Future Tense
From the Encyclopedia of Speculative Fiction - http://encyclopedia.wizards.pro
| Series: | ENT |
| Season: | 2 |
| Original Airdate: | 2003-02-19 |
| Production Number: | 042 |
| Year: | 2152 |
| Date: | Unknown |
| Written by: | Mike Sussman & Phyllis Strong |
| Directed by: | James Whitmore, Jr. |
Enterprise finds a small craft — apparently from the future — adrift in space, and both the Suliban and the mysterious Tholians are intent on retrieving it.
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Summary
Enterprise finds a ship wreck that presents no apparent weapon damage but its hull prevents any extensive scans. They bring it on board and discover a human corpse in it.
Since this "human" went farther than any other, hypothesis are made about its identity: Could it be the long lost Zephram Cochrane? A rendez-vous with the vulcan starship Tal'Kir is schedule to bring the wreck back to Earth and examine it further.
Trip and Malcolm go on examining the ship but neither of them can find anything that looks like a propulsion, a black box or even a power source. What they find is even stranger, a hatch leading to a new room that makes the ship bigger from the inside that it is from the outside.
Not long after, a suliban salvage ship drops out of warp and claim salvage right on the wreck. Jonathan Archer is not ready to give it up so easily, but the suliban captain cuts the discussion short by opening fire on Enterprise. The salvage ship is no match for the NX ship and even after transporting a team of soldiers/saboteurs on the Enterprise, the Sulibans decide to pull back.
Meanwhile, Phlox discovered strange patterns in the corpse's DNA: even if it's mainly human, it contains DNA segments from many differents species, notably Vulcan ones. Since there are no records of Human-Vulcan mating to date, Archer begins to suspect the ship is from the future. He pays a little visit to Daniels' quarters and find out it is effectively the case (the ship is from the 31st century).
Shortly after, a tholian starship repeat the same pattern as the Sulibans before, but they also pull back when Archer threatens to destroy the wreck to prevent the Tholians from having it.
In the launch bay, Trip is finally able to get some power back to the ship. The power restoration is followed by 2 experience of deja-vu, and after investigation, they detect high energy particles emitted by the ship and conclude to some kind of temporal radiations. The launchbay is then sealed off.
Only a couple of minutes from the rendez-vous point with the vulcan cruiser, the Sulibans are back, this time with reinforcment. Archer decides that the Enterprise can sustain the Suliban's fire for a little time and decides to make a run for the rendez-vous point. When they drop out of warp however, it is only to realize the Vulcans has been disabled by a squadron of tholian ships. Fortunately for Enterprise, the Tholians engage the Sulibans first. By the time the Tholians get rid of the Sulibans, Trip has activated a temporal beacon and the ship from the future has been loaded with a warhead.
Even if the Tholians finally get what they wanted, the corpse, the beacon and the ship quickly dematerialize, probably a consequence of activating the beacon.
Background Information
- This episode is the first appearance of the Tholians in almost 34 years, since they first appeared in TOS:"The Tholian Web".
- Early drafts for "Future Tense" had the USS Defiant NCC-1764 instead of a timeship from the 31st century. The Defiant would later appear in "In a Mirror, Darkly".
- Among the images in the 'temporal database', are schematics for a Klingon Raptor-class ship, an Intrepid class starship (possibly USS Voyager), an Intrepid Class Aeroshuttle, the MIR station, the US Space shuttle, a Nygean ship, and a Romulan D'deridex class warbird, a Nova-class ship, the unnamed ship that attacked Enterprise in "Fight or Flight", and an upside-down Surak-class starship.
- Also in the database is a news article (see here) on President George W. Bush's state of the Union Address for 2003.
Memorable Quotes
"It's unlikely we could reproduce."
"Humans and Vulcans."
- - T'Pol specifying after she got a strange look from Jonathan Archer
Links and References
Guest Stars
- Vaughn Armstrong as Maxwell Forrest
- Cullen Douglas as Suliban Soldier
References
Bush, George; B'Saari; Cochrane, Zefram; Cochrane family; D'Kyr type; Future Guy; hyper spanner; micro-caliper; Stegosaurus; Suliban; Suliban Cabal; Suliban cell ship; Suliban salvage ship; Tal'Kir; Temporal Cold War; Tholians; Tholian Assembly; Tholian starship; Time-travel pod; Vega colony; Vulcan High Command; Vulcan Science Directorate.
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