Star Trek: Enterprise: The Complete First Season—Paramount

Video: 4
Audio: 4
Extras: 3
A generation before Captain Kirk and company, there was Jonathan Archer, first captain of the Starship Enterprise, heading with his crew of true space pioneers to explore strange new worlds. It's 2151, and Archer and his officers have a distrust of transporters, phased pistols, and Vulcans, who have subjugated humans' efforts in space for the 100 years since Zefram Cochrane invented the warp drive.

If Enterprise lacks some of the story-telling panache of earlier Star Trek series, it makes up for it with lots of winking nods to later generations of Federation explorers, for whom space travel has become all too routine. As Captain Archer, Scott Bakula perfectly blends wide-eyed enthusiasm and cavalier behavior as Earth's first warp-driven science vessel finds its space legs.

Although it was the first Trek series since the original to be canceled before its seventh year, DVD allows Enterprise to live on. Nicely but awkwardly packaged, the seven-disc set boasts an exceptionally clean, artifact-free picture in 1.85:1 anamorphic, and the lively Dolby Digital 5.1 audio delivers the series' many rumbles, torpedo blasts, and explosions.

Extras are plentiful but lean. Featurettes with such titles as "Creating Enterprise," "Star Trek Time Travel," and "Oh Captain, My Captain!" are joined by a commentary track on the 90-minute pilot, "Broken Bow," in which Rick Berman and Brannon Braga discuss the genesis of the series and characters.

If you're one of the many fans who mourn the loss of Enterprise, you'll want this set.

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