Enterprise Re-Watch: Exile

First order of business: I can't wait for Discovery to finally get here. I'm still loving Trek and finding it hard to only watch a couple of Enterprise episodes/week but, with so much other creative work on my plate at the moment, I'm having a hard time coming up with new posts for this blog in general. My brain is just elsewhere a lot of the time and inspiration, for the most part, is draining into my art and animation stuff. Lucky for you, today I watched The Exile wherein Hoshi is lured to a planet with a lone, telepathic inhabitant and starts down a classic Beauty and the Beast path.

Let me just start by saying that I've never really liked Beauty and the Beast as a fairy tale, as the Disney film (in spite of its groundbreaking, gorgeous animation), or the novel(s) by Robin McKinley that Disney ripped off took inspiration from--and I'm a huge fan of Robin McKinley. When friends who know I love her work ask me to recommend one of her books I always give them Beauty because it's the most beloved of her novels. (I'm far more partial to The Hero and the Crown, if you were wondering.)

At its heart, B&B is about a woman finds herself in the care of a very dangerous man. She is isolated and subject to no one's company but his (and his is bad company, indeed) but, through the power of her love, he is changed into a kind, gentle, handsome, rich guy who gives her a castle with a big-ass, undying rose garden. I grew up around some dangerous men. I grew up around women who felt sure those men could be changed by the power of love. They never did, of course. Real life isn't like fairy tales or novels based on fairy tales or animated features based on novels based on fairy tales. Real life is just real life and I feel like it's just better not to get involved with jerks to begin with no matter how big their undying rose garden is or how many talking candle sticks and tea pots bring you breakfast every morning.

So this brings me to The Exile. The dangerous man in question, Tarquin, is our beast. He reaches out to Hoshi by getting all up in her mind and, at first, making her think she might be losing it. Once she's convinced she's not she persuades Archer and the gang to find him. He promises to do some magic Xindi-themed sleuthing on the condition that Hoshi sticks around his creepy castle for a few days while Enterprise heads off to check out one of the spheres that's been giving them so much trouble. Hoshi agrees even though literally everyone is creeped out by Tarquin. She insists she can take care of herself. She's not some defenseless 18th century French peasant girl, after-all. She's a member of Starfleet.

So, Hoshi sticks around and Tarquin reveals himself to be more and more creepy as the days pass until he ultimately tells Hoshi she's not allowed to leave his Dracula castle because she's going to stay there and be his companion until she lives out her relatively short existence. Hoshi's all, "Ummm. No," and threatens to smash his prized telepathic gizmo until he finally relents and releases her. She goes back to Enterprise, happy to put the whole incident behind her, when he shows up one last time to give her the Xindi intelligence he was able to suss from the telepathic ether. And they all lived happily ever after. The end.

I'd like to say I'm proud of this episode for veering off course from the traditional Beauty and the Beast ending but really it's not as though it could've ended differently. Hoshi had a bad boyfriend as part of a larger scheme of terrible Trek boyfriends which is part of an even larger theme: one episode relationships never end well. Anyway, I am proud of the fact that it was Hoshi who got herself out of trouble in the end. (PS- I never wrote about this but one time Hoshi actually did have a good one-episode fling while Tucker and Reed got themselves tied up in a basement. See episode: Two Days and Two Nights.)

While I watched this one, I did a little fanart:

Two Months Off

It's been exactly two months since my last post. That's the longest I've ever taken away from this project and I guess I sort of needed it.

What happened? Well, nothing, really. I just lived some life. Scott was on hiatus which is basically his summer break (though it happens in April and May) and I wanted to spend as much time with him as I could. But I also just wanted to focus on other projects and not worry so much about making Generic Ensign Vlogs or writing posts or watching Enterprise. I've been learning animation and that's taken up a ton of my brain space as I throw myself into it more and more every day. (The other day I spent good four hours on the same bouncing ball only to scrap it this morning and start from scratch.)

