Line #8 Recap/StarTrekEnterpriseS01E22VoxSola


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ent_voxsola_275.jpg]]
2	[[caption-width-right:350:Talk about a ''sticky'' situation!]]
3	The ''Enterprise'' crew has made first contact with a group of aliens called the Kreetassans, but it's gone awry and they're storming away in anger. Archer, T'Pol, Trip, and Hoshi are trying to figure out why the Kreetassans are angry, but the universal translator isn't working properly. They demand to leave, even when Archer apologises. Once they leave, a gooey, web-like lifeform enters the ''Enterprise''.
4
5	On the bridge, Hoshi feels like she's to blame for the first contact going wrong, since she couldn't translate them, and T'Pol isn't very helpful and simply tells her to practice more. Trip enters, and Hoshi asks him to repair a static-y communications device. He promises to do it tomorrow and asks T'Pol how Archer is feeling in terms of emotions. She tells him he doesn't feel like being visited, but Trip visits him anyway.Trip offers Archer some rib with horseradish, but Archer just asks for it sent to his quarters. Trip then offers a game of pool, but Archer declines. Trip gives Archer a computer card of a water polo match, which finally cheers him up.
6
7	A strange noise is heard in Archer's quarters, causing Porthos to bark as the creature moves through a conduit above the quarters. In the mess hall, Malcolm, Hoshi, and Travis are dining and wondering what went wrong with the first contact. Noticing that Hoshi is still unhappy, the guys try to take her mind off it by talking about movie night instead. A French movie will be playing, and Travis is excited, but the others less so-- Malcolm only becomes interested when he hears it contains explosions, and Hoshi decides not to watch it lest she fail to translate the dialogue. On her way down the corridor, she hears the same noise Porthos did, but decides to ignore it, not knowing that the alien is inside the wall.
8
9	In engineering, a crewman named Michael Rostov is impatient, wanting to see the movie now. His coworker, J. Kelly, tells him that he can watch it in his quarters, but Rostov feels it isn't the same. Kelly then notices a power failure in the cargo bay and tells Rostov to fix it. In the captain's mess, Archer and Trip are watching the polo match with beer and pretzels, and when others try to watch the movie, it shows footage from ''Enterprise'' instead. Malcolm contacts engineering to see what's wrong.
10
11	Meanwhile, Rostov enters the cargo bay and sees a white substance on the floor and the web-like strings surrounding some containers. He tries to contact engineering, but is grabbed. While Archer and Trip keep watching the polo match, Kelly, who got Rostov's transmission, goes to the cargo bay and sees him trapped in the webbing. She contacts Archer, telling him there's a strange creature in the cargo bay, but is also cut off.
12
13	Archer runs to the cargo bay, accompanied by Trip, Malcolm, and another security officer, all carrying weapons. They see the creature, who has now trapped Kelly as well. Rostov tells them to leave before they too are trapped, but Archer and Trip get grabbed by the creature before they can do so. Trip tells Malcolm and the other security officer to run away, and they do. Unfortunately, the lower-ranking security officer gets caught while running, but Malcolm escapes and cuts off a bit of tendril. T'Pol, Malcolm, and Hoshi discuss the situation, and Phlox, who has been examining the piece of tendril, suggests using EM radiation, which the creature appears to be sensitive to. Hoshi, however, wants to talk to it, believing its sounds resemble a language or equations, but T'Pol believes there isn't time and tells Malcolm to build some EM emitters.
14
15	In the cargo bay, Kelly, Trip, and the security officer are now unconscious, but Rostov is still keen to see the movie. A security team, led by Malcolm, enters and, on T'Pol's command, begins firing EM radiation at the creature. It starts to work, but causes severe pain in the trapped crew members. Phlox determines that the creature and its victims are psychically linked, so they can't kill it, thus, T'Pol tells Hoshi that she must try to communicate with it. Meanwhile, Malcolm reveals that Starfleet is working on a force field, which T'Pol tells him to work on as it might come in useful.
16
17	Hoshi starts work on the translation, asking T'Pol for help since the alien language resembles math and T'Pol is GoodWithNumbers. Travis is the only one on the bridge, when the ship is hailed. He answers, and it's the Kreetassan captain, who now speaks English. He explains that the reason he and the others were offended was because they view eating in public with as much disdain as they do ''sex'' in public. Travis apologises and asks the Kreetassan captain if he's seen the web creature before. The Kreetassan captain says that he has and sends Travis the coordinates for its home world.
18
19	T'Pol and Hoshi, meanwhile, have learnt the language and they enter the cargo bay, along with Malcolm, Phlox, and another security officer. Hoshi tells it to let the crew members go, which it does, also giving them directions to its home world, so they send it back.
20	----
21	!! Tropes in this episode include:
22
23	* AliensSpeakingEnglish: The Kreetassans learn English much faster than Hoshi learns their language.
24	* AssInAmbassador: Good lord, the Kreetassans.
25	* BlindIdiotTranslation: When the Kreetassans try to explain that eating, like mating, is offensive to do in public by their standards, the glitchy universal translator translates it to "You eat like you mate".
26	* CaptainObvious: More like ''Ensign'' Obvious; when the Kreetassans angrily storm back to the airlock:
27	--> '''Hoshi:''' I think they want to leave.\
28	'''T'Pol:''' [[DeadpanSnarker That much is obvious.]]
29	* ComfortFood: One of Trip's failed attempts to cheer Archer up is by offering him some of the chef's rib with horseradish.
30	* DissonantSerenity: Despite being trapped in a web-like lifeform and several of his colleagues being unconscious from being trapped, Rostov is still more interested in the movie than anything else.
31	* FirstContactFauxPas: Guess bringing the Kreetassans to the mess hall wasn't such a good idea...
32	* ForceFieldDoor: Malcolm is its inventor.
33	* GoodWithNumbers: T'Pol's math skills make her able to help Hoshi decipher the slime creature's math-like language.
34	* GratuitousLatin: "Vox Sola" means "one voice" in Latin.
35	* HeroicBSOD: Archer goes into a brief funk over the sour FirstContact with the Kreetassans. A game of water polo brings him out of it.
36	* TheMainCharactersDoEverything: With Archer and Trip captured by the creature, T'Pol and Hoshi figuring out how to communicate with it, Phlox studying a sample of it, and Malcolm working on his forcefields, Travis is the only officer manning TheBridge. Guess they really ''don't'' have any backup crew, do they?
37	* MyGodWhatHaveIDone: After the first contact goes wrong, Hoshi is wracked with guilt for not being able to translate the Kreetassans.
38	* ShoutOut: The movie that Travis and Malcolm watch, ''Film/TheWagesOfFear'', really exists.
39	* StuffBlowingUp: Travis talks Malcolm into watching ''Film/TheWagesOfFear'' at movie night by promising lots of explosions.[[note]]Anyone who's actually seen the movie will have a laugh as it's all about trying to ''avoid'' explosions.[[/note]]
40	* {{Synchronization}}: Whenever the creature feels pain, so does everyone it captured.
41	* ToughLove: T'Pol tells Hoshi that the only reason she's so hard on her is that she believes Hoshi is capable enough to reach T'Pol's high standards.
42	* YourNormalIsOurTaboo: Turns out that eating in public is a big no-no for the Kreetassans.
43	--> '''Kreetassan:''' It is like mating. It is very offensive to us.\
44	'''Travis:''' We were just eating. How do you eat?\
45	'''Kreetassan:''' We eat the same way, but not in the presence of others.

Context Recap / StarTrekEnterpriseS01E22VoxSola