Thus saith The Green Vortex:

Heh. And also, word!

I'm pretty sure it was the same guy who played Kate Locksley's dad on a couple of episodes in season one of Angel, if that helps.

And FWIW, the Admiral didn't raise my hackles at all, though that might be because Bakula was way out there during his meltdown and, let's face it, the Admiral had cause to pissed at Archer.

In some ways, even better than Part One. We got down to serious business in Part Two, mainly, Mirror Archer's power lust and paranoia. An unusual character study for any Trek series, and Bakula threw himself into it with utter abandon. I agree with other posters that he was channeling Shatner after he put on the green tunic. And I do think it was a deliberate choice on Bakula's part. You could see him leaning back in the captain's chair the way Shatner did, the way he positioned his arms; I was waiting for the classic Shatner Chin Stroke, but I guess that would have been too much to hope for. Well done, Scott.

Yes, this was Triple X continuity porn, but the loving attention to detail (the Reliant bridge, the uniforms, the SFX) made you think that the PTB actually cared about the fans and the Star Trek universe. Ain't nothing wrong with feeling the love. I only wish they could've done more of this in previous seasons.

The Gorn sub-plot? Time waster.

Loved the Evil!Phlox/T'Pevil discussion in the Mess Hall. Reed? "Eh. Could go either way." Hee. And Phlox's comment that Shakespeare is the same in both universes obviously was a meta-reference to the Shakespearean plot of this episode.

Long live Empress Sato! Is there an opening for an Imperial Concubine? I'm available.

ITA mike p. That Admiral wasn't overacting; he was reasonably pissed! Who wouldn't be if some Lieutenant commits mutiny and comes after Terra Ferma itself, demanding an unconditional surrender? But there was some atrocious overacting going on early in the episode. Did anyone else notice how horrible the acting chops were on that blue-skinned worker that they were interrogating? "Possibly in the power transfer conduits on Deck 22..." Worst. Overacting. EVER!

Actually, I think the original Gorn were like in ths episode - all fluid and proud in their CGI glory.

Then, a plague struck the Gorn race, that threatened to wipe them out. To counter this, they ran genetic experiments, intermixing their own DNA with that of a being capable of fighting off the virus. They found suitable DNA on Earth, taken from a gigantic subaquatic reptilian creature found off the coast of Japan.

The genetic experiments worked to save them from the plague, but altered their physical appearance, causing them to look less CGI and more like hominids in rubber lizard suits.

I'm happy to see the Gorn again, CGI or otherwise. However, I wish they had used them more in general, and not just here in a somewhat pointless subplot.

(If Godzilla doesn't work for you, let's say that they got the DNA from fossilized Sleestaks instead.)

Personally, the ending kind of left me feeling a little flat. I don't know why. I kind of went "Oh snap!" when Hoshi made her ultimatum, I guess I wanted something more after that.
I loved Evil Mayweather kicking someone in the head so much I watched it twice. To do that from standing with no warm up. That was a good kick. Typical of teevee and movies it knocked the person the frell out immediately.
I couldn't hear you yelling, I was busy shouting "Shoot it!" I like during the podcast when one of the guys said that the next scene should have had Archer wearing Alligator boots.
'bout a week or so...
The "Evil credits" made the last two eps seem epic and sweepingly important, the regular credits sound like the theme song to a sitcom about a single mom striking off on her own with her teen-aged offspring. Can we keep the new song, Ma? Please?!

For what it's worth, that low camera angle shot of Archer oblivious to the dangerous Gorn lurking above him struck me as incredibly similar to the low camera angle shot of Frodo oblivious to the dangerous Shelob lurking about him from Lord of the Rings: Return of the King. But, hey, if you're going to do some homage directing, LOTR is a fine place to draw inspiration!

Good fanwank, Taiichi, but I'm not sure. I think we need to have a two-part episode to explain it.
Khan claims he ruled Earth "200 years ago", but Spock says it's 1996. Khan's off by about a century. This is because "Space Seed" was made before they'd really decided which century TOS was set in.

Also, Spock's supposedly the first Vulcan in Starfleet, but there's a whole ship of Vulcans, the Intrepid, who all joined Starfleet after him? I'm not buying it.

