Star Trek: Enterprise – “Bound”

And so begins the final episodes of Star Trek: Enterprise…

Bound

Cast & Crew

Director: Allan Kroeker
Written By: Manny Coto

Starring
Scott Bakula as Jonathan Archer
Connor Trinneer as Charles “Trip” Tucker III
Jolene Blalock as T’Pol
Dominic Keating as Malcolm Reed
Anthony Montgomery as Travis Mayweather
Linda Park as Hoshi Sato
John Billingsley as Dr. Phlox

Guest Cast
William Lucking as Harrad-Sar
Cyia Batten as Navaar
Derek Magyar as Kelby
Crystal Allen as D’Nesh
Menina Fortunato as Maras
Christopher Jewett as Crewman #1
Duncan K. Fraser as Crewman #2

Episode Information

Originally Aired: April 15, 2004
Season: Four
Episode: Seventeen
Production: 093

What Happened

After Archer forges a deal with the Orions, the trader presents the captain with a gift — three alluring Orion women who proceed to seduce all the men on board except, mysteriously, Trip.

Review

And so we slide into the final episodes of Enterprise. Will we end with a whimper or a bang? I can see Manny was going when he wrote this one, setting up the Orion Syndicate to be a grander enemy. Unfortunately we’ll never see the fruits of his vision.

High Points

  1. Green babes in bikinis! I mean, what’s not to love?
  2. The final reveal as to who’s in charge and who are the slaves. Cool and unexpected.
  3. Babes! Green ones! Sorry…

Low Points

  1. Cmdr. Kelby. Doesn’t he know the whiney roles have all been assigned?
  2. The final scene with Trip and T’Pol seems a little too awkward and uncomfortable. It was cute when it started but left you cold in the end.

The Scores

Originality: Pretty girls seduce the crew. Never been done. Right? 2 out of 6.

Effects: Limited effects save for a little fight. Still sharp, but it’s telling that their budget’s been slashed and very few shots are being done. 5 out of 6.

Story: If the series was going on, this would have been a lot cooler. Making the Orions out to be a larger and more dangerous threat than ever before. As it stands it doesn’t do much for the overall canon. 4 out of 6.

Acting: I wish I could have been on the set to hear the staging directions: “OK, go over to Scott and act slutty. No, no, more slut, less seductress. OK, more seductress now!” 3 out of 6.

Emotional Response: No real tension, but I got a good laugh at trip phasering the entire bridge crew. Also the reveal at the end was cool. 4 out of 6.

Production: Hey look, the weight room! 3 out of 6

Overall: Decent episode that would have been better if it set up a longer-term arc. 4 out of 6.

Total: 25 out of 42

Enterprise’s Final Episodes

The schedule as of writing:

  • In a Mirror, Darkly (04.22.2005)
  • In a Mirror, Darkly, Part II (04.29.2005)
  • Demons (05.06.2005)
  • Terra Prime (05.13.2005)
  • These are the Voyages… (05.20.2005)

Next Week on Enterprise (April 22, 2005)

In a Mirror, Darkly

In the mirror universe, Commander Archer mutinies against Captain Forrest in order to capture a future Earth ship found in Tholian space.

Additional Notes and Comments

If you’re interested in what’s in TheAngryMob’s review queue, check out my What’s Coming page.

TheAngrymob

29 replies on “Star Trek: Enterprise – “Bound””

  1. Manny Coto – How Could You ? !
    Well it turned out that this episode was a Coto episode…. and I had such high hopes for the man….

    I give it 3 points out of 10 – in other words it sucked! Here’s why…

    Green Babes in bikinis taking over the ship….been there …done that…can you say “Harry Mudd”? I knew that you could.

    Who *didn’t* actually guess in the first five minutes after the Bikini Babes came on board and starting asking questions that they were going to try to take over the ship?? Telegraphing the plot?? Hell they FedExed it overnight and with 9am delivery!

    The men go psycho primarily affected and the women get headaches …OK, fine… but then why didn’t the woman set things to rights ASAP?? Why did the women have to wait until Trip comes onboard with a phaser … oh yeah, Translator-Lady begs the Captain “don’t do that!”. Hell…T’pol should have replaced the captain forcibly at the first indication he was disabled and acting irrationally. That’s what first officers do right? But not if they’re women on Enterprise apparently…..

    Can you say gas mask? So evil phermones are making all the men psycho and the effect is cumulative…fine…. Put on a gas mask…show’s over….everybody go home now. Am I the ONLY one this occurred to? I don’t think so….

