Future rednecks with future Remington shotguns
I actually disliked that they already had handheld "phase pistols" at the start. I know lots of people had a similar response at the time as you did to that, but to me it's like we have been using our basic projectile guns for 400 years ourselves. This is only 150 years in the future.
I'm not gonna create a YouTube channel to upload 45mn long videos of my bitter and jaded re:views alongside my alcoholic / diabetic friend (I'm not sure which I'd rather be) about it, it's a very minor detail and the Enterprise intro is obviously trying to blindside the viewer. To be honest, future shotgun is no more visually silly than some of those phaser rifles design(s) they had, especially on Voyager. I agree that the series sorta shot its whole load early in paying off the obvious expectations (hey guys, remember TELEPORTATION, TORPEDOS and SET TO STUN ?), or it feels this way.
I'm a bit torn : I kinda like the more archaic, army submarine style but it's also so bloody grey and expected. I must say however than jumping from Voyager : Endgame to Enterprise was massively refreshing. Except for the opening music, made me want to barf.
I'm still reeling from how bad Voyager : Endgame was. Time Travel Ex Machina shit + not so great premise and story + old people make up + cramming so much extraneous details while the main plot is already suffocating from the lack of any scope... And not having even a decent payoff at the end (I dunno, show Earth from space as the credit rolls. ANYTHING) is the killing blow. I thought they made a decent job of wrapping things up and overall direction for the final season up to that point too.