I'm just saying it's nearly impossible to keep the continuity after 700 episodes of any show. Saying that the MU continuity is better than the Regular Universe continuity is like saying Battlestar Galactica's continuity is better than Star Trek's. Let's just see how Galactica's continuity fares after 700 episodes.

ITA that Bakula decided to channel Shatner when he put on the green tunic. That was one of the best parts of the ep, to me. The pose in the captain's chair sealed that it was intentional IMO.

Wow. I constructed a whole scenario to explain why Mirror-Kirk didn't have advanced tech ("The Tholian Web" took place afterward, etc. etc.), only to find that I've been beaten to it. And y'all did a much better job, on that and on the episode as a whole. So what's left? Nitpicking.

The flag and UFP emblem were TNG-era. No. No no no. And if Archer was so great...why was he never mentioned?

They seemed to be overdoing the TOS "moments." I snickered when T'Pol used the viewer, a la Spock. Not so much when Hoshi used Uhura's earpiece, because I think even ENT had those. I saw what they were trying to do when Trip came into the light in his new outfit, but felt it was overdone when T'Pol slowly draped herself over the railing in hers.

I think the use of the Gorn was meant in the same way. Oddly, when Archer first heard the name, he acted as if he'd heard it already. But the Gorn-eye view was a nice effect. As to the blue alien...I wanked that that's how his species talks.

Speaking of uniforms: I don't think you can wear a standard one under spacesuits. But I do wonder why they made sure that they each wore the right colors, etc. for their temporary ones. And I liked the little shout-out of Hoshi's line about the strange tastes in clothing. As to what was said about the Defiant logo being similar to the ships' logos in TOS, that's also the Fleet logo in ENT (which in turn may be based on current NASA and military designs). Interesting. And the mention of MacKenzie was a good nod to continuity.

I've noticed some interesting points on some other sites: The Earth spins the wrong way in the opening credits (on the logo). Supports the evil universe idea. And note that a ship called "Defiant" (or its plans) is stolen twice by mirror humans.

I agree that the Orion females may have been "neutered." It doesn't seem like biology would change. As to Vulcans still being slaves years later, perhaps many of them went along with the Empire willingly, with only a few rebels.

What site did Coto post the bios on? I will agree with him, and everyone here, that they're really slapped together. They don't really fit standard ideas of a bio, for example.

As soon as Archer fell down, I figured it was Hoshi- but then she asked him how he was? That didn't really compute. His forehead as he was dying, though, was as furrowed as it's ever been.

All in all, a solid two hours, this one a bit less so than the first (the Gorn), but still good. And now back to the boring old normal universe, bless it.

As far as continuity problems, this episode mentions the Columbia's captain, Erika Hernandez. In TOS' "Turnabout Intruder", Janice Lester has to trade bodies with Kirk to become captain, since it is so unheard of for a woman to command a starship.

Or how about ST4's Khan remembering Chekov's face, even though Chekov wasn't in TOS' "Space Seed"?

"Turnabout Intruder" can - barely, if you're feeling especially charitable - be reconciled with everything else, due to the fact that "starship" seems to have a very specific meaning in Kirk's era. It doesn't just mean "a ship capable of interstellar travel." It's generally used to refer specifically to a ship of Enterprise's class, of which only a dozen or so exist. And maybe - though it'd be a stretch, and Federation lawyers would likely have trouble defending against a discrimination suit - it was just happenstance that no women were starship captains.

Nah, I don't really buy it either... but it's worth remembering that "starship" wasn't a term you'd use for just any old ship.

I recall that being mentioned in a newsgroup a few years back. The story told to explain that? Well, we hadn't seen Chekhov at that point because he was on the graveyard shift. Unfortunately, he happened to be in the only restroom on that level when Khan was gripped with a sudden case of the Titanian two-step. After finally dragging the ensign out of the restroom, Khan roared, "I will always remember your face, Mr. Chekhov!!"

That explanation would work, except for the fact that there are no bathrooms in Star Trek.

That's a running gag, held over from TOS until today; bathrooms are never, ever shown, on screen or in the schematics. I think they made their debut in this series, but I can't be sure.

Well done, Manny. You really did pull off the "1960s are hi-tech again" trick. I've never been a fan of TOS - I used to avoid it whenever a rerun was on - but this ep impressed me.