And, I still have to deal with my hands. They're... 90% better. A few months ago I realized that the cause of my hand issues was actually something in my neck. Apparently cervical instability and poor posture can work with the weird spasms you get with EDS to create a perfect storm of pinched nerves. So, along with the incredible, sickening, apparently inexplicable pain I felt for several months, I also had neuropathy. I lost strength in my hands, my fingers started to curl up into my palms, and I almost always had a pins and needles feeling in my fingers. It was awful and, really, it wasn't until I had some distance from it that I realized just how much it effected me. Now, as long as I take time (I have reminders set to buzz every thirty minutes) to stretch during the day and I maintain good posture (I also have reminders for this) and I do my physical therapy stuff every night, I don't have much pain at all. Sometimes I have bad days but they're farther and farther apart and I'm grateful for that.

I finished Season One of Enterprise and started into Season Two and I'm ready to chug along but I really want to get a Generic Ensign Vlog up before I go too much further. I confess I feel sort of ambivalent about the Vlogs and general blog posts sometimes. I wonder if the internet really needs another summation of an episode of Star Trek from fifteen years ago. I get bogged down with readership/viewership numbers and I start to wonder if it's worth my time. But, in the end, I always come back to the same conclusion: I do these because I enjoy it and because I think it makes my work better overall to think critically about something I care about and to then try to make something reflective of that thought process.

I just needed a little time away. And that's ok.

The point is: I'm back from my blog vacation. You can expect more posts.

Enterprise SS1 Episodes 12-17

I've been busy. It's sort of hard to explain. But the long and short of it is that I'm throwing myself into animation and I've been working on that--learning both the software and the foundations of animation--around ten hours a day. It's been pretty all-consuming. The days just keep flying by and I just keep not getting a chance to blog or to record a Generic Ensign. But here I am, attempting to make up for lost time with a quick and dirty round up post.

Silent Enemy:
Archer and crew run into some jerk aliens whilst trying to get the phase cannons online. In the b-plot, Hoshi attempts to learn Reed's favorite food. This "calling Malcom's parents and almost accidentally scheduling a date with him" plot is the one I always remember. Maybe, in part, because of its total weirdness. Does Archer track down everyone's favorite food for their b-day? That seems really time consuming. So why only Reed? A few years ago, I worked at a place that always made a big deal out of EVERYONE's birthday. There was cake and there were chips and there was veggie pizza (which was essentially raw broccoli and ranch dressing on bread) and a card passed around and we all assembled in the staff room and sang the song. It was often my job to help with this business but whenever it rolled around to January (and my birthday) the manager decided we should have combined month birthdays. Watching this episode, I basically just put myself in Hoshi's shoes and thought, "I'm a comm officer and highly trained linguist at the top of my field, serving on the flag ship and first Warp 5 vessel of Starfleet and I've just spent the last three days calling a dude's ex-girlfriends and asking about what he likes to eat."

"I could've published seven linguistics papers in the time it
 took to get this cake for you so I super hope you appreciate it."

Dear Doctor:
Wherein Phlox and Archer have a conversation that basically goes,
Archer: These people asked for our help.
Phlox: But we shouldn't interfere with their 'natural development'.
Me: That's pretty condescending.
Archer: Someday, Starfleet will have some sort of... directive... some sort of prime directive that'll tell us how we should blindly act whenever we get into these situations.
Me: Yeah, you should probably ignore that too.
Basically this episode is why I didn't pursue cultural anthropology at the graduate level.

Sleeping Dogs:
Hoshi, Reed, and T'Pol are trapped on a Klingon ship as it sinks into a gas giant. I actually quite like this one but I did imagine, while watching, a scene wherein Hoshi blows up at Reed about how much crap she had do to for his birthday.

"Once again I'm saving the day. What even is your job here?"

Shadows of P'Jem:
Archer and T'Pol are captured by some hostiles. The Vulcans and Andorians get involved and before long everyone's pointing fingers and name calling and making threats. Naturally, I love this one. Anytime the Andorians show up, I'm on board. Archer and T'Pol have natural chemistry and Shran has a wonderful sort of anti-chemistry with everyone.

