{"id":6600,"date":"2017-10-24T13:00:38","date_gmt":"2017-10-24T20:00:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/?p=6600"},"modified":"2017-10-08T19:56:01","modified_gmt":"2017-10-09T02:56:01","slug":"mark-watches-enterprise-s04e15-affliction","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/2017\/10\/mark-watches-enterprise-s04e15-affliction\/","title":{"rendered":"Mark Watches &#8216;Enterprise&#8217;: S04E15 &#8211; Affliction"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In the fifteenth episode of the fourth season of <i>Enterprise<\/i>, Tucker deals with ramifications; Phlox is kidnapped; Reed hides a secret at great cost. Intrigued? Then it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s time for Mark to watch <i>Star Trek<\/i>.\u00c2\u00a0<!--more--><\/p>\n<p>Well, here\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s to hoping that the next part of this is just as intriguing as this story, because <i>damn<\/i>. I had a lot of fun being completely bewildered by the plot in \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Affliction,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d which juggles three storylines that all feel like they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re barreling towards some awful convergence. LET\u00e2\u20ac\u2122S TALK.<\/p>\n<p><b>Tucker<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Well, they committed to it. I respect that! I kept waiting for something to happen or someone to swoop in and take Tucker\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s transfer away, but <i>nope<\/i>. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m thankful for that for a reason that has nothing to do with him: Captain Hernandez, the FIRST LATINX WOMAN CAPTAIN IN <i>STAR TREK<\/i> HISTORY!!! Granted, we don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t learn much about her in \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Affliction,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d but YOU BETTER BELIEVE I AM VERY EXCITED ABOUT HER. Also, wasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t she the mom on <i>The Brothers Garc\u00c3\u00ada<\/i>??? I AM LIVING FOR THIS.<\/p>\n<p>Anyway, I get that Tucker was upset <i>and<\/i> in denial about his request for transfer to the <i>Columbia<\/i>. Nothing made that more obvious than when he snapped at T\u00e2\u20ac\u2122Pol for asking if he was leaving because of her. YES. YES, IT\u00e2\u20ac\u2122S BECAUSE OF T\u00e2\u20ac\u2122POL, BUT HE\u00e2\u20ac\u2122S TAKING OUT ON HER BECAUSE HE CAN\u00e2\u20ac\u2122T BE MATURE ABOUT IT. I do empathize with him to an extent because this was so <i>awful<\/i> for him to experience. And the decision to leave <i>Enterprise<\/i> wasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t even met with much fanfare. We never see his going away party. Instead, all that we get is his <i>absence<\/i>. He\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s just not on the <i>Enterprise<\/i> anymore, and it <i>shows<\/i>.<\/p>\n<p>His transition isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t pretty, either. Look, he had a rapport with his engineering team before, and it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s <i>always<\/i> difficult to develop a new one with a new team. It doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t help that Tucker is immediately thrust into a high-stress situation with the launch of the <i>Columbia. <\/i>I have no idea what mission they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll be on, but I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m guessing it will intersect with the <i>other<\/i> big plot.<\/p>\n<p><b>Phlox<\/b><\/p>\n<p>I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t really think the writers thought through the whole \u00e2\u20ac\u0153kidnapping Phlox\u00e2\u20ac\u009d thing because&#8230; well, it makes no sense. Phlox even says so! Antaak tries to make up excuses about Klingon honor and duty, but like&#8230; they were willing to have Phlox work in secret to develop a cure for the virus that is decimating multiple Klingon colonies. Why couldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t Antaak have secretly approached him so that they could avoid <i>Starfleet<\/i> coming after them? They also could have not MURDERED A BUNCH OF RIGELIANS. Like&#8230; what??? What the fuck, <i>why was that necessary?\u00c2\u00a0<\/i><\/p>\n<p>So while I am perplexed as to the way this was written, this plot turns into something immensely fascinating: THE ACTUAL, CANON EXPLANATION FOR WHY <i>THE ORIGINAL SERIES<\/i> KLINGONS LOOK SO DIFFERENT. I vaguely remember Julian Bashir talking about this before??\/ But oh my god, GENETICALLY ENHANCED KLINGONS. AUGMENTS. Holy shit??? I am still genuinely impressed with this as a way to connect <i>Enterprise<\/i> to future <i>Trek<\/i> series, but it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s also a fantastic vehicle for Phlox to get a complicated story. See, at first, he complies with Antaak, mostly out of a combination of curiosity and convenience. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not like he can go anywhere, you know?<\/p>\n<p>Yet once Phlox puts together what he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s working on, he stands his ground. He <i>refuses<\/i> to help the Klingons perfect their Augments; he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll only work on devising a cure for the virus.<\/p>\n<p>PHLOX IS SO GREAT, I CAN\u00e2\u20ac\u2122T WAIT TO SEE WHAT HE DOES NEXT.<\/p>\n<p><b>Reed<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Okay, this is Section 31, <i>right<\/i>? That one dude dresses like a spy, which is perhaps the only unintentionally hilarious thing in this whole episode. Like, he broadcasts that he is part of a shadowy organization as soon as he steps outside. Anyway, I <i>swear<\/i> I heard Reed make mention of \u00e2\u20ac\u0153section,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s the only explanation that fits. Why else would Reed risk both his career and his friendship with Archer like this??? What is so important that Section 31 would order Reed to lie and to hide that the Klingons are involved? How does this <i>help?<\/i> Did Section 31 allow Phlox to be kidnapped???<\/p>\n<p><b>Shared<\/b><\/p>\n<p>HOW THE FUCK ARE T\u00e2\u20ac\u2122POL AND TUCKER SHARING DREAM SPACE? HOW? HOW WAS HOSHI ABLE TO? Because of the mind meld??? Maybe? <i>What is going on?<\/i><\/p>\n<p>The video for \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Affliction\u00e2\u20ac\u009d can be downloaded <a href=\"https:\/\/markdoesstuff.com\/products\/mark-watches-enterprise-season-4\">here for $0.99<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><b>Mark Links Stuff<\/b><\/p>\n<p>&#8211; <strong>My YA contemporary debut, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.markoshiro.com\/blog\/2017\/9\/22\/i-am-proud-to-announce-my-ya-contemporary-debut-anger-is-a-gift\">ANGER IS A GIFT<\/a>, is now available for pre-order!\u00c2\u00a0<\/strong><strong>If you&#8217;d like to stay up-to-date on all announcements regarding my books, <a href=\"http:\/\/eepurl.com\/ey636\">sign up for my newsletter<\/a>! DO IT.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In the fifteenth episode of the fourth season of Enterprise, Tucker deals with ramifications; Phlox is kidnapped; Reed hides a secret at great cost. Intrigued? Then it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s time for Mark to watch Star Trek.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[674,614],"tags":[615],"class_list":["post-6600","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-enterprise","category-star-trek","tag-mark-watches-star-trek"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6600","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6600"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6600\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6600"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6600"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6600"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<!-- WP Super Cache is installed but broken. 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