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sshbpodcast · 3 months ago

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Character Spotlight: Malcolm Reed

By Ames

Well, we’ve covered the three main stars of Star Trek: Enterprise, and you’ll find that we’re going to struggle a bit more to come up with highlights for the rest of the characters. Maybe Enterprise was more like The Original Series than we thought. But you know what? The hosts here at A Star to Steer Her By came to really appreciate how consistently written our security chief Malcolm Reed really is. You just have to be a little more observant to notice it through Dominic Keating’s accent.

Somewhat like Chakotay, Reed’s characterization has a subtle nuance that doesn’t hit you over the head, but it’s all there: his self-deprecating humor, his stalwart loyalty, his British gumption. It’s easy for your typical Trekkie to commiserate with our explosion-loving friend. His parents kept him at arm’s length, he never seems to luck out romantically (except in Caitlin’s fanfic, of course!), and he might be the most introverted character in the franchise. Can relate! So grab a slice of pineapple cake as we dig into our Reed moments below and on this week’s podcast (jump to 1:04:09). Reed Alert!

[Images © CBS/Paramount]

Best moments

Do you like piña coladas? Even the show seems to understand that Reed is underwritten, but that’s actually part of his charm! When, after painstaking investigations, we learn in “Silent Enemy” that our boy loves pineapple enough that he will go the distance and get inoculated to fight his natural allergy to it in order to have his cake and eat it too, it’s an early endearing moment with the security chief.

Click, click, BOOM Another of Reed’s interests is weapons. If it goes “boom,” you know Reed is 100% there for it. So it’s a cute moment in “Sleeping Dogs” when Hoshi translates some Klingon to “photon torpedoes” and Reed pops up out of nowhere, half erect already. And even more amazing, he uses this entirely alien tech to blast the failing ship into a higher orbit and save the day!

I imagine that would make quite an explosion Like we said last week, the comradeship between Tucker and Reed is one of those beautiful friendships you love to see in Trek. And it also includes more of Malcolm loving explosions! He saves both their asses in “Shuttlepod One” when he comes up with the idea to blow up the impulse drive AND keeps Trip from Captain Oates’ing himself because that’s what friends do for each other!

More possibilities than a bowl of day-old oatmeal Or so the box art for Nickelodeon Floam says. Reed is definitely up for a crazy scheme involving covering himself in bubble-gak (the original product name for Floam!) to disguise himself as a Suliban to sneak into the Tandaran prison in “Detained.” Roll it, mold it, cover it — That's the way you Floam it! Okay, I admit this was all mostly an excuse to do some Floam research.

Throw a patent on that When Archer, Trip, and a couple extras are trapped in a jizz web in “Vox Sola,” Reed basically offers to invent the forcefield, which has been eluding engineers and physicists for the last five years. But Malcolm somehow pulls it off in an afternoon. He tests out just how strong the EM barrier needs to be to keep the tendrils from passing through it, and voila! Instant forcefield!

Keep talking and nobody explodes Reed also instantly figures out how the Romulan mine works after it attaches itself to the hull in “Minefield.” And even more impressive: he’s able to communicate how to disarm it to Archer when he’s gotten himself pinned in the leg. And most impressive of all: he survives the constant chattiness of Jonathan Archer, the extrovert who makes introverts uncomfortable!

If you get tired of exploring, you’d do well in the Imperial Guard Considering how Reed never seems to make romantic strides over the course of the show, it was nice to see some successful flirting between him and Talas in “Proving Ground.” Sure, it was mostly an Andorian ruse on her part that he manages to see past, but their chemistry together was still ship-worthy. One could imagine that in another life, they’d make a cute couple.

The hull, the hull, the hull is on fire Reed is tasked with helping Tucker close down a leaking plasma conduit that was creating a huge plasma fire in “The Forgotten” and it almost does him in. Though his EV suit is rapidly heating, and though Trip specifically orders him to bail and go back inside, Malcolm puts his life on the line to finish the task that stops the leak… and then promptly passes out.

