Get ready to make an impossible choice this week as we examine “Similitude”!
Writer, producer, and podcast host Jason Inman joins the show this week to discuss an episode of Enterprise that pushes the crew of the NX-01 to the breaking point. The ship becomes mired in the Delphic Expanse and Trip is fatally wounded in an engineering accident. When Phlox creates a “disposable” copy of Enterprise’s engineer, Archer will have to make the ultimate choice between his friend and his mission!
Enterprise (*just* Enterprise) was short-lived in comparison to other Trek series, but it stands shoulder to shoulder with them in terms of the depth of its characters and the strength of its premise. It presented us with heroes that lacked the invulnerability of 24th century technology and the certitude of the Untied Federation of Planets. More than that, it charted the path of Starfleet from eager, artless explorers to honed and seasoned protectors of life in the galaxy and it proved that there was still life left in sci-fi’s greatest franchise. On this episode, we discuss Enterprise’s concept as a precursor story, the way it embraced serialization in the franchise and paved the way for it in genre TV, the show’s unabashed emotionality, the military fiction aspects of Trek, the excellent casting, what makes an Enterprise story, and the reason the buck stops with a Starfleet captain.
We also discuss the privileges of rank, Trek switching affiliates on you, gas station comic books, Bob Seger’s “Faith of the Heart”, a Season of Hell, Star Trek’s Donner Party, keeping up with BSG and Firefly, Enterprise’s “Tuvix”, the superlative chill of Dr. Phlox, Riker tanking his career, doppelgangers get all the action, and Sisko as Trek’s “realest” military commander.
Kill your best friend or everyone on Earth dies!
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Listen to “Season 5, Episode 16 “Similitude” (ENT) with Jason Inman” on Spreaker.