Enterprise - Why Was It So Unpopular?

Rasczak

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Apart from seeing the odd episode here and there I have mostly avoided this Star Trek series as I wasn't interested in buying out-dated VHS and I missed the TV broadcasts. Naturally I ordered the DVDs the second they became available but, due to negative comments, delayed watching them...until now.

And I have to say I am at a complete loss as to why it was so unpopular/hated. The stories are decent enough (only seen series 1 and 2 at the moment though) - the 'pre-Trek' angle gives a good twist on what is essential standard Trek fare. The characters are OK (no more wooden than Voyager!). And the title sequence has to be the best Trek has ever offered - it really expresses what Trek is all about IMHO. And the special effects are pretty decent to!

Perhaps I am more forgiving of this series now I have been 'starved' of Trek for the best part of five years (was it really that long ago Voyager ended? :eek: ). However watching Enterprise here and now it gets a big :thumbsup: from me.
 
Turgid, desperately dull retreads of half-baked ideas from all the preceding Treks. And with the least likable bunch of characters, played by the most wooden of actors, and written by the most uninspired bunch of writers.

If ever a show needed new blood on the creative side it was Enterprise. They just didn't get it. It'll be interesting to see what they do with the next movie and the chap from Alias at the helm. I hope to god they don't go ahead with the 'young Kirk at the academy' plot. That really would be the final nail in the Trek franchise.

Reasons enough?

Regards

Mark
 
I think it was canned due to low ratings, thats all.

the show was actually improving even more in the last two seasons. (3 and 4)

The first 2 seasons were just a bit boring I think, thats what most people complained about.

But your right, it wasnt a bad show all in all, and I think that the real problem lies in how spoiled americans are and how quickly they dismiss something.

Well, who can blame them considering they have hundreds of shows to choose from!

After living in EU and Japan, i have yet to see any of these countries make a good sci-fi show that can top even Enterprise, so its no wonder that to us, its not a bad show.
 
Mark_a said:
Turgid, desperately dull retreads of half-baked ideas from all the preceding Treks. And with the least likable bunch of characters, played by the most wooden of actors, and written by the most uninspired bunch of writers.

If ever a show needed new blood on the creative side it was Enterprise. They just didn't get it. It'll be interesting to see what they do with the next movie and the chap from Alias at the helm. I hope to god they don't go ahead with the 'young Kirk at the academy' plot. That really would be the final nail in the Trek franchise.

Reasons enough?

Regards

Mark

If you look at my avatar youl see that the new flick with young kirk and spock is indeed going through. (gold on the left represents kirk and blue spock)

Due in 2008. Take a look in Startrek.com
 
Mark_a said:
Turgid, desperately dull retreads of half-baked ideas from all the preceding Treks. And with the least likable bunch of characters, played by the most wooden of actors, and written by the most uninspired bunch of writers.
Absobloodylutely! Though I'd regard all the casts as wooden apart from DS9. The storytelling started to go downhill with the last couple of TNG seasons, then carried over to VOY and ENT; with DS9 the only creative and challenging spin-off.
 
The first series was dire, but then that's a trek tradition. I actually thought that the last series was really good and I was dissapointed when they cancelled it. Especially as the final episode was a total cop out.
 
i think half the problem with enterprise is the fact its before TOS....but everything looks nice and shiny, and we are all used to crap cheap cardboard sets...lol

it was a nice idea, and some of the cast wernt bad, but i get the feeling they felt oh goody fat paycheck time, no need to work too hard, the show will sell itself.......................oops.....

saw a few episodes from a couple different series of it.....hmm....i'm fairly easily pleased and could probably watch, but with about as much enthusiasm as i watch something when nothing else is on worth watching......unlike Voyager where i was making sure i was home every night to watch it for the first series, then when that ended i went to the video shop and rented out the other series that were already available...lol

likewise TNG.....

DS9 never interested me....dunno why, just couldnt get on with it.....possibly because it was largely based around a confined location.....made it too much like a soap opera with aliens...lol
 
I enjoyed the last few seasons of DS9 the most. Probably because they introduced the Defiant and the dominion war.

