Tom Salinsky

Two British films drawn from reality about stiff-upper-lipped Englishmen stoically doing the right thing, simply because it’s right. There’s more texture to Oliver Parker and William Ivory’s The Great Escaper, simply because Michael Caine’s decrepit old buffer causes all sorts of consternation back home when he does a bunk from his care home, and therefore it’s possible to attribute negative motivations to his actions. This film also benefits from keeping its stars (Caine and Glenda Jackson) centre-stage for much of the running time – the flashbacks to young Caine are kept to a minimum.

It doesn’t outstay its welcome, but it does feel like it’s running on rails, and ends up reaching for a catharsis which seems forever out of its reach. Its most interesting moments are those when Bernie takes a different path – visiting a comrade’s grave and missing out on the big show which was his ostensible reason for going. Spare a thought for John Standing and Victor Oshin who do nice work but get no plaudits. For one brief moment, as Bernie shares a salute with equally decrepit Germans who were firing machine guns at British troops during the Normandy landings, there’s a flicker of something much deeper, more profound and incredibly moving. But Parker swiftly moves back to the feelgood old-folks charm.

I remember watching the episode of That’s Life in which Esther Rantzen surprised Nicholas Winton with an audience full of the now grown-up children whose lives he’d saved by arranging their escape from occupied Czechoslovakia in the late 1930s. It’s practically impossible to watch without bursting into tears. If you want to watch it, a YouTube search will bring it up. Or you could watch One Life which plods its way towards the same endpoint.

Anthony Hopkins is the big ticket here, but the 1930s stuff is vastly more interesting, where we have to make do with Johnny Flynn (hilariously broad in the West End as Richard Burton at the moment), but get consolation prizes in the form of Helena Bonham Carter and Romola Garai. There’s fine evocation of time and place in these scenes, but I was left waiting for Hopkins to come back and then bored by much of what he was doing. As a hymn to the virtues of stubbornness, politeness and diligent paperwork, this is suitably stirring, but nothing can ever come close to the impact of watching that BBC broadcast, despite the best efforts of cast and crew.

Emma Seligman and Rachel Sennot continue the promise they showed in the rather more low-key Shiva Baby. With Sennot now sharing scripting duties, this is a wild, raw, bonkers, coming-of-age story, which faultlessly finds its own unique loopy tone as it plays with the cliches of high school movies and turns them all inside out in short order. In front of the camera, Sennot is joined by Ayo Edebiri, who is having quite the moment after her far more contained and intense performance in The Bear, and her hilarious and all-too-brief cameo in Theater Camp. Both are pushing 30 but manage to pull off the emotional energy of anxious teens without effort. Rounding out the trio is Ruby Cruz who brings a definite Ally Sheedy vibe, appropriate for a film which picks up where various John Hughes movies left off.

This tight, ninety-minute comedy is stuffed full of good jokes, has just enough genuine emotion not to feel like a sketch show and expertly manages the escalation from fairground teasing to punching in the school gym to… well, that would be telling. Succession’s Dagmara Domińczyk and SNL’s Punkie Johnson are somewhat thrown away, but Seligman and Sennot have the sense not to screw up the film’s lean propulsive momentum by wandering off down backstories for tertiary characters. This is the blood-soaked, feel-good movie of the year and marks Seligman out as a major talent.

Yorgos Lanthimos follows up his smash hit The Favourite with this bizarro riff on Frankenstein, from the 1992 novel by Alasdair Gray. We’re introduced to childlike Bella Baxter through the eyes of earnest young medical student Max McCandless, but before he accepts her ersatz-father’s offer to marry Bella, she’s spirited away by rakish Duncan Wedderburn. As usual, Lanthimos adheres to the motto “too weird is never weird enough”, so Willem Dafoe is caked in geometrically-crenelated latex as the hideously benevolent “God”, Kathryn Hunter makes a memorable cameo festooned with tattoos, Bella’s home is surrounded by a bizarre menagerie of cut-and-shut barnyard animals, and various seemingly random shots are given an extreme fish-eye lens treatment.

This is also one of those movies where everyone’s doing a voice. American Ramy Yussef manages to let his stiff English accent imbue the character with a naïve earnestness which works well. Dafoe’s Scottish accent seems to ebb-and-flow, but he’s such a bonkers creation that this is a minor concern. The biggest issue by far is with Mark Ruffalo, who probably would have seemed miscast if he had been allowed to use his own accent, but he’s so far away from the caddish Wedderburn to begin with that the strangulated and inconsistent dialect only compounds the problem. Presumably Jason Isaacs was too busy pretending to be Cary Grant?

But the movie belongs to Emma Stone, who not only fully integrates a flawless cut-glass accent into her performance, but flings herself into the infantile aspects of the role, and precisely tracks Bella’s evolution from feral force of nature, to wilful sex maniac, to bleeding heart handwringing liberal, to effortlessly compassionate master of her own destiny. It’s a stunningly ego-less performance, and Stone’s bad luck that she’s likely up against Lily Gladstone at this year’s Oscars.

What’s it all about though? Well, somewhere under the wacky camera angles, ripe performances, storybook production design and discordant score, there’s a parable about childhood, feminism, socialism and the nature of romantic love. But if this a feminist empowerment film (written by a dude, directed by a dude, based on a novel by a dude), it’s one of those feminist empowerment films in which empowerment is achieved largely by the shedding of clothing. If you’ve ever had cause to wonder what Emma Stone’s nipples look like – wonder no longer. And yet, for all the odd choices, eccentric casting and dodgy accents, there are images and ideas and sequences here which will stay with me. I preferred this to The Lobster, which for all its bracingly flat oddness ran out of ideas in the last third, but it’s not as viscerally engaging as The Favourite, which also has the very fact that it’s about royalty and ruling to give it a bit more thematic ballast.

Good Grief dropped quietly on Netflix just after Christmas. There are so many movies and TV series coming to this streaming service in particular, that it’s not even hard to keep up any more – it’s hard to notice. For some reason, this one caught our eye, and we decided to give it a spin. Dan Levy (who also writes and directs) plays illustrator Marc whose husband of some years is suddenly killed, and he ends up with best friends Thomas (Himesh Patel) and Sophie (Ruth Negga) in Paris, trying to make sense of it all.

For the first third, this is almost too well-done, a hauntingly accurate portrayal of what a life cut short looks like, and it was almost a relief when the plot took a turn for the slightly more melodramatic in the middle. Be warned, we’re leaving Schitt’s Creek a long way behind. And the story continues to be engrossingly told, keenly observed and well acted, even if it never bubbles over into anything more profound, moving or insightful. Levy keeps his David Rose tics under control, Patel underplays and probably could have stood to do a bit more, as he gets a bit lost. But MVP is Ruth Negga who (allowed to use her natural accent for once) has a whale of a time with the free-spirited Sophie who lights up every scene she’s in, even – or especially – when making terrible life choices.

Look out also for The Crown’s Emma Corrin, national treasure Celia Imrie and Luke Evans who has the mighty task of making us fall in love with Oliver in the ten minutes of screen time he has before his fatal accident.

Paul King is a superbly accomplished filmmaker. As if it needed demonstrating, Paddington 2 proved that Paddington was no fluke. He has wonderful visual flair, a warm sense of humour, an enviable address book of British comedy and acting talent, and a keen eye for storytelling. But Willy Wonka is not Paddington Bear and the approach which worked so well in his two smash hit ursine masterworks doesn’t suit this character nearly so well.

This is something of a disappointment. Wonka The Early Years was always a terrible pitch, but not everyone had faith that resurrecting beloved children’s character Paddington Bear would prove successful in the era of TikTok, iPhones and Brexit, and that worked great in the right hands. However, the problems inherent in the very idea of returning to Wonka’s origins turn out to be insurmountable and they gang up to tear in half this slender and not-nearly-funny-enough movie, which is too silly for adults and quite likely too boring for many kids.

In Roald Dahl’s story (and the 1971 film adaptation starring Gene Wilder, to which this film is almost more indebted) the central character is an ordinary child, and the mysterious, reclusive, magical, dangerous, unpredictable and mercurial Wonka is kept carefully at arm’s length. Having him as the protagonist means making him prosaic, outgoing, amiable, understandable and knowable, all of which are terrible ideas. This conflict between the needs of the character and the requirements of the plot drives a series of fatal contradictions through every beat of this film.

