I never figured she had any pyschic powers it's just the alien putting the images in her head. As far as figuruing out the book well she's a genius they do exist after all.
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We got a heartbeat Jim!.. Lock and Load! ST6 - Bones
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It's one thing to be a genius but it's another thing to simply do things that are physically impossible. Like learning a language that's completely alien in a terribly short amount of time.
Enterprise also keeps claiming that Hoshi is encountering parralel linguistic structures in alien languages but alien languages aren't likely to have actual parralel linguistic structures. Human languages which come from cultural interaction or at least an outlook conditioned by the same biology can do that, alien languages are going to be alien to one another.
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Except that on STAR TREK it's well established that aliens are mostly of humanoid origin so theoretically you could extend the parallelism to most TREK species since most share similar biology and physical experiences. Just a thought.
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It's a rip-off. / We're stepped on, and cheated! / We're flat, stone-cold lied to / But we're not defeated / No!
Halen. "The Dream is Over."
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Still even within humanoid parameters, there's a whole lot of variance biologically speaking. Vulcans, Trill and Klingons and Humans are radically different biologically and culturally, even if they all have ten fingers and the same basic set of eyes, nose and ears and mouth.
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You can also argue that it doesn't matter how many fingers or toes or mouthes or whatever the species has when a language forms - even within species, radically different languages can form. Look right here on earth. Same species, yet while the languages based on Latin (English, Spanish, French, German) have similar root forms, and might be able to be figured out one from the other if you have a lot of time and look at the roots of the words, we also have Chinese, and its relatives Japanese, Vietnamese, and Korean, which are radically different in every way. You can't figure out Chinese using Latin as your base. You have to learn it in a totally different way.
Which makes it even crazier to assume that you can easily find relations between languages from different planets. The universal translator (and oversimplification of language differences) were always just writers tools to overcome the issue. I try not to think about it too much. :)
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"Who are you, and how did you get in here??"
"I'm a locksmith, and... I'm a locksmith".
- "Police Squad"
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I agree. Don't think about it, just enjoy the show. The show is chock full of implausibilities (ever notice how ships that drop out of warp suddenly stop in mid-space? Or how ships that have lost power still have gravity?). If you let this kind of thing bother you, you might as well turn the channel.
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I agree. Don't think about it, just enjoy the show. The show is chock full of implausibilities (ever notice how ships that drop out of warp suddenly stop in mid-space? Or how ships that have lost power still have gravity?). If you let this kind of thing bother you, you might as well turn the channel.
One thought on Hoshi's apparent psychic powers: is it possible, however unlikely, that maybe she's not pure human? Granted, you'd think they'd have spotted that by now during physicals and what have you, but maybe it's possible. Could it also be a leftover influence from her being mutated a few weeks ago (which could suggest that the other mutated crew members could also have latent residual side effects from the experience)?
Finally, on the spheres: if anything, they most resemble the First Federation's giant tugboat spheres, in that there's a lot of mass and mechanicals but no life on board. Maybe those big FF spheres moved by using gravitational "warping" too for all we know - they sure as heck were big enough. They could also be related to the Dyson Sphere from TNG for all we know. The problem here is that you figure a race would probably build a large object based on a geometric design of some sort, and there are only so many to go around. They couldn't use cubes, since the Borg have used them already (okay, they used the sphere too, but not that big); if they used pyramids, as alluded to elsewhere, they'd be accused of ripping of Stargate SG1. Geometrically, a sphere is a good shape for a big object, for physics/engineering reasons. So why not? As long as the things don't go flying around shooting at things, they're still avoiding direct comparison with the Borg and/or SW.
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"Who are you, and how did you get in here??"
"I'm a locksmith, and... I'm a locksmith".
- "Police Squad"
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On Enterprise, it's certainly possible that she's being set up to reveal some sort of non-human ancestry. Maybe writing in a Vulcan into her ancestry might do it, after all we know of at least one Vulcan who was running around Earth in the 20th century.
Nice review Deus. I was shocked that you seemed to like Exile. I'd thought for sure that you'd hate this type of gothic, romance fair. I pretty much agree with your review, although I like this episode a lot less than you do.
