The Enemy

Another Geordi episode? Seriously?	Mud, mud, glorious mud. Nothing quite like it for cooling the blood.	The actor of Patahk plays the mandolin for the Enterprise Blues Band, singing songs about Trek.	Tomalak. Fucking legend.
(more images below)

Overview: Geordi is trapped on a harsh planet with a hostile Romulan, and the two must work together to survive.
Writer: David Kemper & Michael Piller
Director: David Carson

Anon²: Know Your Enemy!

Anon: Yeah. This episode has Rommies in it. They're not really my enemies. I like the Rommies. The Rommies kick arse. So, card-count?

Anon²: None.

Pie: Well, there was a card in there. We just didn't manage to find it.

Anon²: Possibly 2 cards.

Pie: Yeah. I don't think the ship was from that episode, but I think the Romulan Disruptor was from it. Maybe or maybe not. It might have been from The Next Phase.

Anon: I always thought it was from The Next Phase.

Anon²: Okay, so this episode. What do you reckon?

Anon: I thought this was really good. I really enjoyed it.

Pie: It had 2 or 3 subplots that all worked really well together.

Anon: There's no real plot flaws.

Pie: Nope.

Anon: It was easily Geordi's best episode so far.

Pie: Yeah, or possibly in the entire series.

Anon: Yeah, quite possibly.

Pie: He wasn't really known for having loads of great episodes.

Anon²: No, not really. There was a point in there when the incident of this episode could have been really bad. Picard even said, "Like Pearl Harbor" which was a really bad film.

Anon & Pie: (laughs)

Anon²: Anyway, Bev suddenly gets hair extensions from the previous episode. Her hair goes from a bob to about fucking two foot long.

Pie: Yeah, from Bananarama to Jennifer Aniston.

Anon²: Riker struts around really aggressively for fucking ages until he gets into "Riker Pose" which is what I'm going to call it from now on.

Anon: Yeah, he's basically showing Wesley his balls.

Anon²: Right, we know what Riker Pose is. If you watch enough episodes, you'll see it. He has one foot up on something at a higher level so he can stretch himself and show everyone his balls.

Anon: I believe he debuted it in Hide & Q.

Pie: He also used it a lot in Angel One, from what I can remember.

Anon: Yeah, slightly after Hide & Q.

Pie: Ah, alright.

Anon²: He has used this move loads of times. Guys, seriously! If you go back and re-watch this to see how many times he stretches his balls... he's basically waving them in people's faces. He just props one leg up on something and goes "Look at my balls! Look at my balls!" And then, he was calm after that.

Anon: Well, he would be calm, wouldn't he? He'd just stretched his balls.

Anon²: Hmmm. What else have we got to say?

Anon: First appearance of Tomalak here. Patrick Stewart's favourite villain, apparently?

Anon²: Really?

Anon: Yeah, that's why he's in All Good Things... Patrick Stewart asked for Tomalak to be written into it, I believe.

Anon²: Yeah. We've got another contender for Up The Arse Corner to be sent into Viz Magazine. A fucking classic actually!

Anon: Right, Geordi and Bochra down on the planet...

Anon²: ... having a bum! (laughs)

Pie: One thing I have to say... I don't know if this is the first time it's happened since The Original Series, but how many times in Trek do they overuse some kind of weird field that prevents the transporter from working?

Anon²: I think they may have used it at least once before.

Anon: It was quite prevalant back in The Original Series with episodes like The Galileo Seven. It's certainly happened a few times.

Pie: It's a bit of an overused plot device.

Anon²: Yeah. I think I'd give this episode a 7 out of 10.

Anon: I think I might go higher than that.

Pie: I thought it was a really solid episode.

Anon: In terms of what we've watched so far, this may even be in the top 5.

Anon²: Yeah, well Q Who is way up there.

Anon: Right, you've got Q Who, The Measure of a Man.

Pie: I think it was at least as good as Code of Honor.

Anon: A Matter of Honor, do you mean?

Pie: Oh yeah.

Anon: Code of Honor was balls. Idi Amin!

Pie: And a Christian Rock Band.

Anon: I think it was at least as good as A Matter of Honor. It may have been better. This had Rommies in it, after all. They're better than Klingons.

Pie: Yeah. It did something that Trek didn't do enough in Next Gen, but did a lot better in DS9. They had an Officer facing an ethical conundrum and not passing it, basically!

