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sshbpodcast · 4 months ago

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Character Spotlight: T’Pol

By Ames

We’re continuing through our Enterprise character spotlights with a much more likeable character than last time: the ship’s resident Vulcan, T’Pol! And though she starts out mostly as eye candy for the 10-year-old boys watching (kinda like Seven of Nine), the sub commander really grows into something more than just a cat-suited female (also kinda like Seven of Nine!). Over the four seasons of the show, Jolene Blalock really nails the “Vulcan nuance,” as we’ve dubbed it, and becomes a character greater than the sum of her voluptuous parts.

She may spend most of the series making suggestions that go unheeded, bearing the brunt of Archer’s xenophobia against Vulcans, and being exploited for the sake of the viewers to ogle her in the decon room or performing Vulcan neuropressure, but the hosts of A Star to Steer Her By really grew to appreciate T’Pol’s presence. The Vulcan Science Directorate has determined you should read on below and listen to this week’s podcast episode (tractor beam to 59:08) for more on our logical first officer!

[Images © CBS/Paramount]

Best moments

I’m the sanest one here! After T’Pol warns everyone not to go down to the planet until they’ve scanned it (amateurs!) in “Strange New World,” everyone on the away mission inevitably goes crazy on pollen. But she keeps her wits about her and manages to not get shot by a batshit hallucinating Trip. Instead, she concocts a clever plan with Hoshi to survive the storm and save everyone.

Tractor beam > grapplers While Archer is racial profiling the Vulcan crew of the Ti’Mur all over the place in “Breaking the Ice” and assuming they’re there to spy on the Enterprise, T’Pol is busy keeping rational and logical, as is her wont. She eventually convinces Archer to swallow his pride and ask them for help when they need the use of Vulcan tractor beams over their miniscule grapplers, which suuuuck.

You have the power to control the waves We really don’t get enough scenes between Hoshi and T’Pol, but when we do, they’re always lovely together. When Hoshi is stressing out while on the Klingon ship in “Sleeping Dogs,” our Vulcan friend doesn’t hesitate to share some meditation techniques with her. And in “Vox Sola,” we see more of T’Pol’s awkward way of showing affection for the ship’s cunning linguist.

My mind is my mind, my thoughts are my thoughts There’s a lot of negative things we can say about “Fusion” (and we will in just a moment, so don’t despair), but none of those things can be laid at the feet of T’Pol, who’s the only person acting on her behalf for most of the episode. I shouldn’t have to say it is good for women to stand up for themselves because “no means no,” but this is the world we live in.

The Science Vulcan Directorate has determined that time travel is not fair T’Pol’s in a rough spot again in “Shockwave” when the Suliban have taken over the ship in Archer’s absence. They interrogate the poor woman for a while, and she holds her own somehow, and clings to her logic that time travel should absolutely be impossible. And after torture, she’s able to jump into the crew’s plans to re-commandeer the ship!

As usual, Vulcans are immune to the anomaly of the week In typical Vulcan fashion, T’Pol does not suffer the obsessiveness that plagues all the other crew members when they study a trinary black hole system in “Singularity.” So it’s up to her to rescue the rest of the characters from themselves (or from Phlox, in the case of Mayweather) by knocking everyone except Archer out cold and saving the day!

An AIDS allegory a few decades too late While a lot of “Stigma” doesn’t hold up today because its AIDS allegory feels like too little too late, everything T’Pol stands for in this episode rings true. Even while every man on the show is telling her what’s best for her, she firmly states that anyone with Pa’nar syndrome should be treated as justly as she is as someone who was forced into a nonconsensual mindmeld.

We can stop the film if it’s disturbing your conversation I do find it annoying every time Archer forces T’Pol to do things outside her comfort zone just because she’s Vulcan, but this little moment is cute. It might just be because of how damn obnoxious we find Phlox sometimes, but watching her tell that Denobulan sycophant to shut up during a movie in “Horizon” was all of us in that moment. Phlox, Shut Up.

