Episode 92: Divergence

Columbia comes to the rescue. Phlox and Antaak figure out a cure. Millions of Klingon mutants (they are not really Augments because they have no special characteristics) survive and TOS' ridgeless Klingon conundrum is resolved.


In the process, there is an extended (though not particularly necessary) special effects sequence involving Columbia flying upside down under Enterprise so that Tucker can transfer from one ship to the other without requiring them to drop out of warp. It's nicely done and quite exciting.


Phlox shows some clever thinking under pressure, not only coming up with the cure very quickly but also figuring out how to force the suddenly arrived Klingon battle cruisers to stop bombarding the planet. At the end, the Klingons are stuck with a subspecies of cranial-ridge-free people but are free from the plague.


The problem is, despite all of the good, the episode just does not make sense.


Enterprise is in Klingon territory and going above-top-speed (something like Warp 5.2) to avoid blowing up because of the Klingon subroutine in its engine computers, yet newly launched Columbia, which still doesn't have all the bugs worked out in her brand new engines, catches up to her easily. Okay, maybe Enterprise swept around in a very wide turn and started heading back toward Earth to meet her but how then did both ships get to the Klingon colony so quickly thereafter?


Further, Enterprise, which has all the bugs out of her, is about to shake apart at Warp 5.2 but Columbia, still new, maintains that speed fairly easily and is even able to extend her warp field to surround Enterprise long enough for Enterprise to perform a shut down and restart of her engines, to purge the subroutine.


And they still manage to get to the Klingon colony before the Klingon battle cruisers.


Then, in the epic battle between Enterprise, Columbia and the three Klingon battle cruisers, the two Star Fleet ships manage to hang in the battle for a lot longer than Enterprise has ever managed to hang in with a smaller Klingon bird of prey. Huh?


And did you see how many Klingon torpedoes Enterprise took and still kept on fighting? Wowee. Where did that come from?


Further, Phlox's resolution is ingenious -- he packs some of the plague into a bottle with a time-release feature and beams it aboard the lead Klingon battle cruiser's bridge in mid-battle, infecting the Klingon crew and forcing them to stop fighting in order to permit Phlox to finalise the cure and save their lives.


Problem is, members of the Enterprise bridge crew had commented seconds earlier that they can't penetrate the Klingon ships' shields. Well, it's pat Star Trek lore that you can't beam through a ship's raised shields.


Sloppy but fun, I guess.