EPISODE: "The Communicator" PROD#: ENT034 TRAN#: 2.08 RATING: PG-V AIRDATE: wed-13-nov-2002 EPDATE: [Unstated; spring? summer? 2152] OFFICIAL: startrek.com/library/ent_episodes/episodes_ent_detail_126346.asp FROM: Phillip Thorne, thorne@underbase.org POST-TO: rec.arts.startrek.tech, rec.arts.sf.tv REVIEW#: 26.0 FORMAT#: 3.7 URL: underbase.org/dept/trek/ent208_communicator.txt This technical overview is intended to support more detailed discussion of this episode and others, by specifically indicating who did what, and by indicating the spelling of proper nouns and technobabble, as attained through closed-captioning (CC). The NOTES are listed in approximate seen-on-screen order, and ANALYSIS summarizes topics. THESE MAY CONSTITUTE PLOT SPOILERS; continue at your own risk. Abbreviations used: (m/f/?) name belongs to mel/fem/unclear, (os) on viewer screen, (?) quote is uncertain, (sp?) spelling is unclear, (vo) voiceover, VHC Vulcan High Command, Vdb Vulcan database. Captions use the spellings "Launch Bay", "Sick Bay", and "shuttle pod", but I sometimes abbreviate to one word. "Star Trek" and all related indicia are copyrights of Paramount Pictures. Spelling correction by D.Joseph Creighton. This overview is (c)2002 Phillip Thorne, thorne@underbase.org. Please notify me-the-author if you wish to re-print large hunks of text. And if you liked this, consider subscribing to my similarly-detailed e-newsletter, the _Non-Sequitur Express_. I. TERMS TRICKY [none] TECHNICAL pre-warp culture, launch bay crew, inverse carrier wave, power signature, polarize shuttlepod hull plating, communicator, scanner, bio-signs, particle radiation, blue-giant cluster; Suliban Cell-Ship, cloaking generator, primary and backup warp relays, power matrix, weapon nodes. CULTURAL Allakas malt. GEOGRAPHIC Alliance, the Complex. CHARACTERS Cpt.Jonathan Archer Travis Mayweather Dr.Phlox Malcolm Reed Ens.Hoshi Sato Sub-Cdr.T'Pol Cdr.Charles "Trip" Tucker Francis Guinan as [General] Gosis Tim Kelleher as Lt. Pell [unnamed in dialogue] Dennis Cockrum as Alien Barkeep Brian Reddy as Dr.Temec Jason Waters as Soldier (unnamed) as (lots of other soldiers) MENTIONS Chancellor Kultarey Klaang III. NOTES TEASER * Archer, Reed and Sato return in a shuttlepod from their visit to a "pre-warp culture". * Attended a rally/speech by CHANCELLOR KULTAREY, which reminded Reed of Winston Churchill's addresses before WWII. * Reed's first such visit. * They climb out the top. * In Decon, they peel off their forehead prosthetics. * From behind a window, Phlox reports them clean, "not a single parasite, spore or virus". * Putting their gear in a tray, Reed realizes his communicator is missing. ACT 1 * "launch bay crew" * Hoshi locates the communicator using an "inverse carrier wave" to "amplify its power signature". * She narrows it to 2-km2, then 3 city blocks. * T'Pol advises that they can't risk "contaminating a pre-warp culture". * Archer and Reed return. * They "polarize the hull plating" of the shuttlepod to evade the "surveillance towers". * (Shuttlepod One, since Two is mentioned later as the rescue craft.) * Reed detects 3 military aircraft, 72-km to starboard. * Landing spotlight in nose. * Tavern * "scanner" * "Allakas malt" * They're captured by 3 military officers, and ushered into a room where 2 more examine the communicator. * The natives confiscate a second comm, 2 scanners, and Reed's phase-pistol. * They're accused of being "Alliance" spies, and taken to "the Complex" to see GENERAL GOSIS. ACT 2 * T'Pol contacts Archer, risking that she be overheard. "Captain, please respond." * Hoshi gets a fix on the signal -- over 30-km from the tavern. * They could've gotten there by train or car, but not foot. * T'Pol orders Hoshi to isolate their "bio-signs"; she cautions that there are 100,000 people in that sector. * A lower orbit risks detection. * Reed wishes for "Epsom salts" to soothe his feet. * "This appears to be a computing instrument," says Gosis of the scanner. * Native guns with underslung drum magazines. * Roughing up the prisoners, the natives discover peel-off foreheads and red blood. * They call for TEMEC. * Tucker proposes using the "Suliban Cell-Ship" for a rescue. * Cite rescue of Klaang from the Helix. * He's been working on it in his spare time. * Mayweather will assist in prep. * (Aft docking bay, we later see) * The entire hexagonal front half of the pod hinges open. * Tucker's identified all the other systems, but is still having trouble with the cloaking system. * Probing at a starboard panel, Tucker is blasted back by an energy wave. Half a toolkit and his right arm fade away, with the cut surfaces shimmering blue. ACT 3 * In Sickbay, Phlox examines the arm, but his medical "scanner" senses little. * It tingles, with no pain. * Phlox guesses that the arm received an intense dose of whatever "particle radiation" produces the cloak, and it'll wear off. * He provides a glove so Tucker can see his hand. * The natives test the captured phase-pistol. * Fired against a metal canister, Stun elicits a shower of sparks "foomp". The second setting: big explosion "BOOM!". * "Some kind of coherent energy pulse". * "Doctor Temec" reports his findings, including yellow-tinged soft-tissue films. The humans have a "redundant renal organ", are missing 4 "thoracic vertebrae", have an unidentified abdominal mass, and have "hemoglobin" based on iron -- "a toxic element". * Photo of shuttlepod in flight. * Gosis suspects they're aliens. * Archer and Reed lie: claim they're prototype genetically-augmented soldiers. * Archer claims the shuttlepod ("a suborbital craft") is built of a "composite alloy" invisible to their "tracking systems". * Temec decides he can learn more if their organs are extracted. * Sato intercepts a communique from Gosis to the Chancellor: the two are to be hung. * Tucker and Mayweather get the exterior to briefly semi-cloak, with the blue-shimmer. * T'Pol rushes them along. * The trio launch from the aft bay. * The planet hasn't yet "split the atom". * Once in atmosphere, the cloak fails and the weapons automatically activate. * They're pursued and fired on by three interceptors. * They recloak. * Archer and Reed are lead to the outdoor gallows. * A bust of dust in the courtyard, and an arm emerges from a square opening in midair, firing. * Archer retrieves the gear and the medical scans. * Everybody gets stunned except Gosis. * Head to the undisturbed shuttlepod. * T'Pol reports, Archer orders to, a "blue-giant cluster" 3-Ly from their current position, with no inhabitable planets. * Reflect that they *did* change the culture -- now believe the Alliance has genetically-enhanced soldiers, particle weapons, and invisible aircraft. * "You don't have to leave technology behind to contaminate a culture" -- T'Pol. * She's impressed Archer was ready to sacrifice his life to preserve it. * Tucker's arm has almost recovered, except for a cm-size hole through the palm. V. CONNECTIONS 1. This particular Suliban Cell-Ship was captured during "Broken Bow" and used in the rescue of Klaang the Klingon from the first Helix they encountered. VI. ANALYSIS 1. The alien interceptor aircraft resemble Rutan/Scaled Composites designs: long forward canards, wing shape. A jet engine is mounted atop each wing. The tips of the canards are bent down, the wings up; there's no vertical stabilizer. The canopy is set far aft, between the wings. There are two machine-guns mounted in the nose, firing tracer bullets. The wingtips each have an unblinking white formation light. 2. The unnamed aliens have cars, trains, and jet aircraft, and recognize a "computing device" when they see one; but haven't yet achieved nuclear fission. 3. The aliens are externally terran-oid, but for shallow forehead bulges. Iron is toxic to them, and their hemoglobin is based on something else. (Hemoglobin and related biomolecules consist of an oxygen-binding metal atom at the center of a "porphyrin" group, secured at the center of a tangled protein.) They have a single renal organ (ie kidney), other differences in the abdominal organs, and 16 thoracic vertebrae. (By definition, human thoracic vertebrae are those with ribs attached; so they probably have 16 pairs of ribs.) 4. While working on the Cell-Ship, Tucker and Mayweather mention the "cloaking generator", "primary and backup warp relays", "power matrix", and "weapon nodes". The pod is hexagonal in cross-section; the entire forward third hinges open along the port upper edge, but there's also a small square hatch in its lower section. Its hull is more durable than that of the shuttlepods. It seems to have preprogrammed behaviors, such as the activation of weapons upon launch. There's a single seat, but at least four people can cram in behind. The cloak's visual effect is a blue shimmer of the surface; it apparently works by bombarding the hull with a dosage of a particular radiation/particle (possibly with a "counteragent" to decloak), since even non-ship materials can be cloaked "persistently" (ie, no need for a sustaining power supply). VII. NITS 1. Why do they have so much trouble locating the errant communicator? Why does it lack any transponder function -- or is there a "hard off" that deactivates it? If there were, they could beam it up -- but there's no mention of the possibility. Does this incident lead to more stringent requirements for equipment, and subcutaneous communicator implants? 2. When Archer and Reed return, they each have a scanner, but only Archer has a communicator. What if they got separated? 3. The writers were apparently short on imagination this week. There's no name for the planet, species, the two nations, the city, or most of the native military officers; all we get are the generic "Alliance" and "Complex". 4. When T'Pol tries to contact Archer, Gosis is present and is able to understand her. Wouldn't he find her English to be gibberish? 5. In 109-"Civilization", the instant-seamless-lipsynch-translation function is built into the communicator. How do Archer and Reed respond at their interrogation, after their gear is confiscated? Did the writers forget that aliens *don't* speak English? 6. Hoshi anticipates difficulty isolating bio-signs amid the 100,000 natives. The humans are the only ones with iron-based biochemistry (it's a "toxic element" to the aliens, so it shouldn't be in *any* tissue) -- is that *not* a bio-sign visible from orbit? VIII. NEXT WEEK ENT035/2.09-"Singularity": the crew becomes singularly obsessed with irrelevant tasks. (Okay, so the producers finally learned that you don't do a "Naked Time"/"Naked Now" episode in the first season...)