Why Star Trek: Enterprise failed

The lyrics of the song in its opening credits made secular humanists (who are the majority of the trek fan base) cringe.   The theme alone was an affront to one of Gene Roddenberry's core principles about star trek.

Instead of orchestral themes, it had this cheap wannabe pop song.

Instead of moral dilemmas, it had tits.

Instead of shakespearean stage actors and drama professors playing well-balanced and noble characters, it had typical TV actors playing trigger-happy rednecks.

Drax says...

I caught one episode soon after it started and a Klingon was standing with the Captain on a high cliff and he actually said, "I can see my house from here.". At least I'm PRETTY sure he did. I did like a triple take trying to determine if I had slipped into some strange daydream or something.

Anyways, I didn't watch it much at all after that.

And yes, the opening theme sucked.

Sarzy says...

The opening theme was pretty much the worst thing in the history of humanity. The show itself was kind of iffy for the first couple of seasons (but still watchable). Towards the end of its run it started to really improve, but I think at that point the damage had been done. As for "rednecks" -- the only character on that show who could be perceived as a redneck was Trip Tucker, and he was probably the best character in the bunch.

dag says...

Comment hidden because you are ignoring dag. (show it anyway)

Poor writing, directing and style choices- it could have been good if hadn't been run into the ground by Hollywood schlock-masters.

Any SF show or movie has to respect the art-form of Science Fiction- or it will fail. This show did not. I imagine some cigar chomping fatty leaning back in his office chair saying "let's give those nerds an alien with big tits - you know, one of those Vogons or whatever those idiots call them". That's why SF shows fail. No science fiction people running the show. That's why Gene Roddenberry was awesome (he hired writers like Harlan Ellison) and that's why the JJ Abrams movie was good too.

Sarzy says...

Yeah, T'Pol's whole presence there was pretty blatantly for sex-appeal, though towards the end of the show her character started to get a lot more interesting (unlike the other Star Trek sex-appeal character, Seven of Nine, who was a shitty character from her first episode to her last). If I had to rank the Star Trek shows, it would look something like this:

1. TNG
2. DS9
3. TOS
4. Enterprise
5. Voyager

Sarzy says...

Well yeah, if you're taking historical context/significance into account, then TOS would have to be ranked number one. But if we're just talking about sheer entertainment value (ie. what would I want to sit down on my couch and watch right now) then I think my list above sounds about right (to me, at least).

enoch says...

im with sarzy on the fact that the show did start to become interesting in the last season or two.shame..because they really had a wipe open slate to work with,add the back story they could have enhanced from TOS and it could have been awesome.

but we diverge from there..
sorry sarzy or anyone else who enjoyed TNG.that show was chock full of gay.
well..until the borg.i find the borg...fascinating.

longde says...

I completely disagree with that list. Here's mine:

1. Voyager
2. DS9
3. TNG
4. TOS
5. TOS cartoon
6. Priceline Commercial with Shatner
7. Enterprise



Voyager was rad. Janeway was rad. 7of9 as a character did improve vastly after her introduction.

gwiz665 says...

I have not seen the complete package - all series that is.

I've only watched the complete TNG, Voyager and Enterprise. I've not watched anything of DS9 and only a few episodes of TOS.

Voyager had some annoying elements, Janeway was incredibly annoying to me and Chakotay with all his "spirituality", neo-indian, "honor his spirit" yadda yadda made me want to cut him and leave him bleeding in a ditch. It did also have some elements that I liked. The doctor was great, reminded me of Frasier, 7of9 and Kez. Maybe something more, but nothing that really stands out to me. Oh, Q obviously, who is just awesomeness in general (better with Picard too though).

TOS is just waay to campy to me. It's too much bravado and too little explorers. The old movies were better than the series, I think.

Enterprise sort of broke with the formula, I think. There was a lot of potential in it, but in the end it sort of fell flat. I liked the theme song, even though it didn't feel like star trek at all, and I cringed a little bit when they sang "I have faith of the heart" since all star trek's are pretty hard atheistic shows.

Deano says...

I would start by saying that all Star Trek is rubbish.

It's got this built-in level of crapness that you have to tolerate if you end up as a fan. I actually view Voyager as a great guilty pleasure and the others can go hang apart from the TOS which at least was good old campy fun.

TNG was utter drivel for it's first three seasons and that's a long time these days. Even after that it was dull and only intermittently exciting. No way a show would last that long now. I just thank the folks who made BSG and proving that intelligent, entertaining SF can be made and broadcast.

Enterprise was the lowest of the low - it couldn't maintain it's low-tech premise (weren't they resorting to transporters even in the first episode!?) and it looked like they had no idea what they wanted to do with it apart from recycle the standard Trek premise. And the characters were uniformly forgettable. Even pineapple head in Voyager trumped them.

longde says...

>> ^Deano:
I would start by saying that all Star Trek is rubbish.


I love some of the idealism inherent in star trek. That's why I can tolerate having to maintain a suspension of disbelief on other details.

But none of the treks hold a candle to Firefly (which can be watched for free on hulu).

marinara says...

DS9 is #1. Love it.
Enterprise has Jolene Blalock...so it can't be worse than Voyager.
BTW, Jolene was in House last week, but just a bit part

That said, one of the big victories of TNG was the SF plots w/o the tawdry sex. The five seasons of Andromeda managed a few episodes of that too.

Kreegath says...

All of these shows are made with a target audience in mind. That's where the fanbase springs up from and why the same show can be described as rubbish, utter drivel and dull on the one hand, and interesting, entertaining and well-acted on the other.

Personally, I can stand neither Firefly nor BSG with their fraction-of-a-second cutting of scenes, overuse of computer animations, the majority of characters' juggling back and forth with convictions and feelings towards each other and general behaviour between episodes, and soap opera-esque storyline. Now, I'm obviously not the target audience they were going for, which most likely is why I feel this way about them. However, that doesn't mean I can't recognize they're made well enough for what they're trying to accomplish, which is something recommended for you to think about as well.

What I did enjoy thoroughly in TOS and TNG was the acting, the pacing, the fictive future presented and that most of the sets and takes were done with real props and not made up whole cloth in a set of computers. They weren't necessarily good props, and the acting wasn't necessarily world class, but it gave me a better sense of immersion than the show Enterprise. Being unable to properly express the main concern I have with the characters portrayed in Enterprise in English is frustrating, and running the risk of being interpreted as saying something but meaning another, let's just say they felt somewhat generic compared to a lot of other shows.

But again, me finding a show appalingly lacking doesn't mean it's objectively bad, and I'm trying very hard not to make it sound like that's what I'm saying. This is blatantly obvious to some, but it can never be stressed enough for others.

jwray says...

BSG is a clusterfuck of gratuitous violence, unrealistically evil characters, and woo-woo nonsense. Interesting, yes. But it is utterly incoherent. Brother Cavil is an even less realistic character than Lord Voldemort. Most of the characters in BSG are fucking insane.

If I had to rank the Star Trek series:
1. DS9 seasons 1-6 and TNG seasons 2-7
2. DS9 season 7
3. Voyager
4. TNG season 1
5. TOS and Enterprise

Prequels are almost always bad because knowing the future in too much detail kills creativity.

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