Some very teeny notes:

- If Reedvil and Mayevil were (evil) MACOs, why are they also able to act as tactical officer and helmsman? Maybe in this universe MACOs are trained for regular Starfleet jobs, or maybe it was part of the skeleton crew push. Really didn't matter, since we all wanted to see the crew in their usual places doing their evil thing regardless.

- I really love the increased diversity in this universe. Just like with the Roman or British Empire, the conquered (or occupied) peoples eventually fill positions of power after a generation or so. It's the only life they know, after all. It makes perfect sense that Starfleet would have Vulcans, Andorians and others serving on board just as some of the best Roman legions were converted barbarians and the Irish were all over the Royal Navy.

- The plot conveniently spared the CGI budget of showing any more Terran ships while also claiming that they had tons of them in their various fleets. But it was still hard to believe after four seasons of weak little Enterprise that the mirror-version NX ships could take down one of those massive Vulcan or Andorian cruisers. Eh, what do I care, that battle scene was awesome.

- It was a nice bit of plotting to get Phleevil to play rebel, but the overriding theme in this universe seems to be Self-Survival. Given that, would Pleevil really have accepted a suicide mission? (I suppose we could speculate that he would have been beamed to the Avenger before the Defiant was destroyed)

- While the shields were down, Defiant seems to have taken some solid damage, but later the ship appears with a pristine hull.

- Still would have appreciated some hint as to how the Defiant would eventually be destroyed and the timeline restored, but I guess that's best left to some fan fiction I'll never read. Now that I think about it, it was kind of neat to NOT have a reset button - did I just spot the difference in the evil!writers?

Manny, my love, why you gotta be like this? Haven't I been good to you?

Didn't we get married in a large open ceremony in Vegas last spring, along with hundreds of ENT fans? Didn't I giggle appropriately while others howled at the Green Cooter Nudies? Haven't I been a good fangirlfriend?

WHY, in this episode, would you present, not one but TWO Archers? WHY on Earth would you kill off not one, but two of my ENT TV boyfriends, Reedvil and Phleevil? What have I ever done to you?

Other than that, I enjoyed this episode. I'm so miserable that the stupid theme will be back next week. I loved Ho-she killing Archer. I could watch that scene forever.

PS: I know Mike Sussman wrote the teleplay, but I'm dropping all the crap at the feet of the showrunner. I'm still on good terms with my TV BF Sussman.

About Phleevil, I don't think he's so terribly different from our version - do you remember (paraphrased):

"Hey...I thought doctors weren't allowed to cause pain?"

"No, we're not supposed to cause harm. I can cause as much pain as I want to."

ENT has shown us plenty of other rooms that we'd have rather not seen (the decon chamber and T'Pol's massage parlor, to name a few), so I guess it wouldn't surprise me. Forget the continuity porn - that stuff was just plain ol' porn.

That was indeed the plan, he was calling for transport when Tucker tackled him.

Screamin, you and I are on the same wavelength. And the funniest thing? He was doing physical therapy with Reed. (I even went to the recap of "Dead Stop" to reread that part.) And funnily, that's the scene I thought of when I saw Phlevil.

There were bathrooms in TNG, there just weren't toilets. Troi is submerged in her bathtub in that episode where everyone is devolving. And I think I recall other TNG characters using the sinks or mirrors in their bathrooms.

And Hoshi took a shower in that episode where she was invisible, so yeah, we have seen bathrooms in ENT as well.

It would make sense that military guided empire bent on conquest would put all their energy and funds into making more powerful weapons and ships, where the Federation would persue technology less military and more for their citizens welfare.


I think it's possible that Emperess Hoshi was afraid of the same thing Archer was, rebels or others wanting power would gain control of the Defiant and use the technology to overthrow her and the Empire, thus she used the ship for conquering and warfare, but refused to have the ship taken apart to study the technology, so the Empire's scientist had to make due with technology downloads and under very tight scrutiny and security to not allow it's secrets to get in the wrong hands, and the Defiant was staffed only with those really loyal to her, and all Empire ships was modeled after the Defiant, because this was the first Terran ship that didn't use alien technology, so a very much proud Terran thing.

And there was the Sonic Shower in Star Trek: TMP

Have you seen the episode that started it all -- Mirror, Mirror?

Hee. Yeah, Archer and Reed were Sharing that malicious school boy look when they saw the power of the Defiant.

