History Headscratchers / StarTrekEnterprise

*** Or you know, Archer is just an idiot. This was the same starship captain that had to ask T'Pol why it was taking longer to get where they were going after they'd slowed down! I wouldn't put this guy in charge of putting my hat on straight, let alone Earth's most advanced spaceship.

*** Archer had prove himself to be a very competent star captain, intellectually sound and scientifically minded man. And indeed is shown on camera that he was interested in astronomy since being a child. So "being an idiot" is not the answer. Having Star Trek's stars not matching real life is also not an answer, everything can be explain with "this is another universe" as is the equivalent of AWizardDidIt, every single plothole on every work of history can be answer by "is another universe things are different", as with most works of fiction Star Trek is supposed to be our universe even if is a fictional version. So that's not the answer either. The best explanation is pretty simple; Rigel is just the name that a random species gave itself which by chance sounds exactly like the name humans gave to a star. It has never being establish canonically that the Rigelians come from the star that humans call Rigel. This way of thinking has two advantages; a) Not only takes away the improbabililty that ancient humans (as the name was chosen centuries ago) name a star by pure luck the same that the species native to it gave to itself, but also b) Would explain Archer question. As Archer is well versed in Astronomy while hearing about the Rigelians his mind-set would be: Who? What? The Rigelians? Rigel is a blue supergiant star too young to have planets in it, thus T'Pol explaining him that is an inhabited star system with the same [by coincidence] name would make sense.

*** The episode mentions that [[InformedAbility Archer's supposed to be a trained diplomat]]. I'd say it's more the writers not having any idea what a good diplomat and officer is supposed to do[[note]]and how the heck anyone in Archer's position could possibly have time for any real experience in diplomacy is a good question[[/note]].

*** Actually, it makes Archer seem like a pretty bad dog owner (we already know he's an idiot)! Think about it: alien planets = alien diseases. They already have to put effort into making sure that the ''human'' (Vulcan, Deobulan...) crew doesn't pick up ThePlague and bring it back to the ship since they don't have nifty transporter bio-filters literally scrubbing them from the inside-out yet. This also fails to take into account both alien domestic animals and wildlife. On Earth, a coyote or some large raptors would happily kill and eat a small Beagle (as would some other dogs)! Did Archer check to make sure that the native wildlife was not a possible hazard for a small pet?

*** The writers were just as clueless regarding fanservice as they were about every other aspect of good television?

*** The writers were just awful with anything meant to be sexy. Almost all their attempts at sexiness derive from a delousing room where the characters rub topical cream on themselves to protect against parasites. Their big romance originated from sleep therapy for someone suffering from PTSD due to crippling grief. So following their usual logic, it makes sense that their sexy character would have an inherent, visible revulsion to her potential romantic interests.

*** Archer had prove himself to be a very competent star captain, intellectually sound and scientifically minded man. And indeed is shown on camera that he was interested in astronomy since being a child. So "being an idiot" is not the answer. Having Star Trek's stars not matching real life is also not an answer, everything can be explain with "this is another universe" as is the equivalent of AWizardDidIt, every single plothole on every work of history can be answer by "is another universe things are different", as with most works of fiction Star Trek is supposed to be our universe even if is a fictional version. So that's not the answer either. The best explanation is pretty simple; Rigel is just the name that a random species gave itself which by chance sounds exactly like the name humans gave to a star. It has never being establish canonically that the Rigelians come from the star that humans call Rigel. This way of thinking has two advantages; a) Not only takes away the improbabililty that ancient humans (as the name was chosen centuries ago) name a star by pure luck the same that the species native to it gave to itself, but also b) Would explain Archer question. As Archer is well versed in Astronomy while hearing about the Rigelians his mind-set would be: Who? What? The Rigelians? Rigel is a blue supergiant star to young to have planets in it, thus T'Pol explaining him that is an inhabited star system with the name would make sense.