So, Wonka, who is utterly impoverished, is capable of magically producing endless supplies of chocolate from thin air – with a single trip to procure giraffe milk being the only time that any thought is given to the need for ingredients, which he never seems to need to pay for. No, I don’t want my beguiling fantasy wizard to be sending invoices to suppliers, but then I don’t want an entire movie built around his financial fortunes either, so it’s definitely the movie’s fault and not mine that I’m asking these questions. When absolutely at his lowest economic ebb, he is able to whisk up an ingenious Oompa-Loompa trap, despite the fact that he has been plagued by this antagonist for literal years, and has never thought to do this at any previous point, when it would no doubt have been far easier.

Wonka is both given an inability to read, and is required to solve a subplot by identifying the letters on a signet ring and working out what they stand for. His imprisoning by Oliva Colman’s Mrs Scrubbit does far more to solve his problem of not having anywhere to sleep, and also furnishes him with a ready-made gang of acolytes than it does to inconvenience him in any way. His endless chocolate-making is fuelled by  cocoa beans which he stole from Loompa-land where they are in very short supply (why not visit somewhere where they grow in abundance then?). He is able to transform a derelict shop into a chocolate palace overnight and seemingly without effort, but is unable to repeat the trick when it catches on fire. Customers desert him in droves when his chocolate causes bizarre transformations, but this is completely forgotten about in the climax when everybody accepts free candy from the man who wrecked their appearance. And so on, and so on, and so on… What’s weirdest of all is that in the Dahl/Wilder version of the story, chocolates were for kids, as you might expect. Here they’re almost exclusively for adults who are nostalgic for their childhood. And desire for chocolate is horrible and leads to vile obesity if you’re a bad adult, but is a magical and delightful experience if you’re nice.

Of course, this is still a Paul King film, so things aren’t all bad. There’s the usual roster of familiar telly faces, with such luminous talents as Sally Hawkins, Sophie Winkleman, Charlotte Ritchie and Isy Suttie all in micro-roles, and meatier parts for the likes of Rowan Atkinson, Hugh Grant, Keegan-Michael Key, Jim Carter, Rakhee Thakrar and Matt Lucas. The songs by Neil Hannon are perfectly serviceable, although shown up by the reprised Leslie Bricusse/Anthony Newley classics. But, even though the Paddington films took place in an artificial world, the basic strategy of an innocent bear in a familiar environment worked, and grounded the stories, so that when King wanted us to feel something, we did. Here, everything is a candy-coloured cartoon, nothing feels real, and when I’m supposed to feel something for moppety Noodle, it’s impossible because she’s made of sugar and pixels, and when I’m supposed to feel something for Wonka, I fundamentally don’t want to. All of Hugh Grant’s best gags are in the trailer, too. Bugger.

My knowledge of and enthusiasm for Godzilla movies is scanty. As I understand it, some time in the mid-1950s, Japanese filmmakers mashed up King Kong and post-Hiroshima science fiction tropes about radiation-created mutations and came up with a suitably thrilling monster movie which spawned endless sequels and imitations. But more recent American attempts to recreate the appeal have foundered, and part of the problem I think is that the monster has always been the star. Thus it’s very tempting to want to make your 100 foot title character, with rizz to spare, in some way the goodie, which means you need another monstrous antagonist, and before you know it, all the human characters have got lost in the shuffle.

Takashi Yamazaki’s new film nimbly avoids all of these problems. His Godzilla is nothing less than an elemental force, a devastating force of destruction which needs to be eliminated at – almost – any cost. He’s also smart enough to sketch in a roster of appealing, but very killable, plucky humans to go up against it – and crucially gives one of them a personal connection to the monster. And the structure really couldn’t be any simpler, breaking neatly into four acts of about thirty minutes each: Godzilla exists, Godzilla returns, Godzilla on land, final confrontation.

Set in the immediate aftermath of World War II, this positions the action prior to the making of the original Godzilla film. (Hence “minus one” I guess. A black-and-white version is on the way, dubbed “Godzilla Minus Colour”.) But, whether with a view on the home or international audience I couldn’t say, this is also a specifically Japanese version of the story, deeply connected with themes of how war in general wastes lives and how the Japanese involvement and tactics in the Pacific Theatre specifically wasted lives. And while it briefly seems to be celebrating those tactics which it earlier seemed to be condemning, this is little more than a tissue-paper-thin action movie feint.

Add to this preposterously convincing effects throughout – whether Godzilla is rising from the ocean, shuffling through buildings, tossing railway carriages through the air in its teeth, or blasting death rays from its jaws – and you have a hugely entertaining, if occasionally slightly leisurely, kill-the-monster movie. My only qualm is that I’m not quite certain who it’s for, being too slender for grown-ups, and too intense for kids, but it seems to have made a bunch of money, so maybe there’s enough margin between those two points for it to recoup all of its costs and set us up for what will presumably be Godzilla Zero in 2026.

Frustratingly, but very deliberately, Russell holds the new Doctor back a good long while. Knowing that this could be many viewers’ first episode of Doctor Who, and having successfully cut ties with so much of the show’s baggage, we begin – as we did in 2005 – with an ordinary young woman whose life is about to become extraordinary, and we see the Doctor through her eyes.

Like the Auton invasion in Rose, this is a relatively simple problem for the Doctor to solve, and a relatively easy monster to despatch. Unlike Rose, which needed to promise the old fans in the audience that this was the same old show while simultaneously recruiting a whole new legion of devotees, Ruby Road was determined to present things we’d never seen before – a Doctor who raves, who cries freely, who celebrates family, who comments that he was adopted. And a Doctor who fights baby-eating foot-stomping goblins in their great big sky ship.

Silly? Yeah. But you have to be wilfully stupid to assume that this was some kind of accident. Arguably, these four shows together have had it as their mission statement to show in the shortest possible time the sheer breadth of the show’s possibilities, from near-literal comic book adventure, to claustrophobic psychological horror, to wild exuberant fantasy, to now storybook villainy which owes more to The Brothers Grimm than Terry Nation or Robert Holmes.

What makes this work, more than anything, is the stunning pairing of Millie Gibson and Ncuti Gatwa. I’ve not seen more than ten minutes of Sex Education, and I’ve never watched Coronation Street, so as far as I’m concerned, they are Ruby Sunday and the Doctor, and I can barely remember a double debut as confident (possibly Matt Smith and Karen Gillan) and while this is explicitly designed as a “jumping-on” point that confidence extends to lots of little teases for future storylines, adding to the pile of little clues from the other three specials. I even didn’t mind Davina McCall.

But there are a few problems. Returning director Mark Tonderai’s shot assembly is somewhat haphazard in places, with the Doctor’s big hero jump composed of three different mismatching shots optimistically but unconvincingly cut together as quickly as possible; I never had any sense of the geography on board the goblin ship, and it isn’t even clear what’s happening in the big spire-through-the-belly climax on first watching. The Sunday’s flat also appears to be bigger on the inside, as Ruby comes to the end of the corridor, turns left to go through her front door, and then turns right into the expansive kitchen, which would seem to me to put her outside the building.

There are also some pacing problems, to do with a big effects scene involving the Goblin King inside the flat which was cut at the eleventh hour – thus, also, the odd 55-minute running time. The result is that the air goes out of the balloon following the rescue of baby Lulubelle and there’s too much standing and talking. However, the second half of that standing-and-talking is what this whole episode is really about. With a nod to A Christmas Carol or It’s a Wonderful Life, the Doctor – and we – get to see what Carla’s life would be like without Ruby. And it’s a cold, hard, bleak, cynical existence, without joy or warmth or love – Michelle Greenidge is astonishing here. And it reduces the Doctor to tears. Wow. Just wow.

Those pacing and directing problems, plus the fact that it’s such a trivial problem mean I can’t give this more than four stars, but I’m tremendously optimistic for the future, and this is a wonderful introduction to an incredible TARDIS team.

This is every episode I watched ordered by star rating. Episodes with the same star rating can be assumed to be equally good.

