God is in the Details

by Janice L. Newman

After Star Trek’s incredible second season debut episode last week, we were on pins and needles. Would the episode hold up to the new standard set by “Amok Time”?

The episode starts out unpromisingly, with Kirk, McCoy, and Scotty ogling a pretty female lieutenant. Scotty invites her for coffee, and McCoy and Kirk exchange quips on how she’s just going to “get married and leave the service”.

Given later events in the episode, one can squint a bit and pretend that they’re talking about this specific crewperson, not women in general. Still, it was jarring, particularly in the context of “Balance of Terror”, where we saw a female officer getting married and still doing her job just fine.

The ship continues on its mission, only to be interrupted by what appears to be a giant hand floating in space, which reaches out to grab the ship. No matter what they try, they cannot break free of its grasp. The crew is sharp and competent here, a pleasure to watch. As they experiment, a floating head appears on the viewscreen. It hails them and begins to talk of welcoming them after a long wait. When Kirk tells it to release the ship, it says it will close its hand, increasing the pressure both inside and outside the ship. Kirk, having no choice in the face of this superior power, agrees to accede to the being’s demands.

Spock, in a refreshing change, remains in command aboard, while Kirk, Scotty, Chekov, McCoy, and the pretty lieutenant, Carolyn Palamas, join him in beaming down to the planet. Once there, they are greeted by the self-proclaimed god “Apollo”, who states that they will remain on the planet and worship him, herding flocks and playing the music of the pipes. It sounds like an idyllic, and very boring, life.

From the start, Apollo is much taken with Palamas. For a nominal ancient history scholar and archaeologist, she doesn’t seem terribly interested or excited about meeting a being that claims to be an actual god and who supposedly interacted with humans on earth 5000 years ago. She is excited when Apollo transforms her uniform into a shiny, pink, skin-baring outfit, though! (My reaction to having my clothes suddenly transformed into something else would not be, “Oh, it’s beautiful!” no matter how lovely the dress.) Apollo sweeps off with Palamas, leaving the remaining crewmembers to look for a way out.

Kirk, as is always the case when the Enterprise is in peril, doesn’t care about anything but getting his ship and crew back. He repeatedly defies Apollo, who punishes him in various painful ways. Scotty apparently loses his head trying to protect Palamas, and also challenges Apollo repeatedly, even going against Kirk’s orders to do so. All this defiance and punishment leads to the discovery that Apollo seems weakened after he shoots lightning bolts or otherwise displays his ‘godlike’ powers.

Meanwhile, the crew on the Enterprise have been looking for a way out. They are a pleasure to watch, with Spock issuing crisp orders and the crew following without question (a nice change from “The Galileo Seven”). Uhura even gets to do some soldering at one point!

Back on the planet, Kirk corners Palamas and orders her to spurn Apollo and break his heart, which will hopefully cause him to use his powers and weaken him enough to give them a chance. At first Palamas resists, but Kirk convinces her. She tells Apollo that he’s only interesting to her as a ‘specimen’, infuriating him and causing him to call a great storm.

The crew aboard the Enterprise is able to get a message through just in time. Kirk orders them to use the ‘holes’ they’ve been able to make to shoot through Apollo’s barrier and attack the source of his power on the planet. The crew obey, and great phaser beams come from the sky, focusing on the temple. Apollo screams at them to stop, but the phasers continue until the temple is left in ruins. Apollo weeps, turns his face to the sky, and lets himself dissolve as his fellow gods and goddesses did thousands of years before.

I think the best word to sum up this episode is: “uneven”. There were parts I liked very much. Anything with the crew being smart and competent was fun to watch. I found Apollo’s monologue at the end to be very affecting. And there were other small moments of brilliance, such as when McCoy complains at Chekov’s insistence on being thorough, saying, “Spock’s contaminating this boy, Jim.”

