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[March 22, 1968] (Two Things Only the People Anxiously Desire, Star Trek: "Bread and Circuses")

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Strange New Worlds?


by Janice L. Newman

In the first season of Star Trek, we saw the crew visit plenty of “strange new worlds”. From the rocky planet where they met The Man Trap to the caves of The Devil in the Dark to the green and deceptively-pleasant planet This Side of Paradise, they took us to places we’d never been and introduced us to thoughtful, interesting ideas. Even when sets were more familiar locales (Miri, Tomorrow is Yesterday, and The City on the Edge of Forever come to mind) the stories were usually fresh and interesting.

In the second half of the second season, we’ve been seeing a new trend, perhaps based on ideas first introduced in “Miri”: planets which have, for one reason or another, evolved to look almost exactly like Earth at some point in history. A Piece of the Action took us to Prohibition-era Chicago. Patterns of Force brought the crew to Nazi Germany. And this week’s episode took us to a ‘modernized’ version of ancient Rome.


The story opens with the Enterprise seeking out the survivors from a ship that was hit by a meteorite six years ago. They track the trajectory of the debris back to a planet and Kirk, Spock, and McCoy beam down to seek out any survivors. They immediately encounter a group of escaped slaves, members of a sun-worshiping cult, who agree to help them. Before they manage to get near the city, though, they are captured and imprisoned. They’re greeted by Merik, the captain of the lost vessel and now “First Citizen”, and Proconsul Claudius Marcus, who knows much more than he should about who they are and why they’re there.

Claudius tries to force Captain Kirk to call down the crew of his ship. When Kirk refuses, Claudius orders Spock and McCoy thrown into the ‘arena’ for a televised battle. The set is a fun merging of modern culture and ancient Roman aesthetics. As Kirk watches with helpless frustration, Spock unwillingly fights against the gladiator assigned to him while McCoy is fortunately assigned Flavius, a “Brother of the Sun” who tries to refuse violence, even as he is “encouraged” to fight by a guard wielding a whip. The “Amok Time” fight theme is well-integrated here, and it makes for an exciting scene. In the end Spock defeats his opponent and rescues McCoy by giving Flavius a Vulcan neck pinch to knock him out.

Spock and McCoy are returned to their cell, where Spock visibly agonizes over their separation, repeatedly trying the bars and looking for a way out. McCoy sheepishly tries to thank Spock for saving his life, which Spock responds to with replies clearly meant to needle and annoy the good doctor. It’s nice to see their roles reversed for once, with Spock doing the deliberate antagonizing. McCoy responds by getting in Spock’s face and hissing out a pointed jab at Spock’s vulnerabilities. Spock’s quiet response, which manages to combine acknowledgement and defiance in two words and a lifted eyebrow, is a work of art. This is my favorite scene in the episode, and one of my favorite scenes in all of Star Trek so far. All of the ‘old married couple’ arguing and mutual antagonism we’ve seen in prior episodes between the ‘heart’ and ‘mind’ of the Enterprise come together to shape this moment of intense intimacy.

Meanwhile, Kirk is brought to a luxurious bedchamber and offered the use of an eager female slave. He doesn’t refuse.


Ah, there's Roddenberry's influence

Claudius returns to Kirk a few hours later in a rather nice transition and tells him he is to be executed on national television. Scotty, who has not been idle on the Enterprise, delivers a careful blow to the city’s electrical system, blacking everything just long enough for Kirk to get away and return to the prison (where he tells his two officers that their captors ‘threw him a few curves’, haha). Merick redeems himself by tossing Kirk a communicator, and the three men beam back to the Enterprise in the nick of time, leaving the Roman planet behind.


Credit where it's due–the escape scene is masterful

And so it’s all over but the shouting, or rather, the final pun: the sun worshippers don’t worship the sun, they worship the son – as in, the son of god. Cue smiles from some of the Christians in the audience and an eyeroll or two from the Jewish and non-religious viewers.

Did I like this episode? There were many things to like, starting with the scene between McCoy and Spock, which is a five if taken by itself. There were definitely some things to dislike, such as the ‘sun/son’ setup and Kirk’s unhesitating willingness to take advantage of the attractive female slave offered to him. Overall, though, the cinematography, use of library music, and use of sets and props was a cut above the usual. The episode was well-paced and exciting, and Shatner’s acting was more understated than usual. Despite a couple of things dragging it down, I give it four stars.

The Unbroken Planet


by Joe Reid

We tend to think of heroes as powerful people who use their powers to right the wrongs of the world.  Star Trek has provided us with heroes that always right wrongs.  When Jim Kirk gets to a new world and finds something amiss, he will do everything possible to make sure that baddies are struck down and peace is restored.  This has been especially true when the cause of the disturbance on a planet was a human, or even worse… a Klingon!  This season we had two examples of Starfleet people purposefully taking control of native populations for their own benefit.  In “Patterns of Force”, John Gill literally turned the inhabitants of one planet into Nazis in order to “help” them.  Then, in “The Omega Glory”, we had Ron Tracey ruling over one faction of humans to eradicate another in order to gain immortality.  Both stories took place on Earth-like planets which boasted histories divergent from our own.  Each story ended with Captain Kirk dealing with the corrupting influence and setting the cultures back on course. 

This week’s “Bread and Circuses” started off much the same as the mentioned episodes.  Some Starfleet person was stuck on a very Earth-like planet with a divergent history.  The crew had a similar obligation as before; to get the space people off the planet before they ruin the people of that world and pervert their development.  Here is where the similarities end.  “Bread and Circuses” turns that recurrent theme on its ear.  Instead of the inhabitants of a planet having to contend with a strong and smart human dominating them, this time it was the weak human, Captain Merik of the SS Beagle, who was dominated by the strong and intelligent Proconsul Marcus.  Marcus overpowered Merik’s mind and will, causing him to sacrifice most of his crew to gladiatorial games in order to save himself.


Puppet and master

Previous episodes on this theme had Kirk seeking to find an alien titan like himself and remove them from power.  This world already had a home-grown titan, who corrupted and broke the man Kirk was looking for.  There was nothing for Kirk to set right on this world.  The humans were the victims, not the victimizers this time.  Kirk found himself outmatched by Proconsul Marcus.  He was captured, threatened, and made powerless by Marcus, just like Merik was before, although Kirk put up more of a fight than Merik did, earning some degree of respect from Marcus.  Marcus was eventually going to break him, as well, given enough time.  The mission ended with Kirk, Spock, and McCoy fleeing for their lives and Merik dying from a knife to his back after a last-minute act of failed heroism. 

This was the one time where the captain of the Enterprise could not fix the problem on a world.  It’s mainly because there was no problem to fix, at least none that he was legally allowed to fix. The society on the planet was progressing down its natural evolutionary path.  Human intervention didn't topple the wagon.  Humans ended up run over by the wagon, which carried on unabated.  “Bread and Circuses” had a subversive twist on what had preceded it in the other episodes.  It felt original, even though some themes started off appearing reused before the twist came about.  In total, the costumes, acting, sets, camera work, and story were all done well.  It was pretty good. 

4 stars

Don't throw back the throwback


by Gideon Marcus

David Levinson, who tends to write letters in after the fact rather than contribute directly to our Trek coverage, noted recently that he was starting not to care if the show got renewed for a third season. We had run into a pretty dire patch of episodes, after all. But between last week and this week, his faith is somewhat restored.

Mine, too.  I observed early on that "Bread and Circuses" felt more like a first-season episode than any of its second-season brethren.  Perhaps it was the copious use of outdoor settings, or Shatner's return to first season form.  Maybe it was Ralph Senensky's crisp direction (he may well supplant Marc Daniels as my favorite on the show).  Maybe it was the collaboration of the two Genes, Roddenberry and Coon, who reeled in each other's excesses rather than adding to them.

I also absolutely adored the fusion of gladiatorial games and modern television.  It was subtle satire in the Sheckley or even Pohl/Kornbluth vein.


Not much different from a boxing match or football game

The one missed opportunity was setting the planet on a near-Earth rather than an exact duplicate, a la "Miri."  I've always liked Lorelei's idea that the galaxy is largely populated by Earth-clones (for some unknown reason) and that's why we get these close parallel history episodes.  Having a completely different planet evolve humans, let alone 20th Century Romans, beggared the imagination.

On the other hand, as our newcomer, Blue Cathey-Thiele explains, maybe it's not so implausible after all…

Four stars on my end.  There are some hiccoughs in the episode, but they're lumped early on, and you've forgotten them by the conclusion.

Bread, Circuses, and Laurel Leaves


By Mx. Blue Cathey-Thiele

In "Bread and Circuses", McCoy comments that the Romans had no sun worshippers. He may need to brush up on his history – or even just ship logs! Earlier this season in "Who Mourns For Adonais", the crew met Apollo on Pollux IV, and while many Roman deities shared traits but not names with their Greek counterparts, the god of music and the sun was known as Apollo to both cultures.

And this raises an interesting question: could the wayward god have stopped over at this planet on his way to Pollux IV? It would go a long way in explaining its many similarities to both modern and ancient Earth. Whether he visited alone or with the rest of his pantheon, his powers would have been enough to leave a lasting impression. A world built to suit the needs of a deity who thrived in Greece and Rome close to two millennia ago, by the time the Enterprise shows up. In fact, a better question might be, why would Apollo ever leave?

Perhaps it was not him, but one of his cohort. He was the last of his kind, and while he said that gods do not die the way mortals do, they fade. Per his account, one of the goddesses spread herself thinner and thinner until she was gone. Could some part of her have found this world and influenced its development? Remained there as things like the industrial revolution came along, the invention of television, while her diminished presence ensured that the Roman Empire kept a firm grip on society?


The ex-senator explains why he no longer worships Apollo

The inhabitants even spoke English! Having a lingual origin of Latin would greatly increase the chances of a language developing with even a slight similarity to the form of English currently spoken. Who better to serve as a source of this language than someone who was there when the people around him used it on a daily basis? Apollo (or his shadowy companion) would be a living dictionary.

We can even guess about the stirrings of the "Son (not sun) of God". Apollo stayed long enough on Earth for belief to fade in him and his fellow gods of Olympus. He would have been around to hear of an emerging belief system, particularly one that was in competition to his own status. Apollo was hardly shy about sharing his own history, and if he mentioned this Earth faith, someone, somewhere would take interest.

To this viewer, a powerful visitor leaving a lasting influence on the planet seems far more likely than running across yet another example of "Hodgkin's Law of Parallel Planetary Development" in such a short span of time.

4 stars.




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Science Fiction/Fantasy, TV

[March 14, 1968] Bugs in the machine (Star Trek: "The Ultimate Computer")

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The MT Soul


by Joe Reid

Brothers and sisters, I am quite simply over the moon.  I feel rewarded and fulfilled due to what I just witnessed.  Above all else, I feel something that I haven’t felt in a while as a lover of Star Trek.  I feel respected.  As I enjoy the last few sips of my cocktail, I take pleasure in divulging my thoughts on “The Ultimate Computer”.  It was very good!  The end.


