(1x07) Blue Man Crew: The Andorian Incident!

[entkayjay]

This is the discussion thread for S1E7, The Andorian Incident! All Delphic Expanse rules of engagement apply.

Written by: Rick Berman and Brannon Braga (AND story credits list Fred Dekker as well... 1st time new blood?)
Teleplay by: Fred Dekker (also Vox Sola, Sleeping Dogs; consulting producer on 21 other episodes)
Directed by: Roxann Dawson (Vox Sola, Dead Stop, Dawn, Bounty, Exile, Chosen Realm, Doctor's Orders, E2, Awakening)

There is a Rewatch Chat scheduled for 1:00am GMT (FRIDAY March 11) in either the chat forum here if our local magicians manage to make it appear, or at Tinychat.com (instructions and live link will be posted in the Live Chat Information Thread). Or whenever anyone else wants to watch and chat!

[Honeybee]

So, we had some fun last night at the rewatch.

This is definitely one of my favorite first season episodes. It's got a pretty lighthearted tone, despite the seriousness of some of the issues it raises.

Poor Archer gets beat up for the first of many times. Trip and Archer start playing their Dumb & Dumber act we later see them use on the Ferengi. Trip, Archer and T'Pol start working together very quickly, with T'Pol figuring out something was amiss pretty quickly. The big three are clicking into a nice working relationship.

There are some nice character moments. Just like in Unexpected, there are a few scenes that establish Trip's competence. Archer's stubborn streak comes through. Even though she seems to have a lack of patience with the humans in the beginning, T'Pol definitely shows signs of warming to them. She asks for the stone of whatever ritual at the monastery. She defends them to the head monk. Yet, she's still pretty arrogant, especially in the beginning and when describing the Andorians. Meanwhile, Malcolm is being very competent back on the ship.

We see T'Pol's first (of many) reasons to doubt her people's righteousness, and she seems genuinely taken aback at the end. She does follow Archer's orders, because that's her job but also because she feels it is the right thing to do. T'Pol is a character that believes Vulcans are honest, she tries to adhere to their values and so her actions make sense.

This time around I noticed that Douche Vulcan (our name for the younger monk) is probably not a monk at all, but a member of the V'Shar as he seems to ignore the elder and be not very spiritual at all. My guess he's there to play hide the listening station.

In general, I like the action resolution (with blowing up the giant head) better than the downed tree thing in Terra Nova. If you want to get picky, you can wonder why the Andorians only brought four people, and why there didn't appear to be more than three or four Vulcans at this huge monastery.

We did notice that all monasteries look alike, and the Surek statues look an awful lot like Buddah statues.

Best of all, we get Shran. And we get the awesome Andorian makeup. And moral ambiguity.

[Mistress Euclid]

I very much enjoyed the rewatch last night! I had forgotten how many lovely AT&T scenes were in the episode, with the three of them working together. I enjoyed the moments when Trip teases T'Pol, and I enjoyed where she seems offended when Jon questions her loyalty.

The Andorians were a delight - and I daresay they should have been the focus of the first season. Shran lights up the screen.

[Aquarius]

Best line for me was when Trip says "Somethin' sure smells."

Trip fixing things rocked my world.

Seeing the self-righteous Vulcans caught in their lie was awesome. I also liked T'Pol's part in this. Her whole world view got shaken. She did the right thing, but she struggled with it and I really appreciated that.

One of the things that interested me in the chat last night was when someone pointed out that Douche Vulcan obviously didn't belong, that it was obvious that he was a spy and not a monk. I hadn't really thought of this before. I struggled, like a lot of fans, with this different take on the ST universe at the time this episode originally aired. I had chalked it up to bad writing or a misreading of the grand Star Trek text...but when that was pointed out last night, it was one of those lightbulb over the head/DUH!! moments. Pretty cool to get a new perspective.

[Brandyjane]

I agree Douche Vulcan was probably a spy, not a monk. The issue that I used to struggle with, though, was that if he was a spy, how Archer was able to effortlessly knock him over. I would think it would be logical to send someone trained to fight to help guard that station. Douche is a Vulcan; he should be able to take on a human! Then it got me thinking how the whole concept of hiding the spy station in a monastery made no sense. I understand the need to have surveillance capabilities. If I were the High Command, I'd want to monitor a species as volatile as the Andorians, too. But were there really no other places to hide the equipment than in a culturally priceless sacred monastery with a bunch of pacifistic monks? If this place is really as sacred as T'Pol makes it sound, you'd think there would be no way they'd put it at risk. Then I got to wondering how the Andorians came to suspect it was there in the first place. Were they tipped off? Did the Vulcans do a really poor job at concealing the transportation of supplies and manpower to and from the station? Was it emitting radiation they could detect? Again, if this is supposed to be so super-duper top-secret, how did the Andorians find out about it?