On the other hand, the subtle deprecation of women was not only frustrating, it didn’t make sense. Apollo calls Palamas, “Wise, for a woman.” As even the most cursory review of Greek mythology reminds us, the god of wisdom was a goddess: Athena. Add to this Kirk’s humanocentric speech to Palamas – strange, considering that his first officer isn’t human – and his line about finding “one god quite sufficient”, which felt artificial and forced in the context of the rest of the story. Scotty’s unprofessional buffoonery was more annoying than funny and Chekov’s really terrible wig was distracting.

Still, the episode as a whole was worth watching, and I’ll probably even catch it on the rerun this summer. As such, I give it three stars.

Update: Having just re-watched this episode in the summer re-runs, I've decided to increase my rating. While there are still a few irritating flaws, the episode as a whole was strong enough to hold up extremely well to a re-watch. Apollo's monologues in particular were very effective. Even knowing it was coming, I still got goosebumps when he talked about Hera spreading herself thin on the wind and later calling to his friends to take him. Palamas, too, seemed less like silly damsel and more like a woman struggling to protect her crewmates. When she initially goes with Apollo, it seems more appeasement than interest. It's only after Apollo's promise to raise her up and make her the mother of gods that she truly seems to become enamored with him, and as I said aloud to my friends, I'd go with him after a speech like that! And in the end, in the face of that temptation, she still does her job. Upon re-evaluation, I'm raising my rating to four stars.

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A finely tuned machine, or Deus ex Machina

by Lorelei Marcus

Something I have always appreciated about Star Trek is the seamless operation of the crew of the Enterprise. While on the bridge, one can always hear the murmur of radio chatter as various ship sections give their status reports. If a crewman has to leave his post, there is always another ready to take over at a moment's notice. Repair personnel can often be seen in the halls, patching up the damage after an attack. All of these details give the impression that the USS Enterprise is a plausible naval vessel, well-trained and well-run.

This became particularly apparent in this week's episode, when Spock is left in command of the ship, with no contact with the ground crew or his Captain, while in the grip of Apollo. All of the First Officer's actions are purely logical, of course, but the best part is seeing how his crew carries out the orders without fault or question. Everyone is competent at their station, providing innovative solutions to problems, like Uhura manually soldering a bypass circuit, or Sulu scanning the planet for major energy signals. I personally love the line Spock says when Sulu can't pinpoint the exact origin of the energy: "Simply scan where the energy is not, and use process of elimination to determine its origin." Such a simple, yet ingenious solution.

In addition to being smart and creative, the crew also works well under pressure (sometimes literally!) Even after the ship is almost crushed by Apollo, status and damage reports come flying left and right from the edges of the bridge. McCoy reports the situation in sick bay, Scotty states the strain on the engines, and Sulu notes how the ship has lost all speed. It's moments like these that remind me how good Star Trek can be. I can truly believe that the Enterprise is a highly trained military vessel, and one of the best on television, sci-fi and not. I'd like to see how Admiral Nelson's submarine would fare against Apollo's antics!

While the scenes on the Enterprise are excellent, the scenes that take place on Pollux IV are inconsistent, and so I give the episode three stars. But so long as the shipboard action remains as taut and believable as it was this episode, it will be hard for an episode to fall below that baseline.

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5000 YEARS OF LONGING

by Joe Reid

Do you remember the good old days?  Those times long ago, when men were more manly, and women were reserved.  I do.  Those were great times!  Should those times ever visit us again, I know that I for one would be overjoyed!  To reclaim the simple pleasures of life.  Those days when I felt truly alive.  Surrounded by people that loved and appreciated me.  They needed me, and I needed them. 
These are the sentiments that I hear from old (and not-so-old) folks reminiscing at the family gathering.  This sentiment was the very soul of the antagonist in this week’s episode of Star Trek, “Who Mourns for Adonais?”.

As I have stated in my previous observations, Mr. Rodenberry’s weekly excursion to the stars seeks to take us to far away places, to meet sensational characters, and to capture our eyes and minds in order to fill them both with images of who we are today in 1967.  I love that Star Trek gives me a positive vision of a future time, I hate that it at the same time shows me a negative image of who we are.  Of who I am.

