ENT – Rajiin

Plot – Interestingly the ‘last time on Enterprise’ is absent which means if you are coming to this episode cold you might be in a lot of trouble. People mocked the ‘previously on Star Trek Deep Space Nine’ but it certainly caught the viewer up with all the pertinent facts before the hour played out. Why that was dropped here baffles me because I have so many questions. How are all the aliens gathered around the table and why are they creating a weapon to destroy the Earth? What is their relationship to one another? Why is Archer suffering from scabby lesions?

Performance – With the weight of the world literally on his shoulders, Bakula now has an excuse to play Archer as a funless Ambassador. Go and watch The Captains documentary on Netflix to see just what a delightful, unassuming man Bakula is. He is working overtime to make Archer as joyless as he can possibly be. What a shame because he could potentially be the most likable Captain of them all, rather than the least, which he turns out to be. At this stage of the season there is no real reason for Archer to be quite this gravel-faced, he is because that’s the approach the writers and directors seem to have taken with his characters following the terror attack on Earth. A terror attack occurs on DS9 in The Changing Face of Evil and Sisko treats it with the appropriate gravity it deserves but later in the episode he is still charming his wife with flowers and rings. ‘You seem very memorable to me’ is one of Archer’s chat up lines. No wonder he is so frustrated when he works the romance scene with that level of sophistication.

Production – What I really appreciate about the Xindi arc (which appears for one season is promptly dropped the next) is not only Enterprise’s dedication to serialisation but also the many varied types of aliens that appear in this year. It is push away from all the typical races in the franchise (I’m not saying focusing on them is a bad thing but it is a lot easier than creating new races). I particularly enjoyed the Insectoids and the Aquatics (who on earth has the imagination to think up these names?) because they were a chance to do something ambitious with CGI. Because their appearances are spread across the season it looks like some real effort has gone into creating them in detail. Does the cost of the CGI then get amortised across the year because this is love level (of the time) CGI compared to some of the cartoonish work elsewhere. The CGI of the settlement that Enterprise visits is a good example of this – it is striving in its outlook (a collection of barges on an ocean planet working together as a thriving market community) – but it does look a little unfinished.

The more I listen to it, the more ill judged the Russell Watson theme song becomes. Who were they trying to appeal to with this saccharine melody? Star Trek themes have always been either suggesting great excitement in travelling the stars (TOS, TNG) or the majesty of working out amongst so many worlds (DS9, VOY) but Enterprise goes for the ‘we’re having a relationship with the stars and it’s turning out okay’ approach as if the ship and the stars having been flirting with one another for many years and now they have finally settled into a comfortable and mature relationship. It suggests romance in conquering space, rather than exploration. Which might be okay (having that theme song will never be okay) if that was the tone that the show took but the first two seasons are mostly insipid and bureaucratic. There’s nothing amorous about this show at all to warrant being stuck with such an idealistic song.

Best moment – Thank God the Reptilians turn up at the climax to provide the show with a little action because if it had ended with Rajiin just scuttling off after getting the Enterprise crew all hot under the collar I would have been mightily disappointed. As it is this the easy way out but at least it features some explosions and guns. One thing that definitely improved on Enterprise in the third season was the action content and execution and this is a terrific example of that, and nowhere near the best of the year.

Worst moment – Ooh sexy, a woman who can reveal what is tucked away under your skin as she seduces you. I wonder how many horny teens were turned right off by the sight of spines and organs when Raijin seduces Archer.

There’s a horribly ill-judged sequence featuring T’Pol being seduced and then attacked. In one of the rare sequences of exposed lesbianism on Star Trek and it quickly develops into what looks like rape and needs to be rescued by a man. Now there’s a healthy message to promote. Even the usually reliable Mike Vejar has no clue how to stage this. It comes across incredibly inelegantly.

I wish they hadn’t done that – Why is it always male sleazebags offering female company in these kinds of shows? Enterprise tends to buck the trend with that sort of thing and exploit the sexual promise of its male stars far more than its female ones and so it might have been more interesting to have featured a female pimp offering out the services of scantily clad men. It would have been even more welcome had just one of the Enterprise crew shown an interest. It was far too early in television for that sort of thing, but that would have made the choices more bold. The Hoshi/Rajiin and T’Pol/Rajiin scenes is a gesture towards lesbianism but it strikes me that that is all the show is willing to make at this point, a gesture. Again, this would have been far more controversial had Rajiin been a man seducing men.

A reason to watch this episode again – You can feel the gears turning and cogs whirring to force Enterprise into serialisation but it isn’t quite willing to commit to that yet. Rajiin is a fine episode of Enterprise when it is wandering through a new region of space and it adds scenes to tie it into the larger season but essentially this is still another Trek standalone featuring an exotic and alluring alien temptress. What keeps the interest levels above water isn’t the plight of the Rajiin but the solid execution of this episode by Mike Vejar who is trying to push the show into more exotic waters. Unlike visiting alien worlds the type we have seen a million times over on the other shows, this feels like a fresh and vibrant location. What perturbs me in an episode that is supposedly packed full of sex appeal and romance is how Enterprise feels like it is attending a funeral at this point in its life. This might have been high sex and passion all the way but like so much of Enterprise it feels apologetic for getting its hands dirty. Rajiin is at an awkward halfway stage between the lacklustre efforts of season two and the more dynamic instalments of season three.

**1/2 out of *****