Star Trek: Enterprise - a personal reflection on the most underrated series

I have a special relationship with this series. It was the first show from the Star Trek universe that I watched many years ago. I was a kid who was into space, spaceships, aliens, and all sorts of crazy things of that kind. I was fascinated by what might be out there somewhere. And I can definitely say that this series influenced some of the decisions in my life.

When I watched the episodes for the first time, I was too young to understand everything I was seeing, but now I perceive the series very differently. At the moment, I’m at a stage where I started watching everything from the universe in chronological order. And some things felt illogical and even irritated me. But my overall conclusion remains the same – this easily enters my top 3 Star Trek series.

I’ve never understood why there’s this idea floating around that STE is an unpopular series and that even the fans reject it. That may be true for the purists devoted to the classic era, but for people like me, who simply enjoy good sci-fi, STE doesn’t carry that heavy dark tone over the universe. For me, the foundation started there.

And this brings me to the intro song. Before I heard anything from classic Trek, I heard Shape of the Heart from STE, and it became a source of motivation and inspiration. Whenever I was dealing with something tough or exhausting, that song helped me and reminded me that nothing of quality comes easily. It’s not the classic melody that most of the older generations expected, but that didn’t matter to me. I didn’t know any others.

I’ll start with the things I didn’t like, so I can dedicate most of the text to the things I do like.

People often explain how the series starts slow and sluggish, and only in the third season does it become dynamic, interesting, and “find its footing.” For me, that statement isn’t exactly true. In some ways, it’s the opposite.

The first two seasons had some of my favorite episodes – Silent Enemy, Civilization, Oasis, Carbon Creek, Minefield, Dead Stop, The Communicator, Horizon, and Regeneration. Honestly, almost all of them. Throughout those two seasons, I hardly ever looked at my phone. But I can’t say the same about seasons three and four. Less so for season three and much more for season four.

Season three is strong, but for me, season four feels like mini-arc episodes that stretch longer than I’d like. In the first seasons, we explore different worlds, cultures, situations, while in season four it’s the opposite – much more action, almost no universe-building, and a lot of recycling of existing ideas.

Personally, Vulcans aren’t one of the most interesting races to me, and the episodes with them feel a bit too much. Especially when they span across several episodes… not my thing. Something else I didn’t like at all is that the further the series progressed, the less attention was given to the career development of the crew.

No one got promoted for 10 whole years.

But back to season three – things developed great there. We have action episodes, moral episodes, dilemmas, and interesting situations. The whole Xindi storyline unfolded a bit quickly, but the sense of closure wasn’t overly forced. Still, there were too many illogical things.

It was illogical for Archer not to seek a solution to the anomalies just because T’Pol had an intolerance or objection to it. Saving Earth seems like an important enough goal to require sacrifices. Also – why is Enterprise the only ship in the Expanse searching for the Xindi? There was no real sense that Earth was on the brink of destruction. Obviously there are other ships in orbit and in the fleet – we’ve seen them. They’re not NX-class, but shouldn’t every vessel be searching for a solution?

Why didn’t the Vulcans send ships to assist Earth in orbit? When the Xindi reach the planet in the final episode – shouldn’t there be an armada waiting for them? Not a few confused captains and one station that doesn’t even have weapons.

This is something that annoys me in most series. Many events and situations are treated as isolated problems. Little aquariums that never step outside their boundaries, and everything is always conveniently tailored to the needs of the plot. The universe has the potential to be enormous, yet everything always revolves around a single pin-sized solution. Why?

The universe is teeming with life. Archer himself says in season four how the galaxy turned out to be much more populated than they thought, yet the show never truly conveys that feeling. You don’t build your first sailing ship before you’ve built thousands of small sailboats. It doesn’t make sense to have an NX ship with such an engine if you don’t have tons of smaller ships circulating the solar system.

Another unpleasant thing is that there is no functional Starfleet or a real organization above Archer. They exist on paper, but decisions are made mainly by the crew, even when they should be far above the captain’s authority. There should have been far more coordination. Another downside is the lack of personnel. The entire show revolves around five people and no one else. It would’ve been great to have several recurring secondary characters around the main cast. Instead, the “holy trio” ends up doing everything. They could remove 90% of the crew and not a single episode would feel their absence.

These two things always annoyed me, even when I was little. Now they feel like an even bigger, illogical burden. Archer is the captain of a starship. He’s supposed to oversee processes, not run around everywhere with a phase pistol while the tailor (figuratively speaking) commands the bridge.

As for the plots – what I’m about to say applies to all Trek series, so it’s not so much a red flag for Enterprise specifically, but simply that it suffers from the same issues. The ship’s “problems” always follow the plot. Exactly when the solution is to beam someone up – suddenly the transporter fails. They need to scan something – the last torpedo conveniently hit the scanners. They need weapons – they’re offline at the worst possible moment. Not to mention how many episodes have plot holes specifically involving transporter technology. They’ll be trapped somewhere in a building and no one thinks to beam them out. (For example, the P’Jem episode.) And if someone does think of it – oh look, atmospheric interference or some malfunction.

For me the whole idea of the Temporal Cold War and time travel, while interesting in terms of individual episodes, makes no logical sense. Paradoxes everywhere, and they should’ve avoided them… personal opinion. Endless plot holes.

I mean… I get it, but it feels childish at times.

Now to why this series is in my top three.

The feeling of the show is exactly what it should be. They managed to create a ship and technology that feel precisely like the transitional era between today and TOS/TNG. The NX itself is one of the most beautiful ships I’ve seen. Its interior resembles a submarine, and the exterior is elegant and clean. The bridge feels advanced, yet outdated at the same time. The designers recreated the “past” of Trek perfectly.

The whole series gives this sensation of being close to us. Like we’re almost at the point where we could have what they have.

The characters feel alive, with history. Even though we don’t get to know anyone outside the core seven, those seven have stories, fears, desires, ambitions. It’s a shame their careers weren’t developed more. Some deserved promotions. They’re fun characters with fun moments, intriguing, sad, spontaneous – there was a bit of everything.

The moral-dilemma episodes are fantastic. One of the strongest episodes for me is Dear Doctor. To recap – it’s the episode where Enterprise visits the planet of the Valakians and the Menk. The Valakians are dying from a genetic disease, while the Menk have the capacity to eventually lead the planet on their own. It’s a heavy episode with heavy dilemmas. Whether Phlox should help the Valakians or let nature and evolution decide. I’m satisfied with the outcome and I think it was the right decision – we’re not there to play God.

The series has many such great episodes that make you think. It’s not pure action where they shoot all the time.

All Shran episodes were amazing as well. Every episode with him is a pleasure to watch. I’m only conflicted about the very last episode of season four. Trip’s death there was so forced and senseless. If they really wanted to kill someone, they could’ve done a better job. Archer deserved a better finale episode… but it is what it is.

Outside the plot and aesthetics, something else I think is great are the effects. Even for such an early period, for the early 2000s, the team did a fantastic job and everything looks great even today. The show hasn’t aged morally or visually. The battles are great, the ship scenes incredible. The effects like the phase pistols, rifles, teleportation, etc., are spot on. Even the Suliban modifications don’t look bad.

I’m glad this was the first series from the universe I ever watched. It lit the spark and pulled me into this world of exploration, morality, philosophy, and psychology. I’m sure nostalgia plays a role, but this is easily one of the top series in this universe.

I really hope we’ll see some of the characters again in a new series or something that resembles the aesthetic of this one.