Sci-Fi Universe reviews Enterprise's series finale, "These Are The Voyages..."
[UPDATED: Questions and answers can be found below!]

Article posted on Sunday May 01, 2005 by Michael van Poppel at 5.59 pm EST / 2.59 pm PST.
Updated on Tuesday May 03, 2005 at 6.56 pm EST / 3.56 pm PST.

Sci-Fi Universe reviewed Enterprise's final episode, "These Are The Voyages...", airing May 13 on UPN. Be aware, the review below contains heavy spoilers!

Also stay tuned for a review on Enterprise's "Demons", airing this Friday.

You can find wallpapers for "These Are The Voyages..." at the bottom of the page.

Here's a report on the series finale:

 

 

SPOILER ALERT

As you may know, "These Are The Voyages..." starts six years from the 'current' Enterprise storyline.

Teaser and Opening Credits
"These Are The Voyages..." opens with the Enterprise heading to the decommissioning ceremony for the Enterprise.
Captain Archer, played by Scott Bakula, is preparing his speech for the signing of the charter for what will become the United Federation of Planets.
Then you hear this: "Computer, freeze program.". Everything stops, Commander Riker, in his season 3 uniform from "Star Trek: The Next Generation, appears and turns the holodeck off and walks out.

Episode
After the credits, we see the Enterprise D, as we saw it in The Next Generation, and we're with Troi and Riker as they're walking through the corridor. It seems Riker has been looking at historical records to gain some insight into a decision he has to make concerning a secret mission from the past.

It's a reference to "Pegasus," the season seven episode from "Star Trek: The Next Generation".

Anyway, Riker starts up the holodeck program and we're back on the NX-01, the Enterprise bridge.
Enterprise receives a call from Shran, the Andorian. They're surprised to see him, since they think he's been killed.

Shran tells Archer that his daughter's been kidnapped and he wants help to get her back. Archer decides he owes Shran, so they take a detour and pick him up and then decide to mount a rescue mission.

Meanwhile, Riker has decided he's going to impersonate the NX-01's chef so he can talk to each of the crew members, and he does, under the pretense of finding out what their favorite foods are.
So, we get a scene with each of the crew members as they talk to Riker, who looks like he's been eating a little too much of the chef's hush puppies and catfish himself.

They go on the rescue mission, and there are some nasty aliens. Shran and T'Pol make the exchange of a rare space ruby for Shran's daughter, then fighting breaks out, and Riker, dressed as a MACO, kills a couple of aliens. Then they all escape.

Later, the aliens manage to beam aboard the NX-01, and confront Archer and Trip in the corridor. The aliens knock out Captain Archer and tell Trip that if he doesn't lead them to Shran, they're going to kill Archer.
Trip plays along. He takes them to a room where he says he has to rewire some communications conduits or something while the aliens watch. Then, he tricks them and says, "you're all going to hell." Trip blows himself, and the aliens, up.

Archer wakes up, and takes Trip to sickbay, he's in a bad shape. Trip says it's all good, and the doctor ships him into a tube, and that's the last we see him. He's dead!

The last scene
The last scene is Captain Archer and Commander T'Pol on Earth in the green room for the big ceremony.

T'Pol's sad about Trip dying, and Archer's going to make his big speech. We hear "End Program" and the last bits are with Riker and Troi on the Enterprise D as it flies off.

We hear Captain Picard, from "Star Trek: The Next Generation" saying; "These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise...", then we see the Enterprise from The Original Series and we hear Captain Kirk's voice, "her ongoing mission, to seek out strange new worlds, etc.".
Final, we see the NX-01 and we hear Captain Archer saying, "to boldly go where no one has gone before...".

The episode ends. It was, to quote Jolene Blalock, "appalling." If I were the Enterprise cast, I'd be really pissed that so much screen time went to Riker and Troi and dealt with a storyline from "The Next Generation."
And I think it was Rick Berman and Brannon saying, "See? Enterprise may have sucked, but at least we did The Next Generation, and that was a good show, so here, remember this?".

I'd give it one star, only because of the disrespect it showed to the Enterprise cast and mythologies.
Many cast members got very little screen time, especially Doctor Phlox, Mayweather, Hoshi and Reed.

 

Your questions, answered below!

Question: Is "These Are The Voyages..." an TNG [The Next Generation] episode? As opposed to Enterprise?
Answer: Kinda hard to tell, actually.