Drawbacks, in no particular order:
1) Hoshi's choice of clothing while staying with the creepy alien dude. I found her breezy, summer like dresses and high-heeled shoes silly in the least, just plain stupid in the extreme. Why would someone, especially a woman, wear clothing that can easily be taken as alluring while stranded alone with a person that A) creeps you out, and B) has made it clear that they are attracted to you? Why didn't Hoshi pack extra Star Fleet uniforms, or if she has only the one, just keep wearing that for crying out loud?
2) Archer's decision to leave her with the creepy alien. This point could easily be taken as a positive, in that Archer's decision to leave a crew member alone on a planet with a strange alien, who is obviously attracted to said crewmember, can be taken as a sign of his desperation in finding the Xindi. At first I laughed out loud at how foolish his decision seemed (leaving poor Hoshi to the vices of this weirdo!) but then I realized that if it was any male crew member, say Trip, Archer's decision to leave a member of his crew with the creepy alien wouldn't have bothered me in the least. I guess Archer just wasn't being as sexist as I hate to admit I might have been in that situation. With this written, I still am bothered by his decision.
3) The romance cliches you point out in your review are right on. Luckily, the actor playing the creepy alien, and Linda Park were able to rise above the sometimes predictable writing.
In defense of Exile, though, I took Hoshi's being ability to use the alien's crystal to see telepathically as a direct result of the alien sharing his ability through the crystal, not Hoshi actually having the same powers herself. I'm probably way off on this, since what you write about TPTB potentially turning Hoshi into a telepath makes a lot of sense.
Despite my misgivings, I did enjoy this episode. As you point out in your review, it does a top notch job of moving the story along, and in my book, the more we see of Linda Park, the better!
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Yes Hoshi's clothing was absurd. A standard uniform would have made a lot more sense and it was obviously done for reasons other than realism. But compared to some of what's been done to T'Pol or even to Hoshi in the previous season, this is so minor it barely attracts any attention.
I don't particularly like those kinds of gothic romances, but Exile downplayed the romance and played up the tragic nature of the character. Thus the suspense scenes were the weakest while the character scenes the strongest.
For us men who are members of the Hoshi Sato (Linda Park) Estrogen Brigade, the episode "Vanishing Point" was anything but a "waste of time." It stands out as an episode worth watching again (and again) because of the performance of this talented and fetching actress.
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Odie, you can be forgiven for not recognizing the difference, since we can hardly expect a guy to be versed in the intricacies of a chick genre like Gothic romances. This plot went a couple centuries further back, to classic fairy tales. The very weaknesses you see in the story are the tip offs, though. For example, the crystal ball becomes the Beast's magic mirror. Its visions of tragedy and destruction parallel the visions of death that drove the Beauty to leave the Beast. In the classic tale, the Father asked the Beauty to remain with the Beast, although not demanding she do so. This matches the attitude of Archer, who is willing to leave a member of the family in possible danger in order to protect the whole. The motivation to sacrifice ones self for the "family" are identical for Hoshi and the Beauty. I suspect that most of the female audience, at least the ones who remember the non-Disneyfied version of the tale, picked up on it.
On an entirely differnt note, I wonder how wise it is for the writers to focus on the second tier of characters, no matter how many advocates they might have. Personally, I think that all the series since TOS have suffered from the need to showcase too many cast members. To use political science terminology, it's never wise to sacrifice the core for the periphery.
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Well I did refference Beauty and the Beast in the review's episode summary, if you'll note. But my thinking is that the writer's sources were less fairy tales and more bad novels.
TOS had the big three, but Enterprise doesn't. Unlike Kirk, Spock and McCoy, Enterprise simply doesn't have three characters so wonderful and compelling that they can be exclusively focused on to the detriment of all the rest. That's why most of the post-TOS shows have been more ensemble.
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I agree, but it seems like few of the (vocal) fans on this site are interested in characters exhibiting normal human fears. Fight or Flight was disliked, for example, because Hoshi screamed when she saw corpses of dead aliens hanging from hooks in a derelict space - I guess the people who visit this site are generally quite heroic and aren't phased by dangling dead bodies in dark, unknown, foreign environments.
I have enjoyed almost every ep that put the spot light on Hoshi, although, as with the rest of season three so far, this one was one of the weakest IMHO. I found it artificially cliche, and I think Linda Park did too. The outstandingly ridiculous highlights were:
- Hoshi changing twice into moderately sexy outfits (high heels, plunging necklines) when she clearly was not showing any interest in her alien stalker.