Every day is exactly the same Even though it’s kind of an alternate timeline, the T’Pol that we see in “Twilight” does some very commendable stuff. Sure, there’s taking command of the ship when Archer is incapacitated, but there’s also resigning that commission to take the most thankless job there is: taking care of memory-less Archer for years on end and explaining life to him over and over.

There’s a human expression: You gotta give ‘em that hawk tuah We get another alternate T’Pol in “E²” and she’s just as compelling as “Twilight” T’Pol. The older, wiser T’Pol is astute enough to see the flaws in her son Lorian’s crazy plan and provide her younger self a better, just as crazy plan. Add that to the literal self-reflection she shares about getting over her trellium addiction and learning to love Trip and it’s all great stuff!

Blood is thicker than plomeek soup This is one of those complicated episodes, so you’re going to see “Home” on both lists, but let’s start with the good. We’ve got to respect T’Pol a bit for sucking it up and marrying Koss even though they’d called the engagement off (not to mention that she has a thing for Trip). But it was to save her mother’s reputation and get her reinstated at the Academy, so that’s nice of her.

Her name is Elizabeth We don’t get a lot of T’Pol with baby Elizabeth in “Demons” and “Terra Prime” but what we do get is heartbreaking. We’ve really got to give credit to Blalock and Trinneer for some beautiful acting when a doomed Human-Vulcan infant is thrown in the mix, especially in their final scene of “Terra Prime,” which is utterly devastating.

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Worst moments

You were only there for three days and you couldn’t restrain yourself While Vulcans throughout Enterprise are typically bitchy and blunt, it seems a bit illogical how T’Pol jumps to the conclusion that Trip must have acted ungentlemanly during the course of “Unexpected,” resulting in his getting pregnant. This before he’s been able to tell a word of his own story. That’s just rude, T’Pol. Get all the facts first, then make your judgement.

Don’t blame the victim We’re not victim blaming T’Pol for what happened to her in “Fusion.” No, we’re blaming the writers, who did a bad bad thing in this episode that we largely loathed. For some reason in Trek, the writers treat it like a requirement for the sexy lady character to get mind-assaulted, and to treat it as sexually as possible, and we’ve been fed up with that since Troi and Seven.

Oo-mox always makes the list! I will always put oo-mox on the bad list, because too often it feels like sexual degradation. Lwaxana does it. Crusher does it. Jadzia does it. And in this parade of women performing mild sexually-implicit acts on Ferengi, we see T’Pol perform oo-mox on Krem in “Acquisition.” It’s just disgusting how the writers keep falling back on making this gross joke over and over.

The spy who neck-pinched me We learn in “The Seventh” that T’Pol was an operative for the Ministry of Security, which is idiotic enough on its own. She also sides with Archer on what to do with Menos, which is never a good idea, after the resurfacing of some wiped memories of all the messed up shit she did. Worst of all, the writers forget about her spy training and foist it off on Reed being in Section Thirty-fucking-one, but we’ll cover that later!

Pon farr also always makes the list Almost as much as I dislike oo-mox, I dislike pon farr. We already covered this in “Blood Fever”! It’s yet another device to sneak sexiness into episodes, but it is in no way consensual. Blame pon farr all you want, but for all of “Bounty,” we’re subjugated to watching T’Pol run around in her underwear trying to rape Phlox just to titillate the teenaged boys, and that’s disgusting.

I don’t believe it, now my pants are chafing me Like our last Enterprise spotlight, most of the bad moments are coming from season 3. This is when we’re subjected to countless instances of T’Pol engaging in Vulcan neuropressure with Trip, which is NOT her job. Relenting to Phlox and doing this was bad enough, but did she really have to trick Trip into it in “The Xindi”? And why did she HAVE to be topless for it?

Green-blooded with envy We promised you last time lots more moments from “Harbinger,” so here we go. Vulcans wouldn’t typically find it illogical to be jealous of other people, but that doesn’t stop T’Pol from getting all jealous when Trip starts hanging out with Amanda Cole. It makes her look like a petty, whiny teenager all episode long. Green is apparently not a good color on you, T’Pol.

