Enterprise Rajiin Spoilers

Cafe Society
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[Gorn]I weary of sexed-up promos[/Gorn]. Episode not sex romp!

Okay…
Good stuff in this one! Comments follow:
The Xindi aqua things make me think I’m at Sea World.

Trinneer was great in the first scene in T’Pol’s quarters. He can use his Magic Fingers on me any time.

No wonder Archer cant’ sleep. He’s got two damn pillows. He needs a makura.

Cutler is still on board? I’d sure like to see her again.

Good use of slomo in the marketplace. They didn’t really need it later, though it looked cool when Rajiin was falling and firing at the same time (not unlike Trinity).

Good music throughout.

Why didn’t Mal help Archer in the fistfight?

Snotty sneezing chemist guy was a hoot. Or a snoot.

Rajiin does one heck of a funky MRI. But why would Archer let her have the run of the ship? (I know; she has to make trouble. But it’s not good policy.)

On TOS they could never find people on the ship when they needed to. Now they know where everyone is all the time. Devolved tech?

The green glob on the wall that fires little nasties at the security guards was a clever device. Just throw it, then sit back and watch.

Cool.

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can’t sleep.

Must edit self.

Should I verb me too?

43

Hold on to your butts, ladies and gentlemen: I actually kinda liked this one.

Not perfect. The slow motion bugged me. Think back: How often does Trek use slo-mo? It’s not really part of the visual vocabulary. I wouldn’t be surprised if there was as much slo-mo in this single episode as there was in all of TNG.

I had a kind of derisive chuckle at the design of the alien slave-market salesman dude. Could his head have been any more phallic?

But beyond that, this was actually pretty snappy. I definitely liked how the promo made it look like one thing, but didn’t give away the twists like usual; they used clips from only the first twenty minutes or so (not counting the explosions, which could have been anything) to keep the last half a secret. Smart.

I liked the establishing shot of the floating market. That’s something we haven’t seen before on Trek, as far as I know. (But it would have been cool to see a cackling Dennis Hopper drive his oil tanker through it. ;))

I was a little annoyed at the straightforwardness of the boarding party and hallway firefights (except that wild “fragmentation” thingy, which was neat but of course we’re never going to see it again). That’s always been a mark of Trek, though: a lack of imagination in terms of futuristic tactics. I mean, why not let the boarders get on the ship, then seal their corridor and vent the atmosphere out the airlock? Or turn off the gravity? It’s like the writers keep forgetting they’re on a spaceship a hundred and fifty years from now.

That’s a minor complaint, though. This time, there was actually a story, something at stake (though our heroes don’t know exactly what it was yet), and a legitimate conflict. This bodes very well. Now, keep it up.

P.S. Remember in the other thread, I mentioned that in the preview the actress playing Rajiin looked really familiar, but I couldn’t remember where I’d seen her? Well, I finally placed her, while I was watching the show. Remember that Bailey’s commercial where the guy in the office gets like half a dozen huge bouquets of flowers, and he sheepishly explains he gave a few people rides home the previous night? The Rajiin actress (whose name NCB helpfully supplied in the previous thread: Nikita Ager) is the woman in the doorway of the office who gives the guy an ambiguously skeptical-yet-sultry “so what does that mean?” look. I knew I’d seen her before. I think I scared my wife by suddenly snapping and pointing at the screen with a loud “HAH!” when I finally made the connection. Not a bad performance, either, but the California accent was distracting. Oh well. Nice bar code, though. :slight_smile:

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Yes. You live in California, so it’s probably legal there.

Another solid episode. Three for four so far this season. A few thoughts:

*I had, while watching the beginning of this, a very minor nit, but darn it, I can’t remember what it was.
[Linus’s father]
“Must have been a lie!”
[/Linus’s father]

*Although Rajiin was a fairly common archetype (the reluctant villian), she was pretty well done.

*She was rescued with only one outfit. Did she make Archer go back and get her suitcase?

