The Andorian battlecruiser, providing the exclamation point to a classic aliens return.
One of the treats of Enterprise was the return of the Andorians in a big way. Jeffrey Combs elevated those characters to another level, and his relationship with Archer was probably one of the most intriguing on the show. Being a central race on Star Trek means you get your own ride. The Andorian battlecruiser had an almost insect like quality with an oversized head to rival that of a driver ant. From a drawing by John.
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Screen caps courtesy Jörg.
Wow! That is picture-riffic! If I had to point to one thing I really dug about Enterprise, it was the depth given to the Andorians – proving that even blue guys with antenna can be cool if written well and played with conviction, and in that regard, Combs is king.
Thanks for showing off, Mister Drexler!
You guys really made up for the lack of Andorians in the TNG era. Jeffrey Combs was just the perfect commander, but you guys gave him such a great ship. Its too bad we never got to see them *really* cut loose, but they always had that look of a predator either lounging around but ready to strike!
I love this ship!
Shame the pics are a little small for this one.
Would love to see the concept art build up to the final design, it along with the Vulcan designs from ENT were my favorites.
How cool would Season 5 have been with Shran among the crew. It always felt like they were heading for that, what with him losing his ship – the Kumari during ‘Babel One’ and saying the Imperial Guard probably wouldn’t reward for that.
Now how do I not remember the any details of this smokin’ ship! Well, being a big Combs fan, I think I was more intrigued in his take on Shran and his antennae.
It would have been great to possibly see more Andorians vessels in later seasons!
I agree with ChristopherPike that Shran involved with the Earth fleet would have been awesome, though his strong character would seem awkward to me to serve under Archer…maybe some other duty (on or off Enterprise) where he could be seen regularly, but not necessarily as a crew member.
This wasn’t meant as a reply post, sorry!!
This is great, thank you.
I loved their (re)introduction in “the andorian incident”
Shran quickly became one of my fave characters, and the competition/friendship development between Shran, Archer and even T’Pol to an extent was fantastic.
the ships looks cool. I’m glad I can finally see it from all kinds of perspectives.
One of the best new-old ships to appear on Enterprise. Surprisingly large for her crew of only 86, but somehow I doubt this is due to an overabundance of creature comforts for them. Perhaps it is a powerpacked ship, an Andorian effort to keep up with the Vulcans.
You couldn’t ask for a better guy like Jeffrey Combs to play the part…he’s an awesome alien actor!
This cruiser is really nice. It feels like a fast warship, not too sleek, but not too bulky. Just right
And these are great views. About a year ago I bought a small model of this ship and now, I can accurately do the detailing.
Thanks for posting!!
It’s a shame that (to my knowledge) no other Andorian ships were shown, but there’s a strong, distinctive style laid down there for any fans to hit the ground running designing their own additions to the blue skin fleet.
The Andorians were really done justice.
Well, there was one other andorian ship, a smaller one.
Cool, didn’t know that. Maybe it’s coming up in another post. Was it some sort of escape pod, or a proper starship?
It appears in the battle in the episode “Kir’Shara”. It looks like a fighter to me. I hope Doug has this one in his files and will post more about this little known ship.
Jeffory Combs really did a great job and made me fall in love with the Andorian people.
And I really liked the Andorian Cruiser design. Though I have to ask Doug, what’s with the third engine? The Warp Nacelles are obviously on the wings, and the Red the Impulse Engines (which looked very close to those on the Consitution), but what’s the center engine? Another Impulse Drive?
Easily one of my favorite ships in Enterprise (along with Enterprise and the Vulcan cruisers), from what is probably my favorite Star Trek race. If details on the Akira/Enterprise were meant to allude to the P38 Lighting, I really love how the vertical pair of impulse engines (white) strongly alludes to the RAF mach 2 jet fighter Lightening. I’ve always thought that that, along with the metallic hull color scheme, were brilliant. I only wish we had been able to see much more emphasis on the evolving relationship among the founding members of the Federation had Enterprise been allowed to continue for several more years… and we would have been able to see much more of this ship in action and a family of contemporary Andorian ships developed around it. Will we be able to see a feature on the smaller Andorian ship soon?
What are the wingtip pods for?
Cryoprojectors.
