The Next Generation 1x19 "Coming of Age"

**

"Coming of Age" is definitely another artifact from the first season of Next Generation, but it's one of the first signs that this era of Star Trek would ultimately be definitively different from the original series.

It's also a pretty odd one. There are two halves of this episode to consider.  I'm making this statement about one of them.  The lead story concerns Wesley taking the Starfleet Academy entrance exam.  When I say "odd," I mean that Wesley has to worry about competing against other potential cadets, which is "odd" because he's been presented as the boy wonder since the start of the series, an uncommonly brilliant mind that has often upstaged veteran officers.  Why should this kid, other than to keep him around a while longer, have to sweat an exam, let alone worry about competition from others?  We're meant to understand this dilemma better when Picard admits he failed his first attempt, too, but this is juggling apples and oranges.  Regardless of what you feel about Picard at this point in the series, Wesley has already been demonstrated to be nothing like him.

Maybe some of this is an early indication, along with the Traveler from "Where No One Has Gone Before," that Wesley will not ultimately find his destiny in Starfleet.  Although, again, the presentation of this character is easily the most botched aspect of the entire series (with all due apologies to Denise Crosby, who probably still thinks Yar was), and "Coming of Age," although it can be interpreted otherwise, is both one of the worst depictions and perhaps one of the best.  It's "odd."

It does, however, allow us one of our best looks at the Benzites, who were clearly intended to be a signature alien species in this series, although they quickly disappear and never resurface, even in any of the other series.  Their blue awesomeness was clearly stolen by the Bolians.  And then back from the originals, the Andorians.

(Why so many awesome blue aliens, Star Trek?  And why do none of yours sing cosmic opera?)

The other half of this episode is a prequel to "Conspiracy," which is unarguably one of the best episodes of the first season.  That alone pulls "Coming of Age" above the stock of the first season, makes it notable viewing no matter where you stand on the general quality of the series to this point.  "Conspiracy" doesn't ultimately lead to anything else, so the developments seen here might be seen retroactively as perhaps the most fascinating development of the storyline, in which paranoid Starfleet officers (or rather, members of the conspiracy we'll explain later) start harassing each other.  A few of the characters in this episode actually reappear in "Conspiracy," making this whole episode far more serialized than just about the whole of the original series.  In short, it suddenly pays to be watching Next Generation on a regular basis, both so you care about Wesley's future and why those visiting Starfleet officers matter so much.

It's not a great episode by any means, but it's another sign that the series is really figuring itself out.

franchise * series * essential * character

Notable guest-stars:
Daniel Riordan

Memory Alpha summary.

Enterprise 2x26 "The Expanse"

****

The second season ends with a bang, concluding the crew's efforts to figure out how they fit into the grander scheme by letting them know that they have a long way to go.  This is accomplished by kicking off the Xindi arc with a giant swash of Florida being eradicated, and also the last efforts by Duras to gain revenge on Archer, concluding another arc begun in "Judgment."

In a lot of ways, this is Enterprise being Deep Space Nine, having the series steeped in its own mythology.  Next Generation started this with "Redemption," which also featured Klingons, and certainly "The Best of Both Worlds," still the most famous but not first appearance of the Borg.  Contrary to how much of the preceding season had played out, there's a definite connection to other episodes (another irony of the perception of the season, given that even in the early episodes, there was a link between "Minefield" and "Dead Stop," and Trip references plenty of things we've seen in "Dawn").

Another notable feature of "The Expanse" is its inclusion of the Temporal Cold War arc, which even at this point seems to have been altered from its original conception.  Future Guy makes his last appearance of the series, undeniably aiding Archer, as previously suggested for his motives in "Cold Front" from the first season.  Rather than a black and white, Silik-is-the-bad-guy/Daniels-is-the-good-guy interpretation that some episodes might have argued (notably "Shockwave," which ambiguously ended the first season and began this one), we have reason to believe after "The Expanse" that it benefits plenty of factions for events to play out as they historically did, rather than be altered.

Which in itself suggests that the whole third season could be redefined as the definitive Temporal Cold War story, even though the familiar players from other stories in the arc are mostly absent (Daniels appears a few times).  But that's an argument for another time.

Even if you don't care about that arc, there's plenty to enjoy about the episode.  Trip loses his sister in the attack, which is the last push the season gives him for everything that would come, the material that would truly build his enduring legacy.  The Xindi crisis itself reflects the 9/11 attacks that had just occurred when the series began, marking the first time Star Trek used contemporary events to inspire an ongoing story (unless you count the other Cold War and the Klingons).

If you don't particularly want to watch this one for all the interseries continuity, it can still be enjoyed as a standout Star Trek adventure.

franchise * series * essential * character

Notable guest-stars:
John Fleck
Vaughn Armstrong
Gary Graham
Daniel Riordan
James Horan
Daniel Riordan

Memory Alpha summary. 

Enterprise 2x19 "Judgment"

****

Sometimes fans of something don't seem to appreciate the benefits of being, y'know, a fan.  Perhaps they forget that "fan" is short for "fanatic."

I mention this because fans are supposed to be the ones who appreciate what fans will gleam from regularly enjoying something.  Too often in this magnified age of fan interaction, they end up rejecting what they seem to enjoy precisely because of that familiarity.  I know, I'm still confused by that myself.

What I'm still driving at is the appreciation of patterns.  Star Trek has always been about enjoying patterns.  The original series was littered with patterns.  It's nature of episodic television, what makes a procedural franchise possible.  Even when Star Trek doesn't follow the episodic format, there are still established elements that resonate through each incarnation.

I'm not even talking about that.  "Judgment" is a little more fundamental than that.  This episode of Enterprise  calls to mind a specific sequence from Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, released some twenty years before the episode originally aired.  "Judgment," to be specific, features a return to the Klingon tribunal Kirk and Bones once got to enjoy, as well as the same result, a sentencing to the ice planet penal colony Rura Penthe.

If that weren't enough, it also guest-stars J.G. Hertzler, playing a Klingon defense attorney.  Hertzler famously played Martok, who eventually became the Klingon chancellor in Deep Space Nine.  Although he only appeared in the last few seasons Martok quickly became one of that show's most memorable recurring characters.

And in that weren't enough, "Judgment" also features the first chronological appearance of a character named Duras (infamous from The Next Generation and a pair of sisters who survived two TV series but not their first movie appearance, Star Trek Generations).

It's as if the whole episode were constructed in order for me to make this point.  Enterprise was always about celebrating the legacy of the franchise.  This may be the most resonant statement of that aspect of the series.

Anyway, the unfortunate dude at the Klingon tribunal this time is Archer, and he easily and confidently carries the episode, holding his own even as Hertzler is, well, Hertzler, actually making the case that not all Klingons are warriors (it's true!).

So yes, on the one hand you can watch "Judgment" for the novelty of revisiting something from one of the movies that fans generally like, or for Hertzler, or for Klingons in general (this is their best appearance in the series), or simply for the fact that it at last grounds the season in ways prior episodes, even "Cease Fire" with the Andorians and Vulcans, tried their best to do, establishing how far Archer has gotten and how far he still needs to go.  There's a string of episodes that continues the story, by the way, straight into the Xindi arc that envelopes the next season, so those fans who like Star Trek to be more serialized won't be disappointed, and neither will those who like it episodic.  It works every way you like, and beyond that.  It's meta Star Trek, but it doesn't lose sight of telling an interesting, compelling story.

In short, there's little wrong in loving this one.

franchise * series * essential * character

Notable guest-stars:
J.G. Hertzler
Daniel Riordan

Memory Alpha summary.