Liquor infused levity aside, I suppose I am obligated to expand on my thoughts.  The episode got off to a roaring start, with the Enterprise arriving at a space station with a visibly upset Kirk having been summoned to that station sans explanation.  When Kirk asked for an explanation, he was told that his explanation would be beamed aboard.  Commodore Wesley beamed in, someone who both Kirk and Spock appeared acquainted with.  Wesley told them that they were to participate in war games to test a new computer that would be installed on the Enterprise, replacing most of the crew.  Twenty crew members would be left aboard.

After the new M5 multitronic unit was installed, shrinking the crew, we met the tall and off-putting Dr. Richard Daystrom, creator of the M5.  He was a man lacking several human pleasantries, in that he was dismissive of people but very focused on and protective of the M5.  The two most human members of the crew, Bones and Scotty, caught Daystrom’s ire in the subsequent exchanges, demonstrating his preference for machines over men.


The new sheriff in town.

As the new M5 equipped Enterprise started its tour, it made a trip to a planet.  M5 took extra initiative, navigating the ship into its orbit and even picking assignments for an away team. It excluded Kirk and Bones, who it deemed to be unnecessary for the mission.  This bothered Kirk, who was already feeling put upon, having a computer taking on more of this job than he surmised.  The M5 also started turning off parts of the ship that were absent of crew members for some unknown reason.

Leaving the planet, the ship found itself under a sneak attack as a part of the war games Wesley had planned.  The M5 took complete control of the Enterprise, dispatching the attackers swiftly with weapons at 1% power as the exercise demanded.  This earned the M5 a success report from Wesley and Kirk a (perhaps joking) slight from the commodore, when Wesley called Kirk Captain “Dunsel”; dunsel referring to a part on a ship that serves no purpose.


"Good job, Captain Useless!"

Things were looking good for the M5 and Daystrom was very pleased with the outcomes, while Kirk flirted with depression at the thought of the day’s events.  It was at this time that the M5 took a bad turn, starting by its destroying (unprovoked) an automated ore freighter.  The crew quickly became adversarial toward the M5, which now had completely taken control of the ship.  All efforts to get control back from the rogue computer failed, even costing an engineer (not Scotty, thank heaven) his life.


Posthumous hazard pay is in order.

Daystrom was undeterred in his defense of his creation, not wanting to disconnect the M5, a sentiment which didn't change even as the real war games started when M5, using weapons at 100%, utterly defeated a group of starships and killed everyone on the Excalibur.  Daystrom didn’t even try to stop his creation until the M5 was threatened with destruction by the other ships.


Here comes the Piper.

In the end, it took Kirk, using his ironclad logic against the M5, which contained Daystrom’s embedded fears but also his morality, to prevail.  He prevented an attack not using the wizardry of technology, but by trusting in the intelligence, will, and heart of men.  Proving that spaceships still need men at the helm.

I loved this episode.  It had great acting, fantastic camera direction, an intelligent original story, and best of all, there was little to no exposition to explain what was happening to the audience.  We had to infer what everything meant based on the story elements provided.  Again, it was very good.

5 stars.

Homo ex machina


by Gideon Marcus

Star Trek, like much science fiction, often tries to convey messages in its stories.  Sometimes, it does so hamfistedly, other times contradictorily.  In "The Ultimate Computer", the show presented not one, but two themes simultaneously, and did so with subtlety and cleverness. Bravo.

Firstly, "Computer" addresses the specter of automation.  The episode does not endorse Luddism.  It is clear that someday at least some of the 430 jobs on the Enterprise will be performed by computer–indeed, halfway through the episode, the ship comes across a completely robot-controlled DY-500.  In other words, M-5's revolution is not the automation of spaceships, but the next development in their automation.

The dialogue between Bones and Kirk on the captain's impending obsolescence, as well as the undercurrent of tension between the captain and Commodore Wesley (who puts on a blustery front, but probably is no happier about M-5's ramifications than Kirk), are some of the best parts of the episode.

It should also be noted, that whenever computers have gone amok, it is not their fault: in "The Changeling", Nomad's functioning got cross-contaminated with Tan Ru's.  In "Court Martial", the ship's computer is deliberately tampered with by Ben Finney.  Even Landru in "Return of the Archons" only did what it was programmed to do.  In other words, computers are useful, inevitable, and desirable tools.

But this is not just a story of steam replacing sail, or iron horses replacing ponies.  It's about what happens when too much reliance is placed on automation without sufficient involvement of humans.  It's a cautionary tale in the same vein as Failsafe (the book or the movie).  No matter how sophisticated computers get, or what shortcuts their developers take to leapfrog their development, in the end, humans are necessary–to guide them, to control them, to maximize the utility of them.


The missing link–sane oversight.

One can quibble over details; this story was told in a dramatic way so as to get its point across in 50 minutes, and in doing so, there are some inconsistencies and some let-downs (the final confrontation between Kirk and the M5 is about two exchanges too short).  But for me, "The Ultimate Computer" feels like a return to form, one of the rare episodes of the second season that recaptured the essence of the first in feel, in technical proficiency, and coherence.

Four and a half stars.

Annoyingly Predictable


by Erica Frank

The M-5 is supposed to be able to run a ship normally crewed by four hundred with just 20 people. Of course, that turns out to be a lie, not because it can't, but because it doesn't bother with little details like, oh, following regulations, obeying the captain, and not killing people.

How the hell did this computer get approved for take-control-of-a-starship testing? And when Daystrom started to make excuses for it ("You don't shut off a child when it makes a mistake!"), why didn't Kirk immediately reply with, "You don't give a child command of a starship, either. And if a child grabs control of the family car and rams into another car – you don't let the child keep control. Shut this off NOW, or we'll start shooting our phasers into its circuit banks."

("But that would leave us floating dead in space!" he might answer. And Kirk could respond, "I'm sure someone will be along shortly to pick us up.")

Instead, Kirk lets it keep control long enough to kill over 60 people before getting Daystrom out of the way. Then he manages to use third-grade logic to get it to shut itself down: "What is the penalty for murder?" "Death." (Except we know otherwise – the only crime in the Federation with a death penalty was visiting Talos IV.) Unable to cope with the awareness that it violated its internal morality, it collapses.

…Where was that logic when it was shooting at the other ships? Why didn't the super-computer recognize the "laws of God and man" before it had broken them? Why didn't Kirk insist Daystrom talk it out of shooting before it had killed anyone? Shouldn't its logic work faster and more efficiently than a human's?

But we wouldn't get much story if the M5 had immediately recognized it was stuck between "defend myself" and "kill humans, whose protection is my purpose." So it couldn't notice that until the damage was done, its creator was unconscious, and Kirk was earnestly explaining exactly what it had done wrong.

As Snoopy might say: Bleah.

Just as dull as all the "psychic powers create sadistic manipulators" stories.

The acting was good. The story pacing was good. The explanations of the technology were good. Yet another "I liked everything but the plot" episode. Two stars.

Hey McCoy – got another Finagle's Folly lying around? I could use a drink.


"Here's to Erica, at least."



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TV

[March 12, 1968] Be Seeing You (The Prisoner)

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The weekly news is up!  Please watch, enjoy, and mail in your comments to the station!


by Mx. Kris Vyas-Myall

Television and Films over the last few years have been littered with spies. Many of them have been forgettable but one was ahead of the pack: Danger Man.

Example image of Danger Man showing McGoohan as John Drake

Starring the brilliant Patrick McGoohan as John Drake, it took a more cynical and grounded look at the world of secret agents, compared with the more fantastical exploits of James Bond or John Steed.

We were meant to be getting a new series of Drake’s adventures, produced in full colour for the American market. Instead, we heard, he was concentrating on a new espionage series, The Prisoner. I had expected some cross between the former show and The Fugitive. What we got was quite different.

Shot of The Village where the residents are chess pieces on the board

After resigning, the un-named McGoohan is transported to a village. There he is assigned the Number Six and the authorities try to either probe him for information or get him to do their dirty work. So far this could have been an episode of Danger Man similar to "Colony Three". But there are much stranger elements.

Firstly, the whole village is not simply an island prison, it has the unnerving sense of enforced jollity. Which makes it more unnerving. I found myself reminded of the planet in Doctor Who’s Macra Terror, with both having that holiday camp feeling with dark tensions underneath.

Number Six goes down to the beach to look at another resident who has been dragged ashore by Rover.

Then, we have Rover, the Village’s loyal “Attack Bubble”. It should not be scary for a giant roaring soap sud to be scary, but the way that people are trapped within it, straining to get out makes for a terrifying image.

There is also the governance of The Village, where (in spite of a system of elections and councils) the power lays with “Number Two”, a figure who changes each week (or even multiple times in a week) with their own different experiments.

Number Six dressed as Sherlock Holmes on a fairground ride.
Just another day in the strange life of Number Six

As the series progresses it gets stranger in its plots. We have duplicate number sixes, dream journeys, trips to Old West, not to mention the world’s strangest martial arts. Over the seventeen episodes McGoohan moves us from a man trying to escape into the surreality we would more expect from The Corridor People or Do Not Adjust Your Set.

Number Six on the operating table with a probe pointed at his head.
You WILL enjoy The Prisoner

These offbeat choices may have put some people off but I enjoyed them, albeit with a couple of caveats. It would sometimes go too much into trying to be direct satire, rather that something more broad and nebulous, particularly in McGoohan’s directed episodes. These tended to work less well as it felt like to author was trying to pontificate to the audience and never gave a sense that this world had an existence outside of serving these points.

The other, is that, all these choices played against trying to give a solid finish to the story. For example, we are shown two characters and told that they both represent forms of rebellion. One we are not sure if we have seen before (the actor appeared previously but the character may be new) and the other only a couple of times in a position of authority. In a less experimental format I could see these challenges being overcome and a tighter solution put together.

A group of hooded and masked people dancing.
All the different factions celebrating the show.

However, as an experiment it is still one I enjoyed seeing and exploring the fascinating setup from McGoohan and co.

A high four stars


by Fiona Moore

Lots of people who tuned in to The Prisoner and watched to the end are, apparently, disappointed. Those people are missing the point. The Prisoner isn’t a spy series, or an sf series, or a metaphor… and yet, it is all of those things. The Village is a real place… and yet it’s also a state of mind, a cloying conformity that, as the series itself demonstrates, could be found in London or the Wild West as much as in Portmeirion, where the series was actually filmed. The point many critics are missing is, The Prisoner is first and foremost a Rorshach test.


Make of him what you will.

Even the most straightforward episode of The Prisoner can be interpreted through multiple lenses. Want to see it as a spy series, a kind of Manchurian Candidate with extra surreal elements? As a spoof of spy series, dialling the conceits of Danger Man or James Bond up to maximum so the viewer is confronted with how ridiculous they actually are? As a Jungian exploration of one man’s psyche, and how it crumbles under the strain of atomic-age paranoia? As a metaphor for childhood, and the way in which we go from complete dependence on our parents to adolescent rebellion to (one hopes) a more balanced adulthood? As a twisted, op-art version of the Tibetan afterlife, as the soul refuses the temptation to return to the Wheel of Samsara and eventually seeks peaceful oblivion in Nirvana? You can find all of those in there. But you’re also never going to find one interpretation that fits the series throughout, because that’s not what it’s all about.