• TNG S07E25 All Good Things…
• TOS S02E01 Amok Time
• TOS S01E14 Balance of Terror
• TNG S03E26 The Best of Both Worlds
• TNG S04E01 The Best of Both Worlds, Part II
• DS9 S05E15 By Inferno’s Light
• TNG S05E18 Cause and Effect
• TNG S06E11 Chain of Command, Part II
• TOS S01E28 The City on the Edge of Forever
• DS9 S02E23 Crossover
• TOS S01E25 The Devil in the Dark
• TNG S06E14 Face of the Enemy
• TNG S04E02 Family
• DS9 S06E13 Far Beyond the Stars
• ENT S03E20 The Forgotten
• TNG S05E23 I Borg
• ENT S04E19 In a Mirror, Darkly, Part II
• DS9 S05E14 In Purgatory’s Shadow
• VOY S05E04 In the Flesh
• DS9 S06E19 In the Pale Moonlight
• TNG S05E25 The Inner Light
• TNG S02E09 The Measure of a Man
• VOY S04E25 One
• DS9 S04E10 Our Man Bashir
• TNG S06E04 Relics
• DS9 S06E06 Sacrifice of Angels
• TNG S03E23 Sarek
• TNG S06E12 Ship in a Bottle
• TOS S01E22 Space Seed
• TNG S06E18 Starship Mine
• TNG S06E15 Tapestry
• TOS S01E24 This Side of Paradise
• DS9 S05E06 Trials and Tribble-ations
• TNG S05E08 Unification II
• DS9 S04E03 The Visitor
• DS9 S04E01-2 The Way of the Warrior
• TOS MOS02 The Wrath of Khan
• TNG S03E15 Yesterday’s Enterprise

• DS9 S03E26 The Adversary
• TOS S01E18 Arena
• ENT S03E18 Azati Prime
• TNG S06E16 Birthright, Part I
• VOY S07E07 Body and Soul
• DS9 S02E05 Cardassians
• TNG S06E10 Chain of Command, Part I
• DS9 S05E22 Children of Time
• ENT S03E12 Chosen Realm
• DS9 S03E07 Civil Defense
• ENT S04E05 Cold Station 12
• TNG S05E14 Conundrum
• TOS S01E10 The Corbomite Maneuver
• VOY S05E18 Course: Oblivion
• ENT S03E19 Damage
• VOY S05E15-16 Dark Frontier
• VOY S04E03 Day of Honor
• TNG S03E10 The Defector
• TNG S06E26 Descent
• TNG S07E01 Descent, Part II
• TOS S02E06 The Doomsday Machine
• DS9 S01E19 Duet
• TNG S02E20 The Emissary
• DS9 S05E24 Empok Nor
• VOY S07E25-26 Endgame
• TNG S05E03 Ensign Ro
• TNG S04E15 First Contact
• TNG MNG02 First Contact
• DS9 S05E13 For the Uniform
• TNG S06E21 Frame of Mind
• TNG S04E08 Future Imperfect
• TNG S07E05 Gambit, Part II
• VOY S04E02 The Gift
• TNG S04E22 Half a Life
• DS9 S04E19 Hard Time
• DS9 S04E04 Hippocratic Oath
• VOY S04E26 Hope and Fear
• DS9 S03E03 The House of Quark
• TOS S02E18 The Immunity Syndrome
• ENT S03E05 Impulse
• VOY S05E07 Infinite Regress
• TOS S03E05 Is There in Truth No Beauty?
• DS9 S02E26 The Jem’Hadar
• VOY S04E18-19 The Killing Game
• VOY S05E11 Latent Image
• VOY S06E24 Life Line
• DS9 S04E08 Little Green Men
• DS9 S02E20 The Maquis, Part I
• VOY S02E16 Meld
• TNG S04E24 The Mind’s Eye
• TOS S02E04 Mirror, Mirror
• VOY S04E12 Mortal Coil
• TNG S03E22 The Most Toys
• TOS S01E04 The Naked Time
• VOY S05E01 Night
• TNG S04E19 The Nth Degree
• TNG S07E12 The Pegasus
• TNG S07E24 Preemptive Strike
• VOY S04E16 Prey
• ENT S03E13 Proving Ground
• TNG S02E16 Q Who
• ENT S02E23 Regeneration
• TNG S04E05 Remember Me
• DS9 S06E02 Rocks and Shoals
• VOY S04E01 Scorpion, Part II
• TNG S06E24 Second Chances
• DS9 S03E05 Second Skin
• ENT S01E15 Shadows of P’Jem
• DS9 S05E02 The Ship
• DS9 S02E03 The Siege
• DS9 S07E08 The Siege of AR-558
• TAS S01E14 The Slaver Weapon
• DS9 S04E07 Starship Down
• VOY S06E02 Survival Instinct
• ENT S04E21 Terra Prime
• DS9 S05E19 Ties of Blood and Water
• TNG S06E25 Timescape
• DS9 S04E23 To the Death
• ENT S03E08 Twilight
• TOS S02E24 The Ultimate Computer
• ENT S04E13 United
• VOY S03E17 Unity
• ENT S01E22 Vox Sola
• DS9 S06E11 Waltz
• DS9 S07E25-26 What You Leave Behind
• DS9 S02E22 The Wire
• VOY S04E08 Year of Hell

• VOY S02E01 The 37’s
• TOS S03E23 All Our Yesterdays
• ENT S01E07 The Andorian Incident
• DS9 S05E01 Apocalypse Rising
• DS9 S02E13 Armageddon Game
• DS9 S05E09 The Ascent
• ENT S04E06 The Augments
• DS9 S07E15 Badda-Bing Badda-Bang
• VOY S06E03 Barge of the Dead
• TNG S01E09 The Battle
• DS9 S06E04 Behind the Lines
• TAS S01E01 Beyond the Farthest Star
• TNG S06E17 Birthright, Part II
• VOY S06E12 Blink of an Eye
• ENT S04E04 Borderland
• VOY S05E12 Bride of Chaotica!
• TNG S04E03 Brothers
• TOS S02E22 By Any Other Name
• DS9 S05E26 Call to Arms
• TNG S03E19 Captain’s Holiday
• ENT S02E02 Carbon Creek
• VOY S06E19 Child’s Play
• DS9 S07E14 Chimera
• DS9 S02E02 The Circle
• ENT S01E11 Cold Front
• DS9 S04E13 Crossfire
• TOS S01E09 Dagger of the Mind
• TNG S05E02 Darmok
• TNG S04E11 Data’s Day
• DS9 S03E09 Defiant
• TNG S03E13 Déjà Q
• DS9 S03E21 The Die is Cast
• VOY S02E17 Dreadnought
• VOY S05E02 Drone
• TNG S02E03 Elementary, Dear Data
• TNG S03E07 The Enemy
• TOS S01E05 The Enemy Within
• TNG S03E02 The Ensigns of Command
• TOS S03E02 The Enterprise Incident
• DS9 S07E23 Extreme Measures
• ENT S01E23 Fallen Hero
• DS9 S03E23 Family Business
• DS9 S06E05 Favor the Bold
• TNG S06E08 A Fistful of Datas
• VOY S03E02 Flashback
• VOY S07E09 Flesh and Blood
• DS9 S04E22 For the Cause
• VOY S07E21 Friendship One
• VOY S03E09 Future’s End, Part II
• TOS S01E16 The Galileo Seven
• TNG S07E04 Gambit, Part I
• VOY S05E13 Gravity
• DS9 S03E14 Heart of Stone
• TNG S05E11 Hero Worship
• TNG S03E21 Hollow Pursuits
• TNG S01E18 Home Soil
• DS9 S02E01 The Homecoming
• DS9 S04E11 Homefront
• TAS S02E05 How Sharper Than a Serpent’s Tooth
• TNG S04E18 Identity Crisis
• VOY S07E02 Imperfection
• ENT S04E18 In a Mirror, Darkly
• DS9 S04E05 Indiscretion
• TAS S01E07 The Infinite Vulcan
• DS9 S06E18 Inquisition
• VOY S07E06 Inside Man
• DS9 S07E16 Inter Arma Enim Silent Leges
• DS9 S07E10 It’s Only a Paper Moon
• TOS S02E10 Journey to Babel
• ENT S02E19 Judgment
• ENT S04E09 Kir’Shara
• VOY S01E16 Learning Curve
• DS9 S05E03 Looking for par’Mach in All the Wrong Places
• TNG S07E15 Lower Decks
• VOY S03E12 Macrocosm
• TAS S01E08 The Magicks of Megas-tu
• TOS S01E01 The Man Trap
• VOY S02E11 Maneuvers
• DS9 S02E21 The Maquis, Part II
• TNG S02E08 A Matter of Honor
• VOY S06E14 Memorial
• VOY S04E14 Message in a Bottle
• ENT S02E03 Minefield
• DS9 S02E08 Necessary Evil
• TNG S05E10 New Ground
• TNG S05E24 The Next Phase
• ENT S03E09 North Star
• DS9 S05E04 …Nor the Battle to the Strong
• ENT S04E11 Observer Effect
• TOS S02E13 Obsession
• VOY S06E08 One Small Step
• DS9 S04E12 Paradise Lost
• DS9 S03E11 Past Tense, Part I
• DS9 S02E18 Profit and Loss
• VOY S04E06 The Raven
• DS9 S04E06 Rejoined
• VOY S05E24 Relativity
• TOS S01E21 The Return of the Archons
• DS9 S04E14 Return to Grace
• TOS S02E20 Return to Tomorrow
• VOY S04E05 Revulsion
• TNG S06E05 Schisms
• VOY S03E26 Scorpion
• DS9 S03E01 The Search, Part I
• DS9 S07E02 Shadows and Symbols
• VOY S07E11 Shattered
• ENT S03E07 The Shipment
• TNG S05E04 Silicon Avatar
• ENT S03E10 Similitude
• ENT S01E14 Sleeping Dogs
• DS9 S05E21 Soldiers of the Empire
• ENT S03E14 Stratagem
• VOY S03E04 The Swarm
• TOS S01E23 A Taste of Armageddon
• DS9 S06E26 Tears of the Prophets
• DS9 S05E08 Things Past
• VOY S05E20 Think Tank
• TOS S03E09 The Tholian Web
• DS9 S06E01 A Time to Stand
• VOY S05E06 Timeless
• TNG S05E26 Time’s Arrow
• VOY S06E04 Tinker, Tenor, Doctor, Spy
• TOS S01E19 Tomorrow Is Yesterday
• DS9 S07E06 Treachery, Faith, and the Great River
• DS9 S02E25 Tribunal
• TOS S02E15 The Trouble With Tribbles
• TOS MOS06 The Undiscovered Country
• TNG S05E07 Unification I
• VOY S06E26 Unimatrix Zero
• TOS MOS04 The Voyage Home
• TNG S01E06 Where No One Has Gone Before
• TNG S03E04 Who Watches the Watchers
• VOY S07E16 Workforce
• VOY S03E25 Worst Case Scenario
• TNG S04E12 The Wounded
• VOY S04E09 Year of Hell, Part II

