Archer is called upon to mediate a territorial dispute between the Andorians and Vulcans. But the talks are to take place in a war zone, and when Archer's shuttlepod is shot down, it's unclear if he will reach the negotiations alive... or indeed, if all parties actually want him to.
To a great extent, this episode is all about the casting. You have Jeffrey Combs returning as Shran, Vaughn Armstrong appearing as Admiral Forrest, and Gary Graham back as Soval. To that, they add Star Trek veteran Christopher Shea as a new Andorian, and veritable Star Trek royalty in Suzie Plakson as Tarah. (Her appearances as K'Ehleyr on The Next Generation made a huge impact.)
If you're not into what all these returning actors are doing? Well, then there kind of isn't much to this episode for you. Star Trek has shown that it can put us in a war zone and make that believable, but then this episode isn't really trying to make a point about war or violence in the way Deep Space Nine did. This is a more workmanlike effort to just nudge along the ongoing Andorian storyline. It "does the job" narratively, yet we don't really care much that Shran is betrayed by a close advisor, that Soval is inching away from his xenophobia, or that Archer is gradually being respected by both sides.
Well... maybe we do care at least a little about that last thing. After a season-and-a-half of regular incompetence by the main characters of this series, they really need to start posting wins. Even if the idea of the show is that "these people haven't learned how to do all this Star Trek stuff yet," at some point they need to start showing that they are learning -- otherwise, they really are as dumb as you've been making them look all this time.
So it's much needed development for Archer that he can make logical arguments that Soval can't counter, has T'Pol truly "cheering" for him to succeed (as much as a Vulcan could), and has past relationships that here make him "the only one for the job." He's set up to do "in four hours" what previously took "eight years." And not only does he succeed, but both Shran and Soval (in their own ways) express their appreciation!
Other characters get nice moments as well. T'Pol is made to suffer veiled insults from Soval about how human she's become, but doesn't rise to the bait. Phlox informs us of his history as a medic in the Denobulan infantry, a minor detail that nevertheless adds dimension to his character. Trip takes command and this time shines, stalling armed conflict between Vulcan and Andorian ships by putting Enterprise between them (and bluffing almost as well as James T. Kirk would).
But the episode does feel a bit rushed to me. It builds to a climax that could easily be the cliffhanger for a two-part episode, but then quickly resolves everything. Part of the rushed resolution is the reveal of Tarah as a full-on, mustache-twirling villain. A lot of time is spent on action rather than character -- though the big brawl between her character and Archer works surprisingly better than I would have imagined. Suzie Plakson then delivers her "you meddling kids" monologue with verve, but it's still no substitute for giving Tarah a more detailed and personalized grievance for her opposition to peace with Vulcans.
Other observations:
- T'Pol likens the Andorians claiming a Vulcan planetoid to "Klingons setting up a colony on Pluto" -- an analogy that hit a little harder at the time the episode was made, when Pluto was still officially classified as a planet. Though if anything, the current state of this comparison seems more apt.
- A more fun exchange involving T'Pol is when Soval asks her why humans are so fixated on Vulcan ears. "I believe they're envious."
I would have liked more character development in this episode, but I'm really happy to see the Enterprise crew notch a win. I give "Cease Fire" a B.
No comments:
Post a Comment