Is this the real Village?

The fact that the series’ ending is chaotic and strange is, therefore, perfectly in keeping with that. You could see “Fall Out” as a commentary on rebellion, or on nuclear proliferation, or on the relationship of the id to the ego and the superego. You could also just sit back and let the imagery flow past you, and draw from it the meaning that personally speaks to you, that allows you to relate the series to your own life and the personal and political struggles you face in the turbulent and strange times we live in.


No, it doesn't have to make sense.

The point is not to over-interpret, or to seek a prescriptive meaning for the series. Does it always succeed? No. But does it fail? Only if you wanted a story with a nice neat ending, where The Prisoner is (definitely) John Drake and Number One is some bald-headed type in a Nehru suit stroking a fluffy cat. Otherwise, I’d say just turn on, tune in, and enjoy where the ride takes you.


The Prisoner and friends enjoying the ride.

Six..er..four out of five stars.




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Science Fiction/Fantasy, TV

[March 10, 1968] The Best Laid Plans (Doctor Who: The Web Of Fear [Part 2])

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By Jessica Holmes

The latest serial of Doctor Who tempers the base-under-siege formula with an infusion of ‘whodunnit’, but is this a fresh take on the format or are the mystery elements just a red herring? Let’s take a look at the latter half of The Web Of Fear.

EPISODE FOUR

The episode kicks off with a Yeti attack, with the beast absconding with Professor Travers and leaving Anne unconscious on the floor.

Meanwhile, the Doctor and company pursue Chorley in the hopes of preventing him from getting to the TARDIS, but there’s no sign of him in the tunnels. In fact, thanks to the rapidly encroaching fungus it’s completely impossible to get to the TARDIS. Wherever Chorley is, he’s not there.

They return to the base to find the aftermath of Travers’ kidnapping, and the Doctor wonders why the Yeti didn’t just kill him. Unless, of course, the Great Intelligence needed him for something.

With the situation growing more dire by the minute, the Colonel decides to lead an expedition over the surface to reach the TARDIS, load it onto a trolley, and send it back through the tunnels.

It does not go well.

The below-ground half of the mission immediately goes down the drain, with two men (Staff Sgt. Arnolds [Jack Woolgar] and another bloke whose name I failed to write down) dying in the attempt to send a trolley through a web-infested tunnel.

As for the surface, it’s a total bloodbath. Well, web-bath. The Colonel takes a couple dozen men up there, and a few action-packed scenes later, he’s the only one to make it back alive, empty-handed.

Meanwhile, the Doctor and Anne get to work on trying to find a way to control the Yeti. However, two of the Yeti control figurines go missing, and the Doctor works out that the Yeti are using them as homing devices.

What’s more, the Doctor collected a sample of the fungus earlier, but it seems to have mysteriously vanished—and the last person who laid hands on it was Evans.

Needing additional supplies in order to build a remote control for the Yeti-sphere, the Doctor persuades the Colonel’s subordinate, Captain Knight, to accompany him to the surface so he can pop to the shops.

This also does not go well.

As it turns out, Knight (unbeknownst to him) has one of the missing Yeti figurines, and the monsters find the pair in a matter of minutes. Knight is no match for a couple of Yeti, and promptly gets himself killed. The Doctor only survives because (I can only guess) the Great Intelligence calls them off at the last second. It seems the Great Intelligence’s plans for the Doctor are a little more sophisticated than simple murder.

The Colonel stumbles back to the base not long after the Doctor, and finds that he has the other missing figurine in his pocket. No wonder the surface mission went so badly.

The Doctor realises that the Yeti could be still homing in on the Colonel as they speak, but before the Colonel can destroy the figurine, the door bursts open.

In walk a pair of Yeti…and who should be with them but Professor Travers?

That’s an excellent twist, and had me eagerly anticipating the next episode.

EPISODE FIVE

I have good news and bad news. The good news is that Travers hasn’t suddenly turned out to be a secret evil mastermind. The bad news is that he’s being possessed by the Great Intelligence.

And the Great Intelligence has plans for the Doctor. It’s not particularly cross about the Doctor defeating it in Tibet. However, the Doctor caught his attention there, and the Great Intelligence is fascinated by the Doctor’s mind. So fascinated, it wants it for its own.

The process of stealing his mind won’t kill the Doctor, but it will more or less turn his brain into soup, and who knows what the GI might be getting up to while the Doctor is re-learning how to stand on two feet and eat solid food.

While the Doctor mulls over whether or not to give himself up, the Intelligence takes Victoria captive. Poor girl needs to take some self-defence lessons. She must be sick of being used as a bargaining chip every week.

As tempting as the offer is, the Doctor would rather take an option that doesn’t involve everyone being killed or his mind turning into mush.

While he works with Anne to try and get the control unit working, Jamie and the Colonel sneak out of the base to try and find where the Yeti have taken Victoria and Travers.

Evans puts his brain cell to work investigating the potential mole situation, and comes to the conclusion that it must be Jamie or the Colonel. And what does he do with this information? Holds them at gunpoint then crumples like a wet paper bag when the pair more or less roll their eyes and walk away. I can like a character who is smart but not brave. I can like a character who is brave but not smart. I have great difficulty liking a character who is neither.

Elsewhere in the Underground, the Intelligence is nice enough to let Travers have his mind back for the time being and Victoria catches him up on what he’s missed. He also discovers that Staff Sgt. Arnold still lives, and sends him to bring word of their location back to the Doctor. You may wonder why he doesn’t just go with him, but apparently the Yeti would notice. I mean, the Yeti didn’t notice him carrying on a full conversation with a third party, so maybe he needn’t have worried.

And if they did notice, so what? It’s not as if they can run very fast.

The Doctor and Anne manage to get their control sphere working, as well as a couple of remote controls, one of them voice activated. They find themselves a lone Yeti and swap out its control sphere for their own. Nice, now they can use the Intelligence’s own weapon against it!

However, they’re running out of time. The Intelligence gave the Doctor twenty minutes to hand himself over…but the fungus isn’t as patient.

EPISODE SIX

The Doctor and Anne, reasoning that they don’t know who they can trust, decide to conceal their feat of controlling a Yeti, and send theirs away. They’ll use it when the time is right. They reunite with the rest of the group, surprised to find that Arnold is alive. Everyone’s here except Evans, and that’s pretty dangerous if one of you is in league with the Intelligence. Sure enough, the Yeti surround them moments later.

Now would be a good time for Evans to find his courage and mount a rescue, but he has a Slinky where his spine should be. His cowardice doesn’t save him from being captured, however.

With some help from the Colonel, Arnold slips away from the Yeti as the group travel to the Intelligence’s base in hopes of finding help. Along the way, he discovers another unexpected survivor—the irritating journalist, Chorley.

The Doctor tells Jamie about his plan to control the Yeti, though he does have a little problem: he’s not sure which Yeti is his. Jamie will just have to get lucky. Failing that, he’ll have to run really fast, because he’s going to slip away from the group and try and find that Yeti.

These Yeti aren’t very observant, are they? Can’t even do a headcount before moving on to the next location.

They take the Doctor a little ahead of the group, which handily gives him the opportunity to freeze the Yeti escorting him and tamper with the device that will be used to scoop his brain out. And, for plot reasons, to avoid anyone else finding this out.

As for Jamie’s attempt to find the Doctor’s Yeti, it doesn’t go well. And he doesn’t even get a chance to run away.

It looks like the Doctor is going to lose his mind.

With everyone gathered in the Intelligence’s base, we finally find out who the mole is, courtesy of Chorley. It’s not him. It’s Arnold.

Who ever would have guessed?

Me. Actually no, I tell a lie. Before Arnold turned up alive I was half expecting it to be Anne.

…It made sense in my head. I’m a Holmes but not a Sherlock.

Much to Jamie’s consternation, the Doctor willingly puts on a silly hat (or mind-stealing helmet, potato po-tah-to) and sits inside the Intelligence’s device. It looks like a glass pyramid. The Intelligence likes its pyramids, doesn’t it?

What happens next illustrates the importance of communication. The Doctor has a plan, you see. He’s tinkered with the mind-stealing device so that rather than losing his mind, the process will be reversed, stealing the Intelligence’s mind and neutralising it for good.

But Jamie, suddenly faced with the responsibility of raising a 400-year-old baby, doesn’t know that, and panics. He still has the voice control device, so he yells into it, hoping that one of the many Yeti gathered in the room will obey him.

As luck would have it, one does. And as much as the Doctor tries to resist being rescued, eventually Jamie drags him out of the pyramid. Said pyramid then short-circuits and explodes, leaving the Intelligence without a connection to Earth, and the Doctor very put out.

Well, at least the Intelligence is gone…for now. And his puppet, Arnold, is dead. He seems to have been deep fried, but the Doctor suspects he’s been dead for quite some time; likely since before he even arrived.

How grim.

The Doctor makes an abrupt departure as Chorley starts to take an interest in him, promptly getting himself and his companions lost in the now fungus-free tunnels. They’d better work out where the TARDIS is soon…or the trains might beat them to it!

Final Thoughts

So, that was The Web Of Fear. It’s a good solid serial, well-paced with a decent cast of characters. That said, some of the characters were definitely more fun to watch than others.

Most of the soldiers were completely uninteresting which doesn’t really matter because they were more or less Yeti-fodder. Still, I might have cared a bit more whenever any of them died if any of them had much personality. Evans and Chorley are both too irritating for their own good, and I was actually hoping they’d end up on the wrong end of a Yeti, but alas we can’t always get what we want.

Anne’s great though, I hope she pops up again, like her father. The Colonel was pretty cool too, I like his ‘get stuff done’ attitude. I wouldn’t mind seeing him again.

As for the Intelligence, I have a thought or two. It’s got no body, could be thousands of years old, can control people’s minds, and we don’t know where he came from. And yet I don’t think it’s scary enough. The Yeti are just too cuddly for me to take them, and by extension the Intelligence, as a serious threat. Maybe the Intelligence should start a cult, get itself some servants that aren’t eminently huggable.

The mystery made an otherwise quite standard plot a little more interesting, though I’m not sure Arnold being the mole is a particularly satisfying conclusion. He’s not much of a character. In fact, I didn’t think to mention him when covering the first half of this serial because he was such a non-entity. He wasn’t even nefarious, no motivation of his own, just a meat puppet for the Intelligence. That’s just not as much fun as a willing accomplice.

Assuming the trio don’t get splatted by a train, I look forward to seeing what adventures are in store next time on Doctor Who.




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Science Fiction/Fantasy, TV

[March 8, 1968] Inglorious (Star Trek: "The Omega Glory")

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by Gideon Marcus

Last year, Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry won science fiction's highest award, the Hugo, for writing the two-part episode "The Menagerie".  It was a deserved laurel.  After all, he not only had written the excellent pilot that formed the germ of the double-show, but also made a reasonably interesting extension to fit the new format.

