Star Trek: Enterprise 11/05/'03: "twilight" (1 Viewer)

[Rex Bachmann]

episode title: "Twilight"
episode: #60
original airdate: November 5, 2003
writer: Mike Sussman
director: Robert Duncan McNeill
synopsis: "A spatial distortion leaves Archer unable to form any new long-term memories. Years in the future, he wakes up one morning and is stunned to learn the outcome of the human-Xindi conflict."
Notes: "Sadly, Jerry Fleck (one of the series' First Assistant Directors) passed away during production. Production was halted for a day as a result. An earlier episode of the season ('Extinction') was dedicated to him."

Geez, haven't got a clue on this one. Maybe I'll take a little Memento of my time with it.

 

[Jack Briggs]

A spatial distortion? Groovy. Something that's never been done before. Next, they should try something really new -- such as an "energy field in space."

 

[Tony Whalen]

Memory loss hmmm???

Well at least he doesn't wake up on some primitive planet and scream "I...am... Arch-ock!"

 

[Francois Caron]

Lucky stiff! I would love to forget the entire series altogether!

 

[Nelson Au]

Not sure anyone here cares to read this, according to a story from Trekweb, AICN reports a highly positive review for Twilight. Perhaps there are many who have very little respect for AICN or don't feel it has good reviews, I don't know, I don't look there.

For not wanting to see any spoilers, I just scanned the Trekweb article. A lot of positive words were tossed around. But we'll see tonight, or at least I will.

Tony, don't you mean, "....kir.....Kirok"

Nelson

 

[John_V]

Just watched the episode. Although I don't like how they made the look into the future possible, I do like what they showed. Very cool to see the crew aged 12 years, and the events that transpired.

This episode makes the mission they're on more compelling, I think.

 

[Nelson Au]

A domestic Vulcan, Hoshi with a better hair style, Mayweather gets killed (poor Matweather, will he have anything to do?), Reed's goatee, great effects and look into the future; an engrossing look as Enterprise's take on Voyager's "Year of Hell". Or Battlestar Enterprise.

The reason's for how we go into the future seemed plausible, no time travel. And the bugs left in Archer's head seemed like a reasonable idea, if the anomolies had organic materials within them that where left in Archer's head. But then it seemed perhaps a reach for it to work that way. But I'll leave that kind of nitpicking for Rex.

On the whole, it was a fun romp. Enjoyed seeing how the crew changes roles, and how the Xindi went at killing off Humanity. Was genocide really necessary, is this alternate timeline an excuse to make the Xindi one dimensional killing machines bent on killing every human rather then just blowing up the Earth? Would T'Pol really have done what she did to damage the Enterprise so bad that it resulted in her delay to stop the weapon? This seemed like a bad dream and the events were never going to happen this way if Enterprise did fail to stop the Xindi weapon deployment. But it was a fun look at one possible future.

The only thing I disliked is the old "remove this temporal element and it goes back in time and fixes everything" trick as was done on "Year of Hell" and no one knows what happened. The way Archer asked T'Pol for the pillow and dimming the lights and comment that she'd make a great nurse almost seemd like a wink at the audience in this regard, was it? I suppose the way they set it up, it was a logical solution.

Fun episode and a great excuse to blow things up. And the subtext of a love story there with T'Pol and Archer had a nice little emotional tug to it.

Nelson

 

[PhilipG]

As Enterprise's attempt to blend All Good Things... and Yesterday's Enterprise it was a good episode - only lacking in the acting department. Unfortunately Scott Bakula is no Patrick Stewart. But I was engrossed all the way through. The "reset switch" trick was used, and for once I didn't mind. Now that's an achievement!

Meanwhile, Vulcan Slut Barbie is Archer's babe this week.

 

[Jason Seaver]

Arrrgh.

Don't get me wrong, I kind of enjoyed this episode, despite having enjoyed it more when it was called Memento, or "Yesterday's Enterprise"; it was better than "The Year Of Hell", though it had a lot of the same problems. (DS9 also did a self-erasing episode or two like this, but both "The Visitor" and "Children Of Time" made the act of returning to normal more tragic than the other examples)

There's a large group of fans that will love this episode, and not notice the hypocricy of complaining about "reset-button endings". After all, "dark" is good, right? And how much darker can you get than Earth being destroyed, every crew member being offed one by one, until they finally destroy themselves and erase their timeline just for the chance to succeed?

