Benny

Well what do you know. In "Azati Prime" Archer actually acknowledges the bad thing he did in "Similitude". At least it was addressed slightly afterwards.

I had a brilliant defect run right before it, only to realise So naturally I immediately started another run and that deck was actually even better and went on to win me the full run.

Andorians have really grown on me. Loved the episode with them

Carole and Tuesday is the antidote to anime malaise.

I'm not sure who exactly is going to find it disrespectful if I'm pointing out a sci fi show has a shakey moral argument that could be seen to be condoning slavery. Otherwise when exactly are we supposed to discuss media that clearly has problematic writing on the subject? I'm up to the religious fundamentalist aliens blowing themselves up episode now though and hoo boy...

I think you're misunderstanding me: I'm not comparing it to the plight of real people suffering real injustice - I'm comparing the characters in the show treating a person as a slave to their own needs as being as abhorrent as someone doing the same thing in reality. And saying he isn't really human is exactly the argument people used to justify treating people different than them as lesser and not worthy of the same rights in real life.

Oh it's ugly as sin and not very good to be honest. I just couldn't stop watching it for some reason.

Beaten with all 3 original characters now. Only The Watcher to go.

I think a group owning a human being and them being exploited for their resource is pretty much the definition of slavery. They created him purely to use him, and that's condoning using someone as a slave for a purpose against their will whichever way you look at it. It doesn't matter what the end result or what they are trying to achieve is: they have taken agency and life away from another human being no matter what their intentions are. They are literally condoning the ends justifying the means no matter what kind of suffering is caused in the process.

I suspect a lot of my frustrations with the show are probably down to just how inconsistently Archer is written at this point. He comes across as more of a liability than Janeway. That fucking sick dog episode, christ

Essentially, I found the episode extremely frustrating, because it created a highly speculative "what if" scenario, but then never truly engaged fully with the issues this brought about, and focused all the drama away from the moral issue that would be at the core of the idea. That is: was what they did justifiable in the first place.

I'm not sure where the disrespectful part is coming from - I'm engaging with the argument presented, not your personal real world views. The parallel is bang on in my opinion: As for the experimental treatment part: And by contrived plot devices I mean, what we are supposed to engage with as the story as presented. All stories are necessarily contrived, but once the text exists it will then form a narrative that either does or doesn't make sense as written - in this case the story is highly contrived because, as written, it's a story about exploitation of another being, but characters are contrived to make decisions and have dialogue that sidesteps the actual issue that was created by the situation created for the plot demands.

I do agree the problem is very much that it's an interesting idea that Enterprise has muddled through and not really addressed properly in a particularly satisfying or morally interesting way. It's still miles better than Discovery obviously, as there aren't even any questionable episodes in that show but with actual big ideas to have discussions about.

Additionally, a decision that would have actually made the episode really have a moral quandary and show character development: