Star Trek: Enterprise 1-01: Broken Bow - Part 3

This week on Sci-Fi Adventures, I'm writing about the final third of Enterprise's pilot episode, Broken Bow. It's kind of weird how the series was just called Enterprise, without the Star Trek in front of it. It's like they were trying to distance it a bit from the brand so that people who'd already written the franchise off and decided that they weren't Star Trek fans would give it a chance.

Did the plan actually work? I mean everyone knows that no one was watching Enterprise, but was anyone watching it? Seems that about 12.5 million people tuned in to the first episode when it aired in the US, which was about average for a Trek pilot. It dropped by 26% by the next episode, but the series was still pulling in bigger numbers than the season of Voyager it was following on from.

You've probably noticed that I called it Star Trek: Enterprise anyway in the title up there. That's because I'm a renegade who plays by my own rules. Also that's what it's called on my Season One box set.

You're currently reading part three of a three-part article, so if you want to go back to PART ONE or PART TWO you should click one the appropriate link.

SPOILER WARNING: This will be full of spoils for the episode and earlier Star Trek stories, but everything that came after is safe.

Star Trek: Enterprise 1-01: Broken Bow - Part 2

This week on Sci-Fi Adventures, I'm still writing about the very first episode of the entire Star Trek franchise (chronologically speaking): Broken Bow. Sure there are episodes with events that take place before it, but this is 100% set in April 2151 from start to finish. That means it's actually a kind of sequel to the movie First Contact, revealing what happened next. By the same writer in fact!

Though First Contact wasn't just written by Brannon Braga and neither was this, as this time around he was joined by Trek overlord Rick Berman. It seems a bit strange to see Berman credited as a writer, as up until this point he'd mostly been the franchise's executive producer, succeeding Gene Roddenberry. But he had written the Next Gen episodes Brothers and A Matter of Time, and he'd been giving notes on all the Trek scripts scripted during his reign.

Broken Bow is a feature length episode with a lot to write about so I've split this article into three parts for the sake of everyone's sanity (especially my own). You're currently reading part two, but if you want to jump back to the first part you can click THIS LINK.

SPOILER WARNING: I'll be spoiling this episode and others that came before it, but everything that aired after it is safe.

Star Trek: Enterprise 1-01: Broken Bow - Part 1

Episode:

1

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Writer:

Rick Berman & Brannon Braga

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Director:

James L. Conway

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Air Date:

26-Sep-2001

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This week on Sci-Fi Adventures, I'm reviewing the 629th story in the Star Trek franchise, Broken Bow! I figured I might as well, seeing as it's its 20th anniversary today.

But unlike all those other episodes, this story doesn't push the timeline forward. Trek had spent 14 years in the Next Generation era, but this took a huge jump 227 years backwards from Star Trek: Voyager to tell a story about Starfleet's early days. Prequels were in at the time, with Star Wars returning to cinemas with The Phantom Menace, so I suppose it wasn't a surprise that Trek would want to jump on that bandwagon. This was a real turning point for the Star Trek franchise though, as after the final Next Gen movie, Nemesis, the franchise spent the next 17 years stuck in its own past.

Personally I would've preferred to find out what happened next in the 24th century... and now I've got Lower Decks, Prodigy and Picard for that, so I'm happy. At the time though the franchise wasn't really inspiring much enthusiasm in people. Deep Space Nine had been over for a few years, Insurrection had been a real disappointment, and Voyager had kind of rolled past the finish line on fumes. Plus even though Trek hadn't exactly been heavily serialised, it had built up enough mythology during its Next Generation era to be daunting to some viewers. Enterprise had a premise different and interesting enough to bring some hype back to Trek and it promised to provide a jumping on point for people who didn't know the difference between a Cardassian and a Kazon. It definitely got me to jump back on board after skipping the last few seasons of Voyager... though I may have jumped ship again a few months later. It's not my favourite of the spin-offs to be honest.

I'll be going through the entire episode writing comments under screencaps, so this will contain MASSIVE SPOILERS. There may also be spoilers for episodes and movies from earlier shows as well; anything before 2001 is fair game. Though unlike the commentary tracks on the disc, I'll not be spoiling anything that comes after it.

Justice League 1-01: Secret Origins

Episodes:

1-3

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Writer:

Rich Fogel

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Air Date:

17-Nov-2001

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Today on Sci-Fi Adventures, I'm writing about the first episode of the Justice League cartoon! Or maybe the first three episodes depending on how you look at it. Either way, the story's still called Secret Origins.

Justice League was the seventh cartoon in the epic DC Animated Universe continuity, which began with Batman: The Animated Series in 1992 and ended with Justice League Unlimited in 2006. So that places this episode about two-thirds of the way through the DCAU era, at a point where Static Shock and Zeta Project (cartoons 5 and 6) were still airing. In fact, Batman Beyond (cartoon 4) also had an episode left to air, so it was a busy time for DC animation.

I didn't watch any of them at the time though. First time I saw any Justice League was a few years later when I was flipping through channels and caught 10 minutes of an episode where the League goes into a parallel universe and meets versions of the Golden Age Justice Society. Except I didn't know that, as I'd missed the start, so what I saw looked to me like some goofy Golden Age-inspired comedy series for young children and I quickly decided I wasn't interested. And that's the story of how one of season 1's best episodes nearly put me off the Justice League cartoon forever. Fortunately, my second exposure to the series left me hopelessly addicted until I'd finished it all off.

This is going to be a full recap with commentary and massive SPOILERS, but I doubt I'll be saying much about events in the DCAU cartoons leading up to it and I definitely won't be spoiling anything that came after it.

Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within

Written by:

Al Reinert, Jeff Vintar

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Directed by:

Hironobu Sakaguchi

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Release Date:

2001

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Welcome to Ray Hardgrit's Sci-Fi Adventures, review #001: Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within.

My past self thought it'd be a great idea to start a new website about science fiction movies and TV shows in addition to the Super Adventures site I already have going, but now it's me, my present day self, that's stuck writing content for it! Still, there's nothing more sci-fi than starting a spin-off.

Speaking of beginnings, Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within was the debut movie from Square Pictures, the video game company's new computer animated film division. And it was also the last, because it bombed so hard. They'd would only work on one more project, the Final Flight of the Osiris short for the Animatrix, before being shut down. I guess if you keep using 'Final' in your titles it will eventually come true.

I'm not sure the movie failed because it was based on a video game though, because I've seen this before and I know full well that it ain't based on any 'Final Fantasy' games I've played. But this isn't a case of a movie studio taking a brand name and doing their own thing with it, as it was conceived and directed by 'Final Fantasy' creator Hironobu Sakaguchi himself! His very first film in fact, and also his last.

Despite its utter failure, Spirits Within was a pretty important milestone in cinema, as it's the first full-length 'photorealistic' motion captured animated movie. A proper big-budget serious cartoon aimed at adults starring humans, four years in the making! To give it a bit of context, it came out 6 years after Toy Story (the first full length CG movie) and around the same time that 'Final Fantasy X' hit the PlayStation 2. So yes, it really is 15 years old at the time I'm writing this.

(I'm basically going to go ahead and spoil this entire movie one scene at a time now, so please stop right here unless you're okay with that).