- Had Hoshi seemed conflicted in her response to the guy then I might have been sold on her choice of garments
- She also looked ridiculously posed in one scene lying on her bed in her sensually red, luxuriously silk negligee. Contrived maybe?
(Aside: The people on this site who rail about T'Pol's sexy scenes
never commented on this - I guess Hoshi is less threateningly beautiful?)
- The crystal ball and the castle were just absurdly cliche
- Couldn't Phyllis Strong have been imaginative enough to think of some other object that would magnify his power?
- The motion of the bouncing shuttle pod looked cartoon-like
- I can just hear the dudes who developed that CGI sequence giggling to themselves as they took another toke.
One last observation, this ep needed a lot more time. Tarquin's (I think that was his name) brooding character needed to come across as more attractive and complex for this sort of a story to work. It's hard to pull this off in less than an hour, but better writing, directing, and acting could have achieved it. This may sound silly, Richard Burton's brooding gravitas is exactly the quality that would be right for this character and would have helped the production a lot - I guess they'll never make another Richard Burton though...
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'It was beautiful, we were selling rich women their fat asses back to them' - Tylor Durden
The spacewalk also offers the opportunity for comedy, which for once isn't broadly overacted by Trinneer.
Comedy, yes, but the scene certainly was refreshing - showing Trip and Archer as real people who makes mistakes. We see a chief engineer screw up an apparently simple repair, the dumbfounded look on both Archer and Trip with the unspoken "Oh, shit! Now what do we do?", and Trip admonishing Archer for his first shot near miss and then both just start taking shots as it shuttle gets further away. (Why all weapons don't include some kind of targeting guide is long ST mystery)
I thought the final crash with Trip and Archer just standing there as the shuttle skidded dangerously close was a nice homage to Men in Black.
It is rather odd that Hoshi would use the crystal ball to see scenes of space battles the Enterprise fought years ago instead of seeing what is happening now.
True, but only if she was actually using the crystal ball to telepathically scan the heavens. I think it is much more reasonable to believe that Tarquin was actually simulating the experience, showing Hoshi how his telepathy works or how she could visualize the universe with his guidance. The images Tarquin selected may have been pulled from Hoshi's mind or from his own to give her a sense of wonder, while shielding her from any horrific encounters. She imaged a reptilian Xindi, a encountered species, not one of the others that are as yet unknown to ENT. For all we know, uncontrolled use of the ball could have overloaded Hoshi's synapses.
Though it still wouldn't explain how she learned to read an entire alien book in an entirely unknown alien language a short time after she first laid eyes on it without help or a Rosetta Stone of any kind.
Didn't Hoshi comment that the language resembled a form of archaic Klingon? Considering past interactions, its logical that Hoshi is probably now fluent in Klingon and may have delved into the Vulcan database to learn earlier, archaic forms. Tarquin would have selected a book for Hoshi that was a challenge but within her translating abilities. (It must have also been pretty good as literature since Hoshi couldn't put it down).
The producers have been giving Hoshi superhuman abilities for some time now and while "Exile" does at least begin to try and justify those abilities, what's being portrayed is still far in excess of what is possible or plausible.
Some form of telepathy does explain her uncanny ability with languages.
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About the part when Archer and Trip drew their weapons and aimed. I think Archer said something about "Whoever gets the best shot at it" or something before both commenced firing. I think the line was sort of awkward because both men were standing right beside each other. It would have made more sense to me if the men were at different angles in respect to the spinning craft.
Perhaps an alternate way of handling it would be to have the two haggle over who was the better marksman while firing, or capping on each other for missing or saying "aww, crap" or getting upset or something.
The scene seemed to come off more like a carpenter snapping a drill bit on the job, or catwoman losing her nail, instead of "We are really in some deep sh#t here." and "God knows if this is gonna work."
T'pol said that spheres are 1000 years old and the book that Hoshi got is about 1000 years old (the alien said so). Could there be clues in the book of creators of expansion.
BTW, Great episode!
