EPISODE: "Bounty" PROD#: ENT051 TRAN#: 2.25 RATING: PG-DV AIRDATE: wed-14-may-2003-21:00 EPDATE: 21-mar-2153 OFFICIAL: startrek.com/startrek/view/series/ENT/episode/128726.html FROM: Phillip Thorne, thorne@underbase.org POST-TO: rec.arts.startrek.tech REVIEW#: 42.0 FORMAT#: 5.0 URL: underbase.org/dept/trek/ent225_bounty.txt I. INTRODUCTION This technical overview is intended to support discussion of the current episode, and to later serve as a reference: it contains PLOT SPOILERS; CONTINUE AT YOUR OWN RISK. Whenever possible, it indicates who did/claimed/knew what. Spellings of technobabble and alien nouns are obtained from TV closed-captioning ("CC") -- which is imperfect: it may not match spoken dialogue, or the website, or be consistent within or between eps. In the Synopsis, I sometimes condense or reorder scenes, for clarity. If you have corrections or clarifications, please contact me, and I'll (eventually) make corrections. "Star Trek" and all related indicia are copyrights of Paramount Pictures, while this overview is (c)2003 Phillip Thorne. Some details provided by _The Star Trek Encyclopedia_, 1st ed., 1994. Feel free to use this document as a reference, but please give credit where due. Abbreviations commonly used: -(m/f/?) name belongs to mel/fem/unclear, (os) on [viewer] screen, (vo) voiceover, -(?) quote is uncertain, -(sp?) spelling is unclear; VDB Vulcan database, VHC Vulcan High Command; series: TOS TAS TNG DS9 VGR ENT. Although CC uses "Launch Bay", "Sick Bay", and "shuttle pod", I often condense those terms to single words. II. TERMINOLOGY TECHNICAL: G-type star, L-class planet, warp regulator, impulse throttle, navigation sensor, subspace beacon, plasma conduit, antimatter injector, Launchbay Two, C-deck, D-deck BIOLOGICAL: dopamine, limbic system, decon gel, sedative, Pon Farr, serum LOCATIONS, POLITIES and ORGANIZATIONS: Rura Penthe CULTURAL: Klingon Judiciary, magistrate, darseks, Orion slave girls, fire salt NAME-DROPPING: Chef III. ANALYSIS 1. What we get... An epdate. A new look for Tellarites. A new currency (darseks). Followup on the "Archer escapes Klingon justice" arc. Decon is on D-deck, and T'Pol's quarters on C-deck. 2. What we don't get... 3. A Tellarite has a big, jowly head; with long hair, beard and moustache. His eyes are deeply set (but not holes, as in TOS:"Journey to Babel"). His mouth contains four prominent peg-like teeth (one pair upper and lower), and the lower lip is pronounced. The nose is wide, with large (but not very pig-like) nostrils. 4. Skalaar's shuttle is tan, long and rectangular, with a wedge-shaped nose and single long window. A cylindrical chin cutout contains a yellow-glowing (nav deflector?). There are four aft circular thrusters, and two cylinders tied to the upper aft corners. There's a pair of aft outriggers containing cylindrical weapons. Its weapons fire is blue beams. The interior is a redress of the TNG set used for Dirgo's shuttle and Rasmussen's timeship ("Final Mission" and "A Matter of Time"). 5. Kago's ship is green. It has three underslung drum-shaped thrusters, and a fourth strapped to the upper side. Its weapons fire is yellow beams. 6. Goroth's ship is green and wedge-shaped, with a semicircular aft cutout. On the aft edge of the outer slabs are four vertical slots, green-glowing: possibly warp photon spills. Underslung beneath those are red-glowing slots: impulse? There's a cylindrical cut in the nose, housing a red-glowing (nav deflector?). The ventral side contains seven escape pods, five plus two. It has invisible weapons ports on each side of the nose; they fire green bolts. 