Fortunate Son
- Episode aired Nov 21, 2001
- TV-PG
- 45m
IMDb RATING
6.4/10
1.8K
YOUR RATING
Enterprise is sent to help the freighter Fortunate after an attack. However, its first officer, Ryan, is hiding something.Enterprise is sent to help the freighter Fortunate after an attack. However, its first officer, Ryan, is hiding something.Enterprise is sent to help the freighter Fortunate after an attack. However, its first officer, Ryan, is hiding something.
Daniel Henson
- Boy
- (as Daniel Asa Henson)
Jane Bordeaux
- Female Crewmember
- (uncredited)
Mickey Cassidy
- ECS Fortunate Guard
- (uncredited)
Amy Kate Connolly
- Crewman
- (uncredited)
Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaThis episode was directed by LeVar Burton, who played Geordi La Forge in Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987).
- GoofsThe end-of-transmission screen from Admiral Forrest references the signal as relayed from Relay: Echo 1/Transponder 4. A Relay that hadn't been deployed yet.
- Quotes
[Reed and Phlox are under fire]
Lieutenant Malcolm Reed: Get down!
Dr. Phlox: Under the circumstances, I defer to your experience.
- ConnectionsReferenced in Star Trek: Enterprise: Bound (2005)
- SoundtracksWhere My Heart Will Take Me
Written by Diane Warren
Performed by Russell Watson
Episode: {all episodes}
Featured review
"Fortunate Son" Is A Muddled Mess
"Fortunate Son" is a muddled mess and quite possibly the worst episode of "Enterprise." I know, it has some competition there, but let's go through it.
The plot revolves around interstellar piracy and the lack of law enforcement in space. We learn that there is a fleet of earth freighters that have no protection against raiders, so their crews take matters into their own hands. These freighters take years to travel between destinations, turning the crews into "families" or, less euphemistically, armed gangs that basically do whatever they want on their journeys.
So, "Fortunate Son" at its heart is about lawlessness and how people exposed to it handle themselves. This isn't the most exciting concept, and there isn't a shred of originality about anything in this episode aside from the inevitable introduction of a new race (who really cares what they're called because they're just another variety of Klingon-variants with the standard forehead ridges, but they're the "Nausicaans") and the concept of freighters. Neither idea is particularly interesting and both seem a bit fanciful given the time periods we're dealing with, but we'll go with it.
The plot is the major problem. Put as succinctly as possible, it's insipid. It also makes virtually no sense. Freighters taking on not just warships but multiple warships, crews who haven't thought through at all what they're doing, a resolution that can be seen a light year away... it's just a cauldron of confusion and banality.
On the bright side, this is undoubtedly the best episode of the series for Ensign Mayweather. We learn through endless tedious monologues about how he grew up on a freighter, what he knows about freighters, how tragic life can be on freighters, blah blah blah. Are you really that interested in freighters and Mayweather? Then this is the episode for you (and I know there are some of you out there). I didn't find anything shown in this episode to be particularly interesting or insightful, but may the speed at which freighters travel is just fascinating to you.
Back to the banality. There is some heavy-handed moralizing going on, and not in a subtle way. They brought LeVar Burton in to direct this (think really hard to figure out why), and the pacing is horrible because we keep getting sidetracked by Mayweather opining about this and that. Maybe Burton's a good director elsewhere, but not here. We get pointless and banal discussions over meals, an extremely forced relationship between Mayweather and the villain or antihero (what he is is unclear from this muddled script), and a truly bizarre climactic moment when Mayweather just leaps into sensitive negotiations and embarks on a pointless monologue where he tries to say something meaningful. He's still trying. Maybe he'll manage it eventually. Oh, since Mayweather is the only person who knows anything about freighters, apparently that's why he's entitled to just talk over Archer and start pacing around the bridge expounding on his own theories.
