'Enterprise' will tackle theme of saving Earth from the future

By DAVE MASON Scripps Howard News Service June 3, 2003

"Enterprise" is going on a mission next season to save Earth from future destruction.

Any parallels in this season's finale to Sept. 11, 2001, or the war in Iraq were unintentional, according to executive producers Rick Berman and Brannon Braga.

"We were way out in the script stage before we saw the parallel," Berman said during a conference call featuring Braga and star Scott Bakula.

Braga added: "The idea of aliens coming to destroy Earth has been around a lot longer than Sept. 11. But anytime we can explore a contemporary issue, it makes the show that much better."

"Enterprise" airs on UPN. The prequel "Star Trek" series explores Starfleet's first missions in deep space in the century before Capt. Kirk and company.

In the finale, a man from the future, who has guided the alien race called the Sulibans, told Capt. Jonathan Archer (Scott Bakula) that it was the Xindi, a new alien species, who had attacked Earth with the blast of a small ship, killing millions of people from Florida to Venezuela. Archer persuades Starfleet Command to let him go to the Delphic Expanse, a horrific area of space, to find the Xindi and prevent their plan to destroy Earth with a larger weapon.

The Xindi attacked Earth because someone else from the future told them that 400 years from now, Earth will destroy their planet. The communication from the future is all part of a temporal Cold War.

Is the man who talked to Archer telling him the entire story or even the real story? That's the question for next season, Berman said.

On "Enterprise," Archer and crew are trying to save Earth. Here on the real Earth, it's all part of a plan by Berman and Braga to raise interest in the series at a time when the ratings and fan satisfaction fall short of those for "The Next Generation."

"We went to the 10 'Star Trek' films and saw that two of the most popular movies, 'Star Trek IV' with the whales and 'Star Trek VIII' with the Borg, which Brannon and I were involved with, had to do with saving Earth," Berman said. "It's the first time in a 'Star Trek' series that we're taking on a mission besides exploring space."

Bakula, the "Quantum Leap" star who portrays Archer, said it's the right time in the series for the captain's mission.

"I'm thrilled about it. Rick, Brannon and I were talking about the first two seasons, what we had learned, and I felt it was time for (Archer) to take a stand. It was time for him to pick up something and pursue it."

That's when Berman and Braga told him about the plan for the Delphic Expanse, a newly discovered part of space. "My character is going to be more determined; he'll be more driven," Bakula said. Searching for the Xindi won't distract Archer from his original mission of discovery, Bakula said. "The Delphic Expanse is unexplored; the emotion won't be lost."

Berman and Braga said the mission into the Delphic Expanse doesn't mean "Enterprise" is following the course of "Star Trek: Voyager." "It's not a 'Lost in Space' like 'Voyager,'" Berman said. And they could run into aliens familiar to "Star Trek," including Klingons and Vulcans.

The season ended with the Klingons still chasing Archer for having escaped from their mining prison on Rura Penthe after Archer rescued refugees escaping from their empire. Will the Klingons follow Archer into the Expanse? "Perhaps," Berman said, not saying another word.