Sleeping Dogs (2)

DVD, Enterprise S1 (Sleeping Dogs) (2)

Let 'em lie, is the usual advice, but Starfleet always has to poke its nose in, with the best intentions of course. But the road to Klingons is paved with good intentions, and a Targ in the fridge is worth two hanging from meat hooks, or some such saying. The point is this is the next encounter with the warrior race and this time I think he's got it, he's got it, he's finally got it: Archer learns his galactic life lessons slowly, as if he had all the time in the world (or seven years on TV), but at least he gets there. It's strange how he didn't mention 'The Vulcan Hello' entry in the nine hundred pages the Vulcan database sports on the subject of 'Klingon,' as that would seem to be 'How To Deal With Them 101,' but just as the Captain prefers eyesight, taste buds, sniff and touch to a mechanical probe being out there in space to document these experiences, maybe he likes to discover the inhabitants of the final frontier for himself, too? You'd think they'd at least have the computer automatically synch up with the database to provide instant identification of unknown ships, just for the sake of security, but in this case even T'Pol didn't recognise the Raptor-Class vessel as being Klingon. Even though it looks so very Klingon! It is a tasty design and it stands out even more after the poor standards of Klingon representations seen this century (in the real world - the 21st), whether that be 'Into Darkness' or 'DSC.' This one has the essential Klingon lineage to it, and though we don't get quite enough of a look at it for my liking, shrouded in the seething fumes of the gas giant as it is, it looks powerful and majestic.

This is only the third encounter with the Klingons for Jonathan Archer and crew, but the Captain remains determined to help them despite previous animosity from their side. Although the episode is merely passably good, enjoyable and solid by comparison with the misery, depression and disappointment of 'DSC,' its Klingons, its characters and its 'stories,' that it's enough to stand out for me. It wasn't going to win any awards, it wasn't going to go down in history as one of the greats, but what it does, works. It isn't broken, in fact it is a pretty satisfying example of what the series could do with its greater grunt in visual effects, widescreen views and detailed sets. There is some extraneous stuff going on (I never worked out why Reed had a cold, expecting it to be integral to the plot at some point, but it never was!), and some inconsistency, but it's an inconsistency that makes sense. It stems from the fact that T'Pol knows the Klingons and their ways and the humans don't. Reed and Hoshi, even after they've been trapped on this sinking ship, the only conscious Klingon having stolen their Shuttlepod and skedaddled, still want to help the crew, and now themselves. T'Pol, rightly, says Klingons wouldn't want their help and would rather die at their posts as that's considered an honourable death, but later the captured Klingon woman is goaded into assisting in the rescue by Archer saying she doesn't want her crew to die a dishonourable death, crushed by a gas giant, and he's right, she doesn't. So it's clear that although T'Pol has plenty of knowledge on the race she's far from an expert, which I like.

I will concede the episode could have been a classic: three disparate Starfleet officers trapped on a dark, dank Klingon ship, the crew could wake at any moment and they're sinking deeper into the deadly pressure of a gas giant's atmosphere. It's the time for all good Starfleet officers to do their duty, pull together, and use their expertise to get themselves out of a fix. There isn't quite enough tension to make it a great story - when I think of being trapped on a ship amidst rising tensions I think of the unimaginatively titled 'The Ship' on 'DS9.' Now that I come to think of it, that really was an incredibly unimaginative title for that series, more fitted to 'TNG' at the height of its 'The …' period. 'The Enemy,' 'The Survivors,' 'The Offspring,' 'The Price,' and on and on! But I digress. The point is the 'DS9' episode was heavy with atmosphere, like a bomb about to go off. At the same time it was made in that series' fifth season, a position 'Enterprise' was sadly denied reaching against all better judgement (come on CBS, give us a continuation: 'Enterprise II'!), while 'Sleeping Dogs' is only halfway through the opening season when the production was still trying to find its sea legs. But there are signs that a consistency was beginning to be reached, and one of these is in the use of the characters. Hoshi had been largely muted for a few episodes, but she's definitely one of the stars of this show, facing any fears she has head on and putting in the homework on the shooting range in the grand tradition of characters taking target practice, or other games, together in the past, or should that be future, such as Picard and Riker, Picard and Guinan, Janeway and Seven…