Unfortunately, Roddenberry has yet to reach that high water mark again.  Despite having plenty of screenwriting experience, he seems to only have had that one good story in him.  First, there was his disappointing adaptation of "A Private Little War", originally by Jud Crucis (that's got to be a kind of Cordwainer Bird).  And now, we have his worst outing yet–"The Omega Glory":

The setup should be interesting.  Kirk, Spock, McCoy, and the red-shirted Lieutenant GAWLway beam aboard the abandoned but undamaged starship Exeter in orbit around an uncharted planet.  Everyone onboard has been reduced to crystals–sort of a reverse "Man Trap" phenomenon.  This seems shocking to Kirk and co. despite having seen a very similar phenomenon just last episode.  Obeying the exhortations of a tape by the mortally ill Exec of the Exteter (who, like Spock, is apparently a double-duty officer), they beam down to the planet.


"Save yourselves!  Go down to the planet!  I dunno why we don't, but you go ahead!"

There, they meet Captain Ron Tracey, the second active-duty Starfleet captain we've seen other than Kirk (we met four others in "Court Martial", at least one of whom had graduated to Starbase running).  According to Tracey, the planet confers immunity to the disease that killed his entire crew when the rest of the landing party beamed back aboard.  Also, the planet somehow makes all the inhabitants live life spans measured in millennia.

In the six months since Tracey beamed down, he teamed up with the 'Coms', "yellow" city-dwellers under siege by the savage "white" people.  Flagrantly violating the Prime Directive, more explicitly spelled out here than in any episode prior, he exhausted his hand phaser defending the village.


"We drained four of our phasers, and they still came. We killed thousands and they still came."

Now that Kirk is here, Tracey wants to go into the immortality bottling business, distilling the essence of the anti-disease and anti-aging qualities of the planet.

Except, as Bones soon figures out, there is no such thing.  The immunity is a natural (and permanent) phenomenon, and the natives live a long time because of freak genetics resulting from the near-total bacteriological catastrophe that wiped out civilization centuries before.

That's one thread of the episode.  The other involves finding out that this is a parallel Earth, like "Miri", and the 'Yangs' are the descendants of Americans (white ones, of course), adopting the ways of the Indians in order to survive, but carrying a corrupted tradition of Founding Father document worship.  Thus, they mangle the Pledge of Allegiance and the Constitution's preamble without understanding.  Luckily, Kirk is an avid historian, and he explains what these holy words really mean.  He also insists that the Coms (what's left of them–it appears the Yangs have killed nearly all of them by the end) are people too, and they need to be treated with the dignity and equality prescribed by our nation's most central document.


"This document is absolutely perfect as is.  It's a good thing you never made any changes to it."

And then they beam back to the Enterprise.  Happy endings for everyone.

Except the audience, of course.

So much about this show doesn't make sense, from the lack of children, to the paucity of population centers, to the way genetics and natural immunity works on the planet.  I won't even touch the racial aspects of the episode, which my colleagues are champing at the bit to address.

I will say that I am utterly confused by Captain Tracey's actions.  We've been led to believe that Starship captains are a breed apart.  Sure, Commodore Decker had his issues, but they were understandable given his situation.  But Tracey?  As soon as his crew fell ill and he didn't, you'd think he'd have beamed at least some of his people down.  And certainly he'd hold sacred the highest of orders (though not the one that violation incurs the death penalty.  That's number four.) Instead, he lets his crew die, doesn't warn Star Fleet of his situation, and becomes a little dictator.


"Crew?  What crew?"

The only thing that could possibly explain the situation is that "Ron Tracey" is actually Dr. Simon van Gelder, escaped from Tantalus without being cured, somehow assuming Captain Tracey's guise and stealing the "Exeter".  Outlandish?  Sure, but no more than this episode.


"I'm the real Captain Tracey!"

Two stars.  Why two?  Because I actually kind of dug how the show went back to the parallel Earth thing and didn't just abandon it for one episode.  Of course, they didn't do very much good with it…

When Worse Comes to Worst


by Janice L. Newman

We’ve had the best of episodes, we’ve had the worst of episodes. But never have I watched an episode so infuriating as “The Omega Glory”.

Like last week’s By Any Other Name, the story starts out promising. We’re swept up in the mystery and the danger to the senior officers we’ve come to know and love. And like “By Any Other Name”, it seems that “The Omega Glory” is prepared to play against expectations. On the planet Omega, the white people are violent and savage, while the non-white people (in this case apparently of Asian extraction) are peaceful and good. What a switch!

Just kidding! It turns out that the white people are the good guys after all. They’ll be setting up a democratic government any day now, and they’ll even let those no-good commies in…as long as the commies are okay with living under their system.


"I am Cloud McCarthy, and this is Wise Dicknixon.  We promise equality and fairness for the Coms."

I described Patterns of Force as “subtle as a brick”, but this episode went beyond that. The pro-democracy message was as direct and painful as a bludgeon to the face. It was all the more insulting in the way the white “yangs” (“Yankees”, GET IT?) started out as savage, violent, unwilling to parley or compromise, yet were still painted as the triumphant good guys in the end, for no other reason than that they were descendents of a Christian nation with an American democratic system (despite literally having no understanding of the very documents and principles they revered).

One grudging star, only because I can’t give it zero.

Losers Keepers


by Joe Reid

I recently saw a preview at the theater for the upcoming Planet of the Apes movie (based on the book) starring Charlton Heston. It's a flick about a world where cavemen-like humans in rags are dumb beasts and mistreated by the intelligent thinking and talking apes. 

Much like this week's episode, which featured wild men dressed in rags that appeared to be unable to speak and behaved like beasts.  A couple of months back we had the “Gamesters of Triskelion", which featured a Master Thrall Galt who shared the look of Ming the Merciless from “Flash Gordon”.  In fact it was that same episode that had me complaining about the amount of borrowing or sometimes outright theft that Star Trek employs in its stories.

If imitation is the best form of flattery, Star Trek is the Casanova of Burbank, California!  The number of its paramours have surely become legion.  Much like the erstwhile lover of legend, Star Trek is never able to focus on attaching to one thing at a time.  Episodes must borrow from multiple sources.  Even from other episodes of Star Trek.  For example, just last week we saw an episode where the powerful Kelvans turned members of the crew into white minerals.  This week a disease did it.  Two weeks ago the Nazis from Earth history showed up on another planet.  This week the US flag and constitution showed up, for no reason other than to attempt to throw a twist at the audience.  Both of these last two examples make me feel as if I am watching an episode of the Twilight Zone instead of Star Trek.  So many episodes of that show introduce elements into settings where they should not exist.  When it happened in the Twilight Zone it was thought provoking.  When it keeps happening in Star Trek, it lacks the same effect and is starting to leave me pining for repeats of the episodes that have more original stories.


"A man…can't just…turntosalt!"  "Captain, need I remind you what happened just last episode?"

I’d love for new episodes to stop with the borrowed elements and stick to bold new content, not plucked from the theaters, or the current newspaper headlines, or popular Earth characters like Jack the Ripper. 

Although the recent “Patterns of Force” was not an episode that I loved, I do love the fact that it was original and not an obvious rip-off from something else.  “The Omega Glory” could have been more glorious had its elements not been entirely borrowed.  That's only one of its sins, of course, but it'd be a start.

1 star

Beyond the Pale


by Amber Dubin

I want to preface myself by saying I am whole-heartedly enraptured with Star Trek. It is my first and only love, the only fictional universe I'd gladly abandon my own life to walk one day in its storyline, and I'd defend the continuation of this show to the death and beyond. I feel the need to profess my undying loyalty as a fan of this series, because I am about to unleash a diatribe that could only be wrought by the betrayal of an immeasurable love. This episode made me apoplectic. I've had my hackles raised from some insulting implications about the nature of women or certain races, but so far most of my reactions have been to subtleties. Subtle this episode was not.

The least subtle attack on my sensibilities was the racism. The Yangs are introduced as inhuman savages that cannot be reasoned with when they are first encountered. However, it turns out that they are not feral, merely driven wild by religious fervor. The supertext is that the Yangs' nature is that of Native Americans (what we have ignorantly called, for centuries, 'Indians'). I cannot begin to describe how offensive this concept is. Gene Roddenberry is saying here that Native Americans as a race are naturally a savage subspecies of whites, but they, like the fictional Vulcans, have trained to control their natures through a spirituality reverential governmental system. The fundamental insult lies in the implication that the government of whites partially tamed their savage nature (only partially, because the whole time sacred ceremonies take place, the majority of the tribe is outside yipping and howling at the moon). I hate that I have to explain this, but in reality, Native Americans have had democratic systems in place before most white societies that the white founding fathers actually drew from when they were drafting their governmental systems. In addition, the role of spirituality in most ancient Native American tribes was not a controlling cult-like obsession as could be argued is displayed by many modern organized religions, and was instead a much subtler, reverential guiding force that soothed the more offensive natural human instincts like a balm rather than a set of shackles.


"What do you mean 'they're too white?'  What do you think this is?  High Chapparal?"

Unfortunately the racial attacks in this episode are not only leveled at the Native American peoples. When it comes to the Comms, although it is implied that their genetics/immunological resistance is superior to humans, they are also implied to be inferior to the white race. This is apparent in the way that they immediately recognize Ron Tracey as their leader, after "getting over the shock of [his] white skin." This is offensive not only in the way it implies innate white supremacy, but also in the way they imply that it is natural for "asiatic races" to choose innately flawed governmental systems (godless totalitarianism and communism – for shame!) over the morally upright white, democratic Republicans. They even managed to throw in fetishization of female Asians just because this steaming pile of an episode needed a little sexism for spice.

And the science! My God, the poor, poor science! I'm too angry to even go into how terribly this episode mangled the concepts of genetic and cultural evolution. It didn't even have the most basic understanding of immunology and epidemiology! The fact that any of the plot of this episode made it off the cutting room floor goes beyond the pale of my tolerance and understanding. To say I am deeply disappointed in Gene Roddenberry is an understatement of the highest degree.

I wish I could give it less than one star, but I, like the actors in these scenes, am contractually bound by the system in which I work.

One star

Speaking of Star Trek, it's on tomorrow!  And it seems to presage a civil war…

Here's the invitation! Come join us.




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Science Fiction/Fantasy, TV

[February 28, 1968] Zero for the Price of Two (Star Trek: "By Any Other Name")

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by Janice L. Newman

This week’s Star Trek episode starts in one genre and ends up in another, ultimately making a promise it just can't deliver on.

The story opens with the Enterprise responding to a distress signal and landing on an out-of-the-way planet. They encounter aliens that appear human, who immediately commandeer the ship. When the landing party attempts to resist, the aliens make a chilling example: they turn two members of the landing party (both garbed in red) into small, strangely-shaped objects, apparently by removing all the water from their bodies and leaving the concentrated essential salts and minerals. One of these objects is crushed before Captain Kirk’s eyes, while the other is restored to his normal human state.

I want to take a moment to note how compelling this part is. It could have been corny in a different kind of show. Yet it’s unexpectedly effective as Kirk crouches over the powdery remains of one of his crewmembers, shocked. There’s no gore or blood, yet it is genuinely horrific.

