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Enterprise is one of my favorite Star Trek series, yet there's one thing that's always mystified me. Dr. Phlox. Specifically, how many times he makes errors in judgment. Enterprise was only four seasons long, and yet I've seen too many cases of Dr. Phlox saying "X patient is going to be just fine", only to see them dead at the end of the episode. I don't think I've seen any of the other doctors make errors like that, combined (TOS, TNG, DS9, and VOY).

Why do you think that is?

Who knows how qualified he is in treating humans? He was quite competent when treating T'Pol, but I doubt he is the greatest physician for human physiology.

Humans are relatively new to the stage by the time of ENT, so it's possible that Phlox wasn't fully trained in their treatment. I'd imagine that his apointment on the NX was based more on politics than his actual skill with humans. It would certainly be a nice gesture of trust to have a member of your own race apointed as the only doctor on Earth's first long-range exploration vessel.

And it let the redshirts know just how much Starfleet cared about their well being.

"So, did you see the ship's Doc?"
"No. What's he like?"
"Well, let's just say that you won't want him to have to remove your apendix."
"Why not?"
"Because Steve went in there yesterday to get his tonsils removed. He came out missing his liver."

So Phlox is...

"Now open your mouth and lets have a look at that brain... no, no, not that mouth. "
"I only have one."
"Really?"
"Uh... is there a human doctor around?"
"Young lady, I am an expert on humans. Now pick a mouth, open it and say "brglgrglgrrr"!"
"Uh... brglgrglgrglgrrr!"
"What? My mother was a saint! Get out!"

Sionnach Glic wrote:Humans are relatively new to the stage by the time of ENT, so it's possible that Phlox wasn't fully trained in their treatment. I'd imagine that his apointment on the NX was based more on politics than his actual skill with humans. It would certainly be a nice gesture of trust to have a member of your own race apointed as the only doctor on Earth's first long-range exploration vessel.

I got the general impression that it was Archer who had Phlox come on board. He first met him when Phlox was treating the Klingon. Said something to him in private and next thing we know he's onboard Enterprise unpacking. That and talking like the aliens from Galaxy Quest...

It's possible that Archer asked for Phlox to tag along in case Klang the Klingon's condition deteriorated, then liked him enough to ask him to stick around for a while.

Personaly I don't mind Phlox. He's an odd character, but he's less 2-D than most of the ENT cast. Plus, he gave us to best line in the show:

T'Pol: "Mayweather is injured."
Phlox: "Who?"

On the other hand, he did convince Archer to effectively commit genocide and condemn an advanced species to a prolonged and probably painful death based on nothing more than his own warped view of evolution. Which is a pretty bad mark on his record in my book.

T'Pol: "Mayweather is injured."
Phlox: "Who?"

I loved Phlox. The fact he makes mistakes too makes him even better. He isn't in Starfleet, Earth or UFP. No Prime Directive.

That is actually one of the few things I did like about ENT was Phlox once in a while telling some of the crew about the strange and sometimes questionable actions of certain species. That is how they do things etc, etc. How we view them is just human nature etc.

To me it made it a bit more alien with near complete;y different values than humans.

it has no sense to have an alien doctor (your only doctor) in a only human ship

What I liked about Phlox was when they had his wife turn up and she wanted to sleep with Tucker; Phlox thought it was a great idea. They'd mentioned about Denobulan group marriages before, but to see people actually living in such a truly different way was pretty cool.

It's always interesting to have aliens actually act alien. I think with Phlox they too often had alien = gross as part of a gag though.

GrahamKennedy wrote:What I liked about Phlox was when they had his wife turn up and she wanted to sleep with Tucker; Phlox thought it was a great idea. They'd mentioned about Denobulan group marriages before, but to see people actually living in such a truly different way was pretty cool.

I always considered that to be a rather ham-handed attempt at pointing up how "alien-y" and different Phlox was. Personally, I didn't really need a reminder that Phlox wasn't human.