But yeah, it was a soap opera in a confined space and trek has always been about exploration. (thats not to say that there werent some amazing DS9 eps though!)

I hope they make another series more like "Titan" (a trek book series) where you have will Riker taking his own command and going back to the roots of trek which is exploration of the unknown.
 
AML said:
...I hope they make another series more like "Titan" (a trek book series) where you have will Riker taking his own command and going back to the roots of trek which is exploration of the unknown....
As long as the pilot episode involves the death of Troi and the aging bearded fatso's quest for revenge :devil:
 
krish72 said:
As long as the pilot episode involves the death of Troi and the aging bearded fatso's quest for revenge :devil:

Seconded!

I liked enterprise, season one did suck slightly but no more than voyager. Last season was very good, copout final episode indeed, shame, bad end to a good series
 
Well, the book takes place after the events in Nemisis and so they are married and living on the Titan.

One interesting point about titan is that its a ship designed to house many different species and not just humanoid.

Aquatics, carnivores (raptor like beings), and so on. This would look good on film me thinks.

Its all in the true spirit of what trek should be.
 
Turgid, desperately dull retreads of half-baked ideas from all the preceding Treks.
Well I guess we'll have to disagree. The previous Treks were good and I'm quite happy for 'retreads' of those stories - I don't watch Star Trek for something totally different every week. I though the pre-trek gave a decent twist to stories, i.e. they normally couldn't just beam out, weapons were frequently ineffective, they couldn't outrun things and so forth...

played by the most wooden of actors
Most Star Trek acting is wooden. Very few of the actors are Grade A material (Patrick S excluded) and the actresses tend to be glamour models with clothes on. What do you expect?
 
Even though - IMHO - ENT was the worst iteration of Trek; a lot of us do look back with rose-tinted specs at TNG

I loved TNG at the time of its original run (aged 15-22), as I'd also enjoyed the TOS movie franchise.. then began to enjoy DS9 more, and then thoroughly disappointed by VOY and ENT

TOS now stands the test of time.

TNG is so very very dated, stuck in the 80s, awful cast and acting
- even Patrick (a second-rate RSC actor who thinks he's in the same league as McKellen) who owes his wealth to Trek, even though he slags it off (and then goes on to X Men, another franchise, and that crap show on ITV, touted as the British X Files that nobody watched :rolleyes:); Avery Brooks and Rene Auberjonois are much more accomplished actors.

DS9 - the ignored/misunderstood middle child of Trek - whatever you think of it, it cannot be denied that it did have the best cast; no undeveloped characters (unlike Chekov, Uhura, 2 x Crusher, Harry, the ones who's names I can't even remember from ENT), strong characters, more challenging and less of the pink and fluffy feelgood patronising and insulting storytelling. Think I've posted this before, but DS9's writers have gone on to create/write The 4400, The Dead Zone, BSG. DS9 still stands the test of time in my eyes.

VOY & ENT - Crap Crap Crap.... Lets re-use the Borg a zillion times. Janeway was bloody awful... no match for Kira Nerys!! ENT was so crap, they realised it, and brought Manny Coto in to try and salvage what was left... then they crapped on him with the worst Trek finale ever. Luckily he moved on to bigger and better things in making 24 Season 5 one of its best ever seasons (due to his writing, and bring in his mate Peter Weller as Henderson).

Finally, I can't let this go without saying something ...
Rasczak said:
And the title sequence has to be the best Trek has ever offered - it really expresses what Trek is all about IMHO.
Every time I hear that cheesy soft rock ballad sung by pretend-opera singer Russell Watson, I want to encase my head in concrete!! :mad:
 
I did not like the first series of Enterprise and though the second was little better. And that’s probably where the viewing figures rot set in.
I enjoyed the longer story arc of the third and also the last series where most of the stories were 2 parters all though some of the were clunkers there we also some gems in there as well.
 
