Terra Nova, Prod#ST:ENT 106

Synopsis: The crew explores Terra Nova, a mysterious human colony in outer space.

MJC Review:

The Drama -

Finally! After a few rocky starts, a real trek episode emerges. This episode got back to the real basic issues that deal with human space exploration (trek style). In this show, the viewer gets to see how humans deal with and overcome tragedies of planet colonization. 70 years ago, earth colonists set out on an adventure in hopes of colonizing a new world. Many hopes and dreams went with those aspiring colonists only to be devastated by events that would have normally extinguished all life, hopes, and dreams. What archer discovers when he arrived was a bit more than what he had expected. Descendents of the original colonists were a bit more skeptical of Archer and the other humans. After all, the stories past down generation after generation to these colonial descendants depicted a tale of humans causing the "poison" to rain on their homes. It was interesting to see how their stories had developed over time - quite literally from a child's perspective. I thought that these scenes of Archer trying to communicate and help these people was very well done. I think that it showed how strongly Archer believes in humans being in space. This was definitely quite a challenge for him. After all he had to build trust, means of communicating, and even sacrifices to prove his intentions to the colonists. As Archer put it, if you they can't make contact with humans, then you don't deserve to be out there. There were some very good scenes that depicted the Archer/colonist struggle. All of which were very well played. I think that one could almost really feel what the captain was going through. It would have definitely added some serious dramatic twist if it really was humans that had caused the disaster. Oh well. I guess that there's only so much drama you can fit into 45 minutes. This episode was definitely a classic Gene Roddenberry trek tragedy theme that was well done. The Enterprise creators can do things well. For once, we know what trekking around the universe is all about.


Tid Bits -

"Put it on a pad."??? Isn't a pad 24th century technology? "9 years there, 9 years back." I guess some hard core trek-nologist will figure out the actually warp speed for that one. Amazing that the "guns" the colonist had still worked so well 70 years later. Be careful. Most things around here don't react to well to bullets.


What it all means -

"...to boldly go where no human has gone before."


4 cool peace signs
MJC 200110.29