I think someone in the High Command (a Romulan, maybe?) wanted that spy station discovered so that they could provoke a war with the Andorians. I think Douche Vulcan wasn't trying to prevent its discovery, but was instead going down into the catacombs with Archer and the rest so that he could make sure someone did discover it, and that's why he let himself be taken down by Archer so easily. Of course, they had to put up a pretense of hiding it really well and trying to protect it so that the Andorians and the Vulcans as a whole wouldn't realize their true motives: have it discovered so that a war could be started.

Well, that's my insane conspiracy theory for the day!

[Honeybee]

I think you thought all that through better than the writers, Brandyjane! But you could definitely write a story around that idea.

[Aquarius]

I didn't question hiding it at a monastery so much. I think for all the reasons Brandyjane said that they wouldn't hide it there, that makes it the best reason why they would. Why? Because 'everybody" knows that the Vulcans value their shrine, their meditation, their devotion to logic so much. If you've got the rest of the galaxy believing you'd NEVER put it there, that's EXACTLY why you put it there, because they're more likely to take it for granted and not look. Or, as in the case of the Andorians, when they do look, it's not hard enough.

I do, however agree with "Brandyjane in that it should be clearer why the Andorians started looking there.But, for all we know, it was in the script and that detail ended up on the cutting room floor, in the interest of time compression. It would be interesting to know if there was a reason earlier in the writing/filming/editing process.

[Glory1863]

I think there is another reason for hiding a military target in a civilian environment. For the Andorians, that station is a legit military target, but if they destroy what appears to be a civilian installation, and a culturally significant one at that, then they become the pariahs of the universe, particularly if they can't prove through a relatively unbiased source like Archer that the military target existed. Andorian "bad behavior" becomes a rallying point for Vulcans who aren't going to be told the truth of the situation by their own government. Does this sound even remotely like war as it is currently being carried on in the Middle East and elsewhere?

[Aquarius]

I think there is another reason for hiding a military target in a civilian environment. For the Andorians, that station is a legit military target, but if they destroy what appears to be a civilian installation, and a culturally significant one at that, then they become the pariahs of the universe, particularly if they can't prove through a relatively unbiased source like Archer that the military target existed. Andorian "bad behavior" becomes a rallying point for Vulcans who aren't going to be told the truth of the situation by their own government. Does this sound even remotely like war as it is currently being carried on in the Middle East and elsewhere?

I will agree that Star Trek has historically been a mirror for the current social condition on Planet Earth as it is in our century. Warfare and espionage techniques are also likely to be reflected, as they're currently being carried out. Either way, it's an extremely effective strategy, for all the reasons you outlined. If the Andorians were wrong, or couldn't prove it, they'd make a lot of enemies - especially for bugging such a pacifistic society as the Vulcans. The Vulcans would look like total victims, and any other worlds they're allied with would be outraged and incensed.

And yes, governments hold things back from their people. "For their own good." It was this principle on which the Vulcan Arc is built later in Season 3.

[Kathy Rose]

This is one of my favorite episodes to watch and rewatch. For me, it's fun! I'm not saying the situation that Archer, Trip and T'Pol find themselves in is fun, or that the political machinations as discussed by some of you are any less serious. But I love how the characters work together, the dialogue between them, and so on. I crack up every time I hear T'Pol telling them how to behave. She didn't want them to go there, but if they are, she wants them to be on their best behavior.

I think the arrogance of the Vulcans of that era comes into play in this episode. Vulcans? Hiding a spy station in a monastery? That's pretty audacious. Although I thought perhaps they could have come up with something better than some big, old tapestry to hide the huge hatch to the listening post.

I am surprised that Trip didn't get caught when he went to work on the old transmitter. If I were Shran, I would have kept a guard stationed inside the room where the captives were.

I especially love Archer's comment, in reference to the Andorians saying they'd kill the hostages if Enterprise tried to interefere, that he didn't recruit his tactical officer to sit on his butt when threatened. Archer is expecting Reed to do something, and not only that, he's counting on it.

I remember being impressed by Archer's righteous indignation when he realizes that there is indeed a listening post. You can almost hear what he's thinking. The Vulcans have held back humans from moving out into the galaxy, and now the Vulcans have lied to them. He's wondering what else they've lied about.

So I wasn't the only one who thought the statue looked a bit Budda-like.