Two Days and Two Nights: so sexy that even the title has a jungle

love rhythm going on. John Q. Public announces himself disappointed

by the fun-loving nature of this ep, but I Sunbeam thought it was

completely fabulous.

The nicest thing was that, in this ep, TPTB pandered to everybody!

If you're a Travis fan, Travis turns up sleeveless and buff; if you

like Jonathan, he wears Jim-West-tight pants and gets fooled by a

blonde; if it's Dr. Phlox you fancy, you get a prolonged . . .

um. . ..bedroom scene featuring a threeway with T'Pol, Cutler, and

the good doc himself ; if, for God's sake, all you care about

Porthos, even Porthos gets a growly fight scene AND then he

intimately sniffs Malcolm! Plus Hoshi gets her linguistic ashes

hauled, and even Rostov has lines!

But all this pales next to the sexually-ambivalent-yet-operatically

intense scenes featuring OMT and Malcolm

See: the basic set-up is that the Enterprise has two days of down-

time and so they're going to spend it on public pleasure planet Risa

(well-known to all of us TNG'ers as Where Jean-Luc Met That Scary

Scary Tramp Vash, but still . . .) Risa's tourist attractions

apparently took some time to assemble, because the Risa of 2151 is

not the Disco-Sex-Factory that Jean-Luc and Riker visited but rather

more like a well-lit Shoney's Restaurant. But, if most of our gang

doesn't have sex, they at least have sex-flavored adventures, so

that's something.

Sex-flavored adventure A: Archer and the blonde meet at the Risa

Marriot when their dogs fight; they go wading amongst turtles and she

turns out to be a spy. Way to go, Jon!

Sex-flavored adventure B: Porthos alpha's the interplanetary dog

belonging to the blonde.

Sex-flavored adventure C: Hoshi gets her groove thang going on with a

guy she meets at the Breakfast Buffet Bar.

Meanwhile, back on the ship, the vast majority of the crew

(bafflingly) has to stay on board and polish important door handles

and crap, while Dr. Phlox decides to hibernate. But, when Travis

falls off a mountain, Phlox has to wake up immediately; much comic

action ensues. It seems John Q. is divided over whether Billingsley

was funny or overdone; I go with the funny folks. The ep was well-

shot, Phlox was suitably sleepy, and T'Pol and Cutler (one dry as a

bone, the other moist and chewy) made great straight men to the

doctor's comedy.

However, all this extremely amusing action pales in comparison to the

Trip & Malcolm stuff. Did you know Lt. Worf directed this ep?

Klingons have really got it going on! The episode is bookended by

two brilliant one-take Trip & Malcolm scenes. You do know OMT and

his little friend in armory have been planning a Risan sex-a-thon for

several eps now, right? Well, they finally land and head straight

for the bars.

Brilliant one-take scene one: although dressed like dorks and acting

like Jethro, the boys charm the birds right out of the trees and the

camera never turns away. Izzat a man or woman, Trip says, and

Malcolm doesn't know, and it really doesn't seem to matter. They

appraise eight-eyed dates, they ogle waitresses (must be leftover

Ruby-envy), and Trip makes his own gravy of wonderfulness while

Malcolm diffidently looks around.

Brilliant one-take scene two: you know this was coming, didn't you?

Although the boys manage to lure two sultry Risan harlots to their

table, the Puritans at Paramount make sure no good can come of it.

After the girls lure the boys into the basement and ask them for

money and the boys say there must be some mistake and the girls turn

into K-Mart HalloweenMasque monsters, our terrific two wake up tied

together and wearing nothing but their cobalt undies! Again, the

camera never moves away from the splendid spectacle of them figuring

how to get out of this one.

Malcolm: We followed aliens down here.

Trip: Gorgeous aliens, don't forget - they were gorgeous aliens.

Malcolm (stone face of tragedy): They were male!

Trip (best line ever): Not at first!

Connor Trinneer really is the best Trek actor since Patrick Stewart,

plus (although this is heretical) he's younger AND hotter. Every

time CT says one of the do-nothing scripted lines, he gives it a spin

goes right into our collective bloodstream.

I give this episode an ultra-double 106 out of 100 (you call it A+_ ˆ

there's hardly a second that doesn't fire my fantasies.