    If the women run the show then:
    1. Why are they called Orion SLAVE girls?
    2. Why are they traded like playing cards?
    3. Why don’t they have better clothes?
    3. etc…etc….
    4. Does ANY of this make sense???

    And finally…every time someone goes out of the ship they have to come back practically buck nekked and smear Decon goo all over their hot bods….so you bring aboard a previously unknown species to the ship and …HELLO!… no decon for *you* slave girl…now go mingle with the crew in the engine room. Does that make sense??

    In short I couldn’t suspend my disbelief for this show if hd the entire crew that put up the GOlden Gate bridge working on it. The plot was improbably, implausible and it’s only excuse for existance was to guarantee viewership by drooling pre-pub males for the last 4 episodes.

    Bottom Line: Enterprise *still* sucks.

  2. Manny Coto – How Could You ? ! (with paragraphs )
    Well it turned out that this episode was a Coto episode…. and I had such high hopes for the man….

    I give it 3 points out of 10 – in other words it sucked! Here’s why…

    Green Babes in bikinis taking over the ship….been there …done that…can you say "Harry Mudd"? I knew that you could.

    Who *didn’t* actually guess in the first five minutes after the Bikini Babes came on board and starting asking questions that they were going to try to take over the ship?? Telegraphing the plot?? Hell they FedExed it overnight and with 9am delivery!

    The men go psycho primarily affected and the women get headaches …OK, fine… but then why didn’t the woman set things to rights ASAP?? Why did the women have to wait until Trip comes onboard with a phaser … oh yeah, Translator-Lady begs the Captain "don’t do that!". Hell…T’pol should have replaced the captain forcibly at the first indication he was disabled and acting irrationally. That’s what first officers do right? But not if they’re women on Enterprise apparently…..

    Can you say gas mask? So evil phermones are making all the men psycho and the effect is cumulative…fine…. Put on a gas mask…show’s over….everybody go home now. Am I the ONLY one this occurred to? I don’t think so….

    If the women run the show then:
    1. Why are they called Orion SLAVE girls?
    2. Why are they traded like playing cards?
    3. Why don’t they have better clothes?
    3. etc…etc….
    4. Does ANY of this make sense???

    And finally…every time someone goes out of the ship they have to come back practically buck nekked and smear Decon goo all over their hot bods….so you bring aboard a previously unknown species to the ship and …HELLO!… no decon for *you* slave girl…now go mingle with the crew in the engine room. Does that make sense??

    In short I couldn’t suspend my disbelief for this show if hd the entire crew that put up the GOlden Gate bridge working on it. The plot was improbably, implausible and it’s only excuse for existance was to guarantee viewership by drooling pre-pub males for the last 4 episodes.

    Bottom Line: Enterprise *still* sucks.

    • Re: Manny Coto – How Could You ? ! (with paragraphs )
      No Kidding!

      The morons decided to leave men guarding the holding cell!? Duh?

      The women stood around whimpering until big strong Tripp could save them with a phaser. Lucky for them Tripp was getting a little immunity from his association with T’Pol. A shame T’Pol couldn’t use a phaser. Or Hoshi. Or any of the female MACOs.
      Hell, they wouldn’t even need a phaser. T’Pol is a stronger-than-human Vulcan, Hoshi claims to be a black belt, and the MACOs are trained fighters.

      I don’t understand how the hell anyone on the set didn’t see how little sense this story had. I am filled with morbid curiosity to see the train-wreck of a final episode that Jolene Blalock calls “Appalling”. I think I will nickname her A’Palled from now on.

      • Re: Manny Coto – How Could You ? ! (with paragraphs )

        I don’t understand how the hell anyone on the set didn’t see how little sense this story had. I am filled with morbid curiosity to see the train-wreck of a final episode that Jolene Blalock calls “Appalling”. I think I will nickname her A’Palled from now on.

        You know, for a cast member to call the show “appalling” something *must* be seriously amiss. I dread the series finale. I think I’ll quit watching after the next two episodes.

        -Joe G.

    • Pheromone pheromoan …
      Enterprise is a closed environment with controlled atmospherics, designed not only for experimentation with alien biotics but one assumes for safety as well (one nasty venting of core coolant and the whole crew dissolves …)

      BUT THE AIR CIRCULATES FREELY BETWEEN ALL COMPARTMENTS, WITH NO ABILITY TO ISOLATE ANY COMPARTMENT?