• DS9 S03E06 The Abandoned
• ENT S04E14 The Aenar
• TAS S02E04 Albatross
• TNG S03E18 Allegiance
• TNG S01E21 The Arsenal of Freedom
• VOY S06E18 Ashes to Ashes
• DS9 S05E05 The Assignment
• TNG S07E08 Attached
• ENT S04E08 Awakening
• ENT S04E12 Babel One
• VOY S02E26 Basics, Part I
• VOY S03E21 Before and After
• DS9 S05E23 Blaze of Glory
• VOY S05E14 Bliss
• TNG S03E05 The Bonding
• DS9 S04E26 Broken Link
• DS9 S01E06 Captive Pursuit
• ENT S02E12 The Catwalk
• DS9 S06E16 Change of Heart
• TOS S02E03 The Changeling
• DS9 S07E20 The Changing Face of Evil
• TNG S04E14 Clues
• VOY S03E15 Coda
• VOY S04E11 Concerning Flight
• TNG S02E11 Contagion
• ENT S03E23 Countdown
• VOY S05E10 Counterpoint
• DS9 S07E09 Covenant
• TNG S01E13 Datalore
• DS9 S01E08 Dax
• TOS S03E07 Day of the Dove
• ENT S02E04 Dead Stop
• VOY S02E21 Deadlock
• ENT S01E13 Dear Doctor
• ENT S04E20 Demons
• ENT S01E24 Desert Crossing
• DS9 S03E15 Destiny
• TNG S05E05 Disaster
• VOY S03E24 Displaced
• DS9 S05E16 Doctor Bashir, I Presume?
• VOY S05E26 Equinox
• TOS S01E26 Errand of Mercy
• TNG S03E01 Evolution
• VOY S01E07 Eye of the Needle
• DS9 S03E25 Facets
• ENT S02E24 First Flight
• ENT S01E10 Fortunate Son
• ENT S02E16 Future Tense
• VOY S03E08 Future’s End, Part I
• VOY S06E20 Good Shepherd
• VOY S06E25 The Haunting of Deck Twelve
• TNG S01E20 Heart of Glory
• ENT S04E03 Home
• TNG S07E13 Homeward
• TNG S03E11 The Hunted
• DS9 S07E01 Image in the Sand
• DS9 S03E20 Improbable Cause
• DS9 S01E20 In the Hands of the Prophets
• DS9 S02E04 Invasive Procedures
• VOY S01E15 Jetrel
• TNG S06E19 Lessons
• DS9 S03E13 Life Support
• VOY S06E21 Live Fast and Prosper
• VOY S04E23 Living Witness
• TNG S01E07 Lonely Among Us
• TNG S04E10 The Loss
• TNG S05E09 A Matter of Time
• TNG S03E24 Ménage à Troi
• TOS S02E09 Metamorphosis
• TOS S01E08 Miri
• TOS S01E06 Mudd’s Women
• DS9 S01E11 The Nagus
• TNG S01E03 The Naked Now
• TNG S01E26 The Neutral Zone
• TNG S04E17 Night Terrors
• VOY S04E21 The Omega Directive
• TAS S01E03 One of Our Planets is Missing
• TOS S01E29 Operation: Annihilate!
• TOS S03E03 The Paradise Syndrome
• VOY S02E07 Parturition
• DS9 S03E12 Past Tense, Part II
• VOY S06E10 Pathfinder
• TNG S02E21 Peak Performance
• TOS S02E17 A Piece of the Action
• TAS S02E01 The Pirates of Orion
• DS9 S02E17 Playing God
• TNG S05E15 Power Play
• VOY S01E10 Prime Factors
• DS9 S01E15 Progress
• VOY S03E11 The Q and the Grey
• VOY S07E19 Q2
• VOY S04E10 Random Thoughts
• TNG S06E02 Realm of Fear
• DS9 S06E21 The Reckoning
• TNG S05E01 Redemption II
• VOY S03E06 Remember
• VOY S07E24 Renaissance Man
• VOY S07E04 Repression
• VOY S02E12 Resistance
• TNG S04E07 Reunion
• VOY S06E06 Riddles
• VOY S03E19 Rise
• DS9 S04E18 Rules of Engagement
• TOS MOS03 The Search for Spock
• DS9 S03E02 The Search, Part II
• DS9 S02E09 Second Sight
• ENT S02E07 The Seventh
• DS9 S02E16 Shadowplay
• ENT S02E01 Shockwave, Part II
• TNG S03E17 Sins of the Father
• DS9 S06E25 The Sound of Her Voice
• DS9 S06E09 Statistical Probabilities
• ENT S02E14 Stigma
• TAS S01E06 The Survivor
• DS9 S07E22 Tacking Into the Wind
• DS9 S07E04 Take Me Out to the Holosuite
• ENT S01E06 Terra Nova
• TAS S01E11 The Terratin Incident
• ENT S04E22 These Are the Voyages…
• DS9 S07E18 ’Til Death Do Us Part
• TNG S07E16 Thine Own Self
• DS9 S03E19 Through the Looking Glass
• VOY S01E04 Time and Again
• TNG S02E13 Time Squared
• TNG S06E01 Time’s Arrow, Part II
• TNG S03E20 Tin Man
• TNG S06E06 True Q
• VOY S02E24 Tuvix
• VOY S07E01 Unimatrix Zero, Part II
• DS9 S01E12 Vortex
• VOY S04E13 Waking Moments
• DS9 S07E21 When It Rains…
• TOS S01E03 Where No Man Has Gone Before
• DS9 S02E14 Whispers
• TOS S03E14 Whom Gods Destroy
• TOS S03E11 Wink of an Eye
• VOY S07E17 Workforce, Part II
• TAS S01E02 Yesteryear
• ENT S03E24 Zero Hour

