T'Pol

[mj 7]

The might as well named the show Star Trek: Vulcan Love Slave! 

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We needed a joke just now! No one gets mad now ......we know T'pol / Trip is only a portion of the whole story.

[krysis 2]

Might I add something....

 

Whether Jolene B is a good actress or not... I really don't know. I don't recall seeing her on any other show other than ENT. I suppose the only serial I watch is Star Trek.

 

Anyway, did she played T'Pol "arrogantly" on purpose or is she naturally arrogant? I can't remember any other Vulcans who are as arrogant except mebbe the Vulcan Captain that played baseball against DS9 crew... Captain What'sHisName?

 

Really the only reason I don't like T'Pol is because she is arrogant. She makes me feel like she really looks down on us humans. And mind you... we certainly aren't puny but that's what I think her action says. I really don't like it when she says we humans got a bad BO. I don't think Spock ever said that to Kirk. Mebbe its because I keep comparing her with Spock and Sarek and other nice Vulcans.

 

However, if Jolene purposely played T'Pol arrogantly, then I'd say Jolene did a good job at it.

 

In the end, I still think Spock rocks!

 

All IMO...

 

 

Edited section:

 

And another thing... its a bit off topic but it still concerns Vulcans.

 

I don't know much about T'Pol and Trip cos I haven't reached that episode yet. I was just thinking.... off all the Star Trek shows out there... I think the most meaningful, honourable and bestest of the best relationship Star Trek ever portrayed is between Kirk and Spock. Please, I'm not gay, don't get me wrong. I'm just saying its tells us a lot about multi-racial relationship. Friendship that goes beyond the colour of our blood. (It used to be the coloour of our skin).

 

Again, I'm just sharing my opinion.

Edited March 30, 2005 by krysis

[CaptQuick 0]

I believe T'pol as she was originally conceived was a wonderful character. I loved her condescension to all the humans on her ship. It's so fitting with the Vulcan race. To a Vulcan the highest pursuit is that of logic, emotion is the release of a child. So, to a Vulcan, seeing a human race struggling in their everyday matters betwixt logic and emotion, our race must look as children or, rather, adolescents.

And that explains the condescension exuding from the Vulcans as well as their reluctance to share technology, in their eyes humans are adolescents. As you wouldn't give a gun to an adolescent until you're sure he knows how to use it and when to use it, so the Vulcans do not want humans to destroy themselves. What the Vulcans do not understand (and what Spock eventually came to realize) is that humans are actually ahead of Vulcans. Emotions are an integral part of humanity; compassion, an essential necessity of life. Love of his country (planet) will motivate a man to make extraordinary sacrifices. Hope for the future will motivate a man to work even for no reward. Etc. etc. Getting back. The problem I have with T'pol is that after her introduction to the series she was plagued by lazy writing. Most writers just didn't seem to know what to do with her.

 

Getting into specifics. The introduction of the mind meld in season 1 was a good concept. Her seduction and subsequent mind rape illustrated her youthfulness. But I believe she should have found out about the P'anar syndrome right then. This would have deepened the character by making her even more reserved because the only time she let someone close there were dire consequences. Waiting to introduce the syndrome until the second season felt like a manufacutre cheat and cheapened the healing in season 4. Pertaining to character relations I feel there was an even greater failure with T'pol. In the first season things are kind of kicked off (I refuse to acknowledge the decon scenes as anything more than softcore) by Breaking the Ice with the touching dialogue between T'pol and Trip about whether she should marry Koss. The problem I have with the conclusion of that ep is that I believe this is where the character began to be derailed. IMHO, she should have agreed to the match but that it would have to be postponed. For a Vulcan to give up her heritage after only a few months on a human ship seems silly to me. This decision would have deepened her upcoming internal conflict about what to do with Trip (and would have made the finale to the S4 ep, Home, even more shocking than it was). In the second season I think is where the Trip-T'pol relationship should have started coming together. Because the third season brought it all to a head. The high point would be Similitude (a wonderful ep) Trip basically confessed his feelings for her (through Sim). The low point would be all the vulcan neural pressure sesssions. Besides the questionability of Trip's medical problem, I felt like I had a hammer banging on my head. C'mon people, did anybody not think that Trip and T'pol would eventually end up in bed together after continually rubbing their hands all over each other's naked bodies (especially after another softcore display in the season opener). Which brings us to Harbinger, when Trip and T'pol finally sleep together. This would be acceptable (not morally, but storywise) if I believed in their relationship up to that point. I DON'T! Similitude and Breaking the Ice went a long way, but they're only two episodes. That's why I wish there had been more groundwork laid in season 2. I don't buy the line T'pol fed Trip about experimenting with human sexuality. If true it shows that, even after three years onboard, she does not understand the vast pain she causes by that statement (which, being a Vulcan, she would have observed before doing), and, honestly, if she wanted to experience human sexuality she would just find some man who just wanted the sex. There's bound to be a few of those on the ship. It's just not logical.

