The Catwalk

DVD, Enterprise S2 (The Catwalk)

Nothing to do with fashion, it's about the limits of the NX-01 almost becoming a liability in one of the best stories of the season. Combining a situation which was easy to avoid in the later series', since they could all warp away from such a phenomenon (though not always, a la 'Voyager' episode 'One' where the crew's put in stasis to survive a storm), with the opportunity of expanding our knowledge of the ship, showing us areas we've never seen before, mixing in a bit creepiness, a spot of action and finding time to marvel at the beauty of the natural force Enterprise must travel through. About the only downside is the look of the aliens, which isn't special in any way, but doesn't really detract.

Tempers do begin to fray in the close quarters and stuffiness of the catwalks, but although Reed starts moaning about everything from the lack of facilities to the food, things never kick off in the way they did in 'The Ship' on 'DS9,' though the circumstances are different. In that, the crew were besieged with few supplies and an enemy intent on their destruction, while this is more of an enforced camping trip, as Archer describes it. You get the impression, up until the complication of the alien incursion, that he was quite enjoying roughing it with his crew, while T'Pol was merely tolerating the circumstances. It's nice the way she ends up joining them for the film night, even translating the plot for those not keeping up, something she would never have done last season. It shows she is, if not warming, certainly becoming more than neutral to the crew.

Everyone has their scenes, even Porthos and Phlox' creatures aren't forgotten. It's not exactly explained whether both catwalks are filled - it would make sense with the number of crew aboard, but presumably the other catwalk didn't know what happened, unless they were in communication with Archer's side. The scale of the ship and complement, as well as the vastness of the storm field, are exceptionally well realised, with brilliant montages of the crew bustling about in the time they have to get under cover and lock everything down, and the views we get of the storm are as good as the Badlands. Travis continues his reputation for haunting expressions and space experience when he talks so forebodingly about a storm his family's ship went through, and also shows off his piloting skills once again. Hoshi is apprehensive, but no longer a worry for the Captain, and Trip gets down to his diplomatic work as best he can manage!

I'd need a notebook to keep track of the many nuggets of information that are carelessly tossed out throughout the episode, but among them, we learn there are something like 19 billion Denobulans living on the one and only continent of their home planet (perhaps confirming John Billingsley's belief that very few members of the race go off-world); the first ambassador to Earth was Solkar (Archer knows his Vulcan history!); T'Pol mentions the last time she was 'camping' was for her kahs-wan, the ritual Spock went through in 'The Animated Series'; perhaps the Edosian eels come from Edo, a planet visited in the first season of 'TNG'; the Vulcan ship destroyed by a similar spatial phenomenon was called T'Plana, very similar to the ship that made first contact with Earth, the T'Plana Hath; and most importantly, we gets to see chef in person, though not his head and shoulders (he was thickset enough to be Riker, adding to my speculation that William T. went back in time and had another career on the NX-01! - See 'These Are The Voyages…'). Chef's galley is also used again, improbably as the setting for a phaserfight, getting trashed in the process, and Archer shows that iPad's are used for watching water polo in the future (but vertically, not horizontally? Crazy!).

I love the idea of the catwalks, these walkways in the nacelles, as it's fascinating to see the nooks and crannies of the ship, as much as the regular settings we know and love. It's quite moving to see the ship all shut down and abandoned, and this adds something to the scene in which Trip descends into the dark, but not empty corridors with only minutes to spare before he succumbs to poisoning. Danny Goldring, another of the company of actors that have played many roles on the various incarnations over the years, returns to this series again after playing a Nausicaan in Season 1, and makes the cranky old leader of the Takrit soldiers a formidable presence. The music adds much, and everything works towards a different kind of episode, and more importantly, uses Enterprise's weaknesses as strengths.

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