I just don’t like being compared to a lab rat Oh look, more examples from “Harbinger.” The Tri’Pol shippers get their moment when the two of them hook up, and who can blame them? But having T’Pol pull the rug out from under Trip the morning after is just cruel and tactless. She claims (if you can believe her) that she was just curious what intercourse with a human was like, as if she were just checking it off a list. Next!

I’m sorry, Captain, I can’t obey that order Another episode that ranks among some of the worst of Enterprise is “Hatchery.” Everyone except Archer is perfectly content to let the Insectoid babies die, and T’Pol disobeys when captain orders the crew to help save them. She doesn’t even know the captain is compromised yet! She just doesn’t think he’s committing enough war crimes, evidently, and mutinies about it!

Big green monkey, everyone’s a junkie Again, no victim blaming here; addiction is a serious condition, and kudos to T’Pol for eventually getting help from Phlox. But. The writers fail T’Pol’s logical character in making her a trellium-D junkie, as is revealed in “Damage.” You want to explore an addiction plot? Fine, then make it make sense for her character. Have her seek to build her immunity. Have it be to relieve pain from turning zombie in “Impulse.” Chasing the dragon doesn’t work for a Vulcan.

You brought me sixteen light years just to watch you get married to someone you barely know A second ago, we were giving T’Pol credit for marrying Koss to help her mother unsully her reputation (which was neither of their faults to begin with, mind you) in “Home,” but it’s also just plain sad to watch her have to acquiesce to being blackmailed into a marriage she does not wish to be in. And to have to treat Trip like he’s dog meat is also painful to watch! Tri’Pol shippers, unite!

You’re wondering if I’ve been having any daydreams about you? Speaking of the Tri’Pollers, they get a smorgasbord of Trip-T’Pol material in “Bound,” most of it juvenile as hell. Ever since they got together in “Harbinger,” T’Pol has been dancing around this “do you like me” bullshit like a teenager (or worse, like Shakaar in “Crossfire”) and it gets so frustrating. Why can’t the Vulcan just be upfront about this stuff? Why is she in high school?

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It is only logical to end the blogpost here. Make sure you’re following along as we keep the Tri’Pol ship chugging along next week, when our spotlight swings to everyone’s favorite Floridian! Also keep watching along with our watchalong of Discovery over on the SoundCloud or wherever you podcast, do some Vulcan neuropressure with us over on Facebook, and remember to wear a hat whenever gallivanting around in the past!

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sshbpodcast · 4 months ago

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Character Spotlight: Charles “Trip” Tucker

By Ames

Screw Jonathan Archer. Trip Tucker is the real hero of Star Trek: Enterprise. He’s more likeable. He grows more as a character. Unlike John, he actually overcomes some of his racism. He commits way fewer atrocities than John too! We testify all the time on the podcast that he has the character journey that Archer should have had. So this week, your A Star to Steer Her By hosts are here to analyze the best Florida Man out there.

Don’t let the accent fool you: Trip knows his engineering shit. This Southern charmer is not only personable to everyone he meets, he’s more emotionally self-aware than most characters across the franchise. We need more Trip Tuckers in the world. So read on below and listen to this week’s podcast episode (tightrope walk over to 45:57) as we highlight our catfish-loving friend. And pass the pecan pie.

[Images © CBS/Paramount]

Best moments

Challenge your preconceptions or they’ll challenge you One of the early moments of growth we see from Trip comes in “Strange New World.” He spouts some absolutely horrid racist jargon at T’Pol while under the influence of space pollen, but when he snaps out of it, he not only apologizes, but he recognizes that he’s still learning to overcome the systemic racism he grew up surrounded by, which is hella introspective.

I feel like I got caught with my hand in the cookie jar Speaking of Trip apologizing to T’Pol, he knows to come clean to her after he read her very personal letter in “Breaking the Ice.” It’s Trip’s suggestion to Archer to have Hoshi decrypt the message instead of to (ya know) ask T’Pol about it, which is shitty, but then he’s honest enough afterwards that T’Pol sees in him someone she can trust to ask for advice about her arranged marriage.

