I Just Rewatched ____ and Noticed ____

[HopefulRomantic]

Okay, I'm gonna put on my slicker and brave the rotten veggies. I actually liked Twilight...

Another member for the Rotten Veggie Club. Welcome, welcome. You are most welcome, my friend. (Can you tell I've just been watching "Errand of Mercy"? )

[Elessar]

Okay, I'm gonna put on my slicker and brave the rotten veggies. I actually liked Twilight...

Another member for the Rotten Veggie Club. Welcome, welcome. You are most welcome, my friend. (Can you tell I've just been watching "Errand of Mercy"? )

Just as an episode I loved it. The whole A/T thing was totally unnecessary and of course completely flopped. I remember the first time I watched it, before I was a TnTer at all, I still didn't see chemistry between them, and as the episode went on I kept waiting for them to suddenly make sense together, and it never happened. Swap Trip for Archer and it'd have worked beautifully.

[JadziaKathryn]

I've been watching videos and saw again Archer's famous-running-from-the-exploding-Xindi-weapon scene. They did a nice job with that, visually, and it looks very heroic. The problem was that it was so heroic they couldn't resist making it Archer. *sigh* It should've been Malcolm, or even Amanda Cole or some other random MACO. (My preference would be to make it some other MACO who died rescuing Hoshi so that Hayes could be the one who disabled the Xindi weapon. Then he'd actually die and there'd be no stupid alien Nazi plot. Because Starfleet might've wanted the head of their MACO unit to have some serious background in disarming weapons for this mission. And *that* would make more sense for Malcolm's idea that he's being replaced. It all works to me. If wishes were horses...)

[Elessar]

I've been watching videos and saw again Archer's famous-running-from-the-exploding-Xindi-weapon scene. They did a nice job with that, visually, and it looks very heroic. The problem was that it was so heroic they couldn't resist making it Archer. *sigh* It should've been Malcolm, or even Amanda Cole or some other random MACO. (My preference would be to make it some other MACO who died rescuing Hoshi so that Hayes could be the one who disabled the Xindi weapon. Then he'd actually die and there'd be no stupid alien Nazi plot. Because Starfleet might've wanted the head of their MACO unit to have some serious background in disarming weapons for this mission. And *that* would make more sense for Malcolm's idea that he's being replaced. It all works to me. If wishes were horses...)

I actually really liked the way Hayes died. It was so unique, so "almost didn't happen!". I got to really like the guy, being that I really respect military officers and what he was trying to do. His dedication was seamless, and I really didn't like that he died, but his death was meaningful and heroic and felt by everyone in the crew, so it was honorable.

[JadziaKathryn]

Do you ever sleep, Elessar?

Anyway, I don't have an issue with the way Hayes died per se. It's just that him dying on the Xindi weapon fits nicely with my "Archer is the captain, not the person who could run the ship by himself" idea. But hey, you can keep Hayes dying the way he did. We can put Malcolm in Archer's place on board the Xindi weapon, since I guess we're stuck with "Storm Front" anyway. (And you're right, Hayes died doing his job and saving Hoshi, which in turn enabled the disabling of the Xindi weapon, so it was a very honorable death. Tangentially, I always liked the part where Malcolm is unhappy that yet another person died and says that the needs of the many outweighing the needs of the few doesn't make his death acceptable, and T'Pol said, "No, but it makes it honorable.")

[Lady Rainbow]

RE: Hatchery and the MACOs. I know soldiers are SUPPOSED to follow orders. That what makes Hayes a good MACO...he follows orders. The problem is when you follow orders that are obviously so screwed up...Hayes follows 'em anyway. That's how he's been trained and if he'd had any second thoughts, he'd probably convinced himself that at least he did his job. Not to defend the MACOs ('cause, yeah, it makes 'em seem like stupid automatons), but I can understand why Hayes and Malcolm ended up on different sides of the mutiny. Malcolm, at least, questions orders that doesn't make sense.

And that's a really poor misunderstanding of military officers that I can't believe still perpetuates. Even the Marines - and I say even because people tend to think of the Marines like the MACOs in the sense that they would follow orders to the letter with blinders on, more than any other branch, without regard to any mitigating circumstances, like because Marines are all hard-charging jarheads that don't think. To a lot of people the phrase "Marine officer" sounds like an oxymoron for that reason, and it's in line with this perception of military as brainwashed automotons that don't think for themselves. As far as I am aware based on my relationships with Army officers from NCOs in the range of SFC and Sergeant Major and commissioned officers in the range of LtCol and Col, AND Marine officers from 2nd Lt to Capt, an officer is trained and expected to take initiative when orders don't make sense or when your superior is compromised or when higher orders are merely unavailable. They would not be able to function without that skill. Popular media seems to often represent the "your CO has gone mad" scenario as if it's something that the training philosophy just never thought of. So everybody is all "oh my god, our captain is nuts, omg omg omg what do we do?" when in reality the scenario of the CO that becomes unfit for duty is historically not uncommon and because it's so difficult to work with - i.e., relieving your commanding officer of duty and facing possible court martial of your superiors don't later find in your favor - it's covered in officer training in extreme detail. It's a very serious part of every officer's training - and should be written as such for MACOs, too.