• TNG S01E15 11001001
• DS9 S04E17 Accession
• DS9 S07E03 Afterimage
• DS9 S02E12 The Alternate
• ENT S03E02 Anomaly
• DS9 S01E05 Babel
• VOY S03E01 Basics, Part II
• DS9 S05E12 The Begotten
• TAS S02E02 Bem
• VOY S03E16 Blood Fever
• TNG S03E06 Booby Trap
• ENT S02E21 The Breach
• TOS S02E25 Bread and Circuses
• ENT S01E01-02 Broken Bow
• ENT S03E11 Carpenter Street
• VOY S01E13 Cathexis
• ENT S02E15 Cease Fire
• TOS S01E02 Charlie X
• ENT S01E09 Civilization
• TOS S03E21 The Cloud Minders
• VOY S02E10 Cold Fire
• DS9 S02E24 The Collaborator
• VOY S06E16 Collective
• ENT S02E08 The Communicator
• TNG S01E25 Conspiracy
• ENT S03E22 The Council
• TOS S01E20 Court Martial
• ENT S04E10 Daedalus
• TNG S02E10 The Dauphin
• ENT S02E13 Dawn
• TOS S02E12 The Deadly Years
• VOY S02E18 Death Wish
• ENT S01E21 Detained
• DS9 S07E24 The Dogs of War
• VOY S02E04 Elogium
• TNG S07E23 Emergence
• DS9 S01E01-2 Emissary
• TNG S01E01-2 Encounter at Farpoint
• DS9 S03E04 Equilibrium
• VOY S06E01 Equinox, Part II
• TNG S05E16 Ethics
• ENT S02E26 The Expanse
• DS9 S03E22 Explorers
• TAS S01E15 The Eye of the Beholder
• VOY S01E14 Faces
• DS9 S07E13 Field of Fire
• TNG S04E09 Final Mission
• ENT S04E07 The Forge
• DS9 S01E17 The Forsaken
• TNG S04E16 Galaxy’s Child
• TNG  MNG01 Generations
• TNG S03E12 The High Ground
• VOY S07E23 Homestead
• VOY S04E15 Hunters
• TNG S07E10 Inheritance
• TNG MNG03 Insurrection
• TNG S01E08 Justice
• ENT S02E06 Marauders
• TNG S07E17 Masks
• TNG S03E14 A Matter of Perspective
• TOS S01E11 The Menagerie, Part I
• TOS S01E12 The Menagerie, Part II
• TOS MOS01 The Motion Picture
• DS9 S07E07 Once More Unto the Breach
• DS9 S06E14 One Little Ship
• DS9 S02E15 Paradise
• VOY S01E03 Parallax
• TNG S07E11 Parallels
• DS9 S01E03 Past Prologue
• DS9 S07E17 Penumbra
• TNG S06E09 The Quality of Life
• DS9 S04E24 The Quickening
• DS9 S05E10 Rapture
• TNG S06E07 Rascals
• TNG S04E26 Redemption
• TNG S06E23 Rightful Heir
• DS9 S02E07 Rules of Acquisition
• DS9 S04E20 Shattered Mirror
• TOS S01E15 Shore Leave
• ENT S01E16 Shuttlepod One
• DS9 S06E03 Sons and Daughters
• TOS S03E06 Spectre of the Gun
• TOS S01E17 The Squire of Gothos
• VOY S01E11 State of Flux
• TNG S06E22 Suspicions
• TOS S03E17 That Which Survives
• DS9 S06E24 Time’s Orphan
• TOS S03E24 Turnabout Intruder
• DS9 S06E22 Valiant
• VOY S07E15 The Void
• VOY S06E09 The Voyager Conspiracy
• VOY S03E10 Warlord
• TOS S03E20 The Way to Eden
• DS9 S06E17 Wrongs Darker Than Death or Night

• DS9 S04E16 Bar Association
• TNG S01E12 The Big Goodbye
• DS9 S02E19 Blood Oath
• TNG S07E22 Bloodlines
• ENT S01E08 Breaking the Ice
• DS9 S05E18 Business as Usual
• TNG S06E20 The Chase
• TOS S01E13 The Conscience of the King
• TNG S05E20 Cost of Living
• TAS S02E06 The Counter-Clock Incident
• VOY S07E05 Critical Care
• ENT S02E18 The Crossing
• DS9 S05E11 The Darkness and the Light
• VOY S03E23 Distant Origin
• ENT S03E16 Doctor’s Orders
• DS9 S01E18 Dramatis Personae
• VOY S07E03 Drive
• TNG S04E21 The Drumhead
• TOS S03E12 The Empath
• ENT S03E06 Exile
• TNG S05E19 The First Duty
• TOS S02E11 Friday’s Child
• VOY S06E23 Fury
• ENT S03E17 Hatchery
• VOY S01E12 Heroes and Demons
• VOY S07E18 Human Error
• TNG S02E14 The Icarus Factor
• VOY S02E02 Initiations
• VOY S02E22 Innocence
• TNG S07E03 Interface
• VOY S02E20 Investigations
• TAS S01E16 The Jihad
• VOY S05E21 Juggernaut
• TNG S01E05 The Last Outpost
• TNG S04E06 Legacy
• TNG S07E02 Liaisons
• DS9 S01E04 A Man Alone
• TOS S03E16 The Mark of Gideon
• DS9 S02E06 Melora
• TAS S01E05 More Tribbles, More Troubles
• VOY S04E04 Nemesis
• VOY S05E08 Nothing Human
• ENT S01E20 Oasis
• TNG S03E16 The Offspring
• TNG S05E17 The Outcast
• VOY S02E08 Persistence of Vision
• VOY S02E03 Projections
• DS9 S03E16 Prophet Motive
• VOY S02E13 Prototype
• ENT S01E18 Rogue Planet
• DS9 S02E10 Sanctuary
• TNG S02E06 The Schizoid Man
• VOY S04E07 Scientific Method
• DS9 S03E24 Shakaar
• ENT S01E26 Shockwave
• DS9 S05E17 A Simple Investigation
• DS9 S04E15 Sons of Mogh
• DS9 S07E19 Strange Bedfellows
• TNG S04E04 Suddenly Human
• TNG S03E03 The Survivors
• DS9 S04E09 The Sword of Kahless
• DS9 S03E17 Visionary
• TOS S01E07 What Are Little Girls Made Of?
• TOS S02E02 Who Mourns for Adonais?
• DS9 S06E07 You are Cordially Invited…