Checkmate in eight moves According to the Organian that possesses Reed all through “Observer Effect,” Reed is the ship’s chess expert and wins all the championships he plays in. That’s just a nice little detail that rounds out Reed’s character a little bit. And it makes sense as a security chief to be able to plan strategies several moves in advance while also increasing your nerd cred.

I apologize for saving your life, Commander. It won’t happen again. Though Reed’s usual modus operandi is to accept that he’s about to die and run with it, he actually fights to survive in “United.” Maybe because it’s also saving Trip from radiation, which he wouldn’t have any other way. But it’s a very clever plan to trick the Romulans by setting his phase pistol to overload on the drone ship to allow for escape and eventual rescue!

You have to choose where your loyalties lie We definitely don’t need more of Section 31, as none of us are particularly hyped for the new feature coming out tomorrow (at time of posting). But at least Reed seems to understand that he’d like no part in them either. Through the events of “Affliction” and “Divergence,” all he wants is out of that shady organization, and he ultimately picks the Enterprise over Agent Harris.

Red rover, red rover, let Trip come over Apparently the only person who can save the Enterprise 90% of the time is Trip. But the only person who can get Trip to the Enterprise from the Columbia in “Divergence” is Reed! Even while stuck in the brig for doing shifty Section 31 things, he’s able to use his grappler skill to create the tether that brings the Commander over. Ya know, for the spectacle of it all!

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Worst moments

You ever noticed her bum? Let’s move on to the bad things that Reed does. It got fully tiring to the SSHB hosts how obsessed everyone on the show was with T’Pol’s bum. Mind you, it’s a nice bum, but you don’t say it! So Malcolm starts a pretty gross trend in “Shuttlepod One” during his obnoxious dream sequence when he first notices dat ass, and don’t worry, everyone’s gonna jump on board.

This is a strange way to get to the garden Speaking of objectifying women! Trip and Reed are both made to look like fools, led entirely by their penises, when they get tricked by the shape-shifting thieves on Risa in “Two Days and Two Nights.” It’s a very tired plot that you’d expect to see in some sitcom or coming-of-age movie, but we also just don’t need to see more gross behavior from Starfleet officers, do we?

I’d prefer a burial at sea, if I’m not completely vaporized Nearly every time we see Reed in an EV suit, he tries to get himself killed for nothing. In “Minefield,” Archer needs to put his oxygen tube back in when Reed has disconnected it in order to sacrifice himself. Later, in “The Forgotten,” he specifically disobeys a command in order to fix a plasma leak and it nearly gets him killed. This boy is the poster child for therapy.

Your inquiry was not recognized This one probably belongs on the Trip list since it was his idea, but screw it, at least it’s getting reflected here. But really, how stupid is it for the two boy wonders to go sneaking around like dingbats in the Repair Station in “Dead Stop,” having no idea where things go and where the computer can transport them? They’re lucky she didn’t beam them into space.

It’s always in the last place you infiltrated Another dunce moment from Reed comes in “The Communicator” when he leaves his communicator on an alien planet they were sneaking around in disguise (for no good reason, I might add!). It’s a move straight out of “A Piece of the Action” when Bones did the same damn thing, and it’s just meant to be a little joke. A little joke that makes your character look incompetent!

When someone asks if you’re a genetically enhanced super soldier... There’s no Prime Directive in the time of Enterprise, but we can still call out when characters do stupid things, such as in “The Communicator.” Like a buffoon, Reed blurts out that he and Archer are super soldiers as an attempt to cover their identities that not only makes things worse for them, who’ll be killed and dissected, but for the society, who now think their war has escalated off the scale!

I considered your suggestion, Reed Alert, but it seemed a bit narcissistic For the sheer eye roll of it all, this one needed to make the list. Whenever Enterprise gets cheeky and makes a poorly timed, awkwardly written, fanwanky reference to something that will come later, it induces groans all around. The worst offender might be the Reed Alert in “Singularity,” which is just so clunky and obvious bait for fans that we can’t even even.

Would you like a sauna while I’m at it? Why does Reed have to be such a whiny little bitch during “The Catwalk”? It doesn’t seem particularly like him to get on Trip’s case about the preparations made to house the whole crew in the titular catwalks to hunker down through a storm, but instead Reed does little but complain. Poor Trip had mere hours and very little help for this massive excursion. Where was Reed then?

You were looking at my hands when you should have been looking at my eyes Yet another example from “Harbinger,” which has already come up a bunch of times in our Worst Moments. For Reed, this episode is all about having a juvenile spat with Major Hayes and it’s so immature I could weep. Reed is a big baby for thinking Hayes literally doing what he was brought onboard to do as a MACO is an insult to him, and he has a big temper tantrum about it.

This seat’s available It’s unappealing how the show depicts Reed as forever alone. He borders on being an incel at times, and one of those times is in “E²” when he learns his alternate self never got with anyone. It’s one of those cringe moments you expect from television of that era when the very next thing you see is Reed making an admittedly tame pass at the first woman he sees. Ick.

With my final breath, I curse Reed After Reed has finally mended things with Major Hayes and the two hold some respect for each other, Hayes gets killed off in a blaze of glory in “Countdown.” His final request is that McKenzie become his successor. As a last “fuck you” to Hayes, Reed apparently never does this! We don’t see her in the subsequent scene rallying the MACOs, or ever again on the show.

Do we need more Section 31? Finally there’s everything else to do with Section 31 in “Affliction” and “Divergence” and needlessly again in “Demons” and “Terra Prime.” What a terrible retcon for Reed. We already have a secret spy onboard in T’Pol. But instead we get Agent Harris showing up to meanly manipulate Reed and make Archer yell and yell as he so often does. It’s such fanwank because we’ve heard of this pointless memberberry before and that’s all it is.

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That’s a wrap on Reed; cue the explosions! Keep watching this space for more blogtivities as we finish up all our remaining Enterprise discussions. You can also follow along as we watch episodes of Discovery over on the podcast at SoundCloud or wherever you podcast, wish Reed a happy birthday on Facebook, and if you have you put on an EV suit and go outside, consider staying in for the sake of your mental health.

And hey, we're on Bluesky now too! Check us out there!

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sshbpodcast · 4 months ago

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Character Spotlight: Jonathan Archer

By Ames

Just when you thought we were done with Enterprise, our character spotlight series returns somehow! And if our full watch of the series assured us of anything, it’s that Cap’n Jonathan Archer is an angry, ill-prepared, conceited, racist, little nepobaby. Now sometimes, that’s perfectly in character for a prequel series about confronting our first stumbling blocks into space exploration. And sometimes, it’s agonizing to watch how humans as a species were represented by a man who made the worst choices you could make, and then patted himself on the back about it.

But I’m getting ahead of myself! Your hosts here at A Star to Steer Her By can always find something that Archer did to gripe about. And even a couple moments we didn’t hate his guts. Check them all out below and listen to our diatribe on this week’s podcast (jump in time to 1:00:09) as we peruse the actions of our first Enterprise captain. Now back in the pool for some water polo!

[Images © CBS/Paramount]

Best moments

Torturing prisoners = bad! I laugh because this sentiment will be entirely contradicted when we get to season three, but Archer starts out in “Fortunate Son” advocating NOT capturing and torturing pirates. The bar was low for us back in season one, and Archer meets it when he tells Mayweather that humans should display proper ethics in situations like the Fortunate’s dealings with Nausicaans.

T’Pol’s had enough of your help. Stay away from her. After spending much of season one racially profiling every Vulcan he meets (more on that in the next segment), Archer meets a Vulcan that everyone is right to hate in “Fusion.” While he is way too quick to trust the V’tosh ka’tur just because they like having emotions, Archer deserves some credit for believing T’Pol about her assault and letting Tolaris have it, that asshole!

Now is not the time for British gumption Archer may be the extrovert that makes us introverts uncomfortable, but it actually pays off in “Minefield”! Reed is pinned in the leg, and the captain is able to deal with both disarming the Romulan mine AND keeping his security chief alive when he is fully prepared to martyr himself at the drop of a hat. Their smalltalk keeps the tension in check and Reed mostly lucid.