In this episode we got to meet an honest to goodness god.  Not the “Gee-Oh-Dee” of the Good Book, although the title may cast allusions in that direction.  Apollo is the god the crew of the Enterprise must contend with and is he ever a handful!  I’d rather go twelve rounds with Ali than get into a fight with this bruiser.  Apollo remembers a time when he and others like him lived with humans.  5000 years ago to be exact!  They were times that Apollo remembered and loved.  When humans loved, worshiped and revered him.  When he loved them in return, guided them, cherished them.  The episode doesn’t go into detail on how the relationship between the gods and mankind was broken but is the very clear that the advent of humanity to his new home brings him hope that the relationship with mankind will be renewed.  It is this hope which is the root of the conflict in this episode.

In Apollo we see a wounded exile.  One given the hope that a bond as old as recorded history will be restored.  That he will be able to pick back up where he and the people of ancient times left off and go back to paradise.  In the end humanity wanted something different for themselves and the hoped-for reunion left Apollo in tears.

How much like Apollo are we?  We think back to times past and wish they were here again.  We hold on to temporary things as if they were permanent.  Whether those things be people, places, positions, patterns, or our own potential.  In reflection of this story, I must ask a question.  Who might the crew of the Enterprise have encountered on that world if Apollo had been able to move past his longing and desire for what he had long ago?  I leave the answer of that to your own imaginations, friends.  That question invites a second one.  Who might we be if we are able to let go of the past and accept people, places, positions, and potential as we find them today?  As they are right in front of our noses.  If we can answer that for ourselves, then we may no longer need to mourn what we lost.  We only need enjoy what is.

3 stars

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A Woman’s Place is on the Enterprise

by Robin Rose Graves

While at times Lt. Carolyn Palamas played into the stereotypes women often play in television, ultimately Star Trek went against expectations.

“One day [Lieutenant Palamas] will find the right man and off she'll go, out of the service,” McCoy observes at the start of this episode, mirroring what many viewers probably think upon seeing Scotty’s flirtatious invitation for coffee. This reflects a trend in our own world, as women are often expected to abandon their careers to focus on home and family when they marry. With this setup, I assumed the episode would conclude with Lt. Palamas abandoning all scientific pursuits for a man.

But Star Trek did not give in to social pressure!

The episode reaches its climax when Lt. Palamas, despite her love for Apollo, rejects him to preserve the Enterprise crew, suggesting there is more to a woman’s life than being an object of a man’s affections.

It’s also worth noting Lt. Uhura’s active presence in this episode. She is shown to be both competent and crucial to returning the crew to the Enterprise. Her plot reinforces the theme in this episode that women are just as important to the crew as the men. In Uhura's case, indispensable.

I rejoice thinking of the young girls who might be watching, who will admire both Lt Palamas and Lt. Uhura’s beauty, knowledge and capability and think “I, too, belong in science.”

Four stars.

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This article, we welcome Amber Dubin, an editor of a scientific journal who spends far too much time wondering if her 10 year old cat has become more human than she is.

She has a decidedly different opinion on the portrayal of Lieutenant Palamas than Robin…

Lackluster Elegy to a God

by Amber Dubin

My biggest problem with this episode is its inconsistent and disparaging narrative about the nature of women.

In a disappointing start to the episode, Captain Kirk and Dr. McCoy make a condescending observation about Lieutenant Palamas, that she's approaching that 'time in every woman's life' where she'll throw away her career for a marriage. Star Trek usually transcends the sexist zeitgeist of our time, so the presence of this message personally disillusioned me. Moreover when she betrays her crew the way it was foreshadowed, her seduction itself makes absolutely no sense. In an analogous scenario in the episode "Space Seed" the bewitching of the female Lieutenant is much more plausible. In "Space Seed," historian Marla McGivers has a documented obsession with powerful men throughout history; thus when Khan appears to step directly out of her fantasies and shows her intense interest, she is putty in his hands. Though the lieutenant here has had significantly less character development in her episode, even by what we do know about her, how easily Lieutenant Carolyn Palamas is seduced is nonsensical.

