Enterprise

I really think that needs to go. I quite like the song, but it just isn't Star Trek - and it sounds very out of place when you've got normal Star Trek type orchestral backing music either side of the titles. I also think it's about time the visuals were replaced with something more conventional. From watching Regeneration, it does now seem like they are much more at home with this interstellar exploration lark, I think the titles should reflect that, rather than persuing with the 'travel through the ages' theme. Since they are putting the Star Trek name back on the titles, they might aswell have gone the whole hog and go for a complete re-think on them. A version of the instrumental end theme (which I don't even think is 'Faith of The Heart') would work a lot better on the titles, and as I said, go for showing the Enterprise in the 22nd century, we don't need to see the 16th century wooden ships or the 20th century space shuttles any more.



Finding this all intriguing, I dl'd this episode, and viewing it purely on it's own merits it is indeed really good, and much better than the Enterprise I started watching and very quickly gave up on. And to be fair, TNG, DS9 and Voyager all had very shakey first seasons too (The TNG premiere 'Encounter at Farpoint' was particularly weak I felt - and a lot of the characterisation was way off, with Picard just coming across as being a pompous annoying prat more than anything else) which only look better now with the retrospective knowledge of what followed them. I imagine Enterprise is the same, and having watched this episode I probably will now give it a go.

But, I'm still not entirely satisfied that this fits in properly with previous storylines. I know of course it can be argued that because Picard went back in time and changed history everything that we had seen up to that point might now turn out differently (although personally I believe that this was a pre-destination paradox - that Picard was destined to go back in time and help the first warp flight), and so the episodes like 'Q Who?' effectively ceased to exist, but if they are going to use that argument they could now do ANYTHING with Enterprise, with no consideration at all given to the canon of previous episodes. And the general policy taken by most Star Trek chronologists is that everything except for the books (and sometimes TAS) is considered canon, and I can't see this changing now - having two parallel timelines running through Star Trek will make it needlessly complex.

So, assuming that Enterprise and all other Star Trek series exist in the same timeline, the 24th century response to The Borg is now litted with holes. Fair enough, in Enterprise they never knew that they were a species with a collective hive mind called The Borg who fly around in cubical ships assimilating everything they come across (and indeed this is the first time ever that The Borg sent a hail without saying 'We are The Borg' - which is a little too convenient). But, they were able to identify that this was a species of cybernetic lifeforms with the ability to implant cybernetic devices into other humanoids and thus bring those people infected into the fold. Aswell as that, they have pictures and first hand accounts of what these creatures look like. You'd assume this has been comprehensively logged - indeed since this is supposed to be interstellar exploration in it's infancy, you'd expect those logs to be even more comprehensive than they might be in the 23rd and 24th centuries.

Thus, when Picard encountered The Borg in TNG, whilst it was initially thought to be first contact (and would be for the rest of the episode), you'd think when making his logs, Picard would check to see if anything like this has happened before, and realise that 200 years ago the NX-01 crew encountered a species of aliens which look the same and act the same as those he'd just encountered and realised that they'd come across The Borg before. They'd also then learn of their ability to assimilate people aswell as technology (whilst now the hallmark of The Borg, it was presented as an entirely new concept in 'The Best of Both Worlds', and they'd also learn that it's possible to reverse the assimilation process if the victim is caught early enough (indeed I have to say that in general I thought the Enterprise team did a much better job at fighting The Borg than the future crews would 200 years in the future).

The final line at the end that the invasion had been postponed 'to the 24th century' was very clearly trying to tie in with 'The Best of Both Worlds' storyline.

As I said, I realise they may try to argue that history had been changed so this episode was fine, but I don't want to see that being done, or it could end up undermining 30 years worth of Star Trek lore, and I don't think that's acceptable.

What we had here was a wish to incorporate Star Trek's most popular aliens (I think The Borg have well and truly stolen the mantle from the Klingons now) into the newest series - which as I said is an inherant problem of a prequel series (aswell as the fact that the NX-01 looks way more high-tech than Kirk's Enterprise ever did) following 4 'future' series and a movie franchise - so much of what happened there was presented as being new, and now they want to include it in Enterprise before it was discovered and thus at the expense of continuity. I agree maybe it was time to leave the 24th century after spending 3 series and 4 movies there, but I think they should have done a TNG and gone into the future, not into the past.

Have just listened to the new theme tune and it sounds far too sitcom-y for my liking

Listen to the new theme here

What do the rest of you think?

James

WTF have they done? The original theme might be unsuitable, but it's saved a tiny bit by the fact that it's a nice song. This reworking sounds very cheesy and improvised, more like an earlier version of the original theme, rather than a successor of it. And is it an issue with the recording, or does the pitch really drop like that at 52 seconds? It's so obviously just been slowed down slightly rather than written like that, and sounds awful.

Oh, Dear, Oh dear i am affraid to say this could rank along my least favorite TV themes.
A step in the wrong direction, what happend to the great themes made by Jerry Goldsmith?

