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While on a mission aboard “Shuttlepod One”, Tucker and Reed discover that the Enterprise might have been destroyed, stranding them in space. Fortunately, the first scene after the cold open reveals this to not be the case – Enterprise simply got a piece of itself knocked off while they were helping another ship. Malcom and Reed are none the wiser and begin to hatch a plan to try to save themselves from a frigid death in the dark, depths of space. In an episode that focuses on neither the science-fiction nor the character work necessary to make the hour a success, “Shuttlepod One” instead stays in the middle and ends up leaving the viewer hoping for a little bit more.
The Wikipedia plot summary for “Shuttlepod One”:
“On board Pod 1, Commander Tucker and Lieutenant Reed are attempting to locate Enterprise in an asteroid field that Captain Archer had intended to map. Just then, Reed spots an impact crater surrounded by a debris field; with only one piece large enough to be identifiable as part of Enterprise, they conclude that the ship has somehow been destroyed. They are now alone, with ten days’ worth of air left. Tucker orders Reed to head to Echo Three, a subspace amplifier, using the stars for reference as navigation is down. He intends to send a message to Starfleet, knowing they will not be alive when it reaches there, so that command will at least know what happened. To pass the time, Reed records messages to his family and friends, but Tucker becomes exasperated as Reed’s recordings slowly become more pessimistic.
On board Enterprise, it is revealed that the debris that Reed and Tucker saw was from an explosion while a Tesnian ship was trying to dock with the Enterprise. Archer asks about the Tesnians and Ensign Sato says that Doctor Phlox is rotating the 34 survivors in order to give them all six hours of boron a day. Ensign Mayweather reports that their ETA at Tesnia is 20 hours, allowing enough time to return to meet the shuttlepod. Archer and Sub-Commander T’Pol use a mini-shuttle to inspect the damage to the ship, and Archer orders work on a new door for Launch Bay 2. Later, T’Pol presents her analysis to Archer – both ships were hit by a theoretical “micro-singularity“, but he remains skeptical.
The shuttlepod’s hull is also breached by a micro-singularity, which they quickly seal. Reed reports that one of the oxygen cylinders was damaged, leaving them with less than two days’ worth of air. Tucker tells Reed that they can survive for an extra half-day if they lower the temperature to conserve power for the air recyclers. Later, the radio picks up a signal – it is Sato transmitting new rendezvous coordinates and gives an ETA of two days. Unfortunately, they only have one day’s worth of air left and no way to communicate with the ship. They jettison and detonate the engine, hoping to attract Enterprise‘s attention. It works – Reed wakes up in Sickbay, relieved to see Tucker’s sleeping form there as well.”
In this episode of the podcast, Wes and Clay discuss the storytelling focus of the Berman/Braga show-runner team and whether or not it works for this series. Plus! The guys talk about the qualitative properties of T’Pol’s bum, the mystery-box that is Malcolm Reed, and how to kill drama by telling the audience that everything is going to be ok!