      Why even bother with decon gel? As soon as anyone boards the ship and exhales, if the bug is airborne, anything they are exposed to is piped throughout the ship, and we’re all happily infected.

      Granted the Orion women went everywhere in the ship, one assumes they were busy spreading their wonder pheromones. Still, I never saw one in sick bay. Why can’t the atmosphere be purged, compartment by compartment, and get rid of the pheromones? Were the girls perhaps secreting a substance of some sort? I didn’t notice a slime trail, or see them rubbing against the furniture like my cats (T’Pol: “Captain, that slave girl is dry humping your chair.” Archer (panting heavily): “These are an alien species, their customs are different than ours.”) but who knows … They’re green, maybe they emit pollen.

      Lousy plot device in this episode. In spite of that I didn’t mind this episode, particularly T’Pol’s jokes at the end, and the Orion woman arching her eyebrow at T’Pol in the scene in the brig. I just didn’t want to think about this too much. :)

      Like most episodes of this series, if you think about it too much it falls flat.

      -Joe G.

      • Re: Pheromone pheromoan …

        I was liking the first half of the episode, it showed some promise, BUT, it completely went downhill when they locked the green babes up.

        BUT THE AIR CIRCULATES FREELY BETWEEN ALL COMPARTMENTS, WITH NO ABILITY TO ISOLATE ANY COMPARTMENT?

        They should have gone to the decon room, and been locked in with little chance of being let out.

        T’Pol and Trip should’ve gone to spacesuits as soon as they realized what was up.

        I guess there are no gay males on Enterprise, because they would’ve been able to take charge, and ALSO had a witty comeback like “Girl, mesh bikinis are so 21st century!”

        I do NOT fault anything but the writing for this episode. Great premise, lousy development.

        • Re: Pheromone pheromoan …


          I guess there are no gay males on Enterprise, because they would’ve been able to take charge, and ALSO had a witty comeback like “Girl, mesh bikinis are
          so 21st century!”

          LOL – Now THAT’S funny !

        • Re: Pheromone pheromoan …

          I guess there are no gay males on Enterprise, because they would’ve been able to take charge, and ALSO had a witty comeback like “Girl, mesh bikinis are so 21st century!”

          Yeah, no lesbians shown under the spell either. So much for Star Trek crossing boundaries (even if other shows have long since done so).

          And did anyone else notice that when Trip had the three gals at gun point, they all four got in a turbolift together? And they didn’t even try to overpower him? Three on one in a tight area? So much for the “animal women”.

    • Re: Manny Coto – How Could You ? ! (with paragraphs )

      And finally…every time someone goes out of the ship they have to come back practically buck nekked and smear Decon goo all over their hot bods….so you bring aboard a previously unknown species to the ship and …HELLO!… no decon for *you* slave girl…now go mingle with the crew in the engine room.

      BwahahahaHAHAHahaha!

      Now I feel like watching a public service announcement on VD…

  3. Made me ashamed to be alive
    I’ve been a big Enterprise fan, and defended it from time to time, but this was the most painful hour of TV I’ve experienced in a long time. I’ve always loved Manny Coto, starting with Odyssey 5, but this was an abomination.

    You know what? Put babes in the show. Whatever. But to say that these women are “in charge”? Please. They just like to be slaves? They like wearing no clothes? They are undercover sex agents?

    We’ve come a long way since “Angel One”

  4. 3 years too late
    This should’ve been a first season episode! Well at least the concept, not the execution. Only high point was the playful banter at the end where T’Pol makes a joke. It was reminiscent of the verbal sparring between Kirk, Bones, and Mcoy.

    • Re: 3 years too late

      I think the absence of plot logic has been covered already. As for canon…. Yeah, the idea that the apparent underlings actually hold power has potential as a concept, but it violates what we know about the Orions. Butt… uh, I mean, but, if for sake of argument appearances of Orion society are as deceiving as this ep makes out, and Archer and his crew discovered this fact, wouldn’t they have passed this information on so that everyone else would know, including Kirk? Or does that get forgotten, along with the fact that we learned why the Klingons lost their forehead-lobsters, and the description of the big-eared greedy species? I like scantily-clad green babes as much as the next guy, but this episode was a serious step backwards for this season.

      Next series: Star Trek: The In-Between Years:

      Episode 1: “Space… The final… Uh… Something…” A virus causes all Federation personnel to forget important things they’ve learned about key alien species, and the virus spreads to all records, too! Can Captain Bragman stop it before recent history vanishes???

