Enterprise, season 2

AVERAGE EPISODE RATING: 2.9
-Shockwave, pt. 2 ***
Facing a shelving of their mission, archer sulks. But the accident was a suliban plot, as he's whisked into the future by daniels. Rich with TREK mythology-building...doing so without sacrificing freshness requires deftness. Deftly done.
-Carbon Creek ***
T'mir behind sheet...must...hump! T'pol tells a story of her grandmother and the actual vulcan/human first contact, over a century before FIRST CONTACT. J. paul boehmer (SKYLINE, EVERYONE'S DEPRESSED) touchingly falls for an earthling. Charming.
-Minefield ***
Enterprise flies into a cloaked minefield, and loses a piece of the saucer. A second mine attaches but doesn't detonate. When reed goes EVA to defuse it, his leg is impaled. Lovely character work, and nasty romulan ominousness.
-Dead Stop ***
Crippled by the mine's damage, Enterprise sends out a distress signal. Tellarites direct them to a repair station that seems too good to be true.
-A Night in Sickbay ***
The captain's dog contracts a pathogen and archer maintains a sickbay vigil, where he's witness to phlox's curious routines.
-Marauders ***
Enterprise visits a colony that should be able to trade them warp plasma, but something is amiss. Archer convinces them to fight back against predatory klingons.
-The Seventh **
Archer helps t'pol apprehend a fugitive who escaped her years ago. Despite a game turn by guest bruce davison (SHORT CUTS, X-MEN), things don't click.
-The Communicator **
While covertly observing a warring pre-warp culture, reed loses his communicator. Attempting to retrieve it, he and archer are captured and tortured. Travis and trip try to figure out how to use a captured cloak-ready suliban cell ship.
-Singularity **
Radiation from a black hole causes the crew to manifest obsessive behavior. T'pol is the only one unaffected, and when everyone else finally passes out, she must save the ship.
-Vanishing Point ***
An emergency forces the reluctant, paranoid hoshi to use the transporter. Her reality begins warping; phlox thinks it's psychological. She sees aliens planting a bomb.
-Precious Cargo ***
A charming slice of cathode ray diversion. Trip is caught in a lifepod with an alien monarch (padma lakshmi - GLITTER, GIRL MOST LIKELY) pursued by her enemies. They land on a marshy planet, and contentiousness gives way to canoodling.
-The Catwalk ***
A zippy ripper. The crew must take refuge from an irradiated shock wave, inside a warp nacelle. While riding the wave, they are boarded by aliens who try to commandeer the ship.
-Dawn ***
Trip's shuttle is shot down. He and his alien nemesis (gregg henry - INSURRECTION, HUNG) are stranded on an inhospitable moon, and must work together to survive. One of the better incarnations of an oft-recycled sci fi plot.
-Stigma ***
The A plot, an HIV allegory, never pops. The B plot, about one of phlox's wives (melinda page hamilton - DESPERATE HOUSEWIVES, DEVIOUS MAIDS) making a pass at trip, is an all-too-rare TREK de-pantsing of monogamy. Wonderful.
-Cease Fire ***
Archer negotiates a cease fire between vulcans and andorians, plus...suzie plakson (THE NEXT GENERATION, MY STEPMOTHER IS AN ALIEN)!
-Future Tense ***
A ripper. Enterprise discovers a small craft adrift with no perceptible engines and a corpse which has human, vulcan, and other genomes. The craft matches the specs for one of daniels' 31st century ships, and has inner passages larger than the ship itself. Suddenly, suliban are in pursuit. Then tholians. Then suliban and tholians, attacking each other.
-Canamar ***
Accused of smuggling, trip and archer find themselves embroiled in a prison ship mutiny.
-The Crossing ***
A massive vessel swallows Enterprise. A being inhabits trip. Claiming to be explorers, the aliens offer non-corporeal experience to the entire crew.
-Judgment ***
Archer stands trial in the heart of the klingon Empire, for aiding subject refugees who had been abandoned. His advocate (the wonderful j.g. hertzler - DEEP SPACE NINE, SIX FEET UNDER) longs for the time when truth and honor stood proud.
-Horizon ***
Travis takes leave aboard the cargo ship where he grew up. His father has died, and his brother resents him. Tantalizing chemistry sparkles with an old shipmate played by nicole forester (BOSS, BEVERLY HILLS, 90120). Oh, that the series was cut short before her return appearance...
-The Breach ***
Enterprise must evacuate three cave-researching denobulan scientists who don't want to go. A patient refuses life-saving treatment from phlox, for political reasons.
-Cogenitor ***
The delightful andreas katsulas (THE NEXT GENERATION, MAX HEADROOM) is captain of an advanced alien ship. He and archer go exploring. Malcolm gets euphemismed! Trip befriends a gender-neutral member of this tri-gendered race, whom he teaches to read and aspire for more. Trip's friend asks for asylum, is refused, and commits suicide. Powerful.
-Regeneration ***
The remains of the borg sphere destroyed in FIRST CONTACT are discovered at the arctic circle. Several drones are thawed. They assimilate the scientists and take their transport. Enterprise pursues. Phlox is infected. Gripping.
-First Flight ***
Keith carradine (DEADWOOD, COWBOYS AND ALIENS) gives a bravura performance as a.g. robinson, who was the second choice for command of Enterprise. His death in a hiking accident prompts archer to tell t'pol tales of the warp trial program. Fantastic....for a moment or two you forget that it's TREK, which is not something the franchise did often.
-Bounty ***
Jordan lund (FLETCH LIVES, SPECIES) gives a flawless performance as a tellarite bounty hunter who abducts archer. One star lost for a tepid, inaccurate portrayal of klingons - escape pods, and ducking behind cover? Look for robert o'reilly (THE NEXT GENERATION, DEEP SPACE NINE).
-The Expanse ***
An alien probe cuts a swath into Earth, killing millions (including trip's sister). Temporal agent daniels tells archer the xindi built the probe, and are planning to destroy Earth. Enterprise heads for their space, the Delphic Expanse, where the laws of physics change. T'pol is recalled by the High Command, and disobeys. Trip is pissy and vengeful. Another star lost for cautious klingons.