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Probably because it felt less like Star Trek and more like Red Dwarf. Our intrepid heroes: an officer afraid of heights, flying, tight spaces, teleportation, and literally everything else one is likely to encounter on a space voyage. Oh, and she gets motion sickness. An engineer who spends most of the show being openly xenophobic, first to vulcans then to Xindi, and cannot do sventh grade math. Permit me to repeat that, the goddamned engineer cannot perform sventh grade algebra, where did he get his degree from a crackerjack box? The captain who can barely conceal his contempt for his allies, and cannot understand why anyone would be offended by his dog pissing on their holy sites. The Doctor actually uses leeches on his patients, and less savory critters as well. Reed and Mayweather get a by for rarely displaying gross incompetence and not having enough personality for me to mock. But T'pol my god, T'pol is the only person on the damn ship smart enough to check for viability before popping a hatch open on an alien world, if only she didn't feel the need to be such a bitch about it. From day one, in the face of all logic, she does everything in her power to alienate her crewmates. It's one thing to be unable to cope with the smell of your new alien shipmates, it's another thing to bring that fact up in front of them every other episode. Plus, she reguarly completly dismisses all human culture, history, and achievements, usually right before telling them that they need to respect other people's cultures more! These are the best and brightest Earth has to offer?
It was a cool concept to go back and show the early days, the beginning. When and how the Federation was built, when all the devices we took for granted like shields and tractor beams and transporters were created. It's just that the execution sucked.
I once read a short paper on the literary concept of a "power trio," three men representing the Freudian states of id, ego, and superego. One man to be logical, one man to be passionate, and one man who reconcile these views with each other and inject the element of morality. The archetypical example of course, would be Spock, McCoy, and Kirk. I believe they tried to recreate this concept with T'pol, Tucker, and Archer. It's just that none of them could consistently perform their roles.
The real cincher for me was "Dear Doctor" where Archer, the only captain not bound by the Prime Directive, chooses to stand back and let an ancient alien culture die out for... no real reason. There's some vague bullshit about how a second semi-sentient race on that world might someday develop sentience, but not as long as the first group of aliens is around, but in a way that's worse because they decide to let these people all die because there exists a chance that someday, something maybe good might come of it. That was just about the last thing I ever expected in a "this is why we have a Prime Directive" episode. I was expecting them to make first contact with a race that all commits mass suicide, or give advanced technology to a race that uses it to self-destruct. You know, to have them intervene with the best of intentions only for it all to go horribly wrong, as oppossed to being assholes for the sake of being assholes.
I'm really glad Washington spends billions of dollars each year on weapons: bombs, missiles, fighter jets, missile that shoot down missiles, and of course, nuclear bombs.
I'm sure the goverment will use these things in a constructive manner!
Piety, Obedience, Poverty, Chastity and Kung-Fu. (SoB oaths, Knight Errant)
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