I've enjoyed all of the Star Trek itterations and miss my weekly fix. Yes the acting wasn't top notch and some of the story arcs weren't great but overall an entertaining series imo.
I do think however that thay have gone as far as they can with the series and it would have to take something special for most people to want to visit the Star trek universe again.
I sincerely hope that they do manage to find something that will work that is original and doesn't go over old ground too much.
We don't seem to get many quality Sci-fi series these days that last more than a couple of series at best before they get canned (Firefly, Farscape etc)
BSG is a great series and very refreshing but quality series like these seem very few and far between.
I do not subscribe to cable any more and have opted out with my Humax PVR so don't get the choice a lot of you have but I do feel that sci-fi doesn't seem to get it's fair share of screen time imo.

I long for a quality show that has a long story arc with interesting ideas and great characters.
 
AML said:
I think it was canned due to low ratings, thats all.

the show was actually improving even more in the last two seasons. (3 and 4)

The first 2 seasons were just a bit boring I think, thats what most people complained about.

But your right, it wasnt a bad show all in all, and I think that the real problem lies in how spoiled americans are and how quickly they dismiss something.

Well, who can blame them considering they have hundreds of shows to choose from!

After living in EU and Japan, i have yet to see any of these countries make a good sci-fi show that can top even Enterprise, so its no wonder that to us, its not a bad show.

ENT S1 & 2 was BAD, S3 was a massive improvement and the darker largely arc based season appealed alot more to me, then they flushed away all the good work failing to capitalise on it by ending the season with a total cop out finale. S4 continues from the cop out finale & then tries to appease hardcore Trekkies with a wet dream season for them, pretty crap & uninspired rubbish if you're NOT a Trekkie.

So the rest of the world can't do better or can't afford to try. It doesn't mean ENT was any cop. I watch 99% of all new sci-fi & this was on the whole crap. I hate shows like this that survive so long on a franchise name when far superior shows die a quick death & have lots more to offer on every level. I'd love to see a quality british sci-fi but that's never going to happen when the best we can muster is Dr who, which is a glorified kids show.:mad:

DS9, Voyager & Enterprise had 3, 3 & 2 bad (starting) seasons respectively. Trek is living in the past and any IF other series had such crap starts wouldn't have made to the second year maybe not even past episode 13!

BTw DS9 is by far the best Trek Series ,with the best stories , characters & actors...even though they stole their premise & characters from babylon 5 & its creator JMS.
 
Have to jump to the defense of Voyager after all the slagging it's got here. That was my favourite Trek as they got back to the roots of the show, which is exploring. Plus 7 of 9 :devil:

I never watched DS9 simply because they just sat there, on a space station. After reading so much positive comments about it though I'll need to give it a try.

I agree with what seems to be general view of Enterprise. First two series were only OK'ish, improved a bit in the 3rd series and the 4th was really good (apart from the finale). The evil Trek universe episodes and the ones with Dr Soong were good.

Someone posted a proposal recentely to re-invent the original series with the original characters. This might be sacriledge to some but I think it could work. Just look what a fantastic job they did with Battlestar.
 
pmc said:
Have to jump to the defense of Voyager after all the slagging it's got here. That was my favourite Trek as they got back to the roots of the show, which is exploring. Plus 7 of 9 :devil:
getting back to the roots, generally means retreading old ground, the same old boring final frontier / exploration episodes without a fresh twist .... so in VOY's case it was pretty much Delta Quadrant Alien Of The Week... predominantly those cauliflower headed ones for the first couple of seasons. Then once they realised that blonde with the funny ears was boring (though not as boring as Janeway) they replaced her with an easy on the eye curvy Borg, and did the borg to death.
pmc said:
I never watched DS9 simply because they just sat there, on a space station. After reading so much positive comments about it though I'll need to give it a try....Just look what a fantastic job they did with Battlestar.
If you like BSG, you should take a fresh look at DS9, its a more mature sci-fi drama than any other trek
 
Sorry But I'm also obviously in a minority here, don't like the original series and Next Generation, talk about wooden acting there. Loved Enterprise & Voyager.
 