Q: Are Voyager, Deep Space 9 and The Original Series featured at all? or is it just a Valentine for The Next Generation?
A: Nope. It's about half The Next Generation and half Enterprise.

Q: Is the TOS scene in the montage an all-new CGI shot with the original voiceover or an actual clip from TOS?
A: It's a new bit of CG (recycled from "In a Mirror, Darkly." In fact, you can see the Defiant's "NCC" number on the underside of the Enterprise when it flies by, which I think is being corrected for the final cut. 
The Kirk voiceover is from The Original Series, though.

Q: So the fact that it is a Valentine for Star Trek viewers is a lie?
A: Who says it's a valentine to Star Trek viewers?
SFU: It's described by Rick Berman as a "valentine" to Star Trek fans.
A: Hmm, more like it's a valentine to "Star Trek: The Next Generation". And it's Berman and Braga patting themselves on the back for coming up with The Next Generation. Pretending that Enterprise was really just a detour on the way to The Next Generation.

Q: Besides the fact the TNG thing took most of the time, leaving that out, was the episode any good?
A: Nah, it was kinda boring.

Q: is Trip's death a fitting one?
A: Actually, it's kind of pointless.

Q: Did the scene with T'Pol packing up Trip's quarters make it in?
A: Yes, it did.

Q: What is said about Trip after he's gone?
A: It's said that he would have wanted Captain Archer to say his death was worth the cost. 
To further the cause of space exploration.

Q: At what point time-wise does the death of Trip happen?
A: Toward the end of the episode.

Q: Is T'Pol applauded as a hero?
A: Not particularly. they're all applauded as heroes. Archer does give T'Pol a big hug, though.

Q: Do you feel the Enterprise cast and viewers have been betrayed?
A: Hm. I think the cast has definitely been betrayed. Not sure about viewers, though. 
You mean the 15 who are still watching?

Q: Did it get 1 out of 5 stars just because of the TNG factor?
A: Among other things.
SFU: Such as?
A: Boring, subplot of Shran's kid was kind of out of the blue, so to speak; Trip's death was pointless and abrupt.

Q: Is the Romulan war featured in the final episode, in the form of a mention or maybe some 'flashbacks'?
A: No, they mention the Romulans, but only in glancing reference to the Pegasus episode. There is no flashback.

Q: And does the end, apparently, imply that Archer never gets to make his climatic speech?
A: He makes the speech. We just don't see it.

Q: Why was it so important for Riker to run the ENT program? What are they doing on the Ship?
A: Riker's wrestling with a moral dilemma: to tell Picard or not tell Picard about the Pegasus experiment. he uses the Enterprise hologram to help inform his decision.

Q: How does the Trip and T'Pol interaction play out?
A: Sort of lame, Riker as the chef asks T'Pol if she'll miss Trip. Then she asks Trip if he'll miss her and she tells Trip that wherever he goes, she'll miss him. That's about it.

Q: What was it that Riker learns? What was the plot of the story.
A: It's not even made that clear, but Trip disobeys Archer's order to save him, and Riker takes that example to disobey the order of an admiral and tell Picard. Very lame.

Q: No mention of how and why they ended their relationship? 
A: No mention of how they end their relationship. Just that it ended "six years ago". 
I expect they deal with it in Terra Prime. Will get Terra Prime next week, probably.

Q: Do we see any sense of mourning for Trip from any of the crew, and if so, then what do they say and do?
A: Not really. Archer and T'Pol have a few moments, but that's about it.

Q: Shran dies, correct?
A: No, Shran doesn't die.

Q: Are the voiceovers in the montage all old?
A: Yes.

Q: Do we see anything significant with regards to the Federation ceremony? Why are these aliens after Shran? 
Do we learn what became of Archer and his crew in any of Riker and Troi's conversations? 
A: With regards to federation ceremony, last thing we see is the massive rotunda that we saw earlier (the one that Daniels shows Archer in the future), but that's about all we see of the ceremony. We see the Enterprise crew sitting there and waiting for Archer to make his speech.

The aliens are after Shran because he cheated them out of a Denebian Amethyst.

As for what became of archer and the crew, no, we learn nothing from Riker and Troi's conversations, except that they know Trip dies.

Q: Do you know if we see inside Archer's Ready Room in the final episode? If so, do we see the 4 drawings?
A: Riker and Troi do go into Archer's ready room. They comment on how there's no fish tank and it's small. Riker nearly bangs his head on a bulkhead.

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