from TVGuide.com

TREK TROUBLE: The crew of UPN's Enterprise were put on the defensive Tuesday at the Television Critics Assoc. press tour in Hollywood. At issue: Last season's dramatic ratings slide. "I don't think, creatively, we were doing anything wrong," huffed exec producer Brannon Braga. "It can be debated from many different angles whether there are problems with the show." That said, co-exec producer Rick Berman conceded that he and Braga decided to "ramp up the show" this season "to try to lure back some of our viewers." Asked whether Enterprise's struggles and the box office failure of Nemesis are proof that the franchise is on the decline, Berman said, "I don't think the franchise is in trouble."

9:24 am A reporter asks Moonves whether or not he ever considered pulling the plug on the struggling Enterprise. With no organic Top Model segue in sight, he's forced to answer the question directly. "I don't think we were close to it," he hedges, "[but] everything is talked about."

5:00 pm I return from another writing break to attend an Enterprise press conference. In addition to stars Scott Bakula, Jolene Blalock and Connor Trinneer, the panel includes exec producers Rick Berman and Brannon Braga. They all look miserable to be there — especially Braga.

5:01 pm Braga says the show's upcoming third season will be "more action oriented, faster-paced" and "we're going to be focusing a lot of our attention on a brand-new race of aliens called the Xindi."

5:13 pm Berman doesn't think "the franchise is in trouble" despite Enterprise's ratings woes and the recent box office failure of Nemesis. That said, he confirms that there are no current plans for another Trek flick. "But it's only been seven months since [Nemesis] opened, and it's not unusual that discussions for [another] film have not yet begun."

5:15 pm Blalock confirms that her T'Pol character is getting a new wig that's "longer, a little bit cuter, a little bit more girly." What's more, she's getting "a few new suits, so I can actually change clothes — because I haven't washed that brown one in the last two years." Berman adds that "as the season unfolds, T'Pol is going to start experimenting with her emotions. It's going to provide us with some fun and possibly sexy stuff."

5:16 pm Now I know who Rick Berman reminds me of: Donald Rumsfeld.

5:23 pm Without ever cracking a smile, Braga insists that he's "absolutely" still having fun doing this. (This being Star Trek, not the press conference.)

5:27 pm Asked to sum up what went wrong on Enterprise last season that led millions of viewers to beam themselves up and out, Braga says, "I don't think creatively we were doing anything wrong."

Brannon Braga, executive producer of UPN's Enterprise, told SCI FI Wire that that viewers can expect to see five species of the Xindi, the new alien threat facing Capt. Archer (Scott Bakula) and his crew, in the show's upcoming third season. "Our five Xindi species are a Xindi humanoid; a Xindi reptilian; the Xindi sloth, which is evolved from a furry, arboreal creature, an arboreal primate; the Xindi insectoid; and the Xindi aquatics," Braga said in an interview.

The humanoid, reptilian and sloth Xindi will be portrayed by actors in prosthetics and costumes, Braga said. The Xindi insectoids and aquatics will be computer-generated.

"We're calling them the Xindi aquatics, and they're like dolphins and whales," Braga said. "When they're in meetings, they have to live in a big tank, in a big and murky tank. When the aquatics and the insectoids speak, of course, there's going to have to be subtitles, because the languages are just too weird."

Enterprise will come in contact with all five Xindi species, but the aliens likely won't act in unison. "There are going to be some questions as to which Xindi species believes it's the dominant species, as you might imagine would happen in a situation like that," Braga said. "In some ways Star Trek lives or dies by how interesting its alien villains are, and I think the Xindi are an interesting concept."

UPN will re-launch Enterprise in September, with a season opener appropriately entitled "The Xindi."

"as the season unfolds, T'Pol is going to start experimenting with her emotions. It's going to provide us with some fun and possibly sexy stuff."

"I don't think creatively we were doing anything wrong."

Scott Bakula (Jonathan Archer) Tuesday said the changes to Enterprise this year will not be skin deep.

Speaking to the Sci-Fi Wire at the Television Critics Association press tour, Bakula praised executive producers Rick Berman and Brannon Braga's efforts in retooling the series. "What you see are guys that have spent the entire hiatus trying to position the show and new scripts and new ideas, and they're rethinking everything," he said. "I'm saying to them every day, 'Think out of the box'."

Bakula's own wish for Captain Archer to toughen up in season three (story) seems to have been granted. "The idea of being the peaceful 'We-come-in-friendship' [guy]...that guy is gone," the actor said.

But Archer isn't the only character who will be changed by the Xindi's sudden attack on Earth. Commander 'Trip' Tucker, whose sister was killed in the attack, will look to Vulcan Sub-commander T'Pol for solace as he tries to deal with her death. "He may find himself more intimately involved with her than ever before," the Sci-Fi Wire said.

All this talk about the Xindi doesn't mean one of Enterprise's original storylines, the Temporal Cold War, has been forgotten. According to the report, the temporal hijinks will "become an integral part of the Xindi arc later in the season".

Originally posted by Buck Turgidson
Is Xindi going to be pronounced "Zin-dee" or "Hin-dee"?

Might be some disquiet on the latter one...

Originally posted by Buck Turgidson
It wouldn't be all that out of bounds for T'Pol to look more femme-y. Anyone who remembers (and you certainly should), Spock's fiance T'Pring will remember that latter day (by their time reckoning) Vulcan women were capable looking like femme fatales.

Originally posted by sherm42
Great, they are going to ramp up the action. Because we all know that Trek has always been about the action. Wall to wall action.

Originally posted by Numanoid
How the heck could you get "Hin-dee" out of that?