ALL YOU NEED IS LOVE: After a previous Bleat full of vitriol, James Lileks has
a whole lotta love to give the world, including his love of the series finale of the new Star Trek spin-off, Enterprise:

I love the fact that the main villain was also the simpering shoe salesman in the ZZTop video, “She’s Got Legs.” I like the fact that the Captain has a dog. I like the fact that show has figured out very quickly who the good characters are, and shunted the lesser ones off the stage. I liked the fact that the EU Council de Science - sorry, the Vulcan Science Council - had decided that time travel was impossible, when we all know that the Federation figured out otherwise a few years later that it wasn’t. (Of course, the Vulcan Science Council knows better, but they keep things from the simplisme Earthlings.) I liked the special effects because I am, at heart, 12 years old, and a dork drawing Enterprise pictures in my notebook unaware of the KICK ME sign on my butt.

I thought it was pretty good as well, although our local UPN affiliate ran it with a "viewer's choice" episode (apparently determined via Internet vote), which was just dreadful--a group of renegade Vulcans trying to get in touch with their inner emotions. Long, droning and very painful, it made "the space hippies" episode of the original Trek look good in comparison.

Still, the first season of Enterprise has had fewer cringe-inducing moments for a first season of Trek than any series since the first one. And after the pedantic Voyager, I never thought I'd be saying that.