Heheh...See? If you wank hard enough, it's nearly always possible to get from here to there. :D

The cross-legged position is Shatner, but tossing an arm over the backrest struck me as more of a William Windom-as-Matt Decker move. (The Doomsday Machine)

The plaintive voice reminded of The Bynars from an early TNG episode.

I noticed they killed one of Avenger's crew like they killed Captain Rachel Garret in Yesterday's Enerprise -- Shrapnel to the Forehead. We're getting nostalgic Makeup FX, too. ;) All they missed was giving Scott Bakula a trickle of blood from his lip that he could've wiped off with the back of his hand after the Gorn fight.

For some reason, I flashed back to a short story I read years ago. The premise had the Star Trek actors switching places with their 23rd century characters thru some cosmic mishap. So, the actors are on their way to the bridge of an actual Starship Enterprise, and I remember "DeForest Kelley" saying to "Leonard Nimoy" -- "You be sure to tell us what goes on in that viewer of yours, alright?"

Yeah. 12 Starships. That's a Lot of Competition. It may've been that Janice was out of bounds in saying her gender was the reason she'd never make Captain. If Trek had reached S4, I'd like to think that they would've gotten around to showing us a new Starship Captain who was a woman. Roddenberry's first Trek pilot had a female Number One, and First Officers have to be ready to take command. If girls can't be Captains, they can't be First Officers either.

Viewing all mirror episodes by era, you realize it was all the Tholians fault. If they hadn't caused the Defiant to crossover, it's very likely, and probable by what was said, that the Terran Empire would have fallen in the 22nd century. Of course, the rebels could have been just as bad as the empire, but based upon alt-T'Pol and Alt-Soval, a much more benign government would have replaced it. The Defiant's presence allowed the Empire to continue and prosper thru to TOS era.

True. Which was the reason that, after the pilot episode, Majel Barrett was removed from the role of Number One and assigned the much more sex-appropriate role of Nurse Chapel. (I seem to remember hearing that this was at network insistence, rather than because GR wanted to do it, but I'm not certain). Either way, sexism in Trek goes all the way back to the very first episode.

After TOS wrapped up, GR simply admitted that Turnabout Intruder was sexist. Fanwanking can reconcile it with what we now know of Federation society, but it can't un-sexist-ize the writing.

And then she caught a rare virus in the Evil!AmazonRainforest on one of her visits to her home in Brazil and fell gravely ill. Empress Hoshi died a week later, to be replaced by Emperor Travis, who took the Defiant on an impossibly long freighter transport mission, which was his true passion--hence, his lack of ambition to become emperor when Archer was a sitting duck. He took the ship across the galaxy and never returned. Thus, the Defiant was once again lost to the cosmos and the Terran Empire went back to basics with the next-gen successor to NX-01.

ITA, Trevacious Guy. It was the assholes at NBC who couldn't stand seeing a female first officer. So in order for the show to get picked up, they had to dumb down all the female roles to glorified intergalactic secretaries, complete with dead-end jobs where they constantly have Kirk sign stuff on clipboards. If Star Trek was around for a fourth or fifth season, I'm sure Gene would have debunked that stereotype with a bona fide female captain of a starship. Hell, he still found time, even in the doomed third season, to break new ground in Hollywood with the Kirk/Uhura interracial kiss. He was certainly sticking it to the network with that move, so it's certainly possible that he would have eventually done the same with female captains.

ETA: Ah, you beat me to it, Sheap, while I was composing my reply.

I may have missed something, but why was there a Gorn on the Defiant? I read the summary of the Tholian Web on startrek.com, but no mention.

Before Mirror-Archer and company showed up, the Mirror Universe Tholians were using various slave races to work on the Defiant--like the blue no-nose guy Archer tortures (who reminded me a little of Babylon 5's Drazi, but that's neither here nor there...) The Mirror Universe Gorn was apparently the slave master in charge of them. So in the Mirror Universe (at least in ENT time) there's some sort of relationship between the Tholian and Gorn races that there isn't it the "real" universe (in TOS time, which is really the only other time we've sene Tholians and Gorns.)

