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Doctor Phlox on Season 2 of Enterprise

Steve Krutzler writes "TrekWeb has posted a brand new interview with actor John Billingsley (Doctor Phlox on Enterprise). He talks all about the second season of the Star Trek prequel including the upcoming episodes "A Night In Sickbay," "Minefield" (featuring the first encounter with the Romulans!) and "Dead Stop." He also talks about the character of Doctor Phlox possibly falling into the 'Neelix Trap' and says he wishes the series would kill more people off like the original Star Trek!" Billingsly was great on a recent episode of SG1 too. I'm seriously excited for the next season of Enterprise. I don't think I've ever said that about any of the other Trek series.

17 of 336 comments (clear)

  1. Typical Enterprise Episode by happyhippy · · Score: 5, Funny

    1. Goto new planet or space phenomenon.
    2. Imply Vulcans are either stupid and/or evil.
    3. Marvel at planet or phenomenon.
    4. Go down to planet/phenomenon.
    5. Get into trouble.
    6. Shoot at bad aiming aliens and escape planet.
    7. Wrap up episode implying how Vulcans are agian evil/stupid.

  2. Ensigns by Cyno01 · · Score: 5, Funny

    what happened to the expendible extras in star trek? kirk: the away team will consist mof myself, spock, bones and ensign billy, now this mission could be dangerous, one of us may not make it back..."

    --
    "Sic Semper Tyrannosaurus Rex."
  3. Boy I love when Star Trek is a topic... by NanoGator · · Score: 5, Funny

    ... I can never get enough of these comments:

    - The writers can't keep track of 10 movies and 24 seasons of episodes! Why can't they dedicate their lives to memorizing the Star Trek timeline like I have?

    - STTNG was the only good series, the rest were crap. I can't believe they'd keep this show going even though the ratings were so good!

    - Enterprise sucks! It offends me so deeply I want to tear my eyes out! I just can't get over there being a scifi show I don't like.

    - I don't like this show, so nobody should.

    I like to read these comments, then sit back and imagine what Galaxy Quest 2 will be like.

    --
    "Derp de derp."
    1. Re:Boy I love when Star Trek is a topic... by NeuroManson · · Score: 3, Funny

      Or as the crusty fat lumpy one said in an ancient Saturday Night Live sketch:

      "Get a life!"

      --
      Just because you can mod me down, doesn't mean you're right. Shoes for industry!
  4. Re:Inconsistency by Tackhead · · Score: 5, Funny
    > Whatever happened to the Eugenics War [startrek.com] of the 1990's? The one where Khan ruled 1/4 of the Earth, and ends up being ejected into space.
    >
    > And my personal favorite, The Royale [startrek.com] from Star Trek:TNG, where Picard goes off for 2 minutes on how Fermat's Last Theorem goes unsolved.

    Hmph. Obviously, the proof of Fermat's Last Theorem derived by human/machine symbiotes in the late 20th century was... umm, one of humanity's treasures that was lost during the carnage of the Eugenics Wars of the 1990s!

    The fact that the historical record lists the Eugenics Wars as being in the "1990s" was just an error in the historical record, arising from the Great UNIX Date Catastrophe of 2038. (Notice how the Star Trek universe never mentions the Great UNIX Date Catastrophe of 2038? It's because it happened, and all the dates got screwed up, and as a result there's no historical reference to it!)

    Beam me up, Paramount, there are no scriptwriters here. ("Dammit, Jim, I'm a Slashdotter, not a scriptwriter!")

  5. Re:Billingsley is the token annoying character by ChadN · · Score: 3, Funny

    and on TOS, it was Kirk.

    --
    "It's overkill, of course. But you can never have too much overkill." - Anonymous Slashdot Coward
  6. The technical solutions of Star Trek by OzRoy · · Score: 5, Funny

    I must admit I haven't watched Enterprise. But the thing that always struck me about almost all star trek episodes (except the original series) is the way they always get out of trouble. Solution number 1: "Pass the tachyon beam through the deflector array" Solution number 2: "Reverse the polarity of the nuetron flow" And it is guaranteed to work.

  7. Oh, this is good! by Pollux · · Score: 3, Funny

    He also talks about the character of Doctor Phlox possibly falling into the 'Neelix Trap' and says he wishes the series would kill more people off like the original Star Trek!

    I can see it now...Star Trek: Enterprise, Season Two:

    Star Trek meets South Park!

    Captain Archer: "Oh my God! They killed Dr. Phlox!" "You Bastards!"

    Ensign Mayweather: "But he's the most popular person on the Enterprise! How will we ever replace him?"

    Commander Tucker: "No need to worry captain! We have a copy of his atomic signature in the cache of the data resequencer in the transporter! We'll be able to generate an exact copy of him, as if he never left!"

    --- BZZZ BZZZ ZIP! ---

    Dr. Phlox: "Hello, captain! I'm back from helping out the Balaxians on Balax 7! I hope nothing happened while I was gone!"