7. The station at which Gaavrin works has a Cardassian look to it. It's star-shaped, with a central domed disk, from which extend fat T-shaped arms. Each arm has an arched upper limb, and a narrower straight lower limb, which extends out beyond the T's crossbar. There's a Vulcan-looking ship docked (at its nose): the delta-type, minus the vertical ring. The circular cut, however, is lined with blue-glow. IV. NITS 1. When Reed zaps Skalaar's subspace beacon, the orange beam emerges from a spot on the horizontal underside of ENT's saucer, starboard of the deflector -- *not* the place previously established to contain the phase-cannon, which is outboard of the missile ports, on the curved ventral hull. 2. When T'Pol enters Phlox's faux locking-code (4-2-8-6-4) in the keypad, she's not hitting the right keys -- they're not in a familiar 3x3 grid (okay), but moreover she hits five *different* keys. 3. The CC uses both "Sub-Commander" and "Subcommander", and homophonically reads "made it" for "mated". V. THIRD-PARTY COMMENTS [...] VI. EPISODE SYNOPSIS TEASER: [Oops, missed this when taping] ACT 1: [Still oops. Actually, I didn't, but I taped it separately, misplaced the fragment, then missed the late-summer reprise.] ACT 2: ENT tracks the signal to a "G-type star", but discovers a device (a "subspace beacon", Skalaar later says) spoofing them with the warp signature. On Tucker's orders, Reed happily zaps it into a brief orange fireball. Skalaar works at his cooking. "Klingon Judiciary", "Rura Penthe" (pron. "pen-thay"), "magistrate", "Goroth". Phlox scans T'Pol in the blue-lit decon chamber: the "microbe" has induced a "slight fever" and "elevated dopamine levels", and could be affecting her "limbic system". She wants to help the search for Archer, and is willing to conduct it from her quarters (which are on C-deck, Phlox points out). She gets angry, then apologizes: she's having trouble "suppressing her emotions". Phlox has hopes the latest "gel" will work, and suggests a mild "sedative". Goroth is paying "9000 darseks" for Archer, with which Skalaar will reclaim _Tezra_. They're approached by a rival bounty-hunter, "KAGO". While still at warp, they exchange fire (Kago yellow beams, Skalaar aft blue beams). Archer convinces Skalaar to let him out and take the helm; the field sparks-out and the yellow-glowing arc-bars retract. (He doesn't instantly grok the controls: Skalaar points out the "warp regulator", "impulse throttle", and "navigation sensors".) Archer sends them towards the system's "L-class planet" and its opaque atmosphere. Both are flying on sensors, so he launches the two remaining "subspace beacons" to mislead Kago. T'Pol awakens the snoozing Phlox by seductively running her fingers over her chest. "I'm familiar with Denobulan mating practices -- I know your marriages aren't exclusive," she says. Phlox backs off, warns her that her "endorphin and hormone levels are dangerously high." "That's normal,"(?) she says; "You know what's wrong with you?" he replies. It's "Pon Farr, the cycle of mating," which they don't speak of with outsiders. When asked if she's experienced it before, she shakes her head. "It's not time ... If I don't mate with a male, Vulcan or otherwise, I'll die." ACT 3: Skalaar's shuttle is landed on some planet's dark, cratered surface. He and Archer work on its engines. Skalaar notes scornfully that Kago would probably waste the bounty on "Orion slave girls", while he himself would reclaim his long-impounded cargo ship _Tezra_, of which he was captain. "She" was first of her class, the fastest ever built, capable of hauling a million metric tons at warp 4.5; he'd retrofitted her engines himself. However, while hauling a shipment of "fire salt", he'd decided to save time but cutting across an "insignificant" corner of Klingon space. The Klingons didn't think so, and took both ship and cargo. Archer tries to sabotage the engine. T'Pol writes seductively while Phlox works with PADD and test-tubes to concoct a "serum" to "alleviate the symptoms". T'Pol just wants sex: "you have the cure; it's unethical for you to withhold it,"(?) but Phlox replies desperately that, because it was artificially-induced, sex might not help. Tucker arrives with supper; Phlox takes two covered plates and a container of supplies from the airlock-drawer beneath the visit-window. T'Pol digs into her greens with un-Vulcan-like fervor. ENT arrives at the planet, and detects two subspace beacons in the atmosphere, and a ship with one humanoid on the surface. They vid-contact Kago, and realize Archer's been taken for a bounty. They're less than 6 Ly from Klingon space; they head that way. Skalaar docks at the busy space station where his brother GAAVRIN works, "scrubbing plasma conduits". He asks for an "antimatter injector". "And I suppose you have no way to pay for it?" "Do you know who this is? He's the only prisoner to ever escape from Rura Penthe!" Archer doesn't deign to confirm this. Gaavrin doesn't share Skalaar's dream: the Klingons cannibalized _Tezra_: every power relay, conduit; the engines. 