(They radiate “cool”)
Perhaps Mr. Drexler with his make-up background can give us a few tidbits about the evolution of the Andorian make-up for “Enterprise.” The motorized antennae almost became characters themselves in several episodes. The Andorian woman eyeing a cup of coffee and her antennae triangulate gunsight-like on the cup; Shran ducking under a low hanging beam and his antennae moosh down along his scalp as he does so. Did all the Andorian dialog need to be looped? I imagine those motorized antennae must have made a lot of noise while in operation.
the front of that comes across as very battlestar to me very pegasus. i love it
This is one of my favorite ships from Enterprise, just had a cool factor to it. I wish someone made a model kit of it.
The other andorian ship, the “fighter”, was a re-used design if I remember correctly.
It first appeared as the Valakian ship in “Dear Doctor”, was then re-used as one of the human ships from the ragtag fleet in “Twilight”. For the appearances as an Andorian ship in “Kir’shara” and “United” it was modified slithly (hull colour, wingtips, engine colour). I’ve assembled screenshots and sent them to Doug
Wow, thanks Jörg, that was quick of the mark!
Awesome ship – but if I may digress slighlty
This is what bugged me about Enterprise. They had chance to do a completely original ship and they came up with an Akira class rip off. I thought it would look nothing like Federation starships as The Federation arent just the humans its a group of races (I know they’re depicted as the dominant species because of lack of money for doing loads of different types of alien) so I thought the ships in Enterprise would all have an element that if combined would look like the later Federation ships.
Coming back to it now – That’s why I liked the Andorian ships they have a Federation look about them that I can imagine influenced later ship design
As I say though awesome work
Oh not this… again.
As I’m far more a lover of the fantasy of Star Trek, I tend to see the Akira class as the Mini Cooper of Starfleet.
Don’t get me wrong I love the fantasy of Star Trek, I like how some things get explained away as “being in the future” – but I’ve got to disagree with you here – there’s no fantasy at all they just adapted an existing design, that argument that the Akira is based on the NX-01 is really cheap I think. I realise its an old argument but it’s a good one.
I always saw Earth ships with 1701 engines and a big bulky pipe filled box or something
…”they have a Federation look about them”…
That’s it.
This ship really looks like it’s from the same universe and uses similar technology than most federation ships.
I really never cared to much about the Xinidi or Suliban ships, or the enemy “uberships” we keep finding in the movies.
But this andorian ship is a real beauty. Sleek, elegant, easily identifiable, and with definite parts and sections.
If we had just this, the Vulcan’s and Enterprise, I would have been happy and satisfied anyway.
I think the adoration for Andorians on Enterprise is nearly universal, and I would certainly add my own to that. In retrospect, I really wish they had played more of the antagonist role later on, later brought into the fold as the Romulan threat became more apparent. How great would “Broken Bow” have been if they were returning Shran to the Andorians instead of Klaang to the Klingons? Well, it is east to play Monday Morning QB. Great ship, excellent design.
I still wonder to this day about the name “Kumari”. Should it not be one of the “twelve like her” that Kirk was referring to in one TOS story? Granted that the writers of TOS had no clue that ENT would ever be imagined, let alone produced, but looking back now…”playing Monday morning quarterback” again, I am.
I too loved the development that the previously under-used Andorians got on Ent. I mean, they were one of the founding races of the Federation! Although I prefered the antenna further back on the head and curving forward like in the original series, rather than up front, I got used to it, and assumed there are different kinds of Andorians.
Combs is one of my all-time favorite character actors, and he brings so much to every role he plays. I’m glad he had such a large part in DS9 and Ent.! I too thought he was going to join the crew later, and maybe if the show had went on he would have.
Love the Andorians on ENT. If only there was a season 5…
For my money; one of the best accomplishments for STE was the handling of this race; actors, writers and F/X alike.
The DC
The visual design of the Andorian ships made me think that they would probably end up designing impulse engines or better yet runabouts in the TNG era. Maybe it explains the relatively boxy designs of Rick Sternbach…he’s the resident Andorian on a starship design team!
This is a brilliant design but when I saw the scene in the episode “Unity” from which the above screen shot was taken, I mis-took the Andorian battle cruisers for Colonial Battlestars! Only after zooming in on screen capture jpgs did I recognise them as Andorian battle cruisers! Gorgeous ship though!
Ships like this are what star trek needs, i mean, who wants the ship of the week that is the ship of last week turned inside out. I also wonder why there are never any ufo-like ships?