*Clever bartering. They always show them bartering with warp plasma or anti-matter or something like that. It was nice to see them use their brains and barter something that would be much more rare and probably more valuable.

*Yet another case where the vulcan resilience/immunity, fabled in song and story, saves T’Pol.

*Some people commented, earlier during this thread, “what happened to Hoshi?” I think that it wasn’t cut, it was deliberately left up to the viewers’ imagination.

*Was I halucinating, or when you listened closely to the music when Archer and Rajiin were getting it on, were there shades of TOS music?

*Why did the aliens shrug off the shots from the marines (body armor?), but when Archer shot one of them, the alien went down?

On the whole, more positive then negative. I have begun to have limited hopes for this season.

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Yes! I heard it too! I kept expecting a green skinned woman with a blond beehive to materialize.

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The slave market? They specialize? “Git yer 12 pound mammalian wimmin! Long legs an’ itty-bitty pair of boobies!” I mean heck, Jabba the Hutt had a more varied taste in fem-flesh. They could have even snuck in wimmins with more than two breasts each! Think of the panda ops there.

Oh well, the snot bomb was pretty cool. But here’s a tip Mr. Space Marine: If the Bad Guy shoots an unknown weapon at you and it doesn’t go BOOM right away, either run away or shoot whatever it is they throw at you. The Boarding Bug was smart enough to run away from Malcolm’s grenade. (A grenade in an enclosed spaceship. Good thinking there Mal.)

It’s a real good think the Indestructable Vulcans are all logical and peacey. Just think what kind of enemy they’d make if, say, they had a group splinter off and be all warlike. The Universe wouldn’t stand a chance.

Poor Porthos. Has to sleep on the floor. It makes me sad.

We need more eps like this one. Things happened and it pretty much made sense.

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I’m sorry did we watch the same episode?
Minimal panda?

Let’s see we had:

A butt in a thong shot,
A practacly see through Bikini top.
A body painting covering nudity (aside from a ribbon to cover the naughtier bits.
Rajiin’s intonation that she had several owners and she was shared by a crew.
The implication that the women were sold as only sex slaves
The suduction and hand holding with Hoshi.
The breast grab of T’pol
The implied lesbian Rape of T’Pol (I know that isn’t what happened but they sure made it look like that)
Plus the usual Vulcupressure scene with T’pol in her scanty Jimmy Jams.
Tripps initimation that people were talking and T’pol’s only response is let them talk if we were doing anything that is our business.

Yep that was a minimal Panda episode
:smack:
Not that it was not part of the plot but come on this was an episode to make the basement geeks fear their mother coming down to give them a fresh can of Mountain dew and Hostess Ho Ho’s .
On other questions:

Uhh what happened to Hoshi and Dopey security guy?

Why didn’t she stop using her seductive powers to free herself from the cell or at least escape the ship?

Why did Hoshi know where T’pol was when Tripp asked for her location. STNG had this handy innovation based on Ships computer and Comm badges. This happens over 200 years prior, are we to believe someone is constantly momitoring the crews locations? Is there no privacy in the 22nd century or was it sloppy writing by someone who forgot this series occurs well before STNG.

Nifty battle scenes. Interesting goo weapon but the flashy lights glowing in the chests are so unnecessary. Sci Fi doesn’t mean we need all weapons to be energy based… They had me up to that point thinking wow a new type of weapon then disapointed me by revealing it is a new type of energy weapon.

OK finally what is with the piss poor general tactiscs of the Xindi. They successfully breeched the Enterprise, took out a few crew recaptured their prize and lost only one member of their boarding party. What do they do next? They run away and… nothing. Here they found a weakness in the defences and instead of calling in back up to over run and take the ship they do nothing.

I can understand an invading maurader not having the advantage of superior numbers but it is the Enterprise that is the Invader, the Xindid own that territory of space they should have rounded up the fleet and wiped the Enterprise clean away! Or at least gathered up the crew for medical experiments!