Interestingly, the circular 'Star Wars' lightsaber training droid that acts as a target for Hoshi's low-powered Phase Pistol (presumably on a training setting since we know they only have stun and kill capability yet there wasn't even a scratch on the bulkheads from Hoshi's misses - must have had something to do with the power pack we see inserted into the weapon before she starts. I like all these technical details!), was apparently holographic, so we see some evidence for that tech in this series, even if 'DSC' took it way too far beyond what was acceptable for a Trek feel to the 23rd Century. Whatever, it's just pleasing to see Hoshi with a get up and go attitude, jumping into the spirit of exploration and shooting strange new aliens. Okay, maybe not the last bit, but it makes a big difference from the cowering linguist we saw in early episodes. It's not been like a switch being turned on, but a gradual process and you feel so proud of how far she's come, quite in opposition to someone like Tilly on 'DSC' who is just plain annoying, unprofessional and deliberately written for inappropriate humour (the difference is that here Reed is wryly warned not to sneeze into his helmet, which is funny, and there you'd actually see someone sneeze into their helmet, which is not). Hoshi is the right way to do that kind of character and it's a real balm for the soul to see Trek done right, the main reason I started going through Season 1 of 'Enterprise' again in the first place! And she does go the whole hog (or should I say Targ?), even surprising the gung-ho, but cautious Reed by suggesting they fire off the ship's entire complement of torpedoes to create a shockwave big enough to push them into higher orbit.

It should also be noted that her skills of translation and picking up alien languages was as invaluable as ever. Perhaps T'Pol's little Tricorder scanner device might have been reconfigured, with time, to decipher the Klingon readouts for Bridge and Engineering operations (is this the first time we ever saw Klingon Engineering? Probably not, but the sets, the food, the Targs all look great and pull you into the warriors' world), but time was of the essence. At first I couldn't work out from Archer's tone if he was genuine in saying Hoshi had already been assigned to the 'team' (don't think they actually said Away Team or Landing Party this time), or whether he was just making her feel better, but then we hear it straight from the horse's mouth, well, T'Pol's mouth that is, when she states she required Hoshi's skills for the mission. But if so, when was Archer going to inform Hoshi she was to go? I suppose he might just have been about to summon her when she called him and asked to speak, that would make sense. And as it turns out, it's Hoshi's ability to spot Klingon language when they enter the eerie alien ship that tips them off to what they're walking into. This episode is absolutely best seen in the dark because so much of it is gloomy, shadowed hallways in that Viking architecture and style the Klingons had right back to this century, with everything metallic, spartan and harsh, ideal for the metallic, spartan and harsh way they live. As always, the creeping around on a darkened, possibly abandoned ship is what I love and when they're trapped there and the vessel is sinking still lower it delivers the kind of personal situation you want to see Trek characters in.

Not only that, but the lore is respected (another reason this is so much better than a 'DSC' episode), with the Klingons portrayed correctly, details forthcoming that synch up with canon (to use the 'DSC' makers' favourite saying), such as the Klingon honour thing, or that they don't use escape pods, or that they have a very strong odour which Reed can't smell because of his handy cold! Even the apparent glaring mistake of not recognising a clearly Klingon ship design is answered by T'Pol stating she's not familiar with all classes of their ships, which is logical and (just about), believable. It's right for Starfleet that they'd be pro-life, too, in the attitude of Reed and Hoshi to want to rescue the crew. It's a good point that just because the alien culture is about leaving them to die, they can't do that because it conflicts with their morals, and although 'later' Trek crews would probably lean more towards the idea that they shouldn't interfere, they're still green as spacefarers go, and anyway it's proved that this impression of what the Klingons would want isn't necessarily accurate as shown by both the Klingon Captain who doesn't wish to be crushed to death, and the Klingon woman, Bu'kaH (whose name I can't remember ever being spoken). She's typically suspicious, proud, and angry, humiliated as she is to be captured. I loved the ending with that terrific shot of the Shuttlepod flying back down to the ship as debris slices through the gas around them and we see the Raptor rise up before them as the trapped crewmembers' plan works.

It's always great to see them solve a problem, because Trek isn't about galaxy-ending fantasy epics or shoot-'em-up, pew-pew effects, it's about problems being smoothed out with intelligence and training, the things that have been lost from Trek since 'Enterprise' ended and the main missing element that is the 'e equals mc squared' of Trek. And they did it without an Engineer, as Trip was too busy seeming quite relaxed and happy back on the NX-01 - it truly seems that if his engines aren't threatened he's not too bothered about anything else! It's unfair, I know, but Trip was written and portrayed very light in an episode that could have seen the deaths of three of what have become close friends, and he's smiling and being flippant. I know we don't want to see everyone get intensely concerned every time one of the crew is in danger, and it's good to sprinkle a little levity around, but that B-story of Archer and Trip on Enterprise working out how to deal with the Klingons didn't quite gel with the serious situation going on in the gas giant. Though Trip is responsible for getting his Captain to 'think like a Klingon,' so there is some credit due him, and Archer getting a handle on how to approach the race does nudge him up a notch in my estimation when he finally realises you have to tailor your approach to different races who aren't all going to respond in the right way to overtures of peace and friendship. The way to get on with the Klingons is to earn their respect (one of the only things about 'DSC' they got right, but then that was an idea that came from veteran Bryan Fuller, so no wonder!), and to do that you have to show them a bold front (that could have been the episode's title: 'Bold Front'!).

