“Impulse”
Page 2 of 4The auxiliary control gets damaged and Reed suggests overloading the power grid to unlock the bulkhead mechanisms. T’Pol, getting more and more paranoid, accuses Reed of wanting to kill all the Vulcans since this would result in a reactor breach. She then aims a phaser at Archer but when the sound of Vulcans beating on the door distracts her, Archer takes the gun from her. Phlox contacts Archer to tell him that it’s too late for the Vulcans and that T’Pol needs immediate treatment. Their communication is cut off and the compartment is flooded with hexafluorine gas.
Archer and the others escape engineering but on their way to the airlock, they encounter a large hole in the deck that is impassable. They use a metal plank to harrowingly get across while the zombie-like Vulcans attack them. They finally reach the pod but the docking clamps are jammed and they can’t take off. Luckily, shuttlepod two shows up just in time and Trip phasers them loose before the Seleya blows up.
Back on Enterprise, Trip shows Archer the 60 kilograms of trellium he and Travis collected. Archer tells Trip to have it put in a bio-hazard locker as it will take a while for Phlox to inoculate T’Pol from it’s effects if ever. Archer visits T’Pol in sickbay. She tells him that he should leave her behind on the nearest habitable planet and use the trellium to protect the ship. Archer naturally refuses.
We next see T’Pol and crew enjoying themselves on movie night. A tactical alert is called and T’Pol and the crew rush to their posts. On her way there, T’Pol is overtaken by the zombie-like Vulcans. It turns out to be a nightmare and she wakes up in sickbay. Phlox calms her down and she lays back obviously shaken.
Review:
Firstly, I’d like to commend Jolene Blalock on her performance. She can show her emotions so well not only with her eyes as I’ve stated before but with her whole face which is so expressive and boy can that girl scream! Still, she manages to maintain the Vulcan persona nonetheless. I’ve always liked the character of T’Pol and Blalock but I particularly enjoyed her performance here. Scott Bakula is also noteworthy in this episode. In fact, all the actors stand out here. This is partly thanks of course to Livingston’s excellent direction of the episode. He also manages to keep the suspense going throughout the hour as well. The use of what seems to be speeded up and perhaps clipped action scenes along with the strobe lights manages to maintain a perfectly creepy, intense atmosphere. Kudos to the makeup department for creating truly scary looking zombie-like Vulcans. Dennis McCarthy’s score also added greatly to the mix and the sound effects also did much to enhance the horror movie feel of the episode. The CGI work stands-out as per usual as the asteroid field and Vulcan ship looked awesome no less.
We finally find out about what happened to the Vankaara, the Vulcan ship mentioned in last season’s finale and why it happened. This adds a new dimension to the storyline. While other ships in the Expanse are most likely insulated with Trellium-D and can withstand the
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