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Science Fiction/Fantasy, TV

[January 2, 1969] Blood, Sweat, and Tears (Star Trek: "Elaan of Troyius")

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by Janice L. Newman

On December 23rd, 1968, exactly eleven months after they were captured by North Korea, the crew of the USS Pueblo was finally released, and the world breathed a collective sigh of relief. The USA would not be starting World War III over the incident, and our boys, though they’ve been starved and tortured, are coming home alive for Christmas.

It is thus appropriate that this week’s Star Trek episode revolved around choosing peace instead of war.


Bill Theiss, you've done it again!

In the episode opener, we learn that the Enterprise has been sent to support Petri, Ambassador of Troyius, in his mission to “train” the Dohlman of Elas to be a suitable wife for the Troyian leader. The Dohlman turns out to be a beautiful woman played by France Nuyen, made up to look like Cleopatra in a bathing suit. Her name is Elaan, and she is imperious and demanding, while Petri is servile but contemptuous. They are intractable in their dislike of each other. Kirk quickly becomes exasperated with both of them, telling Petri, “Stop trying to kill each other. Then worry about being friendly.”


"And maybe try wearing a bikini…"

In the meantime, the Enterprise is being followed by a “ghost” ship, which eventually materializes and proves to be a Klingon warship. This is a nice callback to Balance of Terror, where the Enterprise played the part of the “ghost ship”, and the recent Enterprise Incident, where we learned that the Klingons now have cloaking technology.


"Follow that starship!"

No sooner does the ship reveal itself than Kirk is called away from the bridge again. Elaan has stabbed Petri, who declares that he will have nothing more to do with her.  He also explains to Nurse Chapel that the mysterious “allure” of Elasian women is merely biochemical: “A man whose flesh is once touched by the tears of a woman of Elas has his heart enslaved forever.”

Back in Elaan’s quarters, Kirk is fed up and declares that he will be Elaan’s new teacher. He tells her she is, “an uncivilized savage, a vicious child in a woman's body, an arrogant monster!”


"I said, 'Gimme five'—you've got to learn modern courtesy."

I must admit, my sympathies were thoroughly with Elaan. Despite her imperious attitude in the beginning, it becomes increasingly clear that she has no choice in the political marriage and no desire to be married. At one point she says, “I will not go to Troyius, I will not be mated to a Troyian, and I will not be humiliated, and I will not be given to a green pig as a bribe to stop a war!” And yet, the Enterprise continues on its way to Troyius, regardless of her behavior, her orders, or her protests. It seems she has no true power, but is merely a pawn to be traded, and probably one the Elasians don’t actually care much about.

In fact, I had to wonder if the Elasians didn’t want peace at all, but sent their “Dohlman” to be married as a sop to the Federation. That way they could say they’d tried, and if the Troyians couldn’t handle the Dohlman, well that just proved that peace wasn’t possible between them.

This also nicely sets up the question of why the Federation cares so much about stopping the war between these two planets, to the point of bringing diplomatic pressure and sending one of their best starships to ensure that the wedding and negotiations go well. Scotty blatantly asks the same question in the episode opener, leaving it to rest in the back of our minds as we watch.

The next day, Kryton, one of the Elasian guards, sneaks into Engineering and sabotages the Enterprise. Kirk forces his way into Elaan’s quarters and again begins trying to “teach” her, which mostly consists of wrestling with her and threatening to spank her. She starts to weep, and he wipes away her tears. The effect is immediate, with Kirk’s ire evaporating and transforming into passion.


"Say, you didn't just hear a kind of snake rattle sound, did you?"

Kryton is caught, and kills himself rather than allow himself to be subjected to a Vulcan mind meld. Kirk orders Scotty to figure out what Kryton did, then returns to Elaan’s quarters. Elaan tries to convince Kirk to work with the Klingons, but he tells her there are more important things than love: “Elaan, two planets, an entire star system's stability depends on it. We have a duty to forget what happened.”

At this point, those of us who have been watching Star Trek since the beginning already know what’s going to happen: Kirk will always choose the Enterprise over everything else. And indeed, when Spock and McCoy come to roust the captain out of Elaan’s quarters, all it takes for him to leave Elaan behind is to hear that the Klingon ship has changed course and is approaching at warp speed.


"Don't mind me.  I always walk this stiffly when my friends are watching…"

Once Kirk gets to the bridge, we’re treated to one of the best combat sequences we’ve seen yet on Star Trek. Kryton’s sabotage, Kirk learns at the last possible moment, was rigging the matter-antimatter unit to blow if the ship went into warp. The Klingon ship therefore starts by trying to bait the Enterprise into going into warp, and that doesn’t work, just firing on them.