• VOY S05E23 11:59
• TOS S01E27 The Alternative Factor
• TAS S01E13 The Ambergris Element
• TNG S06E13 Aquiel
• DS9 S01E13 Battle Lines
• DS9 S04E25 Body Parts
• ENT S02E17 Canamar
• VOY S01E01-2 Caretaker
• TNG S02E01 The Child
• DS9 S07E05 Chrysalis
• VOY S03E03 The Chute
• VOY S01E06 The Cloud
• ENT S02E22 Cogenitor
• TNG S01E19 Coming of Age
• TNG S07E07 Dark Page
• VOY S03E18 Darkling
• TNG S04E13 Devil’s Due
• VOY S05E17 The Disease
• DS9 S03E18 Distant Voices
• VOY S06E07 Dragon’s Teeth
• ENT S03E21 E²
• TOS S03E13 Elaan of Troyius
• VOY S01E09 Emanations
• VOY S05E03 Extreme Risk
• TNG S07E18 Eye of the Beholder
• VOY S03E13 Fair Trade
• VOY S03E05 False Profits
• DS9 S05E20 Ferengi Love Songs
• ENT S01E03 Fight or Flight
• TOS MOS05 The Final Frontier
• TNG S07E21 Firstborn
• TOS S03E08 For the World Is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky
• TNG S05E06 The Game
• TOS S02E16 The Gamesters of Triskelion
• TNG S01E11 Haven
• TNG S01E10 Hide and Q
• DS9 S06E20 His Way
• ENT S02E20 Horizon
• TNG S04E23 The Host
• TOS S02E08 I, Mudd
• TNG S05E22 Imaginary Friend
• DS9 S05E25 In the Cards
• TNG S04E25 In Theory
• TNG S07E20 Journey’s End
• DS9 S05E07 Let He Who Is Without Sin…
• TOS S03E18 The Lights of Zetar
• VOY S07E12 Lineage
• TAS S01E04 The Lorelei Signal
• TNG S02E05 Loud as a Whisper
• DS9 S06E10 The Magnificent Ferengi
• TNG S06E03 Man of the People
• TNG S05E13 The Masterpiece Society
• DS9 S04E21 The Muse
• VOY S06E22 Muse
• ENT S02E05 A Night In Sickbay
• VOY S07E08 Nightingale
• VOY S02E05 Non Sequitur
• TAS S01E09 Once Upon a Planet
• DS9 S01E09 The Passenger
• TOS S02E21 Patterns of Force
• TNG S02E15 Pen Pals
• TNG S05E21 The Perfect Mate
• VOY S01E05 Phage
• TNG S07E06 Phantasms
• TOS S03E10 Plato’s Stepchildren
• TNG S03E08 The Price
• TOS S02E19 A Private Little War
• VOY S07E14 Prophecy
• DS9 S01E07 Q-Less
• TNG S04E20 Qpid
• VOY S02E25 Resolutions
• DS9 S06E08 Resurrection
• TNG S02E12 The Royale
• VOY S03E07 Sacred Ground
• TNG S02E17 Samaritan Snare
• TOS S03E22 The Savage Curtain
• ENT S02E09 Singularity
• VOY S05E22 Someone to Watch Over Me
• ENT S04E01 Storm Front
• TNG S01E22 Symbiosis
• VOY S05E09 Thirty Days
• VOY S02E15 Threshold
• TAS S01E12 The Time Trap
• TNG S01E16 Too Short a Season
• TNG S03E25 Transfigurations
• VOY S02E06 Twisted
• ENT S01E25 Two Days and Two Nights
• ENT S01E05 Unexpected
• VOY S04E22 Unforgettable
• TNG S02E07 Unnatural Selection
• TNG S03E09 The Vengeance Factor
• VOY S06E13 Virtuoso
• VOY S04E20 Vis à Vis
• VOY S05E25 Warhead
• TNG S01E17 When the Bough Breaks
• TNG S02E02 Where Silence Has Lease
• DS9 S06E12 Who Mourns for Morn?
• ENT S03E01 The Xindi

• ENT S01E19 Acquisition
• ENT S04E15 Affliction
• VOY S06E05 Alice
• VOY S02E14 Alliances
• TOS S03E04 And the Children Shall Lead
• TNG S01E14 Angel One
• TOS S02E05 The Apple
• ENT S02E25 Bounty
• ENT S04E16 Divergence
• VOY S06E11 Fair Haven
• TNG S07E09 Force of Nature
• TNG S07E19 Genesis
• ENT S03E15 Harbinger
• DS9 S06E15 Honor Among Thieves
• DS9 S01E16 If Wishes Were Horses
• TNG S02E19 Manhunt
• VOY S07E22 Natural Law
• TNG MNG04 Nemesis
• TOS S02E23 The Omega Glory
• VOY S05E05 Once Upon a Time
• TNG S02E04 The Outrageous Okona
• DS9 S07E11 Prodigal Daughter
• TOS S03E19 Requiem for Methuselah
• DS9 S02E11 Rivals
• ENT S01E12 Silent Enemy
• TNG S01E23 Skin of Evil
• ENT S04E02 Storm Front, Part II
• DS9 S01E14 The Storyteller
• VOY S02E23 The Thaw
• VOY S06E15 Tsunkatse
• TNG S05E12 Violations
• TOS S02E14 Wolf in the Fold

• VOY S03E14 Alter Ego
• VOY S07E20 Author, Author
• ENT S04E17 Bound
• TOS S02E07 Catspaw
• TNG S01E04 Code of Honor
• VOY S04E24 Demon
• DS9 S07E12 The Emperor’s New Cloak
• VOY S01E08 Ex Post Facto
• ENT S03E03 Extinction
• DS9 S03E10 Fascination
• VOY S03E20 Favorite Son
• VOY S05E19 The Fight
• ENT S01E17 Fusion
• TOS S03E15 Let That Be Your Last Battlefield
• VOY S02E19 Lifesigns
• DS9 S03E08 Meridian
• DS9 S01E10 Move Along Home
• TAS S01E10 Mudd’s Passion
• TAS S02E03 The Practical Joker
• DS9 S06E23 Profit and Lace
• ENT S03E04 Rajiin
• VOY S03E22 Real Life
• VOY S07E13 Repentance
• VOY S04E17 Retrospect
• VOY S06E17 Spirit Folk
• ENT S01E04 Strange New World
• TNG S07E14 Sub Rosa
• VOY S02E09 Tattoo
• TNG S02E18 Up the Long Ladder
• ENT S02E10 Vanishing Point
• TNG S01E24 We’ll Always Have Paris

• ENT S02E11 Precious Cargo
• TOS S03E01 Spock’s Brain

No rating

• TOS S02E26 Assignment: Earth
• TNG S02E22 Shades of Gray

ENT S04E18 In a Mirror, Darkly (). As noted, this is the show which is, or was supposed to, get us from First Contact to The Cage. As such, opening with clips of the Vulcans landing and greeting Zefram Cochrane – a mix of movie footage and newly shot material – makes sense. But lo! This time, Cochrane shoots the Vulcan and the humans nick his ship, which takes us into titles glorifying war and weaponry (and sparing us “Faith of the Heart”). Every previous Mirror Universe story (which have included some five star bangers) has shown us the darker side of the Federation from the point of view of our usual goody-two-shoes characters. This time we’re just here.

Vaughan Armstrong is back as Captain Forrest, with Archer as his ambitious XO and the stage is set for a ton of malicious, moustache twirling, dark hair dye, navel-baring fun. That begins, alas, with Hoshi sexualised and disempowered, reduced to nothing more than Forrest’s floozy. Mirror Universe Kira was a bad ass. Mirror Universe Hoshi is just a piece of ass. And T’Pol just looks ridiculous in a Starfleet uniform cut under the boobs and down past the hipbone.

Mirror Universe Archer is considerably more interesting than his familiar Big Boy Scout incarnation. His seemingly self-appointed secret mission involves a trip into Tholian space, and fans of TOS should recognise that name. Having taken care of Forrest, Archer begins his rule by assembling a team of people whose names he knows. T’Pol becomes his first officer, Travis becomes his personal bodyguard, Hoshi puts on a uniform (or most of one). Once again, torture is shown to be a successful method of interrogation, which all available evidence indicates that it absolutely isn’t, but everything here is so amoral and ridiculous that it’s hard to take even that too seriously.

ENT S04E19 In a Mirror, Darkly, Part II (). The ship from the – shall we call it Cis-Universe? – is not just shorn of its goatee beard, it’s from Kirk’s time, which means we get even more fun times, as our regular characters get to run around on a recreated 1960s Enterprise set (technically, this is the Defiant). The commitment to the bit is what really sells this, with another dose of that Ain’t War Grand title sequence, the ruthlessness of the Terran Empire forces and the destruction of the NX-01. Once his stolen motor is under their control, Archer has no problem wiping out the Tholians and any web which they might care to erect.

And the nostalgia continues with Archer wearing Kirk’s wraparound green jersey (followed by everyone else getting in on the TOS-play fun), learning about the Federation and drinking Romulan ale. There’s a bellicose Gorn on the loose and we even hear Majel Barrett’s computer voice again. And while I’m not the least bit sold on evil Hoshi as a character, it’s a joy to see Linda Park allowed to spread her wings for the first time since… well ever. Anthony Montgomery only gets to point a gun and glower, of course.

It’s hard to know who to root for, as power-crazed Archer tries to return to Earth at the command of the overpowered NCC-1764, planning on making himself God Emperor King, only to have the Tholians start picking off members of the crew. But again, that’s why these alternate universe stories are so enjoyable: everything is up for grabs. If I was tempted not to give this one five stars, that reticence evaporated when Scott Bakula lolled Kirk-like in the captain’s chair. Bravo.