      Episode 2: “Revolution on Orion”: The Orion men turn the tables and the Orion Slave Girls, who, until now, have been topping from the bottom, become real slave girls.

      Episode 3: “What the Hell, It’s Been a Good Run”: Network executives get a clue and start supporting fresh, new SF series, instead of rehashing the same tired old cash space-cow.

  5. I’m All Alone Again
    Gee, I hate to speak out and maybe be looked at as the dumb guy in the group but I really enjoyed the episode. There definately were some big plot holes and the bridge women seeming helpless. Over-all, though, I really, really enjoyed the episode.

    Good humor. Phlox and the need for stimulants. T’Pol making jokes a la Spock.

    Good race development. The Orions have a lot of potential as evils. Would’ve been a nice addition to Klingons (who become friends) and Cardasians as main enemies. Maybe in the movies or Star Trek: <I>Next</I>

    And the twist with the women running the society is GREAT. You don’t seeze power… you accumulate it quietly without anyone noticing. The helpless Orion slave girls go through out the galaxy influencing situations everywhere.

    They’re called Orion slave girls – even in the future – because they are bought and sold as slaves. Yet the quietly accumulate power. Just because there’s no mention in TOS and other "future" shows doesn’t mean that it couldn’t be so.

    Plot holes, yes, but also enjoyment.

    • Re: I’m All Alone Again

      Gee, I hate to speak out and maybe be looked at as the dumb guy in the group ….

      You know, normally I’d flame you mercilessly for this opinion but seeing as how I actually *like* Enterprise’s theme music….

      P.S. The *only* (and I mean ONLY) thing I did like in this episode was the moment Phlox shoots himself in the neck with uppers – shades of Harlan Ellison!

    • Re: I’m All Alone Again

      And the twist with the women running the society is GREAT. You don’t seeze power… you accumulate it quietly without anyone noticing. The helpless Orion slave girls go through out the galaxy influencing situations everywhere.

      They’re called Orion slave girls – even in the future – because they are bought and sold as slaves. Yet the quietly accumulate power. Just because there’s no mention in TOS and other “future” shows doesn’t mean that it couldn’t be so.

      Again– maybe. But since Archer and Company know, everyone should know about this in the future, which would minimize its effectiveness– and would likely eliminate all talk of “animal women slaves,” although that notion got retconned out of existence even within the original series.

    • Re: I’m All Alone Again

      The helpless Orion slave girls go through out the galaxy influencing situations everywhere.

      They’re called Orion slave girls – even in the future – because they are bought and sold as slaves.

      I don’t mean to get pedantic here, and I understand that the plot twist was interesting in a “evil romulan really behind the evil vulcans” sort of way.

      But this is a classic gender argument: that women like to be oppressed. I would argue that there’s a big difference between women being proud of their bodies (and wanting to show them off) and women being slaves (aka: prostitutes that don’t get paid).

      In the 70s, Nancy Friday wrote a really popular book about female fantasies (here). There were all sorts of fantasies described, but out of the hundreds of women she interviewed, none had the fantasy of being a prostitute. The idea that women like to be debased in this manner, and that, if they had all the power in society, would continue to want to be used in this way, is ludicrous.

      Add that to the power play Trip pulled on T’Pol at the end (in what should’ve been a tender moment, treated more like a handshake where Trip takes his hand away at the last moment) and you have a show where women are treated as a 12-year-old’s fantasy. Even Baywatch was nicer to women.

    • Re: I’m All Alone Again

      And the twist with the women running the society is GREAT.

      Yeah! And it was even better the first time around

      fer crying out loud… I mean seriously… sheesh!

  6. I know I’ve seen this episode before…

    Maybe here?

    or even here?

    Manny Manny Manny… has the close proximity to Berman rubbed of on you?

    • Re: EWWWWW!!!!

      … Berman rubbed of on you?

      For God’s sake! Please stop using the words “Berman” and “rubbed” in the same sentence!

      • Re: EWWWWW!!!!

        … Berman rubbed of on you?

        For God’s sake! Please stop using the words “Berman” and “rubbed” in the same sentence!

        UNLESS, you also include the word “out”

        • Re: EWWWWW!!!!

          UNLESS, you also include the word “out”

          So I’m thinking maybe it’s time for a rickbermansucks.com web site?

          (we could have a siser site “brennenbragabites.com” as well!)