Shuttlepod One:
Remember how the early astronauts were, nearly to a man, test pilots? The astronauts in these early missions were trained to continue the mission and to try to save themselves until they either succeeded or died. Welp, when Tucker and Reed find themselves stranded in a shuttlepod and they believe Enterprise to have been destroyed, while Tucker goes about trying to figure out a solution Reed gets down to business moping and mooning into several personal letters to friends and family about his soon-to-be untimely death. Even less productively, he manages to have a dream wherein he's making out with T'Pol. Had I been Tucker, I likely would've jettisoned the bastard and kept the remaining oxygen for myself but I'm chaotic neutral and Tucker is, like those early astronauts, lawful good and that's not how things work out.

"I bet you don't even really like pineapple!" 

Truly, I don't mean to pick on Reed. All the Star Trek first seasons have problems and they all have characters who hang around like wet dishrags because they're a good character in theory but no one really knows what to do with them. Archer and Tucker are pretty nailed down in this first season and I think that's because, like I mentioned, these guys are pretty much modeled on the early space program. What kind of guy is Archer? He's Jim Lovell. What kind guy is Tucker? He's Pete Conrad. All the rest of these people are still really malleable. Even T'Pol who it seems was meant to be Enterprise's Spock (and therefore also its Data, Odo, Doctor/Seven) feels a little adrift. What do we do with T'Pol in this episode? Hmm. Let's put her in her underwear. Or maybe she could make out with a guy in his dream. Or maybe a Ferengi should grope her ears. Or maybe she could be attacked in her quarters after she told a guy to stop. My point is that the first season of Enterprise, like the first season of any Trek (and any show, really) is shaky. Even though you're using similar ingredients the recipe isn't coming out like you thought it would. And that's ok. You just have to keep tweaking it until you find the right blend. Just look at how much Next Gen's second season improved!

Generic Ensign's Vlog: Civilization, Fortunate Son, Cold Front

BAM! Bet you weren't expecting this! New Generic Ensign! Right here! Ready to go!

Generic Ensign's Log: ENT 3 from AshleyRose on Vimeo.

Generic Ensign ENT: Andorian Incident and Breaking the Ice

I ate a lot of pecan pie to make this post. A lot. I am not ok after that.

Generic Ensign's Log: ENT 2 from AshleyRose on Vimeo.

Sidenote- I realize that I have a "weird mouth" when I eat. It's a combination of my highly elastic skin and a strange Aspie thing where when I was a kid I was told not to eat with my mouth open and I took that to mean, "NEVER EVER OPEN YOUR MOUTH EXCEPT TO PUT NEW FOOD IN." So my whole life I got weird looks/giggles in school cafeterias and never understood why. Then one day when I was 33 I made a silly Star Trek Vlog and watched it and just laughed and laughed. (That day was today.)

Extra Side Note: (since I'm over here spilling my guts) I have a REALLY hard time with some food textures and gooey/gelatinous sweet stuff is one of them. I'm telling you right now that I sacrificed for this video. Sacrificed. Also I'm still on a bit of a sugar high, if you can't tell. From the rambling. I  hope you enjoyed this installment of Generic Ensign! In spite of my silly struggles, I really enjoy making them.

NEW Generic Ensign for 2017

BAM! I'm back, y'all!

I was SO sick over Christmas and then had SO much work to catch up on once I got back and seriously I haven't even taken the tree down yet. That's how behind I am. It's January 19th or some biz. Anyway, one of the things I hated getting behind on was this blog. I had big plans for the new year. I was going to suddenly pop up on January 1st in my new GE costume and be all like, "GUESS WHAT I'M WATCHING!!!!" But I didn't have time to work on said costume because of said flu. Whatever, I can do that even if it's January 19th because this is my blog and it's the fourth year of this blog and I make the rules (up as I go.) So, without further ado:

GUESS WHAT I'M WATCHING!!?!!? 

(Prepare yourself for five episodes covered in short order)

Generic Ensign's Log: ENT 1 from AshleyRose on Vimeo.

In case you didn't watch the video because you, like me, have an aversion to video posts (unless they're walkthroughs for video game stuff) and you can't even guess from the still up above--it's Enterprise! And, because there's comparatively so little of it, I'm hoping to either write or Vlog about each episode. I've seen Enterprise all the way through three times with a few outliers here and there having been watched a couple more times and I haven't seen it at all since my initial Year of Star Trek so I'm (if you can't tell) super excited. Here we (boldly) go!