I am just going outside and may be some time Who other than Trip could get Malcolm Reed, ship introvert, to come out of his shell? Their friendship becomes a show highlight after their misadventure during “Shuttlepod One.” Trip is even willing to Captain Oates himself to give Reed a fighting chance, but then ends up saving their asses when he prolongs their life support and then detonates their engine to get the Enterprise’s attention.

We all scream for ice cream Earlier in “Breaking the Ice,” Trip advised T’Pol to do what’s best for her (and eat pecan pie). Now in “Oasis,” we see him continue the trend when he advocates for Liana to make her own decisions, and it won’t be the last we see him champion others’ decisions. He also introduces Liana to ice cream, which makes him a goddamn hero. Someone, get this girl a bowl of rocky road.

It’s the CAPTAIN’S chair This is one of the cute moments we couldn’t help but include. It’s also a fun little acting showcase for Connor Trinneer when Trip gets absolutely fixated on tuning up Archer’s chair in “Singularity.” And when he’s clear-headed enough again not to redesign the whole thing, he figures out all he needs to do is lower it one centimeter. Work smarter, not harder, friends.

I’m not leaving him here We get even more benevolence from Tucker in “Dawn” when he’s stranded on a moon with Zho’Kaan, an Arkonian with whom he has no way of communicating. Though they’re distrustful and combative at first, the two men learn to help each other survive as the oppressively hot sunrise approaches. It’s just Geordi in “The Enemy” again, but that’s hardly a bad thing.

They would never let me learn those things There was a bit of a debate about which list to put “Cogenitor” on. You can’t deny that Trip is NOT the person to be making the legal and psychoanalytical decisions on Charles’s behalf. Problem is, there IS no such person on the Enterprise and the one person who could have granted them asylum resolutely refused. So that’s on Archer. Trip, on the other hand, is the only person treating Charles like a person, being the most compassionate crew member yet again.

You owe me one Turns out Sim, Trip’s symbiote in “Similitude,” is just as honorable a man as the original. First off, his engineering ingenuity saves the ship from the polaric field it was stuck in. And what a phenomenal job from Trinneer, distinguishing this subtly different character from Trip, and fighting for his right to exist. It’s a gut punch watching Sim accept his fate after his short life. Ow, my gut!

I’ve been putting off writing this for a while Trip’s emotional journey in season three is probably the most profound. We get to witness various stages of the grief he goes through after his sister’s death to the Xindi probe. Most of the season is anger, which is to be expected. But by the end of “The Forgotten,” we see how far he’s come when he writes the condolence letter to the Taylors, reflecting heavily on his own loss.

If I had suffered your loss, I’d feel the same way All the season three growth really does go to Trip! While Archer is torturing people and trying to kamikaze the Xindi, and T’Pol is a junkie for no logical reason, Tucker is here developing as a person. It’s just before Degra’s death in “The Council” that Trip and the Xindi weapons designer come to a sort of understanding with each other. There’s hope in this universe after all!

I think it was called: “The Ship that Couldn’t Slow Down” It may be pure spectacle, but it’s also impressive as hell when Trip shimmies through space between the Columbia and the Enterprise on a skinny little wire in “Divergence.” As usual, Trip is the only person who can save the day when the Enterprise has taken a cue from Speed and can’t slow down. Who else can say they tightrope-walked between ships at warp?

You’re sweet-talking the wrong guy While I would have much preferred if any of the lady crewmembers of the Enterprise did literally anything when the Orion slave girls take over the ship in “Bound,” I guess I’ll take the next best thing and see Trip do it. Because the typical Vulcan immunity is apparently transferable to their boytoys, Commander Tucker gets to save the day because pheromones don’t work on him.

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Worst moments

Three hours of decompression in each direction Having to undergo decompression to visit an alien ship is a pretty cool concept we don’t see enough of in Trek, and maybe it’s for good reason. When Trip is decompressing during “Unexpected,” he’s absolutely insufferable. He spends the whole three hours whining and whining and whining, and flips the hell out even while Ah’len is assuring him everything’s fine.

Roll a stealth check Though we get some fun guest stars out of “Acquisition,” it feels like it’s missing something all episode long. I posit that what we’re missing is literally any clever engineering tactics from Trip, the only crew member free on the ship after it’s been taken over by Ferengi. Not only does he not do anything “Starship Mine”-y, but he gets himself nabbed by those doofuses!

