My Review- 'Two Days and Two Nights'

WARNING! IF YOU READ THE FOLLOWING SPOILERS, THE SPOILER MONSTER WILL COME AND PROD YOU WITH POINTY STICKS AND STUFF.

Ahh, I have only one ep left to review after this. That's right, next week 'Shockwave Part I' airs. So this is the last 'regular' episode of ENT this season. Excellent. And it's a Risa episode. Oh God damn. Anyone who's watched even a small amount of modern Trek will know of Risa. It's been frequently mentioned in TNG, DS9 and Voyager and two episodes happen on it. TNG's 'Captain's Holiday' which was on the level of 'Unexpected' and DS9s 'Let He Who is without sin.....' which ranks about no. 2 on my top 10 worst DS9 episodes ever and no. 4 overall in my top 10 worst Trek episodes. So a Risa episode doesnt get my hopes up. *sigh*

STORYLINE  

Well Im pleased to announce 'Two Days and Two Nights' is better than both the above mentioned episodes. Though based on the above you may think that's damned praise. And you'd be right. While 'Two Days and Two Nights' isnt TRULY awful, it's typical of ENT: it's mediocre. 'Two Days and Two Nights' consists mainly of four plots. The main Phlox/T'Pol/Mayweather plot, a Trip/Reed plot, a Hoshi plot and an Archer plot. Yes that's right, the episode tries to give everyone a share in the mediocrity. Isnt that nice of it? :) So, continuing in the above order we will start with the Phlox/T'Pol/Mayweather plot. Of course this being Mayweather the only point of his presence in the show is to set up the Phlox plot. Poor guy, I wished they'd give him an episode other than 'Favourite Son' with more than 3 lines. To be honest I didn't particularly like this plot, it veered from stupid to utterly hilarious in a way that was quite disturbing, some parts were funny (Phlox initially waking up in that really surprising way had me chuckling, if only as I wasn't expecting it.) and some parts had me groaning (Phlox's constant addressing of people as 'Captain') it was uneven, and it would of helped if someone (say, Cutler) had acknowledged some humour in reference to the scene, but no one did. Now onto the Trip/Reed story. It suffered much the same problem as the above plot. It too was uneven veering from idiot to genuinely funny, and of course, this being ENT, we had the obligatory 'Trip and Reed in their underwear' scenes. Oh the hilarity(!) Seriously, please stop me, Im laughing so hard my sides have split(!) As you may off guessed by my sarcastic tone, the reaction from me was more of one-raised eyebrow asking what was going on quizzically than actual laughter. The Hoshi plot on the other hand was great, it came across as plausible, intelligent, fun and even a little sweet. As Trek romance plots go this was one of the better ones, but then that's not saying much. Trek's never done romance well. It was interesting, and generally well done. That brings us to the last plot. The Archer plot. This one was very different compared to the others. Two were attempts at humour and one was a romance plot. All were, pretty much, light-hearted fluff. The Archer plot took a much darker edge. The Initial Plot of 'Archer makes a friend' wasn't bad, but it didn't exactly throw any punches. As soon as the Suliban were mentioned my ears pricked up and I started to pay a lot more attention. The fact that Keyla was a Tandaran makes a lot of sense and it's nice to see the big picture (something Voyager seemed to believe didn't exist) being used in such a good way. So in all I disliked two of the four plots, and liked two of the four plots. :)

THE SHIP  

Bah.

THE CHARACTERS  

Surprisingly the two that usually act the best came off as acting the worst this week. From 'Shuttlepod One' we already know Dominic Keating isnt great at broad comedy, but Billingsley really surprised me. I suspect this is due to some kind of mismatch of  material with actor. 'Dear Doctor' this ain't. 

Dey Young (Keyla) and Bakula didn't seem to have much chemistry.

Hoshi came off brilliantly, and Archer came off better than usual.

STAR TREK NOTES.  

Oooooo finale next week!

From 'Detained' and this, the Tandaran Intelligence service is obviously something be reckoned with.

Nice to see Cutler again, brought back some nice memories of 'Dear Doctor' :D

Rating (out of 10): 6/10. Let's hope 'Shockwave' can improve on that.