Star Trek: Hidden Frontier – 103 – Enemy Unknown Part 3

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Star Trek fan series have multiplied around the web like rabbits on Viagra. The pioneering series that showed fan films can have story arcs, recurring characters, and good computer graphics was Hidden Frontier. A spin-off of a private series known as Voyages of the USS Angeles, which you can only see if you know someone who worked on it or at a lucky screening, Hidden Frontier became an epic series on its own, and helped inspire many other fan productions. The production lasted seven seasons, and spawned several other Trek series and even an original science fiction series. Like all projects, there is improvement over time, one that mirrors the actual Star Trek series as well. Early episodes of The Next Generation are laughable, and Enterprise was almost unwatchable until season three. As TarsTarkas.NET will be covering the entire run of Hidden Frontier episodes, we have to start at the beginning. A beginning that will look pretty bad once we get to later productions. But a beginning never the less. There is no shame in these being not technologically sound. Judging the earlier episodes, we will keep in mind the technology of the time. The important thing is if the show is entertaining, not if the makeup is professional. That is the main criterion in which we will be making our judgments. Superb CGI effects cannot save a terrible script.

Episodes of Hidden Frontier are available online at HiddenFrontier.com. You can also view their other series and participate in their forums.

Things to know:
USS Excelsior – The USS Excelsior is a Galaxy-class dreadnought that looks suspiciously like the Future Enterprise from the episode All Good Things…. It is the flagship for Captain Knapp as he spreads his anger across the Briar Patch and gets into fights with Blue Space Jawas.
Deep Space 12 – Deep Space 12 is the new starbase built to deal with the Ba’ku stuff from Star Trek: Insurrection. Captain Knapp is in charge, and we don’t see much inside the station this season.
Briar Patch – The Briar Patch is a region in Sector 441 made of supernovae remains, false vacuum fluctuations, metaphasic radiation and planets including the Ba’ku planet. It was was seen in Star Trek: Insurrection. Most of the action takes place in this area, because fans demanded more information about the Ba’ku.

	Captain Ian Quincy Knapp (David W. Dial) – Angry! His brother was killed by the Dominion, and left Captain Knapp angry! Had a mysterious encounter during the Dominion War (The Dominion who killed his brother) with mystery aliens that made him angry, and now that he commands Deep Space 12 and the USS Excelsior he can take out his anger over his brother’s death with flaming kill-lasers. Did I mention his brother was killed?
	Lt. Cmd. Jason Munoz (Jason Munoz) – First officer of the USS Excelsior—For Now! Overly happy and strangely familiar with many of the crew who seem to be like 10 years old yet all went to the Academy with him. Expect him to abruptly disappear. SPOILERS!
	Dr. Henglaar (John Whiting) – Medical Doctor, Tellarite, and an actual interesting character. Ignore the fact he is wearing a pig nose and Muppet gloves. John Whiting will eventually get fed up with them and learn how to be a makeup supervisor just so he doesn’t have to wear a pig nose. Until then, I will make lots of bacon jokes.
	Counselor Myra Elbrey (Barbara Clifford) – Betazoid, used to teach at the Academy. Survivor of the Grey attack on the USS Rutledge. Has a dog named Mr. Scott. Despite her being interesting and played by a decent actress, not much is done with Elbrey in the first season.
	Rayvan (Gregory Allen) – Iconian, pronounced Raven, instead of like Ray-Bands, which is what I though. But then he’d be wearing sunglasses and erasing memories. He should do that, anyway. Remember how the Iconians were extinct? Well, they aren’t. Yet.
	Ensign Jenna McFarland (Adrianne Lange) – Half-Trill, Half-Human, all Navigation. Was on the USS Olympus before joining her entire graduating class on the USS Excelsior. I don’t know if she has a worm in her belly.
	Cmd. Joseph Johns (Mike Johns) – Commander who does high-level stuff on Deep Space 12, I guess. I am not really sure where he is in the command hierarchy. We will get a whole episode dedicated to one of his goofy hobbies soon.
	Lt. Toby Witczak (Matt Kruer) – Assistant chief engineer, was on the USS Devonshire during the Grey attack. Spends most of his time hitting on his boss Lefler and getting shot down by his boss. Stop putting it on the pedestal, dude! Go watch 40 Year Old Virgin for more tips.
	Ensign Andrew Barrett (Tyler Bosserman) – Communications officer and starting second grade next week. If this kid was any younger, they’d have to install diaper changing stations on the bridge!
	Lt. William Martinez (Anthony Diaz) – Chief of Security who looks like a Chief of Security. Thus he is the Chief of Security. I know he does so on the USS Excelsior, but I don’t know if he does so on Deep Space 12 as well. Doesn’t get enough character development this season.
	Lt. Cmd. Robin Lefler (Kelly Jamison) – Chief Engineer, and someone who can act. Will be recast, so don’t get attached to this face! You may remember Lefler when she was Ashley Judd on the actual The Next Generation show. Has a bunch of laws that she will recite until you pull out a gun and kill yourself. Lefler’s Law Number 244 is “Recite laws until everyone dies!”
	Ensign Ro Nevin (Arthur Bosserman) – Science officer and Ro Laren’s brother. He stares at his tricorder a lot. Not given a lot to do this season, but will become a bigger player soon.
	Ensign Brad T. Rawling (Tristan Clark) – I see they’re recruiting straight out of Junior High now… Communications officer who vanishes into the wind in season 2. Went to the Academy with Ro Nevin and Andrew Barrett, which is weird because one is like 5 years older than him and the other 5 years younger. Makes bad jokes.
	Ensign Amanda Hanley (Betty Bainton) – Who the Devil is this? She never appears on the show, yet she gets title credit billing? What an awesome agent! Maybe she was so young she is just a fetus inside some other cast member’s uterus…