Enterprise rocks! "Exile" was superb (unlike last weeks "Impulse" that completely lacked a good story and character) but my two favourite episodes in season 3 so far is definitely "Exile" and "Rajiin" because they both had character development while slowly revealing something about the Xindi. Of course, they both ooses of great EFX too which is very impressive for a TV series (even with non-stellar ratings).
I think everyone should try harder to love this new approch to Star Trek, if they don't already appriciate it, cause it's all we've got and it's really getting good. If you didn't like season 1 & 2 then I don't understand you, but anyway, you gotta love season 3 for episodes like this.
This week: No screaming T'Pol. No semi-nude T'Pol. And finally the long-overdue focus on Hoshi Sato. :)
re: the talk about ST:ENT borrowing from "Star Wars." Please give it a rest. If the spheres were pyramids, we'd be hearing complaints that B&B were ripping off "Stargate SG-1."
Those spheres are NOT akin to the "Star Wars" Death Star. Please.
I actually like the concept of the fifty-plus spheres creating the spacial anomaly havoc within the Expanse, plus T'Pol's new discoveries about them. (She's the science officer; she came through BIG time.) It's part of the story arc -- and the production team is staying focused on the different pieces of the Xindi puzzle (including the spheres) as the storyline develops.
Admittedly, I wasn't keen on the Beauty and the Beast concept of "Exile." I did find myself thinking "TOS!" when we saw the mountainside castle. Both the TOS episodes "Squire of Gothos" (with Trelane) and "Catspaw" (with Sylvia and Korob) came to mind when I saw those exteriors. Intentional or not, seeing Reed, Archer and Hoshi enter was deja vu of Kirk, Spock and McCoy (in a fashion). That's just my happy memory for this otherwise bland episode. I wasn't too happy with much of it. The story was too predictable and plodding, save the brief excitement of Archer and Trip "shooting down" their shuttlepod. It was a cool special effect sequence and a nifty idea... but the actors' reactions were poorly directed/written. It soured a potentially unique scene, imho.
In closing, I do think the set designers did an awesome job pulling together the castle interiors, though -- major kudos to them for their hard work. It was very, very well-done (esp. with the short time they had to construct it).
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i wouldn't be surprised if they showed pyramids on some future episodes and 'stargates'. hell b&b is probably tuning to smallville, their competitor, and seeing what they can steal from that.
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LET THEM DIE!!!
are you guys insane? have you guys not noticed the parallel between star wars+trek?
first of all, 'the sphere'? O deus... WHY oh WHY have you not mentioned the comparison of this to the DEATH STAR?!!?!?!?!? it's obvious B&B is saying, "well now's a good time to copy star wars". th same goes for asteroid field from attack of the clones when ob1 approaches genosis chasing the jango.
secondly, it's fairly OBVIOUS that the writers are just going off of some 'rule' about screenwriting that every so and so minutes you have to do this and every few minutes you have to do that. enterprise still doesn't have the guts like xf to dedicate an ENTIRE purely on one character. remember in xf when they dedicated 1 entire episode on cigarette smoking man? THAT was awesome. mulder+scully only showed up for a few seconds.
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LET THEM DIE!!!
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There is absolutely no connection to the Death Star, where people live inside. It seems unlikely anyone lives inside the spheres in The Expanse. The purpose of those spheres are to create anomaly's across space. You simply see a connection because they are both shaped as a sphere! That's a bit rediculous if you ask me!
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I don't really know that there's much overlap between the sphere and the death star. Both are giant round and metallic objects in space but their functions are pretty different. And giant metallic round objects in space predate Star Wars all the way back to Hugo Gernsback and Buck Rogers comics.
Secondly, I agree that it would be great if Enterprise did something adventerous like that. Enterprise's episodes are actually a lot more conventional and formulaic than either DS9 or Voyager which both took chances on more offbeat episodes.
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"i concur."-Malastaire Senators from Episode I =^).
doesn't trek fans like you and i and rest of the cows reading trekweb KNOW the forumlas alrady? that's why xf worked well cause... well the first 5 seasons @least, it didn't downplay our intelligence, it played up to it. we need more writing like that in star trek as a whole. more daring stories instead of the same old "A/B screenwriting 101" bullshit we keep getting every week. it's like so godamn convention they have to keep 2 parallel stories @once otherwise our attention span=0. that's soooo stupid.
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LET THEM DIE!!!