How much is that doggy in the incubator? One sympathetic trait that the writers were wise to build into the Archer character is his love for Porthos. It’s easy to connect with a dog person, so Archer is at his most humanized during “A Night in Sickbay” when all he wants is to be with Porthos during the beagle’s time of need. The rest of that episode, not so much, but how much he cares for his puppy is lovely.

What if we trap them in an elevator together? Because Enterprise is a prequel, we know very well that Humans, Andorian, and Vulcans (and Tellarites eventually) will get along well enough to found the Federation. But right now, it’s baby steps and Archer’s goal is to just get them in a room together without actively killing each other in “Cease Fire.” So major kudos for getting Shran and Soval into a conference room.

The House of Duras is without honor We gave Worf credit back when he did a similar thing back in “Reunion,” so we’ll have to count this one for Archer as well, and that’s killing the hell out of Duras. That whole Klingon line is just no good, so when Archer blows his ship to high hell in “The Expanse,” we are very pleased. The only good Duras is a Duras blown to high hell.

I’m not leaving you In a spur-of-the-moment decision, Archer saves T’Pol from a wave of some anomaly or other in “Twilight,” even after she told him to save himself (or perhaps because he’s just so used to doing the opposite of everything she says). We learn non-chronologically that the anomaly that hits him because of this causes his anterograde amnesia, but it was nice of him to help his XO.

You wanted to kill someone, kill me Not only does it take responsibility and honor to sacrifice himself when the Triannons force them to adhere to their dumb justice system in “Chosen Ream,” but it turns out to be a ruse when Archer tricks them into thinking the transporter is a disintegration device that kills people. Fools, it’s only that some of the time! We commend Archer for his really clever thinking!

We’re talking about a one-way trip Speaking of Archer taking responsibility when the going gets tough, he is fully prepared to kamikaze the Xindi weapon in “Azati Prime,” even after both Mayweather and Trip have offered to do it (I guess Reed was out of earshot or he’d’ve begged to do it too). We’ll talk in a second about how bad of an idea this was, but hell, he was ready to get blown up to save humanity.

If that’s what it takes to be advanced, I don’t want any part of it You’ve got to love when a captain calls out another race for absolutely bullshit behavior, and Archer is fully righteous when he tears the Organians a new asshole for treating other species like test subjects in “Observer Effect.” Plus, yet again he is ready to sacrifice himself for crewmates when he exposes himself to the contagion to try to save Trip.

Loop-de-loop hole Archer is again attempting diplomacy in getting the Andorians and Tellarites in a room together without killing each other (this sounds familiar), and volunteers himself to duel in the Ushaan in “United.” It all conveniently works out because for some reason this fight to the death has enough loopholes in it to scare off a trypophobe. But it’s nice of Archer not to kill Shran.

The final frontier begins in this hall. Let’s explore it together. Finally, the two-parter “Demons” and “Terra Prime” really succeeds at reminding us that we all need to overcome our prejudices and malice if we want to make our ways in the universe. Archer sums the whole thing up after defeating Paxton and his Terra Prime cult members. His speech at the end of “Terra Prime” really should have been what the whole show finale’d on.

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Worst moments

What’s all that mean anyway? You know I have to include Archer’s constant xenophobia against Vulcans because it really colored my perception of the captain, and “The Andorian Incident” is emblematic of that. Out of sheer racism, he forces T’Pol to bring him to P’Jem after she advises against it, makes a terrible impression on the monk who’s only doing his job, and then wrecks up the chapel room to expose an Andorian. Maybe ask first, dingbat.

Correction, sir, that’s blown out We also just had to include this early example of just awful acting out of Scott Bakula. Though the bay is being rapidly decompressed, Archer somehow drapes himself over a railing and dangles over the side during his fight with Silik in “Cold Front.” Was he in any danger? Did he expel all the air from his lungs? Were there any consequences to being in vacuum? Who knows.