ENT S04E20 Demons (). RoboCop, in a very contemporary looking suit and tie, examines a Vulcan child in an incubator, which is the latest in a series of nothingburger teasers. Enterprise gotta Enterprise I suppose (the old theme is back, too, of course). But it seems as if such costumes are just what the well-dressed psychopath is wearing in 2155. The child is the timey-wimey offspring of Trip and T’Pol and somehow its presence is going to threaten the formation of the Federation.

Prime Minister Will Ferrell knows that xenophobia is still rife on Earth, following the Xindi attacks and tries to tell Archer not to be so naive as to rely on something as silly as faith of the heart. Wise words. And after 95 episodes, it’s finally time for Travis to get a storyline which doesn’t involve his immediate family. His subplot, in which an incredibly foxy ex-girlfriend throws herself bodily at him, has nothing to do with the main plot of course, but it’s nice to see Anthony Montgomery doing something other than saying “Aye sir”. I don’t entirely trust this young reporter, and I certainly don’t appreciate the many minutes of screen time she occupies with her tedious goo-goo eyes. Without that, this episode has much to recommend it, but – as is often the case with part ones – this is all build-up and no pay-off.

The hidden Star Trek metaphor of Magellan-era exploration is briefly surfaced once more, where it is blithely assumed that “orbiting” is equivalent to “nearby” and that because the Moon orbits the Earth and Mars is the next planet out from the Sun, that the Moon and Mars must always be nearby. Alas, orbital dynamics are a bit more complicated than the relative positions of say, Spain and the Cape of Good Hope.

ENT S04E21 Terra Prime (). What’s particularly exciting about this is that although it looks like a thrilling race against time adventure, it’s really a battle for the hearts and minds of humanity. Have you ever heard anything more Star Trek? RoboCop makes a splendid villain, in the grand tradition of smooth-talking psychopaths who have spent years devising their evil plan and who will stop at nothing to pull it off. And he seems to believe his own poisonous rhetoric, which gives him the terrifying single-mindedness of a true zealot. It’s strong stuff. Thankfully his super-powerful death ray focused on Enterprise seems to pass straight through it with little effect.

Unconvinced by Will Ferrell’s plan to blow to hell the superpowerful comet-redirecting array next to the occupied Martian colony, Archer plans a stealthier infiltration mission. Meanwhile, Travis’s tedious girlfriend is so desperate to ensure that no-one onboard learns her identity that she is forced to reveal her identity to… wait, run that by me one more time… As ever, all of the plot dealing with Gannet Brooks (which is her actual character name and not a silly nickname I’ve given her) is incredibly boring and silly, but there’s much less of it this time, which is good as the rest of this is excellent. Tense, well-paced, and heartfelt, with very decent character stuff for Trip and T’Pol, and even a few crumbs for Malcolm and Hoshi.

And this doesn’t tie everything up with a bow either. Trip and T’Pol lose their child. The inhabitants of Earth won’t all decide overnight that aliens are their friends. And Archer still only knows the names of six of his crew. But we’ve got past the latest stone in the road, and sometimes that’s enough.

This is also – in almost all ways that make sense – the last episode of Enterprise, its slightly truncated episode orders for Seasons 3 and 4 reducing the total number to less than the 100 normally thought to be the minimum for a syndication deal. That seems like an unnecessary kick in the groin delivered by Paramount to the team which earned them so much money over the years. But Brannon Braga (who’s still hanging around) and Rick Berman nevertheless felt like they needed to say goodbye not just to this show but to the franchise they’d built which started back in 1987. So there’s one more instalment left over…

ENT S04E22 These Are the Voyages… (). It does look like an episode of Enterprise to begin with. It’s not even clear that considerable time is supposed to have passed since Terra Prime. But almost immediately, Riker freezes the program and strides off the Holodeck. Wow.

This kind of framing story isn’t brand new for the franchise. One thinks of Living Witness from Voyager, for example, or even In the Pale Moonlight. The recreation of the Enterprise D, barely two episodes after the recreation of (in all but name) the original Enterprise, is pretty faultless – as you might expect. And it effectively enables the last few seasons of the cancelled show to be summarised in forty minutes, finally getting us to the creation of the Federation.

What’s confounding is that for the most part, this is simply an episode of Enterprise, with the usual mix of fan servicing, thrilling escapes from death, old friends reunited and thin characterisation. Quite what we gain by having a 24th century director’s commentary over these scenes is very far from clear. Simply having Frakes and Sirtis hanging around doesn’t make this feel like the summation of the whole 18-year journey, any more than a “Six Years Later” caption would have done.

So, on the one hand, this doesn’t play like the extra episode of TNG which is its reputation. On the other hand, Riker and Troi add very little, except a vague buzz of nostalgia, but I do understand Braga and especially Berman’s desire – from a personal point of view if nothing else – to sum up the entire era. And I don’t buy the bitter comments to the effect that this one story retroactively turns the previous 97 episodes into Riker’s holodeck fantasy. That’s not how TV works.

I would say that all the talk of how irreplaceable Trip is rather gives the game away regarding his fate, except that it’s made absolutely explicit that he’s going to die very early on. Bumping him off seems like a pretty sour way to add a hit of extra emotion to proceedings, and his death seems pretty pointless in the context of the overall narrative. That’s a far bigger problem than making 20% of this instalment a mild ret-con of The Pegasus (a sort Rikercrantz and Guildentroi Are Dead). Really, if we’d been allowed to hear Archer’s much-vaunted speech, this would probably be better liked. But then again, maybe the speech we imagine is better than any speech Bakula could have given – and he gave us a version of it at the end of last week’s episode anyhow. So we go out with a mash-up of the opening monologue instead. I’ll take that.

On this occasion, Riker and Troi’s costumes are holographic, unlike all those scenes in Voyager and TNG where people summoned hastily back to the bridge turn up in unlikely garments.

Season 4 wrap-up

• Right, that’s it. That’s all she wrote. With UPN imploding, Enterprise is the victim of corporate mismanagement and quietly expires, echoing the fate of TOS as it is moved to a new timeslot and then cancelled on the pretext of low ratings, following which the franchise dies with it for countless years. There would be no more new Star Trek of any kind until the first JJ Abrams film in 2009 and no more Star Trek on television until 2017.
• And, of course, it’s cancelled just when it was getting interesting. The one trick which Rick Berman never seemed to master was getting consistently entertaining episodes in year one. There’s good stuff in Season 3, but the season arc storyline hampers the narrative as often as it helps, and the fact that only T’Pol and Phlox can be relied upon to show any interiority is a persistent problem. Season 4 is better and the two and three-parters help enormously. It’s amazing to think that this was primarily a budget consideration; with less money to spend on each show, new sets needed to be amortised over multiple episodes to spread the cost.
• That said, looking at the numbers, Season 4 comes in just a shade under Season 3, 3.32 compared to 3.37, but take out the dreadful Klingon Ridgegate two-parter and the ghastly Orion Slaver episode and things would look much healthier. Enterprise as a whole averages 3.09, virtually a dead heat with Voyager, but both some way behind everything except The Animated Series.
• Another reason why Season 4 doesn’t score more highly is that T’Pol is underserved for much of it. And it’s not like Hoshi and Travis finally get some meaty storylines, because they get ignored almost as much as they have been for the previous three years. It’s just that this becomes the Archer and Trip and The Shiny Guest Stars show. Come back Michael Piller (or Ira Steven Behr).
• For all that, I did have a good time with Enterprise, on the whole. It’s still Star Trek after all, and I’m immensely struck by the crestfallen and apologetic tone of the special features on all four seasons of the Blu-ray release. Maybe if it had run the approved seven seasons, then even if Star Trek had still gone off the air, the creators would be able to look back on it with more pride. As it is, the documentaries are just hours and hours of Brannon Braga saying sorry. It’s profoundly weird.
• Also profoundly weird – I’m out of Star Trek. I have no immediate plans to continue this exercise beyond 2005. I dislike the JJ Abrams films and there’s no opportunity to put any other series into any kind of context, given that the show which kicked off the next phase of the franchise, Discovery, is still running as of this writing. So, instead, as this mission has concluded as planned on Christmas Day 2023, I am going to open some presents, drink some champagne and consider what life looks like without Kirk, Spock, Picard, Data, Sisko, Kira, Janeway, Seven, Archer and T’Pol to keep me company any more.
• Thank you for reading. Live long and prosper.