One of the fun details about this story is that it features Vaughn Armstrong as the Captain of the Klingon vessel. We only see him onscreen, either as a log (which reminds me somewhat of the Klingon Captain from 'Dramatis Personae' on 'DS9' who was also suffering from a virus), or threatening the NX-01 at the end. It's a nice reflection of Armstrong's first ever Trek role almost fifteen years previous to this when he played a Klingon in the first season of 'TNG.' I'd be surprised indeed if anyone ever matches his record for number of different characters played across various Treks, and though best known here for Admiral Forrest, this is only the second role of three this season. I wonder if you didn't know his name and you just watched the episode, if you'd know it was the same guy as Forrest - I'd never miss him, being one of those in the know about the little details, so I don't know. It might have been fun for Archer (well, fun for us, maybe not for him!), to stand toe to toe with the belligerent Captain instead of viewscreen to viewscreen, but he does a creditable job of showing his steel when this ungrateful, shamed and embarrassed Klingon threatens to destroy his ship. That's another part of the end that works really well, because you could almost expect a hearts and butterflies conclusion in which the female Klingon thanks Archer for his help, 'you have made a friend today,' that sort of thing, but no, she doesn't get a look-in, it's just the Captain, angry and aggressive. Maybe Archer did read 'The Vulcan Hello' page after all?

Reed, Hoshi and T'Pol made a good team, although I was surprised that she went along with their deception of Dr. Phlox about the need to stay in the decon chamber. Not only that but she actually makes up a headache to encourage him to run the tests again, so Vulcans do lie! Not that that's a revelation, it's a fallacy that they're always scrupulously honest - it makes perfect sense that if logic called for dissembling then that's what they'd do, and she had shown a bond with Hoshi earlier in the episode when she uses Vulcan voodoo to calm the Ensign's nerves when things get all too much for her. Unlike 'DSC' we get a scene of two women talking emotionally (one of them, anyway, the other comforting), but in this case it's how to be professional and control yourself rather than a breakdown into crying in what became an all too common excruciating scene for the later Trek series. Not that this episode is immune from all criticism - for a start, how it starts. While I like the scene in the Armoury with Reed giving Hoshi tips on the hand weapon (and I love all that tech talk that you don't see in modern Trek now), it's a pretty inconsequential teaser that doesn't hold much wonder about where the episode's going, and we've seen they can do a great pre-credits bit when they choose to. When Reed finds out they've dropped out of warp from the panel I wondered if he was reading sensor information that told him a gas giant was near or a ship-wide report from the Bridge. Just a thought.

There's also the unevenness of the story - I already mentioned the lighter tone on Enterprise not quite fitting the weightier situation on the Raptor, but you get a moment early on when there's a beautiful demonstration of the wonder of space when they put the sound of the gas giant on audio and it's evocative of whale song. It's really Mayweather's only moment of the episode where he recalls his people called it siren calls, but it's over too soon and back to business. And like I said, the tension could have been ramped up significantly with such a great concept for drama, especially with the threat of more Klingon ships set to arrive, but which we never see and it would have been a great visual for the NX-01 to sweep away just as they warp in. The temporary solution for how the Raptor could be prevented from sinking lower was admirable, but if they're surrounded by gas why was it a shockwave that dissipated, surely the whole thing would be ignited, either blasting the ship to pieces or launching it out of orbit with extreme prejudice! And I don't believe they mentioned the Transporter even once, which would seem to be a potential solution for emergency escape from such a situation. The obvious answer is the gas prevented its safe working, but I could have done with them crossing that off the list of possible saviours. It also makes a change for them not to want out of the decon chamber as soon as possible, which speaks to the grime and stench of a Klingon ship that they treat it like a spa session. And perhaps a more serious resolution to the Hoshi story was needed, Reed congratulating her on being tough, or some kind of synergy with Archer's own cause to be tough with the Klingons, but it doesn't detract and it's a far better finish to its beginning.

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