Definitely agree with Deus that this was without doubt the finest guest star turn of the season, and possibly the entire history of this series. Why can't Enterprise give us guest stars of this caliber every week?
Unfortunately, I can't agree that Linda Park was particularly effective in this episode, a real shame since this was her character's opportunity to shine. I thought her line readings in the scene where she discovers the gravestones were particularly off, and it would have been nice in her dealings with Tarquin if her face had been able to register anything other than defiance, fear, and contempt; it certainly would have been more interesting if she had been at least tempted on some level by the opportunity to stay.
Still, overall I liked this episode's approach, which was more whimsical than Enterprise tends to be, and as other posters here have noted, in some ways quite reminiscient of TOS. "Exile" is no Trek classic, or even on a par with "Anomaly", but with its emphasis on character it's definitely a step in the right direction. And FTR, Ms. Park is quite the babe. ;-)
...gorgous in this episode. The hair the makeup, and the costumes really brought out her beauty. Her performance was great to say the least. She had a very candid way of performance, not dull, not over the top, but very face to face and personal.
Definitely agree with Deus that this was without doubt the finest guest star turn of the season, and possibly the entire history of this series. Why can't Enterprise give us guest stars of this caliber every week?
Unfortunately, I can't agree that Linda Park was particularly effective in this episode, a real shame since this was her character's real opportunity to shine. I thought her line readings in the scene where she discovers the gravestones were particularly off, and it would have been nice in her dealings with Tarquin if her face had been able to register anything other than defiance, fear, and contempt; it certainly would have been more interesting if she had been at least tempted on some level by the opportunity to stay.
Still, overall I liked this episode's approach, which was more whimsical than Enterprise tends to be, and as other posters here have noted, in some ways quite reminiscient of TOS. "Exile" is no Trek classic, or even on a par with "Anomaly", but with its emphasis on character it's definitely a step in the right direction. And FTR, Ms. Park is quite the babe. ;-)
O'Deus, I always enjoy your reviews even when I don't see the ep, such as with this last one. I'd like to remark on this comment:
Heavily influenced by some questionable research about human psychic abilities, science fiction widely adopted psychic abilities as being scientifically legitimate; though in fact they're extremely questionable to say the least.
Psychic powers are one example of how science fiction is the new mythology for the modern era. In the ancient myths, mysterious creatures, monsters, sorcerers or whatever always lived far away in the woods, the desert, a mountain or some remote island at sea. And such creatures or persons always had abilities that were beyond the norm.
Nowadays, every corner of the earth has been explored, every animal catalogued and studied, and most every natural phenomenon as been explained. (Of course some will hasten to point out that there are still *some* unexplained things, but these are few, minor and sketchy at best.)
So since our modern world holds few surprises and fewer opportunities for "mythologizing," it's only natural that we would turn our imaginings to places we haven't explored, like the stars.
So science fiction becomes the new mythology, a folklore medium where anything can still happen, a "make believe" world that is still unknown. I know nothing about psychology, but SF seems like an outlet for wish-fulfillment and fantasy projection. After all, every nerdy kids with glasses (like me) would like to fly like Superman. And what guy would NOT like to be an action hero/space gigolo like Captain Kirk?
So anyway, this IMHO is why telepathy and other pseudo-scientific ideas always have (and will) find their way into the mythology of science fiction.
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"When I was your age, I didn't watch television! I LIVED! So... move out of your parent's basements!"
-- William Shatner on SNL, 1986
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That's certainly true. SF is the new mythology, still I prefer it when it stays true to at least some element of scientific ideas, rather than going closer to Scientology or pseudoscience like that.
Many will dismiss FTL as pseudoscience but in fact we really haven't disproven it altogether, by contrast we know humans don't have psychic powers. To me the latter is closer to the investigations of angels rather than genuine SF.
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Sure, one of my standards of quality SF is whether one can "suspend disbelief," and it's certainly easier when the story doesn't totally veer off into the impossible. Cheers, mate!
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"When I was your age, I didn't watch television! I LIVED! So... move out of your parent's basements!"