This promising beginning leads to a promising next act, where the aliens have successfully taken over the ship. Scotty and Spock work out a method to blow up the ship rather than let the aliens take it back to their home planet and start an intergalactic takeover. Kirk nixes the idea, apparently unable to bear the idea of destroying the Enterprise and everyone aboard. Instead of bluffing the aliens or coming up with some clever solution, Kirk flails helplessly, especially when the aliens proceed to turn the entire rest of his crew into salt sculptures. This is once again very creepy and effective, particularly when Kirk comes upon a hallway filled with the fragile objects. Kirk, Dr. McCoy, Spock, and Scotty are the only ones who remain un-salted.

Spock is, appropriately, the one who identifies the aliens’ weakness: they have taken the forms of humans and are now subject to human weaknesses, desires, and emotions. Together, the four hatch a plan to wrest back control of the ship from the aliens.

This is the point where the episode takes a hard left turn into comedy from horror. Of course I expected that the crew would ultimately win, but the tonal shift from creeping horror and despair to wacky high jinks is jarring. Not only that, but the crew’s plan doesn’t make much sense.

McCoy injects one of the aliens with something that will gradually fray his temper, making him angrier and angrier until he snaps. But why didn’t McCoy just use something to knock him out?


"Hey!  Did you put knock-out juice in there?"  "Rats!  Why didn't I think of that?"

Scotty introduces one of the aliens to alcohol, eventually drinking him under the table. These scenes are funny; James Doohan is a talented actor. But since Scotty collapses shortly after his drinking buddy does, ultimately he makes no difference to the plot. Also, why didn’t Scotty just put something in the alien’s drink to knock him out sooner?


"Shay… Did you put knock-out juice in the booze?"  "Ach!  Why didn't I think of that?"

Kirk calls ‘dibs’ on the female alien and repeats the technique he’s come to use on any woman who has captured him: he seduces her (see: “Catspaw”, “Gamesters of Triskelion”, etc). In a nice switch, at first she seems completely uninterested and cold. Disappointingly, this doesn’t last, with her soon falling into his arms again. By the way, Kirk was definitely close enough to have knocked her out with his standard chop to the neck (which he had already used this episode!)


"Say…your lips wouldn't be drugged would they?"  "Why didn't I think of…I mean…why, yes!"

Spock plays on the alien leader’s jealousy, making him angry enough to eventually attack Kirk with his bare hands. Spock has several opportunities to neck-pinch the leader, but does not.


"Say…my shoulder is tense.  Would you mind gripping it?"  "No thanks."

Captain Kirk then gives a monologue which almost makes up for everything in the episode I disliked up to this point. If the aliens are behaving like this after just a day of being human, he says, what will they be like after the 300 years it will take them to get back to their home planet? They won’t even be the same species anymore, they’ll basically be humans, and therefore invaders.


"Aren't you… glad.. you use Dial?  Don't you wish everyone did?"

Sadly, this cleverness is ruined by how easily the once-intractable aliens agree and give in and how quickly everything is wrapped up.

This almost feels like two halves of different episodes. Moreover, the solution is far too pat and comes too easily to have real emotional impact. I assume the scriptwriter wrote himself and the crew into a corner by making the aliens too powerful, then had to do something implausible to get himself out of it.

Three stars, mainly for Scotty and the salt effect.

A Convenient Escape


by Joe Reid

Do you remember that age-old riddle, “what happens when an irresistible force meets an immovable object?” I promise to answer that at the end of this piece.  The question for this week’s Star Trek episode is, what happens when an undefeatable adversary meets an undefeated crew?  In “By Any Other Name”, our heroes were set upon by an enemy that had them outclassed and beaten in every conceivable way.  They faced technology that they could not understand or overcome and a foe that was unrelenting and capable.

When Rojan of Kelva made his appearance, with the female Kelinda at his side, he calmly got right to the point and made his demands clear.  Then he followed up by showing the potency of their power, making the crew impotent.  Impotence in that within a minute and a half he'd paralyzed the team on the planet, making it impossible for them to fight back.  Then he conquered the ship, taking over the critical functions before Kirk had a moment to understand how outmatched they were.  Before we knew it the crew of the Enterprise were slaves on their own ship, most of them converted to mineral polyhedrons. 

Facing a technologically superior baddie that forced them to play red-light green-light or turned them into bouillon cubes, there should have been no way the crew could have gotten out of this trap.  Yet before the end of the episode, the momentum completely shifted to benefit Kirk and company.

This shift happened when Rojan and his associates suddenly became grossly incompetent.  In a short amount of time the Kelvans went from calculating, strategic, and disciplined conquerors that were always in control to drunk, horny, jealous, and rebellious teenagers.  After failing to subvert the Kelvan technological advantage both on the planet and on the ship, Kirk’s strategy to win boiled down to getting the Kelvans to succumb to human faults.


Drea, the one remaining competent Andromedan

In the end this episode allowed the crew to escape their unbeatable dilemma too easily.  I think that more time was needed to unravel a foe of this caliber.  After being introduced to such a credible threat, allowing said threat to beat itself so quickly was a real lost opportunity.  Perhaps this provides us with that answer to that age-old riddle that I promised at the start.  The irresistible force and the immovable object must both yield in order to remain what they are upon meeting.  Answers to ancient puzzles aside, having this unbeatable threat beat itself in the final minutes of the show failed to deliver the payoff that I expected from Star Trek.  The Kelvans lost all credibility in the end and so did this episode.

2 stars

A Generation of Idiots


by Erica Frank

The Kelvans planned a 300-year journey to the Andromeda galaxy. That's a long time, so the trip was planned to involve multiple generations. The Kelvans were born among the stars, and their children would be born en route to another world.


This is a neat effect.

"Generation ships" have been addressed in science fiction before: Heinlein's Orphans of the Sky, Brian Aldiss's Starship ("Non-Stop" in the UK), Judith Merril's "Wish Upon a Star" among them.

In both novels, the "crew" has long forgotten the purpose of their journey. In Merill's story, the arrangement of officers is very different from a standard exploratory mission: the rules have been adapted for multi-generation space travel. In all of them, the authors considered that the great-great-great grandchildren of those who set out will have different goals and priorities than the initial crew.

I do not believe that was considered in this episode.

Set aside that the Enterprise is not designed for this–it does not have food for hundreds of years; its equipment isn't designed to last that long. Pretend that whatever they do to improve the engines will remove the need for repairs or spare parts, and that Sulu's garden will provide enough food. Let's pretend the Enterprise and a small crew can make this trip safely.

The "small crew" is three men and two women. That's not a large breeding pool. But let's pretend that, since they made "perfect" human bodies, they have no troublesome recessive genes; there are no issues with inter-breeding. They designed these bodies with a generation ship in mind, after all.


Do they even know how human breeding works? They didn't know kissing. Are they planning to use the Enterprise's medical records to teach them childbirth, child-rearing, and so on?

They'll need about 4 to 5 new generations per century, depending on what ages they are when they start having children. If they wait until they are 30 or so, they'll have fewer generations–less distance from the original crew. But in that case, the fourth generation will barely remember the originals, and the fifth will not know them at all.

Are they going to have children in neat, exact generations, all births within a 5-10 year period followed by a long gap? How will they enforce that, eight generations down the line?

Nothing about their "generation ship" plan makes sense.

The episode had some good points: Scotty drinking Tomar under the table; Kirk and Spock subtly cooperating to push Rojan into a jealous rage. But the Kelvans' basic plan is so deeply flawed that I watched to see how, not whether, our heroes would foil it.

Two and a half stars. Everything was great… except the actual plot.

Seven Deadlies


by Jessica Dickinson Goodman

Captain Kirk, Dr. McCoy, Spock, and Scotty's plan to use the Andromodeans' newfound humanity against them takes rather a dim view of our (mostly) shared species. It seemed like they each picked a Catholic Deadly Sin to specialize in: the Andromodeans already had more pride than they knew what to do with, plus ample greed on tap; to that potent mix, Scotty served gluttony, McCoy provoked wrath, Spock worked with Captain Kirk on engendering envy, and Captain Kirk spiced things up with lust. The only missing sin by my count was sloth, though there is something kind of inherently parasitic, if not explicitly lazy, in their approach to finding themselves a ride home.


"Get off me!  You don't rank me and you don't have pointed ears, so just get off my neck!"

I wonder what a version of this story might have been if they had instead focused on virtues, on appealing to human curiosity, ingenuity, empathy, even entrepreneurialism, cleverness, or wisdom. Janice is right, the hard left turn to comedy stripped this episode of all of its potential insight into the human condition, taking us from the meaningful deeps and leaving us in frothy waters. But it is fun to imagine what other species-level traits visiting aliens might be saddled with: Our taste for adventure? Our tendency to anthropomorphize ships? Our habits of collecting pets? There are so many more things that make each and every one of us "human" than the sins the officers of the Enterprise honed in on.

Three stars.



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TV

[February 22, 1968] Reich or Wrong? (Star Trek: "Patterns of Force")

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Cowboys and Indians and Nazis


by Lorelei Marcus

Thrice recently we have been cautioned of the importance of the Prime Directive, and the consequences if it is not followed properly. While it seemed almost nonexistent as a concept up until halfway through season two, the prime directive now stands as one of the most popular story devices in our recent crop of episodes. "Patterns of Force" is no exception; it can almost entirely be summarized as a less elegant, Nazi flavored clone of "A Piece of the Action", another episode that featured the prime directive prominently.

The Enterprise arrives at planet Ekos in search of John Gill, a cultural scientist sent to observe the planet's primitive culture and development. His recent disappearance sparks the Federation to investigate, and what they find is a planet far beyond what its technological level should be, a society modeled exactly on Nazi Germany, and John Gill as "Führer".


Not since Martin Landau as Martin Bormann have we seen such an effective portrayal of a Nazi.

Like the gangster world in "A Piece of the Action", the Ekosian society's emulation of Earth history is no coincidence, but the result of direct tampering from outside forces. However the tampering of Ekos' evolution began not with the Federation, but their more advanced sister planet, Zeon, which led to Ekos accessing nuclear warheads and a space fleet. Still, even after fifty years relations between the two planets remained peaceful, and only in the past six years did Ekos begin to model a fascist regime. The only explanation is further manipulation from Gill himself.


Filmed at the Reich Building in Beautiful Downtown Burbank!

Kirk and Spock beam down to the planet to try to find Gill and get an explanation. Despite their clever civilian disguises, they are quickly identified as aliens by SS guards. Much judo chop, neck pinch, and uniform stealing high jinks later, they try to infiltrate Nazi headquarters, and are once again discovered thanks to Spock's ears. One obligatory whipping scene later, with some good special-effects for Spock's green blood, and our leads find themselves in prison alongside a Zeon rebel. We learn that the Ekosians plan to wipe out all Zeons both on their own planet and the Zeon home world, their "final solution" as Isak the rebel puts it.