First, it is implausible that a 'typical space faring woman' like Palamas would want nothing more from life than to be offered a pretty dress and ruling status over a deserted planet. Second, Apollo's plan for seduction is as follows: 1) Show up half naked 2) alter her appearance without her permission 3) isolate her from everyone she knows 4) Call her beautiful four times and 5) Rank her among his previous conquests. If she was a lonely, bored shepherd woman like Apollo is used to impressing, this would be sufficient, but to imply that a woman whose job it was to study cultural evolution would be impressed by this culturally unevolved male display is insulting to both women and anthropologists. It's almost as if her character was written by a man who doesn't understand how to write a woman.

In stark contrast, the concurrent scenario on the bridge casts Uhura in the role of 'strong, dependable woman' in a way that's so jarring with the rest of the themes of this episode that one has to wonder if it was penned by a different hand. In trying to save the landing party, Uhura is tasked with a complex and delicate maneuver and Mr. Spock expresses respect for her intelligence and competence implicitly. Uhura is trusted to take care of herself and fulfill her duties, the exact opposite of how Scotty insists that Palamas is a helpless prop. It makes no sense to praise one woman for her intelligence on the ship, while in the presence of a God, a woman who reveals the same level of intellect is met with revulsion, outrage and literal divine wrath.

Overall, I felt personally let down by this episode because I feel like the narrative voices did not harmonize well and the resulting cacophony of misfiring ideals made for a lackluster elegy to a God.

Two stars.

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by Gideon Marcus

With Great Power…

There is much to both enjoy and to wince at in this episode.  It treads familiar ground, from "The Squire of Gothos" to "Space Seed" to "Charlie X".  But there is also a poignant message about outgrowing the need for external deities, and the folly of a godlike being of trying to force worship from a race that can no longer give it.

What really fascinated me about "Adonais" was its contradiction of Acton's Dictum, which says "Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely."

Apollo was a second-generation God, descendant of space traveling beings capable of projecting tremendous power. Yet, his race almost assuredly started out as baseline human.  This would be laughable in any other setting, since the odds of human beings evolving twice (John Campbell's beliefs notwithstanding) are vanishingly small–I'm not even convinced there is life on other worlds.  But in Star Trek, it's a given; q.v. "Miri" and "Return of the Archons", for instance.  For some reason, humans and even Earths exist all over the galaxy.

So it is not implausible that, say ten thousand years ago, Apollo's race was indistinguishable from us, complete with smog, network television, and bad wigs.  Then they developed space travel and scattered among the stars.  Some of them may have become the Metrons or the First Federation.  One group came to Earth and settled in Hellas.  They were, accordingly, worshiped and revered.

Yet they let that worship and reverence die!  Apollo's brood did not long mingle with mortals, instead repairing to Mount Olympus.  They didn't continue to demand adoration from the increasingly sophisticated philosophers and leaders of Greece and Rome.  They didn't search out another group of shepherds to lord over.  They simply left, even though, in the end, it meant their death.

Why didn't "superior power breed superior ambition (a la "Space Seed") in this case? I have an idea.

Apollo's god status is never disputed.  His story is taken at face value.  We've simply, as a species, outgrown him.  Why?

Because we are now gods. 

Take the Enterprise. While Apollo initially had the upper hand (haha), by the end of the episode, Kirk had at his command power equal to and even surpassing that of the Greek deity.  Humans are now at the level of Apollo and his cohorts.  To any primitive society, what else could we be but gods?

What a responsibility that is!  It is no wonder that the #1 rule of the Federation, the so-called "Prime Directive", is not to interfere with aboriginal cultures (first referenced, I think, in "Return of the Archons").  It is a wise rule given the stakes.

Perhaps Apollo's brood had this same rule.  Maybe a small group allowed themselves to give in to temptation for a little while, mingling with the Greeks they found so charming.  And then, realizing their corrupting influence, first removed themselves from direct interaction, and finally, from any contact at all.  Apollo might have been a dissenting vote, though in the end, he knows the same tragedy as his comrades.

Would that we not suffer the same fate!

Four stars.

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The next episode of Trek is TOMORROW! You won't want to miss it:

Here's the invitation!