Problem with all of them generally was the first couple of season were poor. TNG started slowly, with the Q being only real entertaining part. The Ferengi were awful and the Borg was good towards the end.
DSG showed more of the Ferengi that gave them more colour and the Dominion was great towards the end was very good.
Voyager was generally average. It would of been better if the were all a bit more like the Marki rather than Star Fleet or at least faced more problems sticking to the Star Fleet rules. The episodes with the other Star Fleet ship was good.
Enterprise was ok, but the technology never looked as dated as it should of. The opening credits were fine, if they has some other music. And I keep thinking Quantum Leap all the time :rotfl:
 
grimoor said:
Enterprise was ok, but the technology never looked as dated as it should of. The opening credits were fine, if they has some other music. And I keep thinking Quantum Leap all the time :rotfl:

YES the technology was interesting especially when we saw "futuristic" TOS style ships that were better but looked so old & dated :rotfl:


Sorry But I'm also obviously in a minority here, don't like the original series and Next Generation, talk about wooden acting there. Loved Enterprise & Voyager.

ahhh man they both sucked A***. I'm by no means a Trekkie but I've been recently watching TOS on scifi and it stands up suprisingly well. Ok some is a little iffy like sFX & acting but generally I find it very entertaining, not enough to get the DVDs but way better than VOY or ENT. check out DS9 to see the best Trek or Babylon 5 if you want the real deal;)


I do wonder if fans of ENT & VOY watch much scifi & those who dismiss it watch lots and are more fussy, having higher standards? well?
 
Enterprise's big problem was old rehashed stories but ontop of that to compound it, people today love big action sequences, explosions etc and The Enterprise was dull as dishwater apart from like 2 episodes. If they had done an Enterprise set far in the future where it was a bit like DS9's dominion wars (an attempt at least of gritty warfare) or maybe they should emulate something closer to BSG, after all most BSG fans were trek and BSG (original) fans in their youth and now they want something more adult and I hesitate to use the phrase... dirty and rough.
 
I watched it sky one yesterday, ive probably seen about 10-15 episodes of it in the past few years, i thought it was ok, i think out of all the recent star trek series is the most dynamic and it has a slightly more realistic/gritty slant in terms of character relationships and storyline, its just the fact its all been done before though, im not that interested anymore, used to absolutely love the next generation when i was a kid. i think if something like enterprise was on telly 10 years ago or something people would say its amazing, i think it died because at the end you only had hardcore trekkies watching it, not that it was a bad show.
 
pags payback said:
...ahhh man they both sucked A***. I'm by no means a Trekkie but I've been recently watching TOS on scifi and it stands up suprisingly well. Ok some is a little iffy like sFX & acting but generally I find it very entertaining, not enough to get the DVDs but way better than VOY or ENT. check out DS9 to see the best Trek or Babylon 5 if you want the real deal;)..
Think I've got the same TV sci-fi tastes as you...
- so as regards Trek DVDs I've not bothered with the season boxsets; though I would get DS9 if the bastards at Paramount ever drop their prices. I have purchased two of the "Star Trek Fan Collective" themed compilations DVDs... namely Borg and Klingon, not bothered about the other two (Q and Time Travel) which duuplicate several of the episodes and two-parters of the two I have. Very reasonably priced R1 4-disc sets they are too (with about 14 episodes worth of trek, chronologically ordered.... i.e. ENT episode to start :rolleyes:)

this is possibly the best price for Borg:
www.caimanzone.co.uk/details.cfm?ASIN=B000CCD01C
(very reliable Amazon Marketplace Seller)

and this is possibly the best price for Klingon:
www.dvdpacific.com/item.asp?ID=728747

both are £17.99 at PlayUSA.com btw
 
I'm sorry but I think Enterprise was awful not only did it contradict half the star trek universe but it had that horrible vomit inducing christian rock song at the beginning.

It’s been a long road - getting from there to here.
It’s been a long time, but my time is finally near

And I will see my dream come alive at last. I will touch the sky.
And they’re not gonna hold me down no more
No, they’re not gonna change my mind
Cause I got faith of the heart
I’m going where my heart will take me
I got faith to believe I can do anything.
I got strength of the soul and no one’s gonna bend or break me
I can reach any star. I got faith. Faith of the heart.

I would rate ds9 and 'voyeur' at the same level mainly because ds9 was generally boring and just seemed like an inferior Babylon 5:devil:
 

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