"End of Kuroda" by Brian Tyler

Let's be honest, "Canamar" is not likely to come up on a list of people's favorite or even memorable episodes of Star Trek: Enterprise. It's not a bad episode, per se, just not one that is really worth talking about, despite Mark Rolston showing up as the primary antagonist.

One aspect of the episode that is memorable, however, is the score. This was the second episode of Enterprise with music by an up-and-coming composer named Brian Tyler. Later in the same year, Tyler would score "Regeneration" from Enterprise and the tv miniseries "Children of Dune."

Even at this early point in his career, Tyler was writing scores that are clearly "Brian Tyler Scores" and that are diametrically opposed to the scores that typify the Rick Berman era of Trek: big, complex, thematic, and bombastic (yes, there are some excellent exceptions to this, don't @ me).

"Canamar" sees Archer and Tucker mistakenly arrested and sent on a transport ship to a penal colony. During the episode, one of the prisoners, Kuroda, stages a break but in the process incapacitates the pilot of the ship. Towards the end of the episode, Archer tricks Kuroda by docking with a ship containing crew from Enterprise, which kicks off a fight inside the ship while both ships are entering a decaying orbit. Archer and company are eventually successful in getting the other prisoners off the ship, but Kuroda stays aboard the decaying ship saying he won't go back to Canamar.

Malcolm Reed, Travis Mayweather, and a third soldier firing energy weapons as they enter the prison ship

Tyler approaches this sequence with an all (orchestral) hands on deck approach that fits right in with much of his later work. A rhythmic vamp reminiscent of material in "Children of Dune" kicks off the action as Reed and company storm the prison ship. This is followed by a lengthy section of syncopated action writing augmented by chimes, percussion, and tolling bells, screeching horns and strings, and a primary thematic motif that would be at home in one of Tyler's Marvel scores.

The cue ends a little more quietly with a bit of an epilogue as Archer, Tucker, and company make it back to Enterprise safely. In classic Trek "put the bureaucrat in his place" fashion, Archer gives his "report" to the Enolian official on board:

Archer speaking forcefully to the Enolan official
"Kuroda's dead, the other eleven prisoners are under guard. As you're aware, my engineer and I were falsely arrested. We almost wound up in Canamar! Makes me wonder how many others don't belong there. You wanted a report? You've got one."