Elessar, when I was in Navy ROTC at Virginia Tech (I was in the VT Corps of Cadets...yes, I nearly went into the military, until I blew out my knee during a PT run and couldn't pass the physical... ), my neighbor was in Marine ROTC. She was one of the nicest, most honorable people I knew, but when it came to business, she was all business, and I respected her for that. And my brother (who's a medical corpsman) worked with the Marines in Iraq for 8 months...he'd been stationed at Camp Lejeune, NC for 5 years and he had plenty of friends there.

That's why I winced at the "the jarhead always follows stupid orders and doesn't think" attitude. It made Hayes look like a brainless idiot and it definitely perpetuated the stereotype you brought up. (Didn't mean to insult you there, Elessar. Sorry.)

(((Elessar))))

[Alelou]

Okay, I just want to chime in on the rotten veggies front and say I LOVED the stupid alien Nazis two-parter. It was just so campy and wild but it held its own internal logic (other than all that clearly California landscape meant to be NY). That shot of Enterprise flying low over Brooklyn is one of my favorite shots of all time.

[Lady Rainbow]

But hey, you can keep Hayes dying the way he did. We can put Malcolm in Archer's place on board the Xindi weapon, since I guess we're stuck with "Storm Front" anyway. (And you're right, Hayes died doing his job and saving Hoshi, which in turn enabled the disabling of the Xindi weapon, so it was a very honorable death. Tangentially, I always liked the part where Malcolm is unhappy that yet another person died and says that the needs of the many outweighing the needs of the few doesn't make his death acceptable, and T'Pol said, "No, but it makes it honorable.")

I really liked Hayes's character ("Hatchery" notwithstanding) and I thought if TPTB wanted to kill him off, they'd do it the way they did. Though I always thought someone being shot while transporting wouldn't get hurt...or maybe my physics is off?

And the super!Archer thing really got me. Malcolm's the Security guy...he's the one who volunteered to stay behind and sabotage the Xindi sphere. But yeah, Archer running like he## was a pretty dynamic shot. LOL!

[JadziaKathryn]

And the super!Archer thing really got me. Malcolm's the Security guy...he's the one who volunteered to stay behind and sabotage the Xindi sphere. But yeah, Archer running like he## was a pretty dynamic shot. LOL!

He did try to explain to Archer that it's part of his job, but Archer blew him off with some "No, I want to be the hero - I mean, *cough* I can't ask you to take that risk, you get Hoshi to safety" line. The only bad part about that great shot is that they weren't good at budgeting for special effects, so humans looked like a bunch of morons who didn't get other defenses up when they knew the Xindi wanted to blow up Earth.

[CX]

Or they could've had some balls and killed Archer.

[Alelou]

Killing Archer? Even I wouldn't go that far. Talk about killing off your show. Probably half the audience were dedicated Scott Bakula fans. They wrote Archer into some terrible boxes, and Bakula's acting was uneven, but I think Archer was still essentially a sympathetic character and you just plain need that third point in the triad of lead characters. Personally I don't feel a ton of affection for him but he keeps creeping into my stories because they NEED him.

I agree about the bizarre lack of resistance from earth. Or even space traffic. That was just ridiculous!

[JadziaKathryn]

Really? I thought that, while Archer was written all over the place, and sometimes inane, stupid places where no captain ought to go, Bakula's acting was usually quite good. But you have a point about killing your show by killing off Archer.

[Alelou]

Really? I thought that, while Archer was written all over the place, and sometimes inane, stupid places where no captain ought to go, Bakula's acting was usually quite good. But you have a point about killing your show by killing off Archer.

Oh man. IMO Bakula seldom handled angry or distraught well. And in the Mirror Universe he's just laughable. Honestly. It just makes me cringe. I began to wonder if maybe he just didn't care anymore towards the end of the fourth season and was going campy on purpose. Maybe he'd been watching Shatner reruns or something.

On the other hand, he could be very good at comedy, and he obviously loved physical stuff. And once in awhile he would rise to the occasion with something meaty. But CT and JB were miles beyond him.

[JadziaKathryn]

Oh man. IMO Bakula seldom handled angry or distraught well. And in the Mirror Universe he's just laughable. Honestly. It just makes me cringe. I began to wonder if maybe he just didn't care anymore towards the end of the fourth season and was going campy on purpose. Maybe he'd been watching Shatner reruns or something.

On the other hand, he could be very good at comedy, and he obviously loved physical stuff. And once in awhile he would rise to the occasion with something meaty. But CT and JB were miles beyond him.

Oh. I haven't watched IAMD because I just.don't.care, so I wouldn't know. I agree that CT and JB were better, but then I don't think SB was bad. *thinks about this*

[Asso]

Oh man. IMO Bakula seldom handled angry or distraught well. And in the Mirror Universe he's just laughable. Honestly. It just makes me cringe. I began to wonder if maybe he just didn't care anymore towards the end of the fourth season and was going campy on purpose. Maybe he'd been watching Shatner reruns or something.

On the other hand, he could be very good at comedy, and he obviously loved physical stuff. And once in awhile he would rise to the occasion with something meaty. But CT and JB were miles beyond him.

Oh. I haven't watched IAMD because I just.don't.care, so I wouldn't know. I agree that CT and JB were better, but then I don't think SB was bad. *thinks about this*

Archer? Well! I will try to not be too raw.
Annoying boastfulness, illogical shallowness.
Trustworthy friendship? Mhhh... I'm not sure.
Obviously I'm NOT a Bakula fan, and I ask for indulgence of his supporters.