A Night at the Risa-bury You wanna get your kicks on Risa, you go for it, Trip, but don’t be so disgusting about it. Watching him and Reed ogling all the aliens in the club in “Two Days and Two Nights” gets real gross real fast. But having the two of them get so thoroughly tricked by shapeshifting con artists until they were left tied up in their underwear shows how out of their depths they are.

I’d hate to be responsible for giving the crew the runs Considering how often you see other crewmen sitting in the chair whenever the captain is off gallivanting, it seems peculiar how utterly clueless Tucker is when he’s left in command during “The Seventh.” It’s like he’s forgotten how to make decisions. Or communicate with Vulcans. Or let Phlox and Reed do their damn jobs. Why is he suddenly inept?

Gives a whole new meaning to doing “The Stranger” Like we talked about a lot in our Kes post, some bad moments are actually things that don’t happen when they should. In this case, there is absolutely no pay off when Trip’s arm turns invisible in “The Communicator.” Nothing comes of this! In an episode where it would behoove everyone to be able to retrieve something undetected, wouldn’t an invisible hand work nicely?

Why, you stuck-up, half-witted, scruffy-looking nerf herder! Aside from just plain being a bad episode, “Precious Cargo” also contains a lot of terrible work from Commander Tucker. There is absolutely no chemistry between him and First Monarch Kaitaama, and yet they go to bone town just because the plot needs them to. You’d think someone who’s gotten pregnant before from engaging in less would show a little more restraint.

I was brought up believing you don’t play around with another man’s wife Let’s be clear: Trip does nothing wrong in how he associates with Feezal in “Stigma.” This is one of those moments that’s all on the writers. Someone continuously and gratuitously coming on to another person who displays no interest is sexual harassment. And yet the jokey, cutesy tone suggests it’s Trip’s error in not banging someone he shows no desire to bang. That’s gross.

You can’t do that on the balcony, buddy? This show is pretty much four seasons of white men not listening to a woman, and it’s enraging. T’Pol, as logically as usual, suggests that Tucker not test the Xindi rifle in the middle of the armory (of all places!) in “The Shipment,” but Trip refuses to listen and nearly blows the thing up in the most explosive area of the ship. Go outside and blow things up like a normal person!

This mission is to save Earth, not an alien hatchery I’m not done shitting on “Hatchery,” which I started doing last week. And in our season three wrap. And in our series wrap. I just find it so detestable that the show tries to glorify Tucker organizing a full mutiny because the captain is trying to save the baby Insectoids. Exactly no one on the ship seems to understand that that is the ethical thing to do, even during war time. Especially during war time.

Bugs Bunny sawed off Florida too, you know We just spent a couple points above praising Tucker for overcoming his hatred of the Xindi, but to get there, he first had to be overwhelmed with wrath. It’s understandable after the lancing of Florida, but when Trip just starts riling Degra in “The Forgotten,” it is not the right time, dude. At this point, Degra is working with Starfleet. Save the guilt trip for when you’re less busy.

Taking my ball and going home The will-they-won’t-they shenanigans between Trip and T’Pol have gotten very tired by the time we get to “The Aenar.” The both of them are acting so juvenile because they can’t work through their emotions nor act professionally around each other. So it’s frankly pathetic that Trip runs away from his feelings by asking for a transfer to the Columbia. And the Tri’Pol shippers lament.

Have a nice Trip. See you next fall. No Worst Moments list would be complete without the awful, awful way that they kill off a beloved character. “These Are the Voyages…” does Trip even dirtier than Nemesis does Data in how pointless a death it is. It feels like a slap in the face to fans, ya know, like that whole finale does. The explosion scene is rushed. The acting is subpar. A piss-poor way to go.

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We, however, still have a long road to go ourselves, with several more character spotlights on the way. So make sure you’re following along here, keeping up with our watchthrough of Discovery over on SoundCloud (among all the other podcast places), get some neuropressure with us over on Facebook, and save us some popcorn at movie night!

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