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Posted By: ZimNova Sep 11, 2003 - 11:13 am

I missed the second half as something came up but I did tape this episode. My first impression was we are seeing the same old/same old. T'Pol's much touted "new" costume was not what I expected. I was hoping she would dress like the rest of the crew or maybe wear those long flowing robes like the other Vulcans. Instead we see her dressed in different colored "catsuits". Oh well.
Good to see Daniel Dae Kim [Lt. Matherson from The Babylon Project: Crusade] guest starring in the recurring role of Corporal Chang.

I saw this review at TV Guide Online commenting on various new series premiere's.
"Hello, boobies. I heard the third season was going to have a new "action-oriented" style, but I didn't think they meant that sort of action. But someone needs to tell the producers that a nearly nekkid rubdown between the alien chick who looks like Hilary Swank in Spock ears and the cute human who looks like Greg Kinnear does not make up for 55 minutes of Scott Bakula frowning over the aliens who evaporated half of Earth. Aliens, mind you, who are about as scary as this dull mess is to its competition. And please, ditch that •••• theme song already!"
There was no by-line for this review.

The Numbers from MediaWeek.com
In series premiere news, UPN's Jake 2.0 got sampled with a fifth-place 4.2/6 at 9 p.m. -- just 5 percent below the season-opening episode of lead-in Enterprise (#4: 4.4/7) and 147 percent above a repeat of the WB's competing Angel (#6: 1.7/3). Comparably, Jake 2.0 came in 9 percent below the premiere of former time period occupant The Twilight Zone (4.6/7 on Sept. 18, 2002). As for Enterprise, the 4.4/7 was 10 percent below its year-ago season premiere (4.9/8 also on Sept. 18, 2002).

More later after I review my tape.

Posted By: Bmat Sep 11, 2003 - 11:52 am

I thought that it was better than the usual Enterprise fare, except for the nekky scene, which would have been better left out, IMO. A comment I heard from another viewer was that the show is obviously geared to young males. Occasional subtle sexual interest would be reasonable, but having ointments rubbed on T'Pol's body is getting a bit overdone.

I enjoyed the scene with the climb, it was fast=paced and exciting. Unlike previous episodes, the show kept my attention most of the time.

Posted By: ZimNova Sep 11, 2003 - 04:22 pm

I just rewatched *The Xindi* and can now offer some thoughts.

First off what I liked.
Archer was in command. No "Captaining by Committee". When in the new Tactical Command Center, which btw I though was a cool idea and following along the lines of EA battleships during B-5 is in the bowels of the ship away from the outer decks, he "lays the line" onto Reed without any doubt as to who's calling the shots and what the mission is (the teaser for next weeks episode makes him look even tougher).
While on the mining colony the set dressing was excellent. Dark, claustrophobic, dank & dirty just like, well, a mine not a soundstage.
The camera movements following the characters was confusing and added to the sense of chaos in the mine and along with a cast of extras moving about in the backgrounds was convincing.
The fight choreorgaphy was way better too. The phaser shots were edited much tighter lasting less than a second so those scenes looked real like a beamed weapon would.
The hand-to-hand fight between the female MACO [sp] trooper and the alien guard was first rate.
She handled herself quite well armed only with a batton. The entire team moved like a crack military unit would covering each other during their battle scenes. Nobody was standing around waiting to get shot this time. The action was fast & furious and the only fault was how they were able to identify the "friendlies" among the bad guys because Archer & Trip's uniforms were covered in dust so they all looked the same.

Many questions were left hanging. Was that destroyed planet the real Xindi homeworld or a "test" planet for the mysterious "weapon" they mentioned twice during the Xindi council meeting?
If it was the real Xindi homeworld where are they now? It was implied that Enterprise is headed off in the wrong direction from wherever they really are.
Chronological question: The Xindi attacked Earth because Earth destroys their planet 400 years in the future. T'Pol stated the planetary debris field was 120 years old. That's a difference of 520 years between the two events? Something don't add up here. I sure hope this question is not resolved by the Suliban messing with time, again.

Things I didn't like.
As mentioned above, T'Pol's costume is still a catsuit. Put a new coat of paint on a '81 Chevy and you still got an '81 Chevy. I was hoping for better.
Not enough of Daniel's character Corporal Chang. I didn't see him during the battle scenes on the planet?
While the story followed the arc developed last season it still held no surprises for me other than the Xandi miner being killed at the end. I was thinking he would last at least a couple of more episodes to add more suspense. The usual talking while climbing that shaft (to be fair, everybody uses that plot device of "dialogue during dangerous asscent" to save exposition time) used him up as a story tool because Archer now knows what we saw about the Xindi, well sort of as he ain't seen them yet. The escape at the last second was both predictable and boring.

Major complaints.
Those Alien Xindi. OK, they were better looking than the usual Humanoid alien type with different "bumps" but in this case, imho, they went overboard.
The "insect" Xindi could understand the "whale song" Xindi and the "werewolf" Xindi and the others could understand the former two???
Throw the baby out with the bathwater, oh, the tub too and why not some plumbing while you're at it!
I could believe Londo. I could believe G'Kar, Kosk, the Minbari, Drazi, hell even the bug criminal n'grath but these Xindi, sorry.

I'm reminded of the genius of the Henson creature shop during Farscape giving us "unique" but still believable aliens such as M'Lee, ro-NA, Raxil [all played by Ben's RL wife Fran Buller], Namtar, Natira, the Sheyangs, Charrid Blood Trackers, that bug-eyed Hangi [from *Stratch-n-Sniff], Scarrans or even Scorpius himself, the ultimate bad guy.
Trek is still far behind those other shows it would seem and needs more to work to get it right.

Then there's the T'Pol, Trip nude scene.
What's up with this??? We've been there/done that in season one in the de-com chamber. This was gratuitous to the max and served no purpose what-so-ever to character development or the story. It was there for one reason only, sex sells and this to me is a sure sign of a show desperate to do anything to get ratings. Shame on them.
If your wondering if I'm some kind of prude, that's not the case. Gigi Edgley did a nude scene with Anth on Farscape but that was an important part of the story arc as we later found out and I found nothing out of character with those scenes because Chiana often played the tralk.
I wonder how an otherwise fine actress in Jolene Blalock really feels about doing a degrading scene like that?
Small nit. The microphone the mine's boss was using to talk to T'Pol on Enterprise sure looked like a 40's radio mike to me. Covering it in cobwebs and dust did little to make it a "special" effect...LOL.
Overall I rate *The Xindi* a four. I was leaning towards a six until the gratuitous sex scene which spoiled Enterprise's third season premiere.

Posted By: Nomad Sep 15, 2003 - 11:35 am

Wow...You said a lot. So much so that I will need to re-wath the ep and maybe have some rebuttals.
On the whole...I really enjoyed the ep and especially the fight scenes.

Posted By: Aldan Sep 17, 2003 - 09:34 am

Hey, Nommy, did you have something stuck to your tongue when you typed that??

Posted By: Nomad Sep 17, 2003 - 09:57 am

yeth