IMHO, Manny Coto an crew ran damage control on T'pol's character in S4 and actually did quite well with her. I didn't really like the resolution of the P'anar syndrome or Koss issues but I thought they were well done nonetheless (and, as said before, I really liked the development in Home.). I do feel that the character had some really good moments in the series (Twilight, one of the great science fiction stories) but ultimately was misused. I never really got the feeling of a Vulcan sincerely questioning her beliefs (as opposed to throwing them out one by one as the plot required) until the fourth season. I also believe its a shame that she was basically relegated to sex symbol for the first two seasons. Deanna Troi was basically a sex symbol in TNG yet she retained her dignity and also contributed many many great moments of character. And that's what I wished T'pol had aspired to. If she'd have been a continuously growing character, the character would have been interesting enough to merit tuning in even she didn't parade around in catsuits, t-shirts and pantys, and the occasional nothing. I do believe the axiom "sex sells" (though I would state it in a different manner), but I believe that if sex is the only way to sell your product, then the product's not worth selling. If I wanted sexual stimulation I would buy porn. As it is, I don't appreciate sex being used as a cover for sloppy writing.

 

In conclusion, am I being arrogant? After all, I do the advantage of seeing in retrospect, and I am, by no means, a professional writer. Furthermore, Star Trek Enterprise was originally intended to be an episodic show (ended up being arc-driven, but the original format was single plots). Asking it to hold to a cohesive storyline may be a bit much. But Next Gen and TOS, also episodic television, both managed to make all their starring characters interesting by the first three seasons (even Wesley had his moments). Something didn't work with Enterprise, perhaps it would have been helpful to envision out all of the main characters' growths for the series and then to have built stories around these notions. Who knows? Perhaps I am being arrogant, but I do dearly love the work done by the writers on the fourth season. And I do wish that things had gone better for the series. I really feel that now, finally, this show is beginning to reach the potential it lacked after the beginning.

[mj 7]

Perhaps I am being arrogant,

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I don't think so. Thanks for sharing your perspective. I think this will generate more conversation about T'pol, and how the character was developed.

[Ozymandous 0]

 

 

Sex for the sake of it and drug induced relationships are a very real and current events. I know because I have a son in college keeping him-self out of those situations but even if I didn't have him as a barometer I would still know it is true from news sources; sexual recreational drugs are still a big deal these days.

 

T'pol was the best character for use in conveying that message; it was with her the Human condition (in a much rawer more natural way than with 7 imo) was being explored this time.

 

Granted it could be said B&B bit-off a little more than they could chew this time delving into areas they were not fully prepared to properly explore but it's wasn't handled so poorly as most think. There is a reason why ENT has fans, we understand it differently than it detractors do.

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AE, your post was making a good point until the second to the last word. Then you undid your entire point. You could also argue there is a reason why ENT lost fans - a lot more than it kept. And because it alienated those people we all lost on the good parts of what was ENT as well.

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Sounded pretty dead on to me. :biggrin: Some choose to overlook the minor things because we saw where the current show reflected some of the previous shows, and some choose to ride off on their high horse because they didn't get their way.

 

If one thing about the entire show could have been changed I wish Manny would have written it from the start, but then I STILL think some of those "hate it regardless" types would still nitpick and find something to complain about because it wasn't DS9, TNG, VOY, etc.

 

I mean for Pete's sake people almost quit watching because of the intro music! How petty can you get?

 

Now with all of that said, I liked T'Pol in general on the show, but if I had a choice I'd much rather have seen the Doctor/Trip and Archer as the primary characters of the show, with T'Pol, Reed, Mayweather and Hoshi being the occasional '4th wheels'. I enjoyed the 'decon chamber' scenes and all the other times Blalock was semi-nude, but thought most of them were gratitious. Some of them could have been done with a bit les skin and still inferred what was going on better (yeah even if they had to be explained to kids, kids as young as 12 are still getting pregnant daily and all), but overall I think the character wasn't bad.

 

All of the character, IMHO, could have been written better. The character whom I think was done the best fromt he start was Tripp. Too bad he had to take a backseat for awhile. Even the relationship with Tripp and T'Pol could have worked if written a bit better.

Edited April 7, 2005 by Ozymandous