The captain sends Elaan to Sickbay because it’s the safest part of the ship. Petri speaks to her there, finally treating her with a modicum of graciousness and respect, and asks her to wear the necklace gifted her by the Troyians, “as a token of respect for the desperate wishes of your people and mine for peace”. She seems genuinely affected by the words and gesture, perhaps realizing that Kirk will truly never sacrifice duty for love.


"Please put these on.  The Emperor paid retail."

Back on the bridge, the crew struggles to keep the Klingon ship’s hits to its best shield (Kirk doing a bit of back seat driving as he leans over Sulu and gives him his orders). An impulse-power driven ship is no match for warp, though, and all seems lost.

Elaan appears on the bridge, wearing the Troyian wedding dress and necklace. Spock immediately notes that there are strange readings coming from the necklace. It turns out that the stones, which Elaan says are “common”, are dilithium crystals! (No wonder the Federation and the Klingons are both so interested in this system!) She gives them to the Captain, who has Spock hurry them down to Engineering, where he and Scotty start installing them. Kirk does his best to stall, but the Klingons are unwilling to discuss terms (I imagine that after “The Enterprise Incident” and The Deadly Years, the Klingons have been instructed not to listen to anything the Federation says—or at least nothing that Kirk says.)


This fellow is no Michael Ansara.  He's not even a William Campbell…

The crystals are ready in the nick of time. A photon torpedo at close range leaves the Klingon ship damaged and limping. The Enterprise leaves it behind to fulfill its original mission.


Pow!  Right in the kisser.

Kirk says farewell to Elaan, who asks him not to forget her. He tells her he has no choice. Nor does she, she replies, only duty and responsibility. It’s clear that she’s come to accept her role, though whether it’s because she realized that her last desperate play to manipulate the captain failed or because her near-death experience made her decide that peace was more important than her personal feelings, we do not know. It is also worth noting that while she goes on to marry into a culture she despises and where she will likely be surrounded by people who hate, fear, and ridicule her (if Petri’s behavior is any indication), Kirk will simply continue doing what he loves. Her choice of “duty” over all else is thus, in my estimation, a far more difficult and admirable one.


"Oh, this knife?  I was just going to pare my nails.  Not kill the Emperor or anything like that, why do you ask?"

McCoy, unsurprisingly (given his track record) discovers an antidote to the Elasian tears. Spock tells him the captain has no need of it, as he’s already found his antidote: the Enterprise.

There were many things to love in this episode, and many things that frustrated me. The “Taming of the Shrew” sequences early on were grating, but the combat was excellent, and to the scriptwriter’s credit, the story did not end with Elaan being “tamed”. In the end, she makes a choice to accept her fate, but she does so with dignity.

The things I liked and didn’t like balanced out pretty well, leaving this a three star episode for me.


by Gideon Marcus

The Sum of its Parts

What I found so gratifying about "Elaan of Troyius" was its continuity with the Trek history we've encountered thus far.  Once again, as in "Journey to Babel", the Enterprise is host to a diplomatic mission (though how the ship could house several dozen delegates to the Babel Conference, but Uhura had to give up her room for Elaan, is never explained).  Once again, Kirk shows irritation at having to play nursemaid to a bunch of civilians.  I would find his flip treatment of Elaan demeaning, but it's no worse than he displays to Commissioner Ferris or Commissioner Fox.

I particularly loved the galactopolitical situation depicted in the episode.  Here we have a fairly new Federation system with two hostile planets, abundant with dilithium crystals, perched right at the edge of the Klingon Empire.  What a fraught situation Kirk must navigate!

At first, it was difficult for me to glean the plot behind the plot, but by the end of the episode, the setup was pretty clear.  The Federation, upon learning of the rich deposits on Elaas (and Troyius?) placed a clamp on all dispatches coming out of the system.  Not good enough, though, as the Klingons clearly want the worlds badly, too.  The Feds then explained to the two worlds in the system that they must work things out.  Elaas grudgingly agrees—and then effects two simultaneous plans to queer the deal.

The first is Kryton's sabotage.  By handing the Enterprise over to the Klingons, they get in their good graces (if, indeed, the Klingons have good graces).  Obviously, the savage Klingons are a better fit for for the militaristic Elaasians anyway.


"Of course I want to be a Klingon—you think I want to keep wearing this outfit?"

