Enterprise 1x19 "Acquisition"

rating: ****

the story: The Ferengi unofficially make first contact with Starfleet.

what it's all about: Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know: fans had kittens about yet another thing Enterprise "wasn't supposed to do."  And they weren't particularly amused about how "Acquisition" skirts canon, anymore than they were the next season when it was done with the Borg, too.  But those fans can seriously stuff it.  "Acquisition" is above and beyond anything else one of the best Ferengi episodes of the franchise.  Maybe the best.  Or most accessible anyway.

Those same fans, mind you, would call that faint praise.  Part of the problem is that the Ferengi have a bad reputation.  Originally conceived as a major new menace in the first season of Next Generation, they instead came off as goofy wannabes.  While that series revised its depiction of Ferengi over the years, Deep Space Nine actually included one in its main cast, the bartender Quark, not to mention a whole host of recurring Ferengi around him.  Now, Deep Space Nine is generally regarded, at least by a cult-within-the-cult, as the best Star Trek series.  But even so, it became plagued, so these fans suggested, by "Ferengi episodes," an epitaph that means anytime an episode revolved around a Ferengi, any Ferengi, all Ferengi...it was probably regrettable.

Anyway, Voyager managed to do a few Ferengi episodes, too, mind you, despite featuring a crew flung far from home.  I can only assume the amusement level of the fans.  But let's move along.

"Acquisition" features a pack of Ferengi who aren't trying to be warriors or merchants but...pirates.  It's really the first time they're ever depicted this way, and it's genius.  Of course it fits into their wheelhouse, perfectly.  And not only is the depiction perfect but the real treat is that the three Ferengi attempting to rob the Enterprise are all played by familiar faces (...underneath the rubber): Jeffrey Combs, Ethan Phillips, and Clint Howard.  Combs had played a Ferengi before, the recurring IRS figure Brunt in Deep Space Nine, Quark's nemesis.  Phillips, better known as Voyager's Neelix, had masqueraded as one ("False Profits," from that series, naturally).  Howard, meanwhile, subsequently became the first actor to appear in every era of the TV franchise when he showed up in Discovery.  He's a truly peculiar Star Trek institution.

Of them, it's Combs who's the lead, and like Quark's brother Rom, he's not especially happy trying to be a typical Ferengi.  Since it's Combs, who also plays Shran in the series, it's a strong performance, and he gets to play opposite Archer (as he does in Shran's blue makeup, too), and once again draws out some of Scott Bakula's strongest Enterprise material. 

Trip's running around, too, in a Die Hard scenario, so it's effectively a three-man drama.  And the thing about it?  In retrospect?  It's kind of a warm-up for the series finale, "These Are the Voyages...," in which another caper involving Archer, Trip, and some invading aliens ends...differently. 

Plus there's some classic comedy, because it's a Ferengi episode, and there's got to be comedy, too.  Eventually Archer admits they do have the vault the Ferengi are looking for.  But really, it's just their reaction to Porthos.  Honestly, the importance of Archer's beagle can't be overstated in the series.  He's not just a vague reference in JJ Abrams' later film reboot!

criteria analysis:

• franchise - Arguably the most accessible Ferengi appearance of the whole franchise.
• series - Foreshadows the final episode.
• character - Archer, Trip, Jeffrey Combs...you pick.
• essential - If you can get past your reservations about whether this should happen, you'll discover its immense pleasures.

notable guest-stars:
Jeffrey Combs
Ethan Phillips
Clint Howard

Voyager 7x25/7x26 "Endgame"

rating: ****

the story: The crew faces one last great shortcut home...but it goes through the Borg and...Admiral Janeway?

what it's all about: Like the rest of the series, Voyager's final episode proved controversial, difficult to like among fans.  Some of them merely singled out parallel elements from Next Generation's finale (a new relationship: Chakotay and Seven/Worf and Troi; a degenerative illness: Tuvok/Picard; a time travel element, different time periods), and thought it merely derivative.  Some were actually upset they didn't get to see just a little more, the crew reuniting with family.  Some were, as they'd been since the third season, upset that the series was still pretending it had something to say about the Borg.  And some still just didn't like Janeway, much less two of them.

To which I say: humbug.  It's surprising, really, how many of Star Trek fan complaints amount to so much humbug, a stubborn insistence to be grumpy, a trend that has grown more and more prevalent among fan cultures of any extraction in recent years, and so Voyager ought to celebrate being at the vanguard of such a movement, no matter how dubious the honor.

I say humbug, too, because this is a perfect ending to the series.  It is a parallel, to the first episode of Voyager.  Janeway has to make a difficult decision that will determine when they get home.  In "Caretaker," she makes a principled stand, a correctly Starfleet one, that strands her ship seventy thousand lightyears from home, so that if it took the full length of time none of the crew would be alive to actually reach it, that it would end up being a generational journey.  By the end of the series, two children had been born into the crew, Naomi Wildman and Miral Paris, whose birth actually occurs in "Endgame."  Throughout the series, Janeway had also struggled with that original decision, notably in "The 37s" and "Night." 