I know, Jerry Goldsmith's name doesn't appear anywhere in Enterprise's credits - which is probably why it's such a mess (I know the other prolific composer Dennis McCarthy is there, but he's nowhere near as Goldsmith imo). Possibly his best known creation, the theme from 'Star Trek: The Motion Picture', (co-credited with Alexander Courage because the introduction is lifted from the TOS theme) went on to become the theme tune to TNG, the theme tune to Star Trek V as well, and has been used on the credits reel of 5 out of the 10 Star Trek films. Anyone see this happening with the Enterprise theme? I think not.

Goldsmith's other main theme, that of Voyager was similarly excellent. He is arguably Star Trek's best composer.

I think my next favourite would be James Horner, who wrote the scores for Star Trek II and III - which were so great that almost 15 years later tracks from these films were being used on trailers (one features very prominently in the trailer for First Contact).

'Previously on "Archer"...'

Dear God, that is appalling. I'm sure that I read somewhere that they didn't bother re-recording Russell Watson, so this is a sped-up version of his original recording.
I'd say that the 52 sec thing is more likely to be an error in the recording. It sounds too bad even for Enterprise...

Anyone else think 'A Night in Sickbay' (shown a few weeks back on C4) may actually beat 'Spock's Brain' to win the coveted title of 'Worst Ever Episode of Any Form of Star Trek'?

Lord knows I've tried to enjoy this show, but it just doesn't work for me.

All the stories have been done before - but better.

What ever happened to the Deanna Riker and hubby's show about an exploration ship?

Hehe - I have to say, my reaction to the remixed theme was very much "oh my God" the first time I heard it. But, having said that, it has really grown on me during the third season.

I know it's out of place for the Trek empire, but it's about time they tried something new. To be honest, towards the end of Voyager the franchise was becoming very stale. I know the last ep of Voyager was utterly superb, but most of the last season stank very badly.

I'm glad they're trying something new - the whole thing was getting a bit tired - music included.

I like it.

Try it again - the third season is very good. I got bored part way through two, and missed most of the end of that season. I've picked it up again now, and very glad I did.

I probably will. Its difficult *not* to be forgiving to the franchise
.

And every one of the preceeding shows got better from Season 3. I suppose I just wanted to like this from the beginning that I was so disappointed.

I remember how awful I thought Next Gen was when it first started. "A bald captain?!" How wrong I was. I am *still* in love with Captain Pickard.

I think Voyager was stretched too far. Just because TNG ran to 7 seasons, there now seems to be some sort of unwritten rule that a Star Trek series must last that long, with both DS9 and Voyager running to the same length.

Voyager really should have been wrapped up at season 6 (I wouldn't have minded their getting back to earth being postponed to a movie - a Voyager movie following up Nemesis would have worked well, and then the next film after that could have used the Enterprise crew, who by then would have bedded in sufficiently to support a place in the movie series), the final season stretched it, and the fact that it was the only series left (which did feel very odd after almost 7 years of there being 2 Star Trek series in production at the same time) didn't help, and the overly long gap between Insurrection and Nemesis (Insurrection was in British cinemas in December 1998, Nemesis didn't make it here until January 2003 - never had a gap this long been left between films before) left Voyager as the sole face of in-production Star Trek, which I agree by then it had become too weak to support by itself (as I said, they should never have stretched it out to 7 seasons).

I do hope it also hasn't been decided in advance that Enterprise will also run to 7 seasons. If it needs to be concluded sooner that it should be, similarly if it has scope to run for longer than it shouldn't be halted before it's time.

Any ideas on the next film (I think as always they have decided that there WILL be a next film, they just haven't made it yet)? The TNG era is pretty much over now unless they try and get the remaining Enterprise crew of Picard, Worf (I think there was a scene shot but cut out where he officially rejoined the Enterprise as chief of security, with DS9 now over), Crusher and Geordi back together and do a new 'sort of TNG but without half the cast' type film - although personally I think that would be very weak.

DS9 was pretty much wrapped up in itself, but a 'how things are 5 years on' type film might have worked, except that Avery Brooks has since fallen out with Rick Berman who vowed never to let him near the Star Trek franchise again and a Sisko-less DS9 just wouldn't work.

The Voyager cast might all still be available, but the Voyager storyline itself is over and so there is no way you could do a self contained Voyager movie.

And the Enterprise cast might still be considered too new (especially as the series will likely still be in production) to appear in a film - with assention to the movie series traditionally being the place you go after your series has ended production.

What does that leave? For the first time ever, there isn't any immediately obvious cast to base a film around. Various rumours have gone flying about, ranging from them picking an ensemble cast with various cast members from TNG, DS9 and Voyager (since Sisko can't appear, and Janeway apparantly has taken a desk job, I'd imagine that means it would still be led by Patrick Stewart and at least substantially based on the Enterprise-E) appearing in a higgledy piggledy ensemble film, to them casting a completely new cast and basing it on a completely new ship/location, with the aim of establishing a separate Star Trek movie cast and setting that isn't tied to the TV series (perhaps going forward and more fully exploring the 29th century setting very briefly introduced in Voyager might work well?).

Anyone have any ideas/proposals on what should be done for the next film?

I think Nemesis was pretty much understood to be the last TNG film.

To be honest, I think they could do with a good long gap on the films - and leave it until after Enterprise has completed its run.

Perhaps they could use it to introduce a new cast set after Nemesis?