What purpose is there to leave an enemy ship roaming around your territory gathering information on you!?!?

Oh wait I know IITS (It’s in the script)(… thanks Jabootu!)
this is a C- episode and it is very telling that weak episodes like this get praise.

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Actually I think it was the music for Gem in the Empath which considering the scene would be a clever bit to use.

Oh yeah what’s with the biology lesson shots of the last two episodes first the CSI Archer chest then we see his skull and spine… what next a ray that makes the crews pelvic bones jump three feet to the left of their bodies?

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Because he’s on Firefly

Does it make cop/military sense? He was holding a loaded weapon; he couldn’t put it down and have it picked up by someone; he couldn’t wade into a fistfight carrying it, so he waited for a chance to pop the bad guy.

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I figure once you know what she does you can smack her if she tries it.
Maybe you sign in with Hoshi as to where you are when off duty.
The boarding party was outnumbered, they had one guy go down and they had what they wanted so they left.
Why did the US Navy let the Conederate raiders attack their commerce, or the Brits stop French privateers? You gotta find them.

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Yeah but they had found them. This is more analogous to The enterprise being a Uboat. The Xindi know they are out there but where? Once they find them they call in the big guns! Who arrive in large numbers and destroy the threat.

I’m sure they could have used subspace comunications stating the Enterprise is in sector so and so and knowing what maximum warp is they could figure the maximum area they need to search.

Oh wait they have been shadowing Enterprise throughout the entire episode… They actually had time to radio for the back up to arrive.

There is no excuse for them not to have had an ambush set up for after they have retrieved their little scanner whore. Except IITS.

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IITS?

Space is a big place, but given the science used by B&B I suspect poetic license.

:slight_smile:

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Is the supposed reason they don’t use projectile weapons to avoid damaging the interior of the ship? A good ole country boy was watching with me last night and while they were fighting in the hallways he asked me “Why don’t they just use shotguns?”. The above answer was all I could think of.

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The Xindi that boarded the Enterprise were acting on their own and unapproved. The closing Xindi War Council showed that.

Like if a splinter group of the US Army went off on their own even though high command told them just to sit tight and wait for future orders.

And then, the Xindi find a bar of gold and decide to go into this little French town where the NAZIs had a stash of gold hidden in some little bank. The tank battle was fun, and well done. I liked Donald Sutherland’s character and his “Negativity, man” way of getting under Gavin McClod’s skin. Even Telly Savalas had a neat bit part. All in all, one of Clint’s best movies ever. Action/adventure with a splash of comedy. Sets up the whole genre for a new generation of fandom.

Are we still talking about Kelly’s Heroes ?

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I don’t know what kingpengvin saw, but I saw a good episode with lots of TOS flava. Didn’t Majel Barrett (sp?) once say that Trek was reflective of Gene Roddenberry’s personality because it had the two things he loved the most–science fiction and scantily clad babes?

