The Aenar

DVD, Enterprise S4 (The Aenar)

Pardon the pun, but I was left cold by this to begin with, and it didn't become a suitable successor to the good, then great first two episodes until it became personal, with Shran's first conversation with Jhamel. We don't see him talk to other people much, it's mainly Captain Archer he interacts with, which makes sense as he's usually there to service their friendship. Here, we see him differently, perhaps more receptive to a lonely female thanks to Talas' recent death, perhaps his nobler instincts awakened, but either way he seems drawn to the Aenar girl and feels sympathy for her plight. You could see what was coming, by the fact the Romulans sent two drone ships this time - what else but the pilot, Gareb, turning them on each other. There was no way to save him, either, being in the heart of Romulan space, a place that no alien eyes would see at pretty much any time, save perhaps Jean-Luc Picard's. So his fate was sealed from the off, but, as his sister said, at least he didn't die alone, as she was able to telepathically communicate with him before the end. His situation does, however, leave many questions: how was he kidnapped in the first place? Do the Romulans have silent strike teams all over the quadrant, waiting to snatch unwitting species? Or did they deliberately seek out an Aenar, perhaps desiring to confirm the myths about them being such strongly telepathic beings? Why did Gareb help them anyway? Was it all coercion, or in revenge for lies they'd told him about being the last of his kind?

The story isn't the best conclusion to the trilogy, not least because it was already, for the most part, concluded in the second, superior part. Only the relatively unnecessary inclusion of the Aenar pilot in the first place gave them a thread to follow. And it leads to a strange place. I'm not talking exclusively about the long overdue first in Trek of a visit to the Andorian homeworld, or the ice caves of the Aenar, a subspecies that were all but legend to the blue-skinned inhabitants of that world until a few decades before. No, as interesting as that was (and as impressive a job as the production crew made of turning the familiar cave set into an icy wonderland!), it was Trip's destination at the end of the episode that was unexpected. He doesn't admit that it's his problems with T'Pol that have initiated it, but he does ask for a transfer. Like William T. Riker before (or after), him, he's previously twice turned down an offer from the NX-02 Columbia, to join them as their Chief Engineer, and now, like Riker and his USS Titan, he wants to take up the offer. But it's not for the right reasons, even if it does give us a handy and unexpected cliffhanger.

Instead of keeping strictly to the two- or three-parters, they have allowed little continuing arcs to slip through, which is good to see, though I was never in favour of Trip and T'Pol's illicit pairing. I did like Dr. Phlox' knowing conversation with him about his lack of concentration, and appreciated T'Pol's more stoic attitude and lack of understanding for how Trip is reacting, as this is more the alien Vulcans that we should have seen from the beginning, when in fact she fitted in fairly well, as if her arc of becoming part of the crew was simplified. When Trip asks her to recall an example of facing the likelihood of death, I was hoping she would tell us of a time before Enterprise, as it would have been an ideal time to learn more about her secret agent duty for the Vulcans in her earlier career. It was these issues of a personal nature that hold the attention more than the exploration of a new, but familiar (in name), planet. You can have all the physical exploration you want, but if it's not backed up by identification with characters, it may as well be a cold and detached scientific documentary.

We did uncover a fair amount of new information about Shran's people, their cohabitants, and even wildlife ('ice bores' - little worms that move through the ice). Shran's stubborn pride injures him when he falls down ice-hewn stairs and skewers his leg on an ice stalagmite, but this does result in him meeting Jhamel, so there was a point to it beyond showing his arrogance again - he actually sounds slightly rueful when he admits to her that no one's ever in any doubt about what he's thinking, and this softness adds ever more depth and subtlety to a character who often seems little more than a loudmouth, incendiary type, but who, as we've seen over the course of his various appearances, has a lot more to him. It's a shame we were only able to scratch the surface before the series ended prematurely, but at least this wasn't his final appearance. We're also afforded a little more personal time with the two main Romulans, Valdore and Nijil, even if it came a bit late. We hear of Valdore's disgrace, how he was forced to step down from being a Senator many years ago for daring to suggest expansionism might not be the best course for his people. In Nijil we see a much more humanitarian persona, one who is doing it for science, but abhors the violence in respect to Gareb, forced to work almost to death. Valdore, on the other hand is bitter from his previous fall, and has no mercy in him. His second major fail leaves me wondering why Romulan ships of the 24th Century are named after him, and it's only a guess, but I imagine, had we had continued with the Romulan storyline, including the war, characters like him would have recurred as we'd need to see the opposing side lest it became all the alliance's point of view against a faceless enemy.

I would also say the direction was artistic, with certain shots standing out in my mind - none more than the beautiful use of the circular window as framing device for the casual conversation between the two Romulans, but also the closeup 'in-headset' views of Gareb and Jhamel, with the operational blinkies sweeping across their faces as they communicated through the telepresence devices. The Aenar side of things was almost (again, pardon the pun), a blind, and something that could have done with more explanation, but at the same time we barely know anything about the Andorians themselves, so introducing a subspecies only begat more questions! Still, that's the mark of a thriving creative force: able to juggle existing canon without being hampered in developing the new. It's something we love about Trek in general, because the universe is forever unfolding, (mostly) logically, expanding the knowledge we have of these races, and turning their makeup and model ships ever more into living, breathing alien societies. The same fault of this series I keep returning to, is once again apparent, unfortunately, with Hoshi not even allowed to speak - you can't focus on every character ever week, but it is a problem when characters are all but excluded consistently. And just while I'm being picky, it was a little ugly to have the exit from the caves appear (after being hidden by the Aenar to prevent escape), so close to where they'd been, as it made the set look small! But in all, this trilogy was the best of the season, and remains so in my estimation.

***