Heck, the way Soval and T'Pol were able to convince him to go along with the plan was the promise of limitless concubines. Presumably, he wasn't planning to enjoy them posthumously... ;-)

This seems to be, at least in part, mythmaking from Roddenberry. IIRC, Solow and Justman's book Inside Star Trek (which I've always found to be a great, highly convincing, corrective to a lot of Roddenberry mythology about the show) paints it more as the network being concerned about the nepotism factor of casting the producer's girlfriend in such a prominent role. I'll have to look up the details when I get home, but I seem to remember that Majel Barrett was even kinda "snuck in" as Nurse Chapel, too. (I.e., the gist was that NBC didn't want Barrett on the show, period.)

Anyone else feel the love for Wrath of Khan during that sequence? Quantum seemed to be channeling Ricardo Montalban while giving the orders to blow it up ...

Thanks for the correction, I caught the "ready for transport" part too when I re-watched this last night. And of course Phleevil would do anything to get his multiple wives back... (maybe he read about that in the database instead of Shakespeare).

No, Trevacious Guy, I haven't seen the original Mirror, Mirror though I vaguely recall seeing Spock with a goatee once and I did read some of Keckler's classic recap. I get the gist. (Note - The whole TOS set was SO cheesy for someone growing up in the 80's that I never got past it to realize that there was good writing going on behind the blinking lights. Now that Manny has made the 60's cool again I wouldn't mind watching the original show.)

I also regret my post on the last page because, really, the writers and cast did a terrific job throwing us this ball of fun, and I shouldn't nitpick. What a great lark. Still amazed that they got permission to do a 100% mirror episode, where regular-Enterprise never showed up at all... (Not counting Ghost of Quantum Present)

And we all scratch our heads going, "Why NOW"? The answer being, of course, that with nothing to lose the show can finally go balls out now. Too often in life, a lame duck will just shuffle off in shame. Kudos to the ones that go down flailing.

IIRC from an interview at startrek.com (with Bakula I think) , I believe this is the episode they were filming when they got the official axe. At this point they thought there would be a fifth season. (And rightfully, IMO. This was awesome!)

The writer also mentions on the podcast commentary that they tried not to decisively kill off too many of the MU counterpart characters, just on the wild off chance they might have an opportunity and idea for revisiting them.

This explains pretty well why we never know for sure that Reedvil and Phlevil are dead. I assume that they are, but it's never stated. Of course, in my mind, Reedvil is planning taking over the Defiant from Sick Bay. Though, Empress Sato would have no problem killing Phlevil or Reedvil and probably did.

And let me add the to the chorus who appreciate that there was no interaction from the Real Universe. It was a great adventurous foray into a parallel universe, and luckily they realized it would have more impact and be appreciated if there was no tension of getting the crew back to the real world.

Personally, I wanted to see MU Chef. I bet all you'd see would be his boots....but they'd be EEEEEEEEEEEEEVIL BOOTS!

He reminded me of the holo-programmer from "In the Pale Moonlight". Same shade of blue. I can't find pictures of either of them to compare if they were supposed to be the same species, though.

Yeah, long before Enterprise (and the Star Trek IV movie) showed us female captains, many Trek fans have basically accepted that Janice Lester's claim was just wrong. She was, after all, insane; there's not a lot of reason to think her belief in a causal connection between her sex and her not being given a command is incredibly rational, tho' it does make for interesting characterization.

Alternately, fanwankers suggest a different interpretation of Janice Lester's most explicit line on the subject. In a conversation with Kirk about their long-ago relationship, she says, "Your world of starship captains doesn't admit women." Some suggest that she's not really saying that Starfleet doesn't admit women, but that Kirk's lifestyle doesn't allow room for a relationship. (Which is probably a workable explanation as far as Starfleet policy goes, though the character obviously thinks she's been victimized because she's a woman.)

I dont know what to make of it. Being no female captains/XO's. I know the 60's was a diferent era and "rules were diferent". I have read articles on both sides, and could see how each side could be true, (females were still wrongly considered second rate to men back then too) but I decided not to lose any sleep over it anymore.

For an example you would not have "Morality Police" behind the wall if Quantum were to kiss Hoshi, like what happened when Kirk and Uhura kissed.

Of course, all the explanation of Janice Lester's comment is just after-the-fact fanwanking to try to deal with the excrable sexism of the episode.

Regarding this episode, if I were Empress Sato, I don't think I'd leave the Defiant for a long, long time, if ever. As soon as she steps off that ship, she risks whomever's left in charge staging a treasonous coup.

Wasn't CQ taking a shower in the first or second episode when the gravity failed and he started to drift up out of his shower-stall?