ENT S04E12 Babel One (). The Andorians in general and Shran in particular are the hidden MVPs of this show. Between the off-brand Vulcans, the conveniently quarrelsome Xindi and the played-out Klingons, the “blue-skins”‘s blend of warlike aggression and compassionate nobility is absolutely fascinating. Less so is the “species which communicates via arguing” which ret-conning feels a little like writerly desperation at the crunch point of a long season. And in true TOS/TNG style, Enterprise is being used as a taxi service for this week’s crop of touchy ambassadors instead of continuing with its mission of exploration.

Doing sequels to TOS episodes is weird choice for a show set before any other Star Trek series, but less weird than bringing in TNG staples like Ferengi and Borg, and as Zagbars vs Zoobles stories go, this isn’t bad and it does help that we’ve seen both aliens before (although in the case of the Tellarites not for decades). But the concept of “the aliens who insult you to show respect” really doesn’t work when you’re trying to tell a story in which diplomatic relations break down, because the Tellarites sound exactly the same when Archer’s welcoming them on board as they do when they accuse Shran of trying to get them all killed. Somebody didn’t think this through. We’re also back in Voyager-land, where Enterprise is under attack and nearly destroyed – and then in the next scene, everything is running smoothly again, and they’re charging along at top speed. And we’re back in multi-part story land, tying up loose ends from TOS’s Balance of Terror. It’s a strong ending too, earning a last minute extra half-star.

After last week’s episode in which Hoshi got plenty of lines when she wasn’t in control of her own body, here we she gets a big scene shouting at Archer in which she was only pretending. I mean, I guess it’s progress but… “Vulcans are expert liars!” claims Shran, not without reason, but it’s not exactly what they’re known for in every other series. I don’t think injecting pure oxygen into those air tanks is going to go well for Malcolm and Trip. I can only assume that science consultant and co-writer of this episode Andre Bormanis turned two pages at once.

Last episode to air before Paramount announced that there would be no Season 5. The party’s over and all that’s left is the clearing up.

ENT S04E13 United (). So this is why Kirk’s crew had never seen a Romulan before, despite the Federation having fought a war with them – remote controlled ships. Neat. And it’s a great escalation for Trip and Malcolm whose last hope was getting to the bridge where presumably life support would be in full effect. Tracking down the hologram-disguised Romulan ships requires a huge fleet to create a sensor web, and thus Archer must assemble a coalition of squabbling species with Enterprise issuing the commands. It’s the kind of thing you’d expect a prequel series to have been doing from the beginning but it’s no less welcome for its late arrival.

This is quite a busy episode, but all the strands work well. Trip and Malcolm’s trial of traps inside the Romulan drone is tense and unpredictable; Archer’s grouchy diplomacy strikes a good balance between Bakula’s two chief modes of impatient headmaster and jovial baseball coach; Shran’s subplot with poor doomed Talas is genuinely affecting; and the big political plot has tremendous scope and impact. We could have used something for T’Pol to do, but that seems like quibbling when the overall quality is so high.

Archer’s dual with Shran isn’t set up with quite the seamless logic of Kirk’s famous battle with Spock but it’s a great way of making the bigger story personal and keeping the focus on our leading players, and not on the Zagbars and Zoobles. This doesn’t have the deep character work of the very best of Star Trek, but it’s otherwise pretty faultless, with a confidence which is extremely gratifying.

ENT S04E14 The Aenar (). Wrapping up many of the big plotlines last time gave a satisfying end to the previous episode but means we don’t carry much momentum into this one. The visit to the Andorian homeworld is worthwhile however, being a genuinely alien environment as well as just a change of scene. But it’s Shran who comes a cropper on the ice and not newcomer Archer. The slower pace creates a bit of room for some nice Trip/T’Pol scenes which is welcome, but it’s hard not to feel that this is just a bit dull, compared to part two which combined Thrilling Escapes From Death with an opportunity for Archer to build the Star Trek legend.

Slicing an antenna in half is enough to render Shran incapable of defending himself, thus ending the dual last week, but he happily goes on the mission with Archer, seemingly unaffected. Maybe that’s why he slips on the ice. He shrugs off being impaled through the thigh as well.

ENT S04E15 Affliction (). Columbia is setting sail and Trip is going with her to avoid having to see officially unmarried T’Pol every day (although he denies that’s the reason). I’m not sure this is the for the good of the show. T’Pol seems to have concluded her arc prematurely and while the stories in this season are far more engaging than before, T’Pol – who was such a highlight of episodes past – for the most part has just become Tuvok. She delivers exposition in a slightly sarcastic tone and lets other people have the big emotional journeys. If she and Trip had to deal with their complicated feelings for each other, I’d be more interested in both of them. Luckily he’s still popping up in her white cyclorama meditation dreamscapes. The new chief engineer is never introduced to us, or Archer. Do you know, I’m not altogether convinced that Trip’s never coming back.

Speaking of things I am and am not interested in, we’ve just had a three-part story in which the Romulans turned out to be pulling the strings – Romulans with a rather different make-up job than those who appeared in TOS. But nobody thought to mention this fact, because it’s clearly irrelevant. And yet, here we are with bumpy-foreheaded Klingons so concerned with some of them not having bumpy foreheads that they’ve kidnapped Dr Phlox and made him try and figure out what’s going on. That’s pretty much the definition of letting the foam latex tail wag the targ. I’m also pretty uninterested in whatever Malcolm is creeping around doing. Maybe I’d have looked upon this subplot with more generosity if I wasn’t so distracted throwing things at the TV screen as poor John Schuck has to dole out this pointless nonsense.

Far from embracing a glorious death, the Klingon in the opening scene protests “My death sentence was commuted!” It’s nearly as bizarre as those madly illogical Vulcans. Seth McFarlane is back for another brief appearance. In Phlox’s absence, another medical officer takes over. Archer doesn’t talk to her, because he doesn’t know her name.

ENT S04E16 Divergence (). Director David Barrett brings us out of the titles with a bonkers CGI whip-zoom through both Enterprise and Columbia to really hammer home just how thrilling this all is. It would love to be a huge exciting chase like the movie Speed, which is clearly where they got the idea of “if we go below Warp 5 we all die”. But it just feels like people in silly costumes standing around studios hanging on to ropes. None of it has any reality or verisimilitude, and it all just feels like busywork because the story of How the Klingons Lost Their Ridges turns out not be worth a movie’s worth of broadcast TV after all. It also seems like there should be someone on Enterprise who can do Trip’s job when he isn’t there. Didn’t they learn that lesson in Similitude?

Phlox’s method for determining the likely effect of various compounds appears to be akin to playing hypospray Russian Roulette. Apart from Malcolm, who is given a new personality in order to make this week’s plot work, characterisation has become something which only happens on other shows. This is all theatrical actors glowering meaningless exposition at each other while melodramatic music thunders away in the background. It’s what Star Trek looks like to people who don’t watch Star Trek. Only John Billingsley emerges with any dignity at all. Actually, Ada Maris isn’t bad as Captain Hernandez. Where’s her spin-off?

ENT S04E17 Bound (). We have a nascent Federation, so now let’s start building some Starbases. And who could wait to see the Orions again after the Augments trilogy? After all, this show’s always had great luck with slave girl stories. It will take Lower Decks to really make a good stab of the Orion Syndicate, because here we’re right back to trafficking scantily-clad young women like a science fiction version of The Benny Hill Show, complete with senior Starfleet officers watching the floor show with their eyes bugging out of their heads like the Tex Avery cartoon wolf. Travis too behaves as if he’s never seen a woman before when they come on board. Meanwhile, Trip is in a plot superposition of states, both with his love life and his professional life, neither in a relationship with T’Pol nor not, neither chief engineer on Enterprise, nor not. This had better be going somewhere, because at the moment it’s orbiting a story but not actually landing on it. The rest of this is just a The Naked Time yet again, but in bikinis. Yawn.