Mixed Reception For 'Shockwave, Part II'

See Also: 'Shockwave, Part II' Episode Guide

The Enterprise season premiere has continued to garner mixed reviews from Internet critics, with most reviewers finding the episode less satisfying than part one.

A round-up of seven new reviews posted online can be found below:

• Over at Star Trek: Hypertext, Jamahl Epsicokhan called 'Shockwave, Part II' a "disappointment," awarding the episode two out of four stars. "Where part one was strange and wonderful and sold on performances of workmanlike precision, part two is a heedless cartoon with action that feels painfully recycled. The plot comes across as little more than a wind-up toy to warrant the action situations. In story thread A, the Suliban Have Taken Over the Ship. In thread B, we have Timeline Games explained away with non-answers and solved with Magic Technology, where Archer and Daniels play MacGyver to escape the 31st century." Read more in the complete analysis.

• David E. Sluss at The Cynics Corner gave the episode 6 out of 10, the equivalent of a D minus grade. One of his complaints was the 'Suliban Unintelligence of the Week':

  Silik's just a stooge; even his aide practically said so to his face and suggested that Silik was not carrying out the Humanoid Figure's mission properly. Silik also jeopardized Suliban soldiers and the Helix itself by refusing to help get Enterprise towed out of the nebula. So why would the Suliban abandon their pursuit of Enterprise just because Silik has been taken hostage? He's a dead loss and the other Suliban know it. It doesn't make sense...

  The full review can be found here.

• "Frankly I was disappointed that they resolved the cliffhanger this quickly and so easily," wrote Gisele La Roche at Voyager's Delights and StarfleetCom.net. "I wish Archer would have been left in the 31st century for a little longer and the story would have gone on for one more episode. But I'm glad that the arc itself is still ongoing nonetheless. I can't wait to see how 'future guy' deals with Silik." 'Shockwave, Part II' was awarded a B minus grade in the full review, which can be found here or here.

• Over at First TV Drama, Richard Whettestone didn't like the apparent unintelligence of Starfleet Command:

  Enterprise not only misses their meeting with the Vulcan ship, and Starfleet loses contact with Archer and the Enterprise, but the Vulcans find the Enterprise nearby cruising with a horde of alien ships and Admiral Forrest isn't worried in the slightest? Not only does the Vulcans not investigate, but Starfleet doesn't even ask the Vulcans to investigate either. Archer flat-out told Forrest that aliens were trying to frame them for the murder of 3600 miners, and Forrest STILL thinks everything's fine and dandy? It's bad enough Archer's dumb. We don't need dumb Starfleet Admirals, too.

  Read more at this page.

• On the other hand, Tim Lynch wrote that 'Shockwave, Part II' was "a good start to season two" at Psi Phi's Enterprise Site. "'Shockwave, Part II' did an awful lot of what it set out to do. The simultaneous plots fit together well, we got just enough information from the future to get a sense of Archer's importance, and we got to cheer the good guy and hiss the bad guy. It's not the sort of show I want to see every week, but as a cliffhanger resolution goes I'm pretty satisfied." The episode was given a score of 8.5 out of 10 in the complete analysis.

• C.A. Voigts at the Starfleet Library was also very happy with 'Shockwave, Part II,' especially the performances of the cast.

  The cast worked very well together - their unity as a crew was well in evidence. It's nice to know that Vulcan neck pinches work on Suliban as well as on humans. And Mr. Bakula does so well when he-s angry - plus this time he didn't have to restrain himself from knocking someone on their... well, you know.

  In the full review, the episode was awarded 4 out of 5.

• A German review of the episode by Bernd Paulus gave 'Shockwave, Part II' a "good" 8 out of 10. Read his comments here at the Daily Trekker.

Further information about 'Shockwave, Part II' is available in the Trek Nation episode guide.

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