If you were smart, won't you take the Defiant off to a quiet part of the Empire and spent months studying it's systems and copying everything; rather than just sailing into Earth-orbit and doing your "...Knell before Zod, and dispair"-schtick? As with Star Trek memorabilia, the money's in the licensing.

Copy the library-computer; read and copy the service manuals and all the back-up information on the technology; reverse-engineers a few quietly marketable commodities to fund additional recruiting of both engineers as well as security people. No empire survives without it's power behind the throne; become one of the powers. There'd also be less people gunning for you.

Who really did invent Velcro, anyway....??

As far as the "no female captains/XO's" thing goes in TOS, the debate seems to boil down to three important points; was it the times, the network execs, or the "Great Bird of the Galaxy"* himself? IMHO, and as Humphrey Bogart once said, "it was a combination of all three".

The times were certainly different, as we saw when the Kirk/Uhura kiss freaked everyone out. The network execs were (and are, and ever shall be) a superstitous, cowardly lot, so they probably didn't want women to get any of the good jobs, either. Again, Uhura's role, small as it was, broke new ground for women in general and black women in particular.

As for Gene himself, it seems that he built a Starfleet that had a very definite glass ceiling, despite all of the protests and retconning that have happened since TOS went off the air in 1969. I think he acknowledged this, at least in a small way, via Janice Lester, ironically in the very last episode of TOS ("Turnabout Intruder").

*Who came up with that nickname, anyway? I bet it was Gene himself.

I was referring to continuity problems/contradictions within TOS, thegreenvortex. We mostly gave up long ago on Enterprise keeping continuity with Trek history.

But also remember in Turnabout Intruder, Janice Lester was washed out of the Academy for being unfit to command a starship. She believed it was because she was a woman, but Kirk painted it as more a psychological problem. Gender was never made an issue except by Lester.


ETA that I should have read the remainder of the thread before adding info that has already pretty much been covered.

Herb Solow (Desilu's Star Trek executive) in Inside Star Trek on Majel Barrett as "Number One," and more:



The interesting unanswered question to me is why, exactly, they dropped the Number One character altogether, (Edit: Actually, the answer is implicit in the above - recasting Number One would require telling Barrett that he and/or the network simply didn't like her as an actress.)


...but Solow later points out that Roddenberry's Star Trek women were mainly "decorative," and interestingly, portrayed in a sexist manner even by the TV standards of the time. He points out that there were actually quite a few prominent lead actresses with strong, independent characters at the time (he mentions Mission: Impossible, Ironside, Gunsmoke, the Girl from UNCLE, and Big Valley as contemporary examples.)

Wow, thanks for that insight, dconner. When I put the blame on NBC, I did think that there was possibility that Gene was involved in the sexist subtext, but I gave him the benefit of the doubt. But after reading your list of other shows that were a lot closer to gender equality than TOS, I'm not sure.

I think Barrett's relationship with Roddenberry skewers the truth. She would have been the perfect excuse for NBC if they didn't want a female Number One. Then when the issue garnered public attention, they would have changed their story to one of disapproval of Barrett's competence as an actress. That is dubious since there were many actresses on Star Trek who were as bad, or worse than Barrett (Nichelle Nichols, for starters).

But as some of you have noted, Roddenberry isn't blame-free either. It's perfectly logical that in the cultural climate of the '60s, he himself was sexist, to say nothing of the other writers. Forget Janice Lester and the final episode. There was rampant sexism throughout the series. What most people take as Kirk's "way with the ladies" was nothing less than an incarnation of the chauvinistic attitudes of that era. And they made women look utterly incompetent in scenes where it was not at all called for. This show took "jiggle sex" to new heights, if not invent it. A lot of that can be blamed on the writers and producers without necessarily looking to the network.

The sad part is that this show tackled many important social and political issues and really did try to break racial barriers. Yet, I find the acceptance and promotion of sexism baffling. As many of you have said, there is no point in trying to fanwank the sexism in TOS. You cannot make sense of madness, of grave fallacies.

It was all in the lighting. Do you remember the lighting on those babes? It has never been equaled, before or since.

The lighting was part, but don't underestimate the power of Bill Theiss's costume design. There once was a thead for sexism in Trek I think.

Topic: I adored this ep., but I'd bet it was in the planning before the cancellation.