Someday my people are going to come up with some sort of a doctrine This one will surely come up again in our Phlox character spotlight, but it was Archer’s word to permit the genocide by inaction in “Dear Doctor.” Not only is it morally reprehensible to wash their hands of the fate of the Valakians, but the science that Phlox easily convinces Archer is emphatically wrong. And the Prime Directive reference? The turd on top of this shit sundae.

What else should I be? All apologies. Though we commended Jonathan for his devotion to Porthos in “A Night in Sickbay,” for the rest of the episode he’s an absolute pissant. All the Kreetassans want is for him to apologize for defiling their sacred tree with Porthos’s piss. You’d think he’d not have brought his filthy dog to their sacred site in the first place, but to act like such a prick about it is even more pathetic.

On my world, when someone asks for asylum it has to be given serious consideration We’ve struggled with the messaging of “Cogenitor” from the get go, and apparently so has Archer. Charles requests asylum from the Starfleet crew and Archer forces them off the ship instead, back into the hands of their oppressive culture. And then Archer screams (screams!) at Trip about violating the non-existent Prime Directive. And he’s supposed to be right?

Torturing prisoners = good? Most of Archer’s bad moments are rightly coming from season 3, an absolutely drek collection of episodes, and it immediately goes south in “Anomaly.” This is Archer’s first foray into torturing people, as he throws Orgoth, the Osaarian prisoner, into an airlock and threatens to space him just to get information. And the cap’n’s actions will only get worse from here…

These are Trip’s quarters It’s a controversial choice for Archer to allow the simbiot to be created in the first place in “Similitude” just to harvest his organs. But that’s mostly a Phlox fault. What we’re harping on here is how terribly Archer treats Sim. Again, he screams at him (there’s a lot of Bakula screaming at Connor Trinneer in this show) for staying in Trip’s quarters and for, I dunno, wanting to live.

How selective could this memory wipe be? A lot of interesting concepts come out of “Stratagem,” but then if you think about it for more than a second, you realize what Archer does to Degra is super messed up. Normally, when someone tampers with someone else’s mind to exploit them for information, it’s the villain of the show doing it. So it’s clever as a scheme, but Archer, my dude, you are the bad guy of this episode.

Let’s torture the canary we took out of this coalmine One of the absolute worst things we see Archer do comes in “Harbinger” (you’re going to see a lot of “Harbinger” in this spotlights) when he tortures that Sphere Builder before he even knows who they are. He jumps to the wildest conclusion that this guy might have information, with absolutely no proof at first, and he tortures the guy. And this is the hero of the show, people!

If that’s a problem for history, then history will have to suffer We may have just credited Archer with doing the honorable thing and wanting to sacrifice himself in “Azati Prime,” but it’s also absolutely idiotic. For once, Archer refuses to listen to Daniels who warns him that if Jon destroys the Xindi weapon, they will only build another one. Please, Archer, do the peaceful, diplomatic thing. No? Why choose now to be so unreasonable?

Out of my way, I’m a motorist! We rag on “Damage” a lot because of the hypocrisy of it all. Archer finally thinks he’s crossing a line when he steals the warp coil from the Illyrians’ ship, despite all the lines he’s been crossing all season. And what a shitty thing to do to these people! He strands them in the expanse and we never hear about them again. Dude, at least send them an Uber.

Even though you don’t wish to own me, I still wish to please you Because I feel like shitting on “Bound” at least a little bit, let’s shit on how Archer so easily gets tricked by the Orions all episode long. You can blame the pheromones for tampering with his senses, but dude, you couldn’t have put some female MACOs in charge once you knew the ruse? You didn’t smell something was up when space pirates wanted to do business? And god, that scene when he talks about sexual slavery is just so uncomfortable. Vomit.

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Sorry, Cap’n, but someone needed to put you in your place. Will our other Enterprise character spotlights be a little more positive? Keep track by following along here on the blog! You should also keep up with our watchthrough of Discovery over on the podcast on SoundCloud (or wherever you listen to podcasts), exchange water polo gossip with us over on Facebook, and maybe scream at Trip a little less. Just a little.

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