Welcome back to Character Insight! I apologize for my absence the past couple months but pandemic life demanded a refresher period, and I'm developing some new segment ideas and concepts for the rest of 2020 and beyond. If you have any concepts you'd like to see, let us know!
Turning to today's segment, we cover The Xindi with a "Did You Know" feature, checking in on five interesting facts that you may or may not have picked up on as you traversed the latter seasons of Enterprise.
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1. The Xindi as a villain in Enterprise were originally to be one particular species much like prior villains the Klingons and Romulans. But the show producers wanted to investigate what it may be like if humans had not been the only species on Earth to develop high levels of intelligence. Hence, we end up with the 5 distinctive species making up this tenuous alliance in the show, and something new and unique in Star Trek lore to that time.
2. This background of the Xindi was written to remain relatable to Earth history in that the different species came into conflict and civil war, but it went so much farther with the destruction of their original home planet and the extinction of a sixth species, the Avians. The Xindi background serves as another cautionary tale on the track that humanity has previously been on with wars and conflicts.
3. The Xindi speak the Insectoid and Aquatic languages with each other because those two species are incapable of speaking the common language of the Primates, Arboreals and Repitlians. Despite these overlaps to work with one another, we see different styles of written language rendered for all 5 of the species, reflecting their significant differences.
4. The Delphic Expanse, the region where the Xindi reside in the time of Enterprise, is an artificial zone of spatial anomalies generated by waves of gravimetric energy emitted by a series of massive spheres built by, you guessed it, the Sphere Builders. The Delphic Expanse was designed as a space version of the Bermuda Triangle, where predictable laws of physics and nature go out the window, adding more danger and unpredictability to the long mission Enterprise takes to find the Xindi in this region.
5. The Xindi were intentionally left out of episodes following their major arc in season 3 of Enterprise because while they proved to be popular with show fans, the show writers wanted to make a clear break from that story arc that defined the core of the Enterprise story. We are left to wonder if they do eventually join the Federation as is posited from another timeline by Daniels during the show and also in the game Star Trek Online.
In summary, the Xindi defined a new type of villain with a complicated past that fit well with the evolving and more complex storytelling TV shows were doing in the decade Enterprise was produced. It also provided a chance for the makeup artists and CGI crews to really stretch their legs and show off the best work they could produce at the time, and it all came together to make a great success on par with the Dominion War arc of DS9.
Keep the dialogue going on Twitter. What other Xindi facts should we know? Until next time, all hail the Guardians who may be shifty-eyed Sphere Builders.
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