Guest Cast:

The Grey (Jason Munoz) – Evil Psychic Space Smurf Jawas. Etherials are the master race, and Jawas are used as foot soldiers. They have a Hive Mind. Remember, Hive Mind=Scary Villain. You never see a good race with a hive mind in science fiction. I call this the Pod People Effect.

Where did we leave off? Oh, yes, the Grey are up to their old tricks, so Captain Angry and crew are headed out to blow them up! Knapp will use the Excelsior to lure out the Grey out of the Briar Patch at the Devron system, then try to “initiate peaceful contact”. Then blow them up! Yes!

Let’s leave Deep Space 12! Engage! Engage all the way to the opening credits. Cue the Galaxy Quest theme again!

We be launching!
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An addition to the plan is to grab a single Grey, so they can Betazoid mindscan it without the background noise of the Grey hive mind. Even notice how all evil aliens have hive minds? Maybe bees are aliens…

The ship will pretend to have a power failure, and everyone gets personal shield emitters to protect from psychic attacks. Then a whole fleet of ships will fly out of nowhere to blow up the Grey. It looks like they thought of everything, except the fact this looks like a very suspicious trap. Hopefully, the Grey are idiots. Munoz’s job seems to be to ask what is going on a lot. He is the cabbagehead in this episode, so the cast can explain to the viewer what is going on. So it is time to get into action, and pretend to have power problem, thus are now sitting in the dark.

The bait is taken, and a Jawa beams aboard. No Betazoid readings, as he is genetically designed to be emotionless. The Grey attack, and the fleet arrives to spank some Grey. Except not enough spanking happens, and the Grey limp towards the Briar Patch, starting regeneration of their armor. They also psionically control the USS Kitana!

Captain Knapp is angry, and keeps not letting the Grey do things easily. The Excelsior gives chase, while trying to communicate with the Jawa, who tells them they are all going to die. The Kitana‘s crew are all taken by the aliens, and the Grey leave the Briar Patch again for some reason. So the fleet reattacks!

Nothing doing, so time to escape, especially since the Grey are targeting the Excelsior to get to Captain Knapp. Knapp tells all the ships to leave, but the Excelsior is tractor beamed and Knapp is beamed off. Oops! Maybe he should have left a bit earlier. Munoz is now in command, and they try to figure out how to get on the Grey ship and get the Captain back.

On the Grey ship, Knapp chats with an Etherial, who says they want life energy. This mean they eat people’s energy. Captain Knapp is angry at this, because he knows he will be dinner soon. Probably served with potatoes and gravy. The Etherial stops the captain being angry and makes him order the surrender of task force. Munoz knows right away that Knapp is brainwashed because he isn’t angry, and thus agrees to this only to buy time to get a rescue attempt (thus Munoz orders the fleet back very slowly.) Then they do rescue the Captain by diverting the Grey shields and beaming him out. The fleet returns and it is more battle time! The Grey run off, because they are cowards. Take that, Grey! Starfleet kicked your butts Blue and Grey!

Later, Captain Knapp is angry about dogs. Then Knapp talks with Counselor Elbrey about how he is having nightmares which are probably backdoor psychic connections to the Greys. He dreams about a Dyson Sphere with hundreds of Grey ships patrolling it. We call this foreshadowing. Witczak also gets shot down again by Lefler. That is also foreshadowing, because Witczak will continue to get shot down. His butt must look like Swiss cheese.