Strange New Worlds Perfectly Calls Back To Enterprise’s Vulcan Insult
Warning: SPOILERS For Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Season 3, Episode 8 – “Four-And-A-Half Vulcans”Star Trek: Strange New Worldsseason 3, episode 8 has a perfect callback to a Vulcan insult towards humans in Star Trek: Enterprise. Directed by Jordan Canning and written by Dana Horgan and Henry Alonso Myers, Star Trek: Strange New Worlds season 3, episode 8, “Four-and-a-Half Vulcans,” is the series’ third Vulcan farce in as many seasons.
When Captain Christopher Pike (Anson Mount), Nurse Christine Chapel (Jess Bush), Lieutenant La’an Noonien-Singh (Christina Chong), and Ensign Nyota Uhura (Celia Rose Gooding) are generically altered into Vulcans, they quickly find that they can’t revert. Most of the newly pointy-eared Starfleet Officers return to duty and their various relationships with humans.
Vulcan Captain Pike makes good on a favor to his girlfriend, Captain Marie Batel (Melanie Scrofano), to prepare dinner for another Vulcan, Vice Admiral Pasalk (Graeme Somerville). Batel needs to impress her former boss to give her back her job as an attorney for Starfleet Judiciary division. Pike, however, finds fault with Marie’s humanity he never perceived before he was Vulcan.
Strange New Worlds Calls Back To Star Trek: Enterprise’s Vulcan Insult Towards Humans
Vulcan Captain Christopher Pike was displeased by Captain Marie Batel’s “human smell,” which is “very unpleasant to Vulcans.” Vulcan Chris decided to excessively “remove” the odor from his quarters aboard the Starship Enterprise instead of asking Vice Admiral Pasalk to “tolerate” it.
Captain Pike’s disdain for human body odor was an invention of Star Trek: Enterprise. Subcommander T’Pol (Jolene Blalock) was the first to mention to Captain Jonathan Archer (Scott Bakula) how badly humans smell to Vulcans in Enterprise season 1, and that some Vulcans resorted to using a nasal numbing agent to tolerate humans.
T’Pol herself eventually got used to the smell of humans aboard the NX-01 Enterprise. Meanwhile, Dr. Phlox (John Billingsley) also commented on human body order in Star Trek: Enterprise, indicating that Denobulans and Vulcans both had to learn to endure the humans’ scent.
Humans smelling badly to Vulcans was previously referenced in Star Trek: Strange New Worlds season 2, episode 5, “Charades.” After Lieutenant Spock (Ethan Peck) briefly turned fully human, the parents of his then-fiance, T’Pring (Gia Sandhu), commented on human body odor, implying blame on Spock’s mother, Amanda Grayson (Mia Kirshner).
Enterprise Is A Constant Influence On Star Trek: Strange New Worlds
Star Trek: Enterprise takes place about a hundred years before Star Trek: Strange New Worlds in Star Trek‘s Prime timeline. It’s logical that Captain Archer’s pioneering voyages aboard the first Starship Enterprise would serve as an inspiration for Captain Pike and his USS Enterprise crew.
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds didn’t directly address Enterprise’s impact until season 2’s crossover episode with Star Trek: Lower Decks. This is when we learned Captain Pike was inspired by Captain Archer, Lt. Erica Ortegas (Melissa Navia) looks up to Ensign Travis Mayweather (Anthony Montgomery), and Uhura hero worships Ensign Hoshi Sato (Linda Park).
Most amusingly, Lt. La’an Noonien-Singh “loves grapplers,” the devices used by the NX-01 Enterprise before Starfleet perfected tractor beams. There is also an image of the NX-01 Enterprise visible by the entrance to Captain Pike’s ready room, a reminder of the legacy of the Starship Enterprise.
When human body odor stopped smelling badly to Vulcans isn’t clear, but it’s obviously still an issue in Star Trek: Strange New Worlds. Curiously, Captain Pike was the only one of the Enterprise’s new Vulcans to complain, as the others didn’t raise a stink with their respective love interests.
Dan Liu, Amanda Row, Maja Vrvilo, Akiva Goldsman, Dermott Downs, Eduardo Sánchez, Jeffrey W. Byrd, Jonathan Frakes, Jordan Canning, Leslie Hope, Valerie Weiss, Sydney Freeland, Christopher J. Byrne, Rachel Leiterman
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