Sweeps week

Horrified, Kirk and Spock fashion a quick escape by using the transponders embedded in their arms for a purpose they were absolutely not intended (turning them into primitive phasers? I'm sure we'll never see this highly useful technology again). With Isak's help, Kirk and Spock join forces with the underground resistance. They plan to infiltrate an elite banquet that night where the Führer is to make an appearance.


Berets and ascots–that's how you know they're resistance

A string of good luck and hidden allies sees them into the banquet, and subsequently the sound booth where Gill gives a speech to the nation initiating the final solution operation. After the speech, they discover that Gill has been drugged, likely by his second in command, who has been the real force pushing for Zeon extermination. Spock performs a Vulcan mind meld to discover why Gill chose to instate a Nazi regime in the first place.

Gill explains that he was only trying to unite a fractured world under an efficient state. He never foresaw such consequences to his actions. Luckily, he is able to give a speech to the people before he dies, and the Holocaust is ultimately called off.


"You won't have John Gill to kick around anymore…"

This story, like "A Piece of the Action", relies on imitative aliens who build their societies around the books and words of outsiders. The sociopolitical situation of two already communicating planets seems too complicated a situation for Gill to have been able to come into and impose an entirely new social structure. I will admit I am a little tired of how Star Trek treats its aliens as if they are children who simply play the Cowboys and Indians they see on TV, rather than think and build for themselves, no matter how primitive the society. For "A Piece of the Action" it worked, particularly because there was a 100 year lead time and a naturally curious and imitative civilization that was infected. This episode was less effective, especially with two pre-existing aliens complicating the mix.

That said, along with its many flaws, there was much to like about the episode. I'll let my co-writers cover the details, but I will say that while the episode was fun to watch, it left me feeling a bit hollow and unconvinced, as if its true purpose for existing was to just put Kirk and Spock in (and occasionally out of) SS uniforms.

Three stars.

Out of Time


by Joe Reid

Having traveled a bit in my time I have come across people who I felt held beliefs and a way of life that held them back from being all that they might be.  Without naming places I can clearly remember times when I thought, “if I could only do something to change how these folks live, they might all be able to make something of themselves.” Faced with places where people lived in poverty, violence was not far.  Never once did I think that struggling people would be better off if we could just make them all Nazis.  This week’s episode failed to adequately answer how a learned historian like John Gill could have come to that conclusion.  I feel like the episode lacked the time needed to explain how that could have come to pass.

It would have been one thing to have taken elements of mid twentieth century German Nazi culture and apply parts of it to make a society better.  After all, I have always been told that under Hitler the trains ran on time (a fallacy to be precise).  It was a total other thing to copy the Nazis whole hog: symbols, behaviors, and uniforms.  The members of the crew that saw what Fuhrer Gill had created all knew how bad the Nazis of history were and were perplexed that it would be repeated.  The brief half-comatose explanation from Gill that Nazis were efficient fell a little shy of the mark.  If we had been given time with a lucid Gill who could have explained why he felt no better options existed, it would have added more credibility to the events as they played out.


"Didn't you see Judgment at Nuremberg?  How about The Brothers Karamozov?"

My next quarrel with the episode is in regard to how quickly it ended.  Within a minute of Gill receiving a fatal shot from his captor, three things happened: The Zeon representatives decided that all of their problems were over and they could take care of things going forward. Kirk considered the planet for admission to Star Fleet, and the ship left the planet.  This leads us to the conclusion that Gill wasn’t wrong at all.  The people were doing great and always would have done great as Nazis as long as no bad people took charge.  That torture, oppression and fear are great tools if you do it without being evil.

Lastly, the motivations of the villain of the episode (Deputy Fuhrer Melakon) went completely unexplained.  He drugged Gill, assumed command, and fought a campaign of oppression against a people for no other reason than, he’s just a bad guy.  If we had only learned that he had a bad history with the Zeons, or that he was one himself and hated it–anything as a motivation–it would have been a good use of time to further the plot.

As it stood, “Patterns of Force” fell too far from believability to be considered a good use of my time.  The leaps that I was asked to make were too far.  Given more time and explanation, perhaps we could have come to a better story.

Two stars.

Springtime for Hitler?


by Janice L. Newman

My feelings on “Patterns of Force” are mixed. There was much to like about the episode. There were two ‘volte-face’ moments that were excellently done. The first caught me by surprise, yet was completely plausible: of course the rebels would want to make certain that the people they were allowing into the heart of their base weren’t secretly Nazi spies. The second moment was cleverly set up, so that it was less of a surprise yet very satisfying. It wasn’t even implausible that there would be Ekosians and Ekosian supporters at high levels of government. After all, Gill would have surrounded himself with good, like-minded people during his rise to power, people like Eneg and Daras’ father. [And don't forget the recent example of Eli Cohen, the Israeli spy who made it to the #3 position in Syria before being caught and executed. (ed.)]

Yet there were elements of the episode that bothered me. For one, other than the aforementioned curveballs, the plot was subtle as a brick, to the point where it threw me out of the episode. Gee, do you think the ‘Ekosians’ might be an especially imitative people (‘echoing’ the culture of others)? Gosh, with names that sound like “Issac” and “Abraham”, how could the people of “Zion” — sorry, I meant “Zeon” — be anything but Jewish?


Funny–they don't look Jewish…

More frustrating than the heavy-handed writing was an important assertion that the story left unchallenged. Even today, there are people who glorify the Nazis and buy into their propaganda. Gill states that Hitler’s regime was the “most efficient state Earth ever knew,” and Spock, the voice of reason, supports and reinforces him! “That tiny country, beaten, bankrupt, defeated, rose in a few years to stand only one step away from global domination.” However, this argument is fundamentally flawed. Just as “Space Seed” fails to challenge the idea that eugenics could work at all, “Patterns of Force” leaves out the fact that Hitler’s success was built on theft, lies, and broken promises long before Germany went to war.

But in the end, my issue with this episode is more emotional than logical. A Piece of the Action does a wonderful job of showing how a culture could be ‘infected’ by another culture. But the Mafioso characters are deliberately cartoonish in their portrayals, fun and larger-than-life and slightly ‘off’. It doesn’t work as well with Nazis. Watching stormtroopers beat and kick and scream at innocent people in the street, seeing them whipping characters I care about, seeing characters I like dressed like Nazis–these things made me uncomfortable. Yes, watching Nazis repeatedly getting knocked out, neck-pinched, shot, and led around by the nose was fun. And yes, I appreciate the message that “Nazis are bad”, even if it was a bit simplistic and unsubtle. But for me, I’d just as soon not see Nazis infect my futuristic science fiction, especially accompanied by mostly unchallenged assertions that they were ever “efficient” or successful.

In quality this was a four-star episode, but my discomfort takes my personal rating down to three stars.

Lord Acton was right


by Gideon Marcus

"Absolute power corrupts absolutely."  It was explicitly referenced in this episode, and it explains a lot.  After watching "Patterns of Force", one of the biggest objections of my fellow watchers to the episode's premise was that resurrecting the Nazis was a bridge too far–too obvious, too ridiculous for a serious historian to consider.


"Hogaaaan!"

But is it really so unbelievable that John Gill, elevated to Godhood to the Ekosians by his knowledge of history and technology long before he became "The Fuhrer", would choose that model?  You and I know (especially if we've read Shirer's Rise and Decline of the Third Reich) that the Hitler regime was anything but "the most efficient the world had ever seen", but would Gill?

We're less than a quarter century from the passing of the most evil government on Earth, yet just last year, the American Nazi party leader was assassinated by one of his henchmen for not being fascist enough. Kids who push counters around on maps in games like Blitzkrieg and Afrika Korps call their clubs "4th SS Panzer", "The Gauleiter Club", "Panzer Lehr Division", and like that.  I have no doubt that, two hundred years from now, there will be historians who miss the point, seduced by dazzling military conquests, Leni Riefenstahl films, and Hugo Boss uniforms.

So, I actually find "Patterns of Force" all too plausible.

I also found it (he said a little sheepishly) quite enjoyable.  With the exception of one clumsy scene edit (the one that ends with Yitzhak saying, "This is more our fight than yours") it's a well put together episode.  Shatner reins in his Shatnerisms, delivering a compelling performance.  Nimoy has the charm one expects of a real ubermensch among people playing at being ubermenschen.  Kelley has a truncated role, but he is at his very best.


"What in blazes is going on here?"

The scoring is an effective mix of library and new music.  The guest stars are quite excellent, actually (though the dubbed "actors" in the first scene on Ekos are some of the worst).

And the showrunners clearly know that women make a big part of their audience.  Why else would the two leads be half-naked for half the episode?


"Very interesting!"

Four stars.

"There's a new episode of Star Trek tomorrow!" "I'll drink to that."

Come join us–here's the invitation!



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Science Fiction/Fantasy, TV

[February 18, 1968] Yet(i) Again, London Is Under Attack (Doctor Who: The Web Of Fear [Part One])

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By Jessica Holmes

After a cracking serial last month with a really fresh story format, we’re getting another ‘base under siege’ plot in Doctor Who. Will The Web Of Fear turn out to be the same old yarn, or have Mervyn Haisman and Henry Lincoln found a way to put a new spin on the format?

EPISODE ONE

You might recall that the last episode of Doctor Who ended with the TARDIS leaning on its side and the occupants clinging on for dear life. It provides a nice little high-action start to the episode, as Jamie manages to climb to the TARDIS door controls and save the group. Out of one perilous situation, the Doctor immediately wants to go and look for another adventure.

Sometimes I think he must enjoy being in imminent danger of a horrible death.

Well, he doesn’t have to go far. The TARDIS stops, but it hasn’t landed. It’s caught in something. Something like a web.

It turns out we are back on Earth in (roughly?) the modern day. Remember Professor Travers (Jack Watling) from The Abominable Snowmen? He’s back, but rather a lot older, and in quite a bit of trouble. He managed to recover a Yeti along with their control equipment and brought it back to London. Rather than keep it safe, he went and sold it to a wealthy collector, yet carried on tinkering with the control sphere. As you can imagine, this has backfired big-time, and he can’t persuade the collector to give it up. The ridiculously-stereotypical Silverstein (whose personality can be summed up with the words ‘greedy’, ‘rich’ and ‘stubborn’) soon ends up on the wrong side of his prized Yeti, and by the next scene, London is in a sorry state indeed.

The Yeti are taking over, spreading a mysterious weblike fungus through the Underground. Trying to hold back the onslaught are our main cast of side characters. We’ve got resident ‘Yeti Experts’, Professor Travers and his daughter Anne (Tina Packer), a handful of soldiers trying to hold out against the Yeti threat, and an absolutely infuriatingly irritating journalist reporting on the situation, Harold Chorley (Jon Rollason).

The TARDIS breaks free of the webbing and lands in the Underground, the group soon finding that the street level entrances are closed off.

Trapped on the London Underground. That sounds like my personal Hell.


The cinematography in this serial is rather good I must say. Some interesting angles and dramatic lighting. Makes things a lot more visually interesting.

Victoria and Jamie soon get caught by a couple of patrolling soldiers, but the Doctor evades capture by being conveniently off-camera.

