Enterprise 0121 – Detained

Originally posted to ScoopMe! on April 24, 2002

LEAD-IN

Detained : Escape From Manzanar

Racial profiling and worse, echoing humanity’s past and present, are confronted with the typical Star Trek subtlety.

SYNOPSIS

Archer and Mayweather wake up in a Tandaran detention camp filled with Suliban captives. The warden, Colonel Grat, explains that Archer and Mayweather have stumbled into a security zone, and they had to be detained in order to make sure they aren’t Suliban masquerading as another species. Grat assures them that while he’s bound by regulations preventing their direct contact with Enterprise, he’ll tell them what’s going on, and that he’ll explain the mistake in a mandated hearing which will garner their release in a few days.

Archer spends his time getting to know his Suliban neighbors. It turns out that these are just run-of-the-mill, ordinary, non-genetically-altered Suliban who have been caught up in a net of fear by the Tandarans and relocated to interment camps throughout Tandaran space. Archer has a problem with that. He becomes increasingly resistant to Grat’s questions — which prompts Grat to threaten to keep Archer detained for more than a few days.

With the help of Enterprise, and Malcolm surgically altered to resemble a Suliban so as to infiltrate the camp, the Human and Suliban detainees orchestrate a prison break. The Suliban take to space in liberated Suliban ships that were stored at the prison, and make a break for freedom, while Archer and crew head back to Enterprise satisfied that they gave innocents a chance.

FADE OUT

ANALYSIS

“To defend the defenseless! Befriend the friendless! And to defeat… the defeatless.” -Zorro, Zorro, the Gay Blade

One of the great traditions of Star Trek is to take a current event and weave a story so obvious that even the little trekkies in wont of a life can “get” it. The most egregious of these kinds of stories was “Let That Be Your Last Battlefield” from The Original Series — a tale so black and white about black and white that the entire concept of nuance was lost. (Wowzers, I guess I didn’t much care for that ep, eh?)

Whether addressing the interment of Americans of Japanese ancestry in the 1940s, or the effects of racial profiling in the late 20th and early 21st centuries (Black, Arab, whatever), the writers made certain to make a nail so large that no hammer could avoid hitting its head. And it’s a cryin’ shame. While a show such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer can serve up allegories about the angst of growing up, Enterprise could only serve up a story that any hack out of film school could have dashed off in day.

Archer clearly comes off better here than he has in the past couple of excursions. He doesn’t let his past history with the Suliban prevent him from learning more about his new neighbors. While his distrust of Grat doubtless fueled his curiosity, it was a good tactical move in any case — if for nothing more than “the enemy of my enemy is my friend”. More than that, he got valuable intelligence about the Suliban. They aren’t all genetically altered. Many, if not most, are much like any other person you’d meet in any society. They just want to have good lives and to be left alone by those whose main motivation is power. The irony is that Archer got so much more intelligence from Sajen in a few days than Grat was ever likely to get out of Archer.

Grat did everything wrong to get Archer to tell him anything useful. First, he captured and detained him. Then he won’t let him talk to his ship, followed soon after by a gourmet meal of prison gruel. Still, Archer might have told Grat more than he should if Grat hadn’t whipped out a PADD and rattled off a list of Tandaran intelligence. Archer might be a little naive and a touch too trusting, but he hates being spied on. If he won’t tolerate it from the Vulcans, he certainly isn’t going to appreciate it from the Tandarans.

Mayweather, too, came off not-too-shabby (and good for Anthony Montgomery for grabbing on with both hands his first multi-line appearance in, like, forever). Mayweather is a wary sort of fellow who doesn’t seem to be too quick with the forgiveness. He’s learned to distrust the Suliban, even though he hasn’t come across that many representatives of the genus. Still, he took his captain’s lead and worked on establishing a rapport with the equally distrustful Danik. While neither is likely to invite the other to his wedding, Mayweather got a chance to mature and learn that sometimes by listening you might actually learn something.

Archer doesn’t come out all rosey, however. He did make an exception to his noninterference policy and conducted a jailbreak. True, Grat was pushing him like so many cliche prison wardens, but looking at it from Grat’s perspective, he was only doing his job and following regulations. Maybe following regs with a little too much vigor (hmmm… must be some untold Suliban history there), but it was hardly Klingon mind-sifter unpleasant. This is the sort of event that is likely to bite Archer on the ass in the future.

Of the rest of the regular cast, only T’Pol had much to do, and it seems that what was given to Archer was taken from T’Pol. While it was probably an act to distract Grat, T’Pol’s little tap dance about inviting Grat to dinner had all of the rhythms of Seven of Nine. It was distracting. T’Pol, a self-professed bad actor, was too much not like herself. A little too effusive. A little too suggestive. Drier, or at least a little less, well, Human would have been truer.

The story itself is timely. In times of crisis, when a population thinks that they can separate out “them” from “us”, there is a strong tendency to want to do so. Politicians try to sugar-coat it and say that it’s to protect “them” from the angrier elements of “us” when it’s actually bigotry run amuck. Archer’s actions, and statements about Manzanar, imply that he thinks that it’s one of humanity’s ugly episodes that is now past. Mayweather, may or may not feel the same, but it still seemed to touch a nerve with him.

In any event, the Suliban who weren’t killed in the riot managed to escape from the camp. What happens next to them? Do they find a nice quiet planet? Do they get conscripted by the evil Suliban? Will they become freedom-fighters for the cause?

In many ways, the follow-up to their escape has more interesting possibilities than the escape itself. What if the citizens interred at Manzanar and similar camps had escaped en masse? What do you do once you gain your freedom when you aren’t sure you can hold on to it?

TIDBITS, IRKS, and QUIRKS

• One of Archer’s best moments as Captain, if not his best moment to-date, is when he remained silent during Grat’s interrogation.

• Massive plastic surgery, and the transporter to the rescue. This seems really familiar.
• Apparently the Romulans got a Tandaran tailor at some point. What’s with the quilted uniforms?
• Since Archer and Mayweather were presumably stripped of their gear before being detained, how did they communicate so easily with the Suliban? An in-prison translator? The Suliban and Tandarans speak English? Please. Let the crew have to struggle without Hoshi sometime.

As ever, your comments are very welcome on the message board.