Anon: Right, Worf just goes "Die, bitch!"

Pie: I think if this was back in season 1, Worf would have had a change of heart and given his blood to the Romulan.

Anon: Yeah, I vaguely remember reading an interview with Michael Dorn about this episode where the interviewer was saying, "I didn't realise that Worf was going to let that Romulan die" and Michael Dorn said when he was reading the script that he didn't realise it either. But I think he quite enjoyed it.

Pie: Yeah. It also gave an opportunity to have a bit of conflict between the Bridge Crew, which as we said back in the Angel One commentary, was a good thing.

Anon²: Right. And Picard was saying to Worf he should consider it, but Worf was just, "No. Fuck off!"

Anon: He stuck to his guns, yeah. Plus he was helped in a way, because the Rommie said to him, "Fuck you. I don't want your cells anyway."

Anon²: Yeah, decent episode, that.

Anon: I can't really fault it.

Anon²: I probably wouldn't put it in my top 5.

Pie: It wasn't edge-of-the-seat like Q Who, but it was one of the better "thinking" episodes. I haven't got a lot of bad stuff to say about it.

Anon: I can't think of many episodes we've watched so far that have been significantly better.

Anon²: So far, yeah. It may well be in the top 5, but I think it won't be by the time we get to the end of season 7.

Anon: Fair enough. When I said "top 5" earlier, I was only talking about so far.

Anon²: Okay then.

Anon: You can usually spot a good episode by the fact it's directed by David Carson, who did Yesterday's Enterprise, amongst others.

(Carson's other Trek directing credits include Redemption, The Next Phase, DS9's pilot Emissary, Dax, Move Along Home, The Alternate and the Star Trek: Generations movie.)

Anon²: Y'know, I'm just so fucking glad that we're on season 3 and upwards. There is an improvement in the way that the show's being made in many ways. Was it this episode that had like, a billion people that wrote it, or co-wrote it? Or was that the previous one?

Anon: I think that was Booby Trap. This was just Michael Piller and some other dude, I think.

Anon²: Right, all good.

Anon: Yeah, not too many jokes to be made about this episode. It was good, so we just sat back and enjoyed it.

Anon²: Yeah. That's the thing. It's the shit episodes that we rip the piss out of anyway. There's less piss to rip from the shows that are still to come. I mean, there'll be some where you just go, "What the fuck?!"

Anon: Like the next episode, which is the sequel to Up the Long Ladder.

Anon²: Oh, fuck off! I am not watching that if it is!

Anon: I'm kidding, dude.

Pie: Up the Longer Ladder!

Anon²: (laughs) Taters taters taters! Y'know, I still think that was way below When the Bough Breaks. That was awful.

Pie: Well, I'd put When the Bough Breaks above Angel One.

Anon²: Fair enough.

Pie: We've all got our own opinions.

Anon: With Angel One, at least you could enjoy the mulletts.

Pie: There was only one, wasn't there?

Anon: There were women with fulletts as well.

Anon²: Was that the one with the guy that had a tiny dick? Or was that When the Bough Breaks?

Anon: Maybe that was Justice? The No-Nuts guy? Or it might have been Trent from Angel One. He appeared to have a bit of a bugfucker in his keks. I say "appeared" - he didn't get it out or anything. I think my favourite name in Justice was Princess Camel-Toe.

Pie: (laughs)

Anon: Guys, if you're ever bored at work, just have a flip through the captions we've done for previous episodes. Then get worried when your IT Security department comes along and says, "What the fuck are you looking at?" Anyway, The Enemy.

Anon²: Know Your Enemy!

Pie: Good episode, and that's the lot.

Anon²: Good song too.

Anon: Well, I expect that's the last episode before Christmas.

Anon²: Boo! Shall we do one inbetween Christmas and New Year?

Anon: We'll see. Anyway, the next episode - for real this time - is The Price.

Anon²: How much?

Anon: Two doubloons.

Anon²: Two doubloons! Half a glod!

Pie: I have no idea what episode The Price is.

Anon²: Right, I'm saying goodbye and Merry Christmas, folks!

Anon: Merry Christmas everybody! And, don't forget, Santa's very upset, because he only comes once a year and that's down a chimney.

Anon²: He's got a huge, bulging sack.

Anon: Okay. See you later. Bye.

- Anon, Anon² & Pie, 23-Dec-2009