have said something to Cochrane on his way out - 'Hey, don't drink too much, stay away from a glowing cloud, don't plant fig trees, oh, and whatever you do, if you don't want to be neuralised by a bunch of nutjobs from the future, don't mention this...'

Although, wasnt there that episode of Voyager when Seven of Nine got stolen by the time cops to track down that bloke with the bomb? And IIRC, the time cops didnt give a rats arse about the fact that the Borg and the Enterprise had just polluted an entire timeline...

[Drach]

We also know that on at least one occasion Cochrine mentioned what happened, in the episode Regeneration(ENT) Archer mentions a speech by Cochrine where he mentioned the Borg, and the Federation ship.

Who knows what he may have said in private to whatever scientific circles he was in

[Dark Primus]

From I see it there are three different universes in Trek currently.

29 century Feds
TOS/TNG/DS9/VOY
Enterprise

Brannon Braga said Enterprise is an alternative timeline in a interview, or that the timeline has changed.
So it would be like comparing Transformers G1 to Transformers Armada.

Kirk and co. might exist in the 23th century, but due to the differences cause by the timetraveling, Kirk might never sit in the captians chair in THIS timeline.

[Newtonian Fury]

This episode shows some potential for future Trek episodes. But I was a bit uncomfortable with the earth attack since it kinda parallels with 9/11. Oh well, it just reminded me of that.

[Crossover_Maniac]

The Bad:
Pal and I had same thought : how come the trench carved out by the Xindi beam-o-death didn't fill in with water? Casualties aside, at least Florida now has a channel similar to Houston

That would depend on the elevation of the trench itself, whether or not it's above sea level. If the trench isnt' too deep and the land has a high enough elevation, it wouldn't be filled in with sea water.

And why did the pod/deathray come apart/jettison and splash down in central Asia? Never explained really, and we never got a really good look at the corpse.

Bad writing.

Interesting thought: when the Vulcan Ambassador was showing tapes of a Vulcan-crewed ship going bananas, I wondered if these Bad Guys (tm), with playing with time travel, had regressed the crew to ancient times -- be interesting to see if it comes up again or was just a throwaway filler scene.

I think that was based on the episode of TOS where Captain Kirk fades in and out of existance while the crew starts going insane.

Dare we hope for the future on Enterprise? Jury is out, but this looks to have some potential if they follow it along.

Maybe B&B will be fired and they'll hire Robert Hewlett Wolfe or JMS either that or at least Paramount would stop taking scripts from them and let someone else do the writing.

[Dark Primus]

Not seeing the attack itself was pretty dumb.
Not to mention the Xindi gave Earth a huge warning of their coming attack by sending in just one spaceprobe.

They might have good ideas, but how they are portraying these stories on TV are huge letdown.

[Burak Gazan]

It's Florida
If memory serves, the water table there isn't too far below ground -- this trench (I'll look more closely Sun) looked to be at least over 100m deep -- kinda like the Borg ice scoop o'death only in a perfectly straight line. And even if the water table cant fill, well, there is the Carribean Sea...

Had forgotten about the interspace episode with the (original) USS Defiant; good catch

[Sir Sirius]

Not seeing the attack itself was pretty dumb.

What are you talking about?

Not to mention the Xindi gave Earth a huge warning of their coming attack by sending in just one spaceprobe.

Yeah, that was pretty damn stupid. Though we can always hope that future developments will fix this problem. Like that the attack was actualy arranged by the future guy in order to cause a war between the Xindi and Humans, but knowing B&B I am less then optimistic.

They might have good ideas, but how they are portraying these stories on TV are huge letdown.

LOL, I say that it is excatly the opposite. Stupid ideas and plots, but the show is well directed, the SFX is good for a TV-show, acting is mostly fair (better then in Voy thats for sure) Etc.

[Admiral Johnason]

I still say that this episode is one big takeoff by Trek on 9-11.

[Howedar]

I found this episode to be quite good.

[Ender]

But I do believe I heard the words to the effect that photorps of the era have variable yields up to being able to put a 3 km crater in an asteroid. If I'm using Wong's calculator correctly, and am correctly assuming that that was a 3 km diameter crater, that puts max yield somewhere between 160 kt and 16 Mt, with 610 kt for hard granite. Pretty consistent with later era torps, oddly enough.

You must be using radius instead of diameter, if you use 1500 meters you get those values, if you use 3000 meters you get 4.9 MT for granite, 127.5 MT for Iron, and 1.3 MT for ice

[kojikun]

how can you justify claiming its a take on 9-11? because its a sneak attack? theyve existed throughout history, real and scifi. Bombing run on Pearl Harbor, terrorist nuking of San Francisco, you name it.

Stop bitching about 9-11 already. Its almost as bad as the fuckers who wanted to rename Two Towers, and shit. Ugh.

[Drewcifer]

Not to mention the Xindi gave Earth a huge warning of their coming attack by sending in just one spaceprobe.

Yeah, that was pretty damn stupid....

IIRC, the guy from the 29th century said that the probe was a preliminary weapons test, and that the Xindi were/would be (damn time travel and tenses) building a larger weapon based on the results of the first probe's effectiveness.


Overall though, I liked the episode. I had stopped watching Ent but decided to catch the season finale. Hopefully they are returning to interesting stories (TOS/TNG) or character and story arcs (DS9) rather than the weekly whiz-bang-saved! reset of Voy.

[Sir Sirius]

IIRC, the guy from the 29th century said that the probe was a preliminary weapons test, and that the Xindi were/would be (damn time travel and tenses) building a larger weapon based on the results of the first probe's effectiveness.

Thank you for stating the obvious.
They could just have well tested that weapon on another planet, like an uninhabited rock. That way they would not have given Starfleet an early warning.

[Newtonian Fury]

how can you justify claiming its a take on 9-11? because its a sneak attack? theyve existed throughout history, real and scifi. Bombing run on Pearl Harbor, terrorist nuking of San Francisco, you name it.

Stop bitching about 9-11 already. Its almost as bad as the fuckers who wanted to rename Two Towers, and shit. Ugh.

Bombing of Pearl Harbor was a military strike with many conventional forces. This was an attack by one lone "probe" operated by one(? not sure, will watch again) alien. Not unlike a terrorist strike.

And it's not stupid to think this is a take on 9/11. It happened not that long ago, and we know many business corporations tried to capitalize on that event. B&B might be trying to do the same right now considering their mediocre rating.

In any case, I'm very interested in how Trek will develop this story. Hopefully with good plots, less technobabble/deus ex machina, and least amount of time line meddling (not likely on this one).