So, the moralizing of this episode is off the Richter scale. At one point, Archer says to Mayweather in a condescending tone, "You in particular should understand (treating everyone equally)." Oh, geez, I wonder what he's really talking about there? And guess what, vigilantism is bad. Wow, shocker in a show centered around a military ship! The vigilantes resent the sudden appearance of law enforcement for some reason because they've become as bad as the pirates (at least that seems to be the lesson of the week). There are other such "lessons," but I'll stop there.
"Fortunate Son" is an unfortunate episode. We get little of interest from anyone other than Mayweather, T'Pol has a few cameos here and there, and everyone else is basically invisible or ineffective, including Archer. Oh, and the title has nothing to do with the song, if you were wondering about that. Nice little misleading trope there, Rick!
So, if you're a big Ensign Mayweather fan, tune in, but virtually everyone else is going to wonder why this was even made.
The plot revolves around interstellar piracy and the lack of law enforcement in space. We learn that there is a fleet of earth freighters that have no protection against raiders, so their crews take matters into their own hands. These freighters take years to travel between destinations, turning the crews into "families" or, less euphemistically, armed gangs that basically do whatever they want on their journeys.
So, "Fortunate Son" at its heart is about lawlessness and how people exposed to it handle themselves. This isn't the most exciting concept, and there isn't a shred of originality about anything in this episode aside from the inevitable introduction of a new race (who really cares what they're called because they're just another variety of Klingon-variants with the standard forehead ridges, but they're the "Nausicaans") and the concept of freighters. Neither idea is particularly interesting and both seem a bit fanciful given the time periods we're dealing with, but we'll go with it.
The plot is the major problem. Put as succinctly as possible, it's insipid. It also makes virtually no sense. Freighters taking on not just warships but multiple warships, crews who haven't thought through at all what they're doing, a resolution that can be seen a light year away... it's just a cauldron of confusion and banality.
On the bright side, this is undoubtedly the best episode of the series for Ensign Mayweather. We learn through endless tedious monologues about how he grew up on a freighter, what he knows about freighters, how tragic life can be on freighters, blah blah blah. Are you really that interested in freighters and Mayweather? Then this is the episode for you (and I know there are some of you out there). I didn't find anything shown in this episode to be particularly interesting or insightful, but may the speed at which freighters travel is just fascinating to you.
Back to the banality. There is some heavy-handed moralizing going on, and not in a subtle way. They brought LeVar Burton in to direct this (think really hard to figure out why), and the pacing is horrible because we keep getting sidetracked by Mayweather opining about this and that. Maybe Burton's a good director elsewhere, but not here. We get pointless and banal discussions over meals, an extremely forced relationship between Mayweather and the villain or antihero (what he is is unclear from this muddled script), and a truly bizarre climactic moment when Mayweather just leaps into sensitive negotiations and embarks on a pointless monologue where he tries to say something meaningful. He's still trying. Maybe he'll manage it eventually. Oh, since Mayweather is the only person who knows anything about freighters, apparently that's why he's entitled to just talk over Archer and start pacing around the bridge expounding on his own theories.
So, the moralizing of this episode is off the Richter scale. At one point, Archer says to Mayweather in a condescending tone, "You in particular should understand (treating everyone equally)." Oh, geez, I wonder what he's really talking about there? And guess what, vigilantism is bad. Wow, shocker in a show centered around a military ship! The vigilantes resent the sudden appearance of law enforcement for some reason because they've become as bad as the pirates (at least that seems to be the lesson of the week). There are other such "lessons," but I'll stop there.
"Fortunate Son" is an unfortunate episode. We get little of interest from anyone other than Mayweather, T'Pol has a few cameos here and there, and everyone else is basically invisible or ineffective, including Archer. Oh, and the title has nothing to do with the song, if you were wondering about that. Nice little misleading trope there, Rick!
So, if you're a big Ensign Mayweather fan, tune in, but virtually everyone else is going to wonder why this was even made.
helpful•711
- kellyadmirer
- Dec 1, 2020
Details
- Runtime45 minutes
- Color
- Sound mix
- Aspect ratio
- 1.78 : 1
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