-- William Shatner on SNL, 1986
Wow, Season 3 has really impressed me. Glad to see it's turning the heads of the naysayers as well. This was a really good episode, if a little predictable. I actually likesd the B-Plot more with Trip and Archer on the Sphere. I had suspected that the Expanse was artificial, and I was right. Now we know we never saw the Expanse in the future: Destory the Spheres, destroy the expanse. Coating a shuttlepod with Trellium-D is a good compromise and gives them a little more capability out there. Enterprise is definateley looking up these days.
I would venture to argue that the ball had no powers at all, but was a luring weapon for Hoshi. The beast guy was able to feed images into her mind, and how tantalizing if he could use that to keep her. Good Episode!
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"Yes, madam, I am drunk. But in the morning I will be sober and you will still be ugly.
-- Winston Churchill
(Picture Main Street Salt Lake City UT, Circa 1900)
This ep really reminded me of a TOS episode. Great work! The tragic nature of the character was excellent - Deus was right on to point that out. The continuation of the sphere/expanse storyline was also fabulous (I was worried it would only be 2 spheres ... to hear the actual amount is great news). I also like how it can explain why the expanse is not mention in TOS and beyond.
I was disappointed that Deus gave this one poor marks for writing. Why praise the ep for having a tragic character, then criticize the wriitng with such a low mark??? The character is a RESULT of the writing, dude.
Anyway, I didn't like the scene on the sphere with the shuttlepod. Basically, it served no purpose! Why was it there? For a cool effect (which it wasn't)? For filler? Spend the time with Hoshi instead.
THat being said, it was a great episode. You know, I find myself at the end of each ep wondering what will happen next week. I haven't watched ENT this consistently since the first 4 eps of Season 1. They've got me hooked. I just hope they tie in the formation of starfleet in later arcs.
Why are B&B just using arcs now? It's a superb way of storytelling and an easy way to get viewers to come back. Sure, people may be scared to tune in halfway through the arc, but it is possible to tell the backstory as the arc progresses. It's how I got into the X-Files after all.
I like Exile. As others have pointed out, the episode reminded me of TOS. The whole feel, storyline, and look of this episode was old school. Some of the great TOS episodes took place on isolated planets, with exiled characters, who had a hankering for gothic mansions.
Enterprise is on a roll. I'm very pleased to see that Enterprises has stepped up its quality in storytelling.
Fairly entertaining, but the main plot was pretty obvious from the start.
Mind you, I really feel the show is now turning the corner away from crapdom into something watchable.
Very cool scenes with the Pod on the Sphere and the inverting ladder in Engineering.
Nice continuity piece between Archer and T'Pol too.
Hoshi is a great character (and under-used) and this made the episode.
She also wears her costumes well, its just a pity the castle was so well heated!!!
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personally i found the episode boring, Once again, you have Hoshi afriad to interact, yet in other episodes she interacts perfectly with the crew! Heopfully the rest of the episodes will not be this sloooooowww. Personally i could care less for Hoshi, At least Travis, Trip and Archer are interesting to watch, TPol and Hoshi are 2 dimensional- maybe they will get better, but compared to the actresses in teh various other TResk, they are not that intersesting.
After abandoning the show for quite a while, and returning to see more disappointing episodes, I was really pleasantly surprised by this one.
It is really reminiscent of TOS episodes in feel and style. You could sympathize with the 'villian'. There are some hokey assumptions that require a suspension of disbelief, just like in TOS. The actors elevated the material, once again reminding me of TOS. The story was a touching one, where you could really feel for the 'alien'.
To me, this is the first episode that ENT has produced that earns it the right to put 'Star Trek' in its title.
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psp1
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Before the series ENTERPRISE began I assumed it would fit in the STAR TREK timeline between the present time and the original series. I assumed there would be some consideration of the uniforms that NASA uses today and the original series. The two elements that made the original series a sucess were the interaction of the characters and the promise that the future would be a positive place when the present was in such turmoil. ENTERPRISE could introduce the romulan war, it could touch on moral questions as the original series did and it could introduce other concepts from the conflicts today. For example: in A JOURNEY TO BABEL there was an alien race that were only 3 feet tall. Those aliens could be introduces to deal with the issue of prejudice. Instead, ENTERPRISE has the uniforms, structure and conflicts of VOYAGER. So far ENTERPRISE is just VOYAGER by another name. I hope when the conflict with the Xindi is over we can get back to the original timeline. Live Long and Prosper, JODY
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