The kids soon get to meet everyone hunkered down at the base, and Anne quickly establishes herself as my favourite new character. I just have a real soft spot for smart women who know how to handle condescending men.

Oblivious to the full details of the situation, Victoria and Jamie think that they’re protecting the Doctor when they insist that they were alone in the tunnel. However, what they don’t know is that the soldiers have a plan for halting the advance of the Yeti. They’re going to collapse the tunnel, and the kids have just given them the all clear.

The Doctor could not have picked a worse time to start poking around the explosives stockpile.

EPISODE TWO

The charges go off with more of a whimper than a bang, to the soldiers’ surprise. What they don’t know is that the Yeti have covered the explosives in webbing, containing the explosion. Thinking that the Doctor may have tampered with the charges, finding the Doctor becomes a high priority. But he’s nowhere to be found. At all. In this entire episode. I think he must have gone on his holidays.

Travers gets to introduce his daughter to Jamie and Victoria, and Anne finds their time travel story a bit hard to believe. She later confesses to her father that she’s a bit suspicious of the Doctor, finding his arrival a tad convenient. She’s not the only one. Chorley is starting to take an interest in the Doctor as well.


Don't you just hate it when you can't get a guy to take a hint and leave you alone?

While searching the tunnels for the Doctor, Jamie makes the acquaintance of a singing driver, Evans (Derek Politt), who is very Welsh. I know they call it the land of song but there’s a time and a place. He’s the sole survivor of a Yeti attack, and tells Jamie he saw one of the Yeti carrying a pyramid. Evans joins Jamie on his journey through the tunnels, but before they run into the Doctor, a Yeti runs into them.

The pair find themselves hemmed in by a Yeti and a wall of advancing… soap bubbles? Of all the ways to make a special effect for spreading web or fungus, soap bubbles would not be the method I’d go for. It doesn’t really look anything like the fungus covering the rest of the tunnels. Still, it would be funny if the Yetis’ web-shooting gun was actually just a water pistol filled with washing-up liquid.


Now, webs that help Yetis can feel soft as your face with miiild greeeen…Faaairy Liiiquiiiid!

EPISODE THREE

Shooting the pyramid does nothing to stop the advance of the soap suds or the Yeti (there must be at least one more out there, methinks), so the pair flee into a side tunnel.

Victoria strikes out on her own to find the Doctor, and soon enough finds him in the company of a new arrival to the Underground: Colonel Lethbridge-Stewart (Nicholas Courtney). What a posh name that is.

Lethbridge-Stewart is here to take over leadership of the little group of soldiers. He has the right paperwork and everything. Still, with the circle line fully consumed by the fungus, the soldiers are a little suspicious of where he came from.

As for Jamie and his Welsh friend, they split up once Evans sees an opportunity to escape. He returns not long later, partly because he felt a bit guilty about abandoning everyone else, but mostly because the street access turned out to be locked.

Once everyone (sans Jamie) is gathered together, Lethbridge-Stewart gives a briefing full of information I’m pretty sure the soldiers should already know given that they’ve been watching this whole situation unfold. Still, he seems an authoritative chap who knows what he’s doing. I already like him better than Chorley, who keeps butting into everything, won’t shut up about finding an escape route, and is getting on my last nerve.

Realising that the Yeti keep cocooning any explosives the soldiers place before they get a chance to set them off, the Doctor suggests putting the explosives on a moving trolley. The Colonel approves of the idea, and it begins to look like the situation might turn to their side.

Then Victoria and Anne realise that one of the Yeti control figurines is missing.

And someone is using it right now, to send a Yeti into the explosives store and web the place up. How very convenient that they should choose to do that at this precise moment… unless it’s not a coincidence. Finding the missing figurine in the weapons store, the Doctor realises that someone in the group must have put it there, and that person is in league with the Great Intelligence.

This base-under-siege is turning into a bit of a whodunnit! That’s refreshing.

Chorley seems oddly horrified when Victoria tells him of the Doctor’s intentions to blow the tunnel, and he’s a little too interested in the Doctor’s TARDIS. He leaves in a hurry once the Doctor shows up, and the Doctor is instantly suspicious—especially when he realises the journalist has locked the door behind him.

I don’t know, I think that Chorley seems a bit too obvious a suspect. I think he's just a coward who wants to use the TARDIS to escape.

They aren’t trapped for long, as Jamie finally emerges from the labyrinth of tunnels to let them out. Good timing!

A scream from another room brings Anne and Travers running to discover one of the soldiers, Weams, dead and all webbed up. A Yeti figurine lies beside him on the floor… and the real thing is looming over them, ready to strike!


What a wonderful facial expression. He looks like one of those Greek tragedy masks.

Final Thoughts

So, we’re halfway through The Web Of Fear and so far it’s fine, I suppose. It's a pretty good serial but nothing that has me forgetting to take notes because I’m so engrossed in the story. It is cool to see Travers again! I appreciate the continuity here. I was a bit surprised to see the Great Intelligence returning so soon, but it’s an interesting villain, so who am I to complain?

I have to applaud the crew for the set design in this serial, with particular regards to the Tube station set. You can practically smell the old dust and stale sweat. I kept half expecting a train to come through at any moment. The resemblance to the actual Underground is uncanny—so much so that I’m not the only one who thought they’d filmed on location. I did do some digging to double check, but it is definitely just a set. Well done, crew.

It’s too early to tell if this serial will do anything very interesting with the base-under-siege format, but the mystery elements of the plot are quite promising.

We’ve also got a decent roster of supporting characters, with Anne being a bit of a favourite for me.

The Colonel’s not yet had enough screen-time for me to draw any conclusions about him, but I hate Chorley so much I just want him to go get lost in a long dark tunnel. Of which there are many, many, MANY in the Underground.

Still, at least his existence isn't an insult to an entire group of people.

Certainly, Evans could not be more Welsh if they called him 'Cymru Llandudno of Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychrwyrndroblllantysiliogogogoch', and it's not an entirely flattering depiction. The singing habit is quite endearing but he’s not exactly bright and definitely not brave. Basically the same old insults the English have been tarring the Welsh with for centuries.

But Silverstein… wow. The depiction of Evans is unflattering but the short scene featuring Silverstein is just absurdly bad. The writers cannot have been oblivious to what they were doing there. They could have just made him a stubborn rich bloke, but they just had to go all in on the antisemitic caricature. It’s very disappointing to see.

I know it’s possible to worry too much about what other people might think about your writing, but maybe some writers could stand to worry about it a little more.




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Science Fiction/Fantasy, TV

[February 16, 1968] In their words (Star Trek: "Return to Tomorrow")

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This week's review is a little bit different–for the first time, we've gotten the characters themselves to comment on the episode!  We think you'll find their thoughts most illuminating…

Sargon

Would that I could return us back to that yesterday those hundreds of eons ago.  Back when I possessed the hubris to decide that the best, brightest, and most wealthy of our people were worthy of surviving the calamity that had destroyed our people and our planet.  Mercifully, entropy mostly corrected my error in judgment and took the majority of those I sought to preserve.  All that remained were Henoch, a brilliant and driven member of the ruling class, Thalassa, a woman of unparalleled talent who was my wife, and me, the man who created the means for us to outlive all we have ever known.  My name was Sargon.

Although our people excelled in power, reaching the pinnacles of science, technology, body, mind, and spirit, we were unable to save our planet.  Some of us sent out space vessels to seed other worlds.  The rest of us remained behind to fight our world’s demise.  We failed.  So, we few transferred our consciousness to receptacles; our lives and days as living breathing beings came to an end.  In our haste to preserve ourselves, we failed again, storing our consciousnesses successfully, but lacking any physical means to return us to any likeness of our yesterday.  Nevertheless, the years have given me and the others all nature of powers as we’ve continued to develop our minds without bodies.


What was left of us.

The day of our hope came when my mind, able to reach far out into the cosmos, touched them, touched him.  Humans.  Scientists.  Explorers.  So much like us that I suspect them to be kin to us.  From their minds I deduced a way to call them to us.  I knew they would help us willingly given the right motivation.  Whether that motivation was the safety of their vessel, the desire for new knowledge, or the will to avoid enslavement, they would help us.  Their leader, Kirk, a brave and solid man, would help us. 


The object of my call–suspicious, but not so obstreperous as he had been to other beings who had seized his ship.

The problem I faced was first that these people would never knowingly help me end the lives of myself and my companions.  Also, that Thalassa and Henoch had not yet come to the same conclusion that I had.  That our continued existence would bring about ruin to these new worlds of people.  Returning to the mistakes we made in our yesterday would pervert and eventually destroy the tomorrow that these beings should live.  So in order to end the continued existence of my people and preserve the future of Kirk’s people I developed a plan to motivate my people and Kirk’s.  For me and mine, what would be more motivating than returning to living bodies?  For Kirk’s people, the promise of our technology in exchange for temporary use of their bodies. 


The android forms I knew would be unpalatable to my companions.

When I inhabited Kirk’s body, he would come to know my good intent for him and his people, but not my every thought.  This was important since I would not be able to remain in it for long periods of time.  For Thalassa I found a suitable woman, so much like she was in our yesterday.  I feared for Henoch’s intentions. 

Knowing that he might not come to see the danger that we posed to these beings, for him we would hide the truth of his mind from the humans.  The Vulcan among them would serve as a vessel that should contain Henoch long enough for my plan to work.  Preventing Henoch interfering while hopefully allowing Thalassa to come to understand my way.

This endeavor would reveal temptations, even for me.  Knowing it would be good to feel again, even for a short while.  But, like Kirk, I would not divert from the path that I have chosen.  I would prevent the resurrection of yesterday and the troubles we would cause.  I would return these humans to the tomorrow that should exist for them.  And with that as my final thought, I sent a Priority One Distress Call to the humans.

If it be not hubris, I give four stars for this episode of our unlife.

Thalassa

We spent 500,000 years asleep, waiting to be awoken and to return to our lives. I remember asking my husband why we simply didn’t cross the vastness of space as we had before, gathering material to build new bodies for ourselves. He told me that it was too late. I did not understand what that meant.

Encountering the humans was like looking into the distant past. I was reminded of what it was to be able to laugh when Sargon awoke me to observe the engineer and the doctor exchanging pithy and sarcastic observations. Dr. McCoy in particular had many amusing things to say.

With all of our power, of course we could have built androids that could feel. According to the ship’s records, even the human Dr. Roger Korby succeeded in doing so, using far more primitive tools than we could craft. But Sargon insisted that we must not give in to temptation, and the only way to prevent it was the path he outlined: a cold and sterile one. It was not until I found myself torturing the earnest Dr. McCoy that I realized Sargon was right.


A return to monstrous ways.

For we would have used our powers to make ourselves gods. Not kind or benevolent gods, but capricious and cruel ones. And so the last hope was gone. We failed Sargon’s test, and the price was our lives. It was the right choice to make. Three stars left behind in the cosmos, for Enoch, Sargon, and myself.