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[sub]Sucks to have to wait till the morning to comment after all the good bits are outlined. So in addition to the above…[/sub]
Overall I liked the episode. It didn’t turn out to be gratuitous, it expanded the arc, it had logical panda, and Enterprise lost ground (i.e. their bio-scans).
[ul][li]Nice that the Merchant was bought off by common spices vs. Warp Plasma.[/li][li]How did the Merchant say “Looks like you have all the necessary equipment to produce Trellium-D”? Trip better not have given him an equipment inventory and said, “Does it look like we have what it takes?” Otherwise the Xindi now have some extra intel on Enterprise.[/li][li]When an alien shoots anything either duck or shoot it. The Weapon-Snot is a great idea. Maybe they can have Spider-Grenades or Bat-Guns or Snake-Whips {seriously}.[/li][li]To Malcolm’s Security: Wear some body armor. To All: And helmets. Ok, let’s say they were taken by surprise. So be on Alert.[/li][li]Anyone have emergency bulheads that security could close?[/li][li]Rajiin gathers this data through biologic means (Phlox found no circuitry) and in the Xindi Council puts her hands on the table and it shows a holographic exploded-parts drawing of her scans. This is bad science. Ok, they could get the data from her in time and by other means so in the end could get their hologram. Instead, have her on a medical table, hooked up to blinking lights, and have the data start to appear on monitors.[/li][li]The Xindi Reptiles/Insectoids apparently did an end-run around the Xindi Council orders. They needed data for the covert bio-weapon and now they have it. It’s weak that they didn’t just blow Enterprise away while they were at it, but there is the suggestion that the Council wants Enterprise to be left alone. Why? Seems stupid. Why didn’t they just send more destructor probes? 1) Difficulty building them. 2) Difficulty making the worm-hole.[/li][li]T’Pol raising her voice when the science experiment is going to explode is un-Vulcan. Maybe she’s learning that when talking to humans you need to raise your voice to get their attention. This assuages my fear that she’s too un-Vulcan, i.e. I pretend it’s an act to deal with humans.[/li][li]Good thing for Archer the physio-scan gift is in a “beautiful human-oid” instead of a slimy worm species. Gosh he was lucky there.[/li][li]How did the bridge know T’Pol was in her cabin? 1) The bridge might have a simple status that says a cabin is occupied or not and assumed T’Pol was the occupant. 2) She might have said she was going to her cabin when she left the bridge. (Good SOP) 3) Senior officers might be tracked in the ship. (Good idea)[/li][li]Run of the ship except for secure areas seems reasonable, but the transporter should be a secure area.[/li][li]The process Rajiin uses to get the full scan is not completely shown so we don’t know how difficult it is or how long it takes. Keep some mystery going.[/li][li]The Xindi will now have complete scans of a human male, human female, and a partial scan of a Vulcan female.[/li][li]Enterprise has good interiors. After the Xindi blow the lock, Archer is still able to open a com link to the bridge by pushing one of the exploded-wall buttons.[/li][li]“Everyone is humanoid” is so lazy*. Have some men dressed as sex slaves. I’m not into it but a) it can get some straight women and gay men as an audience, b) is valid economically for a trader, and c) is weirder when you costume them.[/li][/ul]

  • How about putting an actor on a cot and having them with their makeup’d head upside-down. Place an extra underneath as the body and you have a cheap “different” alien. The mouth above the eyes and whatever makeup you add would look really weird. Have it be an informant at a market place and have the guy eating. :smiley:
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I’ve got UPN but never had SCI-FI. {sigh}

Years ago my black-n-white 13-channel TV finally died and the family could get a new color-TV with more channels. I could finally watch Star Trek! We got the TV and a week later the reruns were cancelled. It wasn’t until years later that they finally came back on. [sub]Uh, this doesn’t date me or anything, does it?[/sub]

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IITS = “It’s in the script”

That’s what they said on the other page anyway.

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Regarding that and de[ressuring the area where the aliens are…how about they hear the atmosphere evacuating and blow a hole in the closeest bulkhead killing a bunch of your people?

One presumes they would lose a running fight and left when they had what they wanted.

[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by Corner Case *
**
[li]Good thing for Archer the physio-scan gift is in a “beautiful human-oid”**[/li][/QUOTE]

Of course. It was a set up.

Good points, Corner.

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No. No, we didn’t. While you were watching Rajiin, I was watching Extinction and Jake 2.0 on the tape that viva makes for me every week since I don’t get UPN. I won’t see this episode until Monday at the earliest.

My comments were based on what others have said. The promos for the episode made it look like an orgy (just like it did for Cogenitor) but it wound up not having as much as was hinted at and even turned out to be almost universally praised. You’re the only one to dislike the episode… everyone else had only minor nits that can be picked at for any episode of any of the Trek series.

I think this sort of programming is intentional. They did the same thing on Voyager all the time. They would advertise an episode with commercials that weren’t all that similar to the actual plot. I’m guessing it’s to draw in more fans while knowing that the core audience will watch no matter what. viva should be able to back me up here.