  8. Wish they were interviewing T'Pol by GuyMannDude · · Score: 3, Funny

    Bringing STAR TREK's newest alien face to life isn't always easy for actress Jolene Blalock, who's spent the last month jiggling her time in space with her time in...

    Now that's an interview I might actually read!

    GMD

  9. More Bikinis! by simetra · · Score: 4, Funny

    Who cares about all that crap. I just want to see the large-breasted vulcan chick in a bikini. How hard would that be to work into the storyline?

    --

    "Would it kill you to put down the toilet seat?" -- Maya Angelou
  10. Re:Why I gave up on Enterprise ... by Tablizer · · Score: 5, Funny

    (* You also have to keep in mind there really isn't a prime directive yet. They haven't messed up enough planets to have a set of rules to tell them not to. *)

    Thats what Enterprise should be about: making all the stupid mistakes that the later ships have rules against.

    I am still waiting for, "Oh yeah, Baby, take that bra off and I'll give your people warp drive!"

  11. Can't happen by smoketree · · Score: 5, Funny

    It should be obvious that transporters -- like all devices in the future -- will have DRM protections preventing duplication.

    --Reed

  12. Re:Inconsistency by Latent+IT · · Score: 5, Funny

    Yeah, but maybe you don't want them opening all the time... who knows what might happen? Maybe the TNG Enterprise had advanced AI to determine if the crewmember was actually trying to walk into the room blocked by the door, or just walking down the hall. On a starship, you don't want doors that open willy-nilly, like every time I walk past CVS on my way to the bank.

    God, what the hell am I saying?!? You know, I don't think geeks watch Star Trek. I think Star Trek makes geeks.

  13. Star Trek: TOS by DCMonkey · · Score: 3, Funny

    Is it bad that I keep reading that as "Star Trek: Terms of Service"?

    --
    DCMonkey
  14. Re:Inconsistency by kmellis · · Score: 5, Funny

    "God, what the hell am I saying?!? You know, I don't think geeks watch Star Trek. I think Star Trek makes geeks."


    Thank you so much for providing the payoff for reading this thread. I wish I had some mod points to mod you up.

  15. $0.205 by Mulletproof · · Score: 3, Funny

    Yep.

    "Gee, Bob... What do we have in the script bin?"
    "Um... Don't know. Why don't you go look."
    "I chose the script last time."
    "No, I chose the script last time because the veiwers were complaining about your stupid temporal stories."
    "Hey, it was a good story!"
    "Hey, it was the twelth one this season"
    "Fine. But I beat you in foozball before lunch. You owe me."
    "Fine. Then we can start counting all the sodas you owe ME."
    "Hmmm... Well, I'm still not getting the script."
    "Neither am I."
    "A Q episode?"
    "Sure, why not?"

    --
    You need a FREE iPod Nano
  16. Re:Ensigns (and Space Mortality) by Dr.+Spork · · Score: 3, Funny
    You know, when we first went into space, we knew it was dangerous. Plenty of people died, and we were sad about it, but we didn't freak out. By 1987 we had apparently changed, to the point where we really did freak out when the Challenger blew up, and it took us years to get the space program back on track.

    Analogously, when red-shirted ensigns bit it on some dangerous, unexplored planet, Kirk was mad, but that didn't stop him from going erect when some cute alien chick walked by a few minutes later. Hey, going where no man has gone before is supposed to be dangerous. You have some funerals and you get over it!

    This attitude was much less visible by the time Piccard took over command. Ensign mortality went waay down, and the few that bit it were mourned much more deeply. It's just like the Challenger thing: by TNG, people got into the mindset that interstellar space is not so dangerous after all, so they found the occasional ensign mortality appalling. They were also much better prepared to manage the risks of space. (Would Kirk have sent in a councelor to console the survivors? No way! At best, he would have sent in Scotty with some scotch!)

    Of course, by extrapolation, life on the earliest starships would have been far cheaper still. One would expect "ensign resupply busses" to be dispatched regularly to catch up with the Enterprise and replenish its staff. I mean, from technical problems alone, I would imagine a few people might die each month. The first Enterprise was not designed to take hits from most of the weapons fired on it, so naturally it would not have been as mature in terms of safety as the later models... which means, more people would have died in comparatively minor situations. The survivors would surely have the attitude: Hey, that's just what space is like.

    So I'm asking you: Why are ensign deaths so damn rare on the first Enterprise? Is this a big coverup? Are we really seeing "Enterprise propaganda?" Surely, a reasonable person cannot believe that all these interstellar freshmen really live through all those encounters with hostile and technologically superior races, riding on a ship that was designed by engineers who were merely guessing at what starships should be like, having no experience to base their designs on. I mean, come on, anybody gets on that thing is basically does so with the understanding that they will die there, probably sooner rather than later.

    So goddamn it, die already! Then build a new ship, and get a better crew (except keep Phlox, he's cool).