In the eighth episode of the fourth season of Enterprise, this whole season feels like each episode is half good and half terrible, and this episode is no exception. Intrigued? Then it’s time for Mark to watch Star Trek.Â
Trigger Warning: For talk of white savior narratives, genocide
There is such a good idea at the heart of “Awakening,†and I can’t deny that it was a pleasure to watch Soval’s continued growth as a character alongside the contrast with V’Las, who represents the most repressive element of Vulcan society. Granted, we get far less time with V’Las, so I’d understand if anyone felt his transformation into the power-hungry, paranoid tyrant wasn’t anywhere near as convincing as Soval’s journey.
At the same time, the Vulcans in Enterprise were always moving towards this point, so I viewed V’Las within three and a half seasons worth of mythology and history. From the start of the show to this point, they’ve undermined the Andorians, they acted in their own interest at the expense of others, they’ve thwarted T’Pol’s plans for the future, and they’ve treated humanity horribly. I don’t see their behavior here as out of character for who they’ve been. Is their reaction to the Syrannites extreme? Of course!
But I’m guessing that the next part of this (I HAVE BEEN CLIFFHANGER’D SO MANY TIMES THIS WEEK) will reveal just how long the majority party in Vulcan culture has been trying to eliminate any group that poses a threat to their precious order. As far as I can tell, the Syrannites actually affect no one, and they are such a tiny minority that the High Command’s attack on them is simply overkill, an act of religious genocide. V’Las basically admits as much when that one councilor tries to stand up to him. Even worse, there is literally only one character who makes any attempt to deviate from this course of action, meaning that the majority of High Command (and probably the general population) supporting wiping out the Syrannites.
I get the sense that this arc is leading to some great reform in Vulcan society, and it is precisely that reason why it makes little to no sense that change will come about because of Jonathan Archer. In many ways, this writing choice is classic Trek, but Deep Space Nine devoted SEVEN YEARS to telling this exact same story. I have no faith that Enterprise can execute it in two episodes. Indeed, it felt so out of place that at one point, I tried to convince myself that this was the subversion of the whole Chosen One narrative, that this was designed so that Arev had no real choice but to pass the katra of Surak on to Archer. And the more I think about this, the angrier it makes me. He couldn’t ask Archer to send T’Pol over? COULD YOU IMAGINE HOW MUCH MORE INTERESTING THIS EPISODE WOULD HAVE BEEN IF T’POL, THE DISBELIEVER, HAD GOTTEN THE KATRA AND THEN HAD TO FACE HER MOTHER WHILE SURAK’S ESSENCE WAS INSIDE OF HER? Like!?!?!?!?! She was right there! You literally wrote her story to perfectly fit where Archer’s was, and yet?
It’s the white dude all over again. Granted, it is a little weird on the surface because… well, how can you have a white savior narrative if all the other characters are white, too? Obviously, Vulcans don’t subscribe to human classifications of race, but this is more about how the story is constructed and how the show is cast than anything else. Archer still exists outside Vulcan culture, and it is inherently less meaningful that with no preparation or care, he is suddenly the person who saves them from their worst tendencies. There’s no more glaring example of that than when he finds the Kir’Shara in like five minutes when the Syrannites had been looking for it FOR YEARS. And it’s so close to where the Syrannites had set up their base and they still didn’t find it behind the big door that was obviously where super secret artifact shit was hiding?
That’s what I mean by this. This feels designed to put Archer in the center of it all, rather than exploring the Vulcan side of things. It’s sloppy!
The video for “Awakening†can be downloaded here for $0.99.
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