Most of us perhaps have seen "Darmok" and/or "Enemy Mine." I know I've seen them both. Therefore, I'm not really in a mood to write a hundred pages about Dawn. Though I truly loved this episode, it's very formulaic. Which is quite fine, indeed. Shiban wrote Trip very well and Dawson directed Trinneer in an excellent fashion. For those disappointed in the veer from my usual reviews, I apologize. I just don't want to beat a dead horse with this one. I'm keeping this one short, folks.

Trip crash lands on one of 62 moons and the race is on to find him before the sun rises. The reason he crashes is due to an alien who fires unprovoked on his shuttle. They both end up crashing, as it turns out, and they struggle to not only communicate with their respective ships but also with each other.

I was impressed with Trip's diplomacy. He's not really acting any different around alien males than he does around alien females. Fascinating, no? People are just drawn to him. He even manages to pick out certain words from Zho'kaan's language and they're able to communicate with these few words and hand gestures. Though they have their share of misunderstandings and fist fights (which actually was quite a turn-on, I hate to admit).

It was very realistic that Trip couldn't fix either transceiver, but was able to combine the two to get something going. Kinda parallels what's going on with him and Zho'kaan. And also with Enterprise and the other alien ship. Everyone has to combine their efforts for a successful rescue. And everyone actually sees the necessity of this for a change. Arkonians aren't a clear-cut bad guy, nor are they a black-and-white good guy. I like the ambiguity. I was a bit confused, however, with what Archer supposedly accomplished in a day that the Vulcans couldn't do in a century. I wish they'd had time to expound on that a bit.

And speaking of Vulcans, how about T'Pol? She really was concerned and worried about Trip. You could tell when she went to visit Archer the first time in his ready room with the news that five moons have been scanned to no avail. Her body language and facial expression were very subdued, distracted almost. And I got a sense that she felt guilty that because of her presence, the Arkonians may not want to offer any help at all. She definitely had a tone of regret. Also a scene to note was when T'Pol informed Archer of the moon's temperature ranges. After the captain says he hopes Trip landed on the dark side, she insists they find him before the sun rises. There was a solid sense of urgency in her voice. And talking directly to Trip once communications were established, she all but yelled at him for wanting to stay and fry on the surface with Zho'kaan. But you also knew her respect for him went up when Trip refused to leave a man behind.

The end finds us in Sickbay with Trip checking up on Zho'kaan. The two didn't make friends with each other, but are both glad the other is okay. There's a general sense of brotherhood, but that's about it. They've come to an understanding and they both know and leave it at that. I would have liked to have seen a resolution of sorts with Archer and T'Pol once they have Trip safely aboard. But, I know episode time has been cut back to something ridiculous like 42 minutes. That's a hell of a lot of commercials. Give the writers five more minutes of screen time and there can probably be some amazing bridges for these gaps, I'd imagine. They probably wouldn't feel so rushed to come up with an ending.

Perhaps one day I'll go back and rewrite this one, but for now I'm leaving it as is.