This time, it rubbed me the wrong way. OK, it's a given that I'm never, ever, ever going to like anything with "anomolies", but if you're going to do a cause-after-effect story like this, then the logic's got to be tighter. So how come when they zapped the parasites, it erased them from the previous scans, but everybody still remembered them and that they were on the scans? Then, contradictarily, you zap enough and suddenly people don't remember them? The assumption at the end also seems to be that Archer being in command will prevent an apocalyptic end to the series. Now, tell me honestly - who here thinks Archer is bright/competent enough to really make that much of a difference?

And, geez, suicide being presented as a problem's solution just seems wrong to me. I'm not a big "is this what has become of Gene Roddenberry's vision" guy, but that sort of fatalism isn't what I watch Trek for.

It's well-enough done, and Ms. Blalock gives an interesting performance that keeps it from being a completely hollow endeavor.

 

[Steve_Pannell]

This episode reminded me of "All Good Things..." mixed with "Future Imperfect". I thought it was pretty good overall.

There are a lot of things about Enterprise that are analyzed again and again because of their implausibility or whatever. I don't care about that as much as I do simple things like: Does the docking port on Enterprise have a neon WELCOME sign and a revolving door or what? This ship is easier to board than a Greyhound bus. Really bugs me.

On this episode, when I saw the shot of Enterprise leading the ragtag group of survivors the first thought that came to mind was "a shining planet known as... Earth Ceti-Alpha 5"

 

[CharlesD]

Wow. thats never been done before! I did enjoyed the episode, Enterprise is worth watching again. I agree with some of the nit-picks, but overall it worked well.

Whats is the alternative to remembering that the parasites were there? Them all standing around scratching their heads wondering why they had focused on a part of Archer's brain that did not have parasites? I supposed they could have done that and had several procedures with the same result before figuring out what was going on... that would be hard to fit in 40 minutes (or whatever) of TV and still have the rest of the story.

Yeah they do need to put a lock on their docking port. If they have to have aliens board the ship, make them cut their way through the hull!

 

[Tony Whalen]

I enjoyed this ep. Thought it was a fun romp! My ears perked right up when I heard they (the humans) had settled on Ceti Alpha V. Ceti Alpha V hmmm? Kept waiting for a Ceti Eel to show up in a tank or something.

Tony, don't you mean, "....kir.....Kirok"

Well Nelson, I WOULD have said that, if Archer's name was Kirk. Glad someone got it though.

 

[todd s]

I liked the nod to Star Trek 2:The Wrath of Khan. With the planet they settle..Ceti Alpha V.

I enjoyed the episode. I am also enjoying the different views of the ship we are getting now. Not just standard side fly-bys.

 

[John_V]

Does the docking port on Enterprise have a neon WELCOME sign and a revolving door or what? This ship is easier to board than a Greyhound bus.

Towards the end of the episode, didn't the Xindi beam themselves onto the Enterprise? I can't remember now...

 

[Steve_Pannell]

Towards the end of the episode, didn't the Xindi beam themselves onto the Enterprise? I can't remember now...

Yes, they did that time. But at one point one of the Xindi ships was docked with Enterprise.

 

[Qui-Gon John]

Talk about already been done, what about the preview. Seems a lot like the Gunfight at the OK Corral episode of TOS!

 

[TheLongshot]

It was OK for what it was, but there is too much, "Been here, done that" in this episode. The fiance kept yelling at the TV to get to the point as to why this is happening. (Kinda hard to buy when you know the Earth will survive).

I also agree that next week's episode is another retread. Not good.

Jason

 

[Hugh Jackes]

Ah, but when the Xindi beamed themselves, it was 12 years later and transporter technology had been perfected and exported to other cultures, right?

I've been suspicious of Enterprise. Even with all of the rip-offs (sorry, homages) of other Trek series' episodes, I too enjoyed last night's episode.

My kids used to watch Trek (Voyager) with me, and they enjoyed it (what can I say, they're kids). But they too had given up on this series. They are so dissillusioned that I couldn't get them to come enjoy this ep with me.

 

[Lee Jamilkowski]

Also nice to see the crew meet a Yridian. Although, with a new timeline created, the Yridians will remain presumed extinct until Rudy Ransom makes first contact with them in the 24th century. What a way to bend the rules. Of course, Smallville did similar tonight...

 

[CharlesD]

If you think about it they only really had to zap one cluster of parasites in Archer's brain to end the timeline. Say there were n discrete clusters in his head. They zap the nth one which then ceases to have ever exited, leaving n-1 clusters. SO when they first tried to zap the parasites on the revised timeline they would have targeted the (n-1)th cluster which would have similarly cease to have ever existed. The clusters would all then recursively cease to exist. Zapping one means they would have instead zapped another etc. until they were all never there.