9,000 darseks is "a fortune". Phlox works while T'Pol chants in Vulcan (not CC'd). "The heat, it's unbearable," she moans; it's to prevent the serum from "congealing", Phlox says. He warns that the imbalance is increasing, and the damage to her limbic system could be irreversible. She insists on leaving, so he gives her the "locking code" (4-2-8-6-4) and admits that "Denobulan medical ethics prevent me from treating a patient against his will"(?), as a ruse to approach her with a hypo. She knocks him out, finds the code doesn't work; so she pulls off the wall-panel (three cables break, sparks fly, a small yellow fire ignites) and pulls open the hatch. Phlox awakes, calls the Bridge, and suggests they evacuate D-deck. ACT 4: Reed and two male guards, all in EV suits, track T'Pol with scanners, and split up. T'Pol finds him. "Malcolm. How long has it been? Since you mated?" (CC reads "made it".) As he reaches for his phase-pistol, she shoves him and runs; but the three corner her. She screams in Vulcan, lunges -- but he stuns her. Skalaar docks to Goroth's much larger ship. Goroth and a guard board, take Archer (manacled), and toss a money-case to the Tellarite (it contains only 6000 darseks). Goroth undocks, rolls clockwise, and warps off. Sato receives a hail from Skalaar. Later, Reed detects Goroth's ship a "2-2-6 mark 7-1"; they go to "tactical alert". In his cell, Archer brings the (trick!) manacles to his teeth and unlocks them, then retrieves a door-unlocker from a secret compartment. He sneaks out; an alarm sounds. He meets one Klingon; they struggle, he clubs him with the manacles, and takes his gun. He finds two more; they exchange fire, and manages to shoot them. He finds an alcove with two escape pods, but while struggling with the controls, Goroth and his guard appear. More fire; Archer escapes; his pod drops from warp. Goroth isn't concerned: "There isn't a planet within fifty light years." At warp, ENT spots Goroth's ship from 800,000 km. Goroth tractors the pod with a green ventral beam; Ent passes overhead and fires. They exchange shots (orange beams vs. green bolts; Reed reports "heavily shielded weapons ports"), grapple Archer's pod in "Launchbay Two", and finally warp out. T'Pol snoozes in Decon; Phlox enters, now dressed, and hypos her. She awakens; he tells her the microbe was eliminated, her "premature mating cycle" ended. "Did we?" she asks quietly. "Oh, Denobulan males aren't confident discussing such topics," he says cheerily, and assures her he'd never violate a patient's confidentially. Archer enters the Bridge. They'd damaged Goroth's "port nacelle", and he's now "limping back to Kronos"(CC). He asks: where T'Pol? They're hailed by Skalaar, who warns them the Klingons will likely double their bounty now. VII. SFX SHOTS Archer's escape-pod drop appears modified from "Precious Cargo" (?). VIII. PRODUCTION REGULAR CAST: Scott Bakula as Cpt. Jonathan Archer Connor Trinneer as LtCdr. Charles Tucker III Jolene Blalock as Sub-commander T'Pol Dominic Keating as Lt. Malcolm Reed Anthony Montgomery as Ens. Travis Mayweather Linda Park as Ens. Hoshi Sato John Billingsley as Dr. Phlox (No Porthos) GUEST CAST: Jordan Lund as Skalaar Michael Garvey as Captain Goroth Ed O'Ross as Gaavrin Robert O'Reilly as Kago-Darr Louis Ortiz as Klingon Warrior CREATIVE STAFF: Directed by Roxann Dawson ["B'Elanna Torres"] Story by Rick Berman & Brannon Braga Screenplay by Hans Tobeason Teleplay by Hans Tobeason and Mike Sussman & Phyllis Strong NEXT WEEK: In 2.26/052-"The Expanse", Earth is attacked and ENT recalled. See http://www.startrek.com/startrek/view/series/ENT/episode/128800.html