Acquisition, Prod# ST:ENT 119
Synopsis: When the Ferengi, a group of intergalactic thieves, stun the Enterprise crew and try to rob the ship, it's up to Trip to work covertly to stop them. After the Ferengi awaken the Captain to force his assistance in pillaging his ship, Trip secretly reveals to Archer that he has inadvertently escaped the effects of the noxious gas and they work together to try to surreptitiously thwart the robbery and save the crew.
MJC Review:
The Drama -
Bad kudos to the producers for breaking Trek continuity! I do not think that this was done well. After all, it was clearly established in TNG that Picard was the first (knowingly or unknowingly) to discover the Ferengi. No maybe, and, if, or but!
Gees, what's next? The enterprise crew encounters the S.S. Botany
Bay?? Anyways, Picard's Ferengi encounter was really, really far out there in space, even for 24th century warp speed days. I seriously doubt that the 22nd century Enterprise, even at warp 5 for the past few
months, would be anywhere near the sphere of Ferengi ship travel. Even if this was the first "encounter" with Ferengies, I find it hard to believe that it would take around 200 years before Picard makes the first "official" encounter with them. The underlying premise leading up to this episode was that the crew was to be unaware of them. That's they way it should have been, if the producers wanted to keep
continuity and have hope for a good story line. Keeping the
"thieves" unknown to the crew were would have added a bit more mystery to the episode as well. Besides the obviously big Trek
continuity error, this episode had a mix of good and bad scenes. I thought that the looting scenes were a bit too long. It seemed like for almost the first 20 minutes or so of the show,
that's all there was - "Gee, look what I found". Having the Ferengi talking in there native language was good, but that got boring before the scenes turned to all "English". I'm not sure if some of the scenes of T'Pol were within her character. The scene of her on the Ferengi ship (although the lobe-stoking was funny) and
un-cuffing Archer ("not interesting...") just seemed a bit odd. It would have been ok if this was all a
dream - yea, that's how it should have ended. The bumbling Ferengi scenes were very funny, though. However, that has been what the viewer has come to expect from Ferengies and what has been well established in DS9. If the producers are going to use Ferengies, at least be a bit more original rather than rehashing typical 24th century Trek Ferengi acting. It was good to see some
veteran actors playing the Ferengi. They played well despite whether the story was good or bad. I thought that Krem was too much of a rehash of Rom. Star Trek has already played out the dumb Ferengi story line
on DS9 (and a good job with it as well). The ending could have been better. I'm sorry but having 'You raided my ship and now I'm just going to let you go' didn't jive well. Oh well, better luck next time.
Tid Bits -
It was good to see Jeffrey Combs play a Ferengi again. I wonder who will be the first Trek viewer to say, "Was that Brunt? Sounded like him. Gee, I guess Ferengies live for at least 200+ years"...etc...etc... Who knows, maybe it was one of Brunt's ancestors. I guess the knock-out gas doesn't affect dogs. Maybe
Starfleet should star assigning guard dogs to their ships. Looks like the Ferengi have more rules to add to their
acquisition book before 24th centrury Star Trek era. I wonder if the Enterprise
encounter may have resulted in those rule additions. Wait till the Ferengi encounter Klingons, if they haven't already!
What it all means -
DON'T STEAL THE CAPTAIN'S DOG!!
2 cool peace signs
MJC 200203.30