Henoch

I have to say, it was a bit of a bummer to spend half a million years trapped in a ball, only to be tricked out of a life of Godhood.  Of course, one wonders why I ever consented to be archived in the first place, given how incorrigible I was.  Certainly, I didn't change my ways after an eon of reflection, nor after my entire planet was destroyed by hubris.  Actually, the reason is simple: once I got into that superb Vulcan physique, surrounded by beautiful (and competent) women, well, how could I resist?


"Well, hello."

The best practical joke I got to play in my brief time of freedom was contorting poor Mr. Spock's face into great displays of emotion.  Sure, he's betrayed emotion before, under the effects of spores and long-chain molecules, but never has he been so casually flirtatious, so smugly sardonic, so deliciously satanic.  I must pat myself on the back.  Or, at least, I would…if I still had a back.

The flood of senses I so briefly enjoyed seemed to lend cinematography and even soundtrack to my every nefarious move.  I was reminded of the rare but innovative angles employed by the 20th Century TV director Ralph Senensky, and the artful strains produced by composer George Duning.  The clever quips that were wholly my own creation were as good as anything TV writer John T. Dugan could have come up with.  (If you're wondering how I am so conversant with ancient broadcast personalities, remember I briefly shared a soul with the walking encyclopedia that is Spock).

Really, I don't regret too much about this episode of my life–except for that damned goody-goody Sargon and that lightweight of a captain whose body he took over.  Kirk must have been so thrilled at the prospect of surrendering his slab of a figure–you could. tell. by. the. way. he. paused. after. every. word.  And then the way Sargon felt up his purloined pectorals…and they call me obscene!


I mean, really…

Finally, while I might respect the skills of the Enterprise's chief engineer, who picked up my technical expertise much faster than I'd thought a primitive could, I still couldn't stand talking to him for any length of time.  His voice reminded me too much of Sargon's.


Fortunately, he was more interested in our littler Tinker-toys than Thalassa.

Oh, I need to rate this bit of my life as well as talk about it?  Fine.  Three and a half stars.  It'd be four if it weren't for weird ol' Captain Kirk.

I know Shatner is proud of his turn in Judgment at Nuremberg, but this may be going a bit too far the other way…

Join us tonight at 8pm Eastern (or Pacific!)



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Science Fiction/Fantasy, TV

[February 8, 1968] The Trek Offensive (Star Trek: "A Private Little War")

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by Gideon Marcus

Science fiction often takes the events of today as inspiration for the stories of tomorrow.  Star Trek has been no exception, tackling current issues like Mutually Assured Destruction ("Errand of Mercy", "A Taste of Armageddon"), brainwashing ("Dagger of the Mind"), eugenics ("Space Seed"), and invasive species ("The Trouble with Tribbles").

But no episode has been so nakedly topical, so ripped from the headlines of today, as last week's episode, "A Private Little War".  For as it aired the Viet Cong were (and are) in the midst of a nation-wide assault on South Vietnam, from Vinh Loa in the south to Quang Tri in the north.  No provincial capital, no military base, was spared the boots of Communist troops, the booms of mortar fire. 

At the heart of Saigon, capital of South Vietnam, terrorist forces even managed to take the American embassy for six hours before being repelled by allied forces.  The myth of a hard but impending victory in southeast Asia has been shattered by the 80,000 enemy troops marching seemingly at will throughout the countryside.

And on the small screen, "A Private Little War" directly referenced 20th Century "Asian brush fire wars" as it explored the superpower-fueled conflict between the village and hill peoples of a formerly peaceful planet.

In brief:

The Enterprise has returned to the site of a Lieutenant Kirk's first planetary exploration, an idyllic world of peaceful hunters and traders that the captain had visited 13 years before.  There, he had befriended Tyree, a hunter of the hill people.

But things have changed in 13 years.  The trader city dwellers, formerly at an Iron Age level of existence, have suddenly jumped 12 centuries in technology, wielding flintlocks and hunting the hill people for sport and profit.  Surely, this cannot be a natural development.

Of course, it turns out it is not–a Klingon agent, rapidly advancing the armaments’ state of the art for the city dwellers, has designs on turning the planet into an Imperial colony.

Kirk reaches the conclusion that his only option is to arm the hill people so that they may resist.  But Tyree, now chief of the hill people, is a pacifist who refuses to kill, despite the strong entreaties of his wife, the Nanutu witch woman, Nona.  When Nona proves unable to sway her husband, she attempts to ensnare Kirk with her natural and artificial wiles. This effort unsuccessful, she finally makes a hasty attempt to defect to the city dwellers, apparently preferring the role of Quisling to that of martyr.

Sadly for Nona, the city dwellers have become addicted to rapine and plunder, and (in a scene I'm surprised passed the censors) first assault and then kill Nona.

Captain Kirk, over the strenuous objection of Dr. McCoy, arranges for the Enterprise to manufacture a hundred muskets.  He instructs Tyree, now infected with murderous rage toward the city dwellers over the murder of his wife, in their use.  And so the balance of power shall remain, maintained behind the scenes by two galactic superpowers.

There is, of course, more to the episode, including an interesting "B plot" involving Spock aboard the Enterprise, but I will let my colleagues discuss that.

This episode, smartly directed by Marc Daniels, and reasonably well-scripted by Gene Roddenberry and "Jud Crucis", nevertheless left us with some uncomfortable messages.  For one, it suggests there is no place for the conscientious objector in war, something we just saw hotly (and ably) debated on a recent episode of NET Journal.  "A Private Little War" also seems to say that, under the specter of Mutually Assured Destruction (in this case, at the hands of the Organians rather than by A-bomb), there is no way to win a proxy war.  Rather, the only option is to maintain both sides at armament parity.

I'll let Janice discuss the merit of this argument, but it was noted that, if "A Private Little War" is supposed to be an analogy for Vietnam, it's not a very good one.  Vietnam constitutes a stalled (for now) revolution in a former colony.  The existence of two countries in what was once eastern Indo-China (and Saigon correspondents hesitate to characterize South Vietnam as a functioning nation) is a brief anomaly whose existence has lasted less than 15 years.

Perhaps Roddenberry was not thinking of Vietnam for this episode, but the more apt situation of Korea, where after three years of inconclusive fighting, the superpowers have settled for a more-or-less nonviolent face-off behind the 38th parallel.  Of course, this conflict threatened and still threatens to spiral into active bloodshed with the seizure of the intelligence ship U.S.S. Pueblo two weeks ago.  Indeed, perhaps the only reason this incident has not met more outrage is thanks to the ongoing Tet Offensive thousands of miles away.

In any event, the result is something of a mixed and forced metaphor, a bit of rah-rah for the now obviously bankrupt American policy in Southeast Asia.  These drag down the otherwise excellent acting, writing, and direction (and good use of library music) to make this a three star episode.

False Dichotomy


by Janice L. Newman

“A Private Little War” presents us with a seemingly unsolvable quandary. With the Klingons arming one side, what is Federation to do but arm the other, allowing them to maintain a careful balance and thus preserve the species?

However, this is a false dichotomy. The fact that Kirk doesn’t recognize this, that he lets himself be mournfully caught up in the narrative of “We have no other choice!” suggests that he is so mentally mired in history and uncreative that he can’t even imagine another course of action. Or it suggests that he’s simply out-of-character, acting as a mouthpiece for a thinly-disguised Gene Roddenberry to explain why we have no other choice but to fight in South Vietnam and anywhere else that might fall to Klingon—I mean Communist—aggression.

There are countless possibilities for how the artificial conflict could have been handled. The Federation could have approached the Klingons with evidence of their interference and sought a solution. They could have removed the advanced tools and metals the Klingons were supplying the villagers and offered them better, non-violent alternatives. Captain Kirk could have worked with the hill people to attempt a rapprochement, reconciliation, and ongoing non-violence treaty with the people of the village, no matter how many weapons the Klingons offer. As horrible as it sounds, the Federation could even have held to its own principles of non-interference and chose to let one side destroy the other, leaving only one power on the planet. The fact that none of these options are even considered is awfully damning. It suggests that the writer wanted the audience to come to one and only one conclusion at the end of the story.


Federation diplomacy

Hopefully when Captain Kirk presents his findings to the Federation, cooler, smarter heads will prevail and determine a better way for handling the planet and its people. For, like McCoy, the sole voice of reason in this episode, I can only say, “…furnishing them firearms is certainly not the answer.”

The forced false dilemma dropped the episode a great deal in my estimation. The deeply disturbing rape and murder of Nona dropped it as well. The episode was well-made in many ways, and McCoy is wonderful as always, but I found the message and elements of the content repugnant enough that I can’t give it more than two stars.

Offensive Trek


by Charlotte C. Hill

With rare exceptions, women don’t fare well in Star Trek. We haven't seen a single one rank above Lieutenant. Too often they are harpies or husband-seekers. So today I’m serving a light helping of sexism, chattel slavery, and femicide, since that’s what they served me in "A Private Little War".

Seen through generous eyes, this episode introduced complexity with respect to women. Uhura is featured on the bridge, and Nurse Chapel in the medical bay. Kirk and McCoy see the one indigenous female they meet, Nona, as influential and worthy of respect. But Nona’s culture is a supposed “garden of Eden,” and her only avenue to power is through her husband, Tyree.

When she can’t Lady MacBeth Tyree into committing murders to advance her aims, she steals the captain’s phaser and tries to switch sides. If the leader of the hill people won’t wield the power she wants, she’ll offer power to his enemies… who don’t want it either, at least from a woman.

I expected the villagers to appreciate that Nona is a “witch” who knows medicines and can save a man’s life. But they ignore her skills and her misguided efforts to bring their people power and decide that the prudent thing to do is try to gang-rape her, and when that is interrupted, to murder her.

Perhaps Kirk’s “garden of Eden” references only the hill people, and during his long-ago planet survey he never understood the detente they’d maintained with evil villagers. Or perhaps this Eden had no sexual oppression before the Klingons poisoned the village people. I’d like to believe that. I’d try to believe it, if not for Nurse Chapel.

Woven through this episode are brief interludes with Nurse Chapel and the wounded Mr. Spock. What could have displayed modern women’s status compared to the immature natives was mostly a set-up to denigrate Chapel’s unrequited love for Spock. When she does what she should to help wake Spock, Scotty (of all people) appears in the sick bay and grabs her. And Scotty keeps holding her.


The scene speaks for itself

Thus, even the professional Nurse Chapel is restrained by a man when she clearly doesn’t want to be restrained. Her sanity and behavior are questioned even as (the male) Dr. M’Benga takes her place to complete her work, and she is only released when M’Benga orders her release. (Look! It’s the 23rd century and now when we physically restrain women, we aren’t considering rape. We’re so advanced!)

The scene ends when Chapel returns to Spock’s side to offer him help and her affection, which he rejects. Chapel is spurned. Ha. Hah.

Once again, only Lieutenant Uhura retains her promotion to full personhood over both her blackness and her gender. She is the shining beacon in an episode that offered far too much to criticize about Trek’s perspective on women.

A four-star episode with problems becomes a 2-star episode for casual rape, and for its narrow vision of equality in the future.

Something strange is going on tomorrow. You won't want to miss the next episode:

Here's the invitation!



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