Enterprise encounters a drifting Reptilian Xindi ship with a dead crew. But a hatchery is intact with dozens of young Xindi about to be born. Perhaps if the Enterprise can rescue them, it will help send the message that humans aren't savage threats? But Archer is irrationally consumed with this goal, influenced by an encounter in the nursery -- and soon, there's talk of mutiny. A conflict between the Starfleet crew and the MACO forces seems inevitable.
There's a particular kind of episode that most Star Trek series seem to do some variation on at some point. The captain isn't acting like themself, and the crew finds that potential mutiny is on the table. Usually, these episodes land in season one of a given Star Trek, at a time when people are still learning about the captain and no one is ready to state definitively that they're behaving strangely. But Enterprise has been effectively giving us a new captain in season three, in the form of a new, darker Archer who will go as far as he needs to to stop the Xindi. So this is as good a place as any to tell a story like this. The MACO angle is a good one to explore as well. The childish bickering between Reed and Major Hayes has been a snooze, but having effectively two crews on one ship is a ripe environment for a mutiny story.
But the recipe doesn't turn out as well as the ingredients. Archer's behavior is too extreme, relieving and confining his bridge officers left and right. The Archer of season three has been so extreme that his behavior must now be even more extreme to seem odd. Part of telling a 9/11 allegory, it seems, is to include a George W. Bush character, and since this was written mere years after 9/11 -- basically, in the immediate aftermath -- the prevailing perspective on W. is that he's "The Decider," the guy who makes decisions and then stands by them no matter how much evidence to change course is presented later. That's how they've been writing Archer in season three, and the writers seem to think they're making a heroic, wartime hero out of him in doing so.
OK, uh.... that was kind of a digression there. Bottom line: it's too easy for the audience to guess that Archer has been influenced by Xindi goo in this episode.
The ticking clock of reaching the Xindi weapon hangs over this side quest in an uncomfortably prominent way. For that matter, it's hard to imagine how they ever found this downed Xindi ship in the first place -- Enterprise should have been warping by too fast to even notice it. (And if it had been sending a distress signal, surely there would have been more concern expressed early on about another Xindi ship showing up at some point.)
The actual mutiny isn't enough of a conflict, either. All season, we've been told how much better the MACOs are supposed to be in battle situations. But they make a monumentally poor showing for themselves in not being able to hold the ship against adversaries they've actually trained with -- they should know their every move.
Other observations:
- Spacesuit costumes aren't cheap, but they still go to the trouble of giving the MACOs a distinctive one that doesn't look like the Starfleet versions.
- A dying-then-dead infant Reptilian Xindi is rendered first in CG, then becomes an interesting prop that John Billingsley has to sell.
- The characters are starting to be less hesitant to use the transporter.
"Hatchery" falls somewhat short of its interesting premise. Or perhaps it's just the familiarity of the mutiny premise that makes this take on it less compelling. Either way, I give the episode a B-.
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