"Endgame" is a chance to revisit it, and once and for all determine whether she made the right call.  But she has help this time.  Namely, herself.  Future Janeway, or as she's known Admiral Janeway, has actually once and for decided she made the wrong one.  Ultimately, one of them has to pay the price.  It might seem cheap for it to be Admiral Janeway, since her timeline ends up being erased anyway, but this is a franchise that has long celebrated such sacrifices, most memorably in Deep Space Nine's "The Visitor," and even in Voyager's own "Timeless," which "Endgame" also parallels and serves as a spiritual sequel.  In that one, it's an older Harry Kim who goes back to fix things, and it's the best Harry appearance of the series.  While Janeway can't quite claim that honor with "Endgame," it's still among her strongest episodes, precisely because it does force her to decide, once and for all, if she was right in "Caretaker."  It's a bold call to say she thinks, at least, that she wasn't.  But she also has an opportunity she didn't then, the classic "have your cake and eat it, too," which results in a dramatically memorable trip home in a metaphorical belly of the whale, a Borg cube that the ship quickly emerges from...in home territory at last.

For a series that long chased truly cinematic moments, knowing like Deep Space Nine before it that there were likely no movies in its future, it's a truly achieved objective.  Getting Alice Krige to reprise the Borg Queen one last time, regardless of whether or not it's a final defeat of the Borg, at least gives the series another long-held objective of giving Janeway a defining win over the Collective, building on everything that had come before it. 

All that and more is why I love "Endgame," and the series around it.  It's a strong final episode, arguably the most appropriate one of the whole franchise, accomplishing in grand fashion what might have been inevitable, but never guaranteed to be so memorable. 

criteria analysis:

• franchise - A series finale that completes the story exactly as expected but still manages to surprise.  In that sense, totally unique in Star Trek lore.
• series - Parallels the very first episode in a deliberate fashion.
• character - Allows Janeway to finish an argument she's had with herself since the beginning.
• essential - To see how the crew gets home, especially that spectacular final sequence, really has to be seen to be believed.

notable guest-stars:
Kate Mulgrew (Admiral Janeway)
Ethan Phillips (Neelix)
Manu Intiraymi (Icheb)
Richard Herd (Admiral Paris)
Dwight Schultz (Barclay)
Alice Krige (Borg Queen)
Vaughn Armstrong

Star Trek: The Next Generation 3x24 "Menage a Troi"

**

A couple of developments and one key scene make this episode more memorable than it really is.  The first thing you should know is that "Menage a Troi" is a Lwaxana Troi episode, and it's also a Riker/Deanna Troi episode, and it's also a Ferengi episode, and it's also a Wesley Crusher episode...And despite all that, the best scene involves...Picard.

First things first.  Lwaxana Troi was a signature recurring character for Next Generation (one of her later Deep Space Nine appearances actually references this episode directly), and this is probably the only time she is directly tied into the main events without having orchestrated them herself.  Even still, it's not one of her better showings.  It's not as clear when she's hanging out with her daughter why she's such a fun character to have around.  That's why the Picard scene is so memorable (but we'll get to that).

Riker and Troi have a fabled romantic background that was sparingly touched upon in the series (though it finally led to a wedding in Nemesis), and while this is the rare episode to tackle it, it's also not an especially memorable instance, because it's mostly the same kind of window dressing character work featured in "Tin Man" a few episodes earlier.  Alas.

Then there's the matter of Wesley.  His status as a Starfleet Academy candidate was so screwy.  You can't present him as a prodigy and then have him have so much difficulty getting into the program (as shown in the first season).  Clearly all this backpedaling on his career progress was meant to simply keep him around, which was all well and good, although his character became more and more pointless the more he was used simply as just another character on the bridge.  Seriously, this is the closest he comes all season to having his own episode.  Because of yet another bogus excuse as to why he hasn't left yet, Picard decides to give him a field promotion to ensign.  This was a far bigger to-do behind the scenes, where Colin Powell was present for a ceremony that saw Gene Roddenberry present Wil Wheaton with the second lieutenant bars from his very real military days.

Then there's the fact that this is a Ferengi episode.  One of the most impossible tasks of the miraculous third season was rehabilitating the Ferengi, who were supposed to be one of the signature creations of the new series, on par with Romulans and Klingons, but whose first season appearances made them out to be more or less complete jokes.  While "Menage a Troi" doesn't quite accomplish the task any better than the earlier "The Price," it's an important step in the direction of DS9, which is still the best argument for Ferengi redemption (though many fans still dispute that).

And then there's The Scene.  In order to get Lwaxana out of the clutches of a would-be Ferengi suitor, Picard must convince him of his own genuine love for her.  As anyone who has seen previous Lwaxana appearances knows, Picard loathes Lwaxana.  He most certainly does not love her.  And so this is a tall order indeed.  He ends up using cultural differences to perform this trick.  He quotes Shakespeare.  Anyone who knows the Picard character knows he loves his Shakespeare.  (He certainly loves Shakespeare more than Lwaxana!)  And the fact that Patrick Stewart is the epitome of classically trained actors in Star Trek, any excuse to let him present such material will always be worth whatever the material provides.  And yet it works so perfectly.  The audience is aware of all the ironies, which are entirely lost on the Ferengi.  It works.  Lwaxana is saved.  And Picard gets the best scene in an episode that otherwise really has nothing to do with him.

franchise * series * essential * character

notable guest-stars:
Majel Barrett
Ethan Phillips

Memory Alpha summary