  7. Previews
    I can’t wait until the “Mirror, Darkly” review comes up: I just have to say that it’s amazing how often, starting with the 1rst season TNG, that if the preview looks like the episode is really going to suck, it ends up being one of the better episodes. I really was expecting to hate this episode, and it turns out to be one of the really good ones that’s of the sort Enterprise should have been about all along… interesting twist on things that tie into TOS…

    I don’t believe for a minute that the Vulcans didn’t blow the empire to smithereens after First Contact, but beyond that: well done!

    • Re: Previews

      I can’t wait until the “Mirror, Darkly” review comes up: I just have to say that it’s amazing how often, starting with the 1rst season TNG, that if the preview looks like the episode is really going to suck, it ends up being one of the better episodes. I really was expecting to hate this episode, and it turns out to be one of the really good ones that’s of the sort Enterprise should have been about all along… interesting twist on things that tie into TOS…

      Ditto.

      & another reason why I go out of my way to avoid previews…. imagine watching the opening scene not knowing it was a mirror universe epsode…

    • Re: Previews

      I can’t wait until the “Mirror, Darkly” review comes up:

      Well I just finished watching the Mirror episode and …it was beter then the last on is all I can say.

      It sufferred, IMHO, from a very basic writing flaw….like THERE WERE NO PROTAGONISTS. So we were left to root for either the bad guys or…the bad guys. I mean who could you identify with in the episode unless you were a total sociopath in this episode? Everyone was a jerk – no one to really like. So who really cares what happens to anyone?? Therefore…no real tension in the story.

      But far be it for the B&B team to enamour even the most essential element of writing a story.

      I wonder if in the mirror universe, Rick Berman can write a decent script.

      • Re: Previews

        It sufferred, IMHO, from a very basic writing flaw….like THERE WERE NO PROTAGONISTS.

        I’m not so sure — we still have to see the second part, and I get the feeling that Archer is in the position Spock was in the original Mirror episode: I think he’s only doing what he has to in that environment to do the right thing… (albeit Spock needed some encouragement…)

        • Re: Previews

          It sufferred, IMHO, from a very basic writing flaw….like THERE WERE NO PROTAGONISTS.

          I get the feeling that Archer is in the position Spock was in the original Mirror episode: I think he’s only doing what he has to in that environment to do the right thing…

          Oh so he’s just following orders right? ;)
          Anyway according to the stinky next week previews Archer and crew yuk it up about how they’ll be taking over the galaxy with the new tech from the mirror universe-time travel (again!!) ship. What’s not to like eh?

          Star Trek will come back some day soon with *decent* writers . Let it die now…let berman’s conytracts expire and let someone competent resurrect it.

          Personally I plan on visiting Bermen one day in the future equivalent of the Old Actor’s Home (He’ll probably be stored there as a talking head) and tell him he’s *still* a schmuck!

      • Re: Previews

        I wonder if in the mirror universe, Rick Berman can write a decent script.

        No, but he doesn’t force his evil scripts on an unsuspecting public, because in THAT universe, he’s good.

        • Re: Previews

          I wonder if in the mirror universe, Rick Berman can write a decent script.

          No, but he doesn’t force his evil scripts on an unsuspecting public, because in THAT universe, he’s good.

          Could well be…but does he have a goatee?

  8. Finally watched this on Tivo. Sigh.
    OK, The first time I tried to watch it I hit stop about 30 seconds into it seeing the bikini clad green chicks. No offence to the guys who like to be led around by their dicks but I’m sorry, I like my sci-fi intelligent, and this wasn’t. My issues in no particular order.

    1. Archer doesn’t even try to set them free from their ‘slavery’ until several days into the trip. Nice enlightened human race learned from our mistakes of teh 1800s moment there.
    2. Appropriate uniforms anyone? I mean at least show them try and get pheromed out of it
    3. Apparently pheromes that are an aerosol delivered thing can get out of the decon chamber and get the all male guard team to open the door, nice. Oh yeah, put guys in charge of three women that made a seemingly sane but whiney guy destroy the engines for them
    4. uh tripp, next time you phaser the crew why don’t you phaser the three bad guys too? hop in an elevator with them by yourself while you’re at it.
    5. and my long standing enterprise bitch about using scantily clad females. While this time it wasn’t ‘decon chambers gone wild’ at the same time the plot line served no purpose other than to put three hot green chicks with lots of screen time up on the boob tube and the ‘previews’ were geared for just that

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