The second is Elaan.  She clearly doesn't want to be there.  Indeed, she does everything she can to get out of it, despite orders from the Elaasian council.  Elaan goes so far as to try to murder the Troyian ambassador and seduce the captain of the Enterprise.  And yet, that scheme fails when Elaan takes a page from Kirk's book, and indeed the example of the whole crew, that duty and the preservation of life trumps all else.  It's a quick, undershown change, but it's there, and I appreciated it.

The episode reminds me a bit of the parable of the peasant woman who shelters a starving prince.  The royal promises to give a gold coin for every fat bubble in the soup she serves.  Greedily, she dumps a huge pat of butter in the soup, which results in one big bubble rather than a myriad of little ones.  Similarly, if the Elaasians had stuck to just one plan, they might have succeeded.  Instead, they double hedged and lost all.

And was the Klingon commander operating with Imperial sanction?  Or was he a rogue skipper with notions of glory?  After all, taking on a starship seems pretty bold given the ever-watchful Organians.

It's not a perfect episode, but it's certainly an engaging one, and I always enjoy seeing Mrs. Robert Culp on the small screen.  Plus, her appearance alongside Shatner is something of a reunion—they starred together in the Broadway version of The World of Suzie Wong.  Plus, I dug both the Klingon ship (which we saw a bit of in "The Enterprise Incident" and "Day of the Dove") and the score for the episode.

Four stars.

Twixt Scylla and Charybdis


by Trini Stewart

The beginning of this week's episode did not seem promising to start, mostly because of the guest characters' first impressions on me. Petri the ambassador seemed childish and reckless in his peacemaking, and Elaan was almost comically uncooperative for royalty sent as a hospitable offering. Looking back, Elaan was possibly playing to her strengths to some end with her antagonistic reactions, and her development with Kirk ultimately became a gripping trial for our captain.

Kirk was the shining star of this episode, which is not something I feel about him often. He was impressively quick-witted against biochemical and psychological manipulation, which really sold his captain qualities for me more than his usual speeches or fights. The way Kirk kept his priorities in check while thinking on his feet reminded me of how Spock left me feeling in "The Tholian Web" when he held the ship together without Kirk. In the short time I have known Kirk, he has struck me as the type to always know what to say and fight when there is no other choice. Kirk managed to unravel the layers of the princess's antics even with serious disadvantages, revealing what his problem solving is like when he is out of sorts. Tension was well-built in this episode on several levels, and the challenges Kirk faced were arguably more dynamic and interesting than Spock's in "The Tholian Web".


"What's a case of tight trousers when the Enterprise is at stake?"

Kirk transitioned from acting as a respectful host to a firm authority with Elaan, and his initial responses to her rude behavior were tastefully poised. Once Elaan had seduced Kirk, he still managed to expertly dismantle the Elaisians’ schemes without falling for the Dohlman or her subordinates’ clever tricks. Shatner did a great job conveying how difficult it was for Kirk to maintain his composure, so it was riveting to see just how he would escape the Klingons, prepare the guileful Elaan for her marriage, and get the Enterprise back in ship shape under that level of duress. His allegiance to the Enterprise evidently sobered Kirk; his articulate maneuvering reflected his symbiotic relationship with the ship and her crew. In the end, even Elaan was humbled by our captain, finally submitting to the responsibilities her title bore. I was quite pleasantly surprised by Kirk this week, and the adversities threatening the crew were positively captivating. 4 stars!

Be Our Guest, Do As You Please


by Joe Reid

“Elaan of Troyius” was this week’s episode of Star Trek.  “Taming of the Shrew” storyline aside, there is one thing that the writers of Star Trek keep doing to twist my britches, and this episode was another example of it.  The Enterprise, powerful symbol of human achievement, has the laziest security imaginable.  Episode after episode, people that wish to do harm to the ship and its crew need only to walk into what should be the most secure areas of a ship to do as they please practically unchallenged.  Areas that on large ships, not all members of the crew are even allowed to enter.  So, let’s delve into some of areas of a ship that guests should not enter.

Let’s begin with the command center of the ship.  The bridge.  The seat of command, where the captain steers the destiny of a ship to complete its missions.  Obviously, a perfect place for a teenage princess to casually enter whenever she chooses.  Elaan pierced the bridge and interrupted the ship’s captain, while he was in the middle of a combat situation.  Good on the writers for making the captain, thanks to Spock’s urging, send her away from the bridge, only to have her show up on the bridge again after a change of clothes.  For an area holding some of the most senior members of the crew, it seems unusual that it wasn’t better protected.  Past episodes showcased singing children, enemy androids, and furry tribbles having free access to the brain trust of the Enterprise.  I anticipate that 15% of Kirk’s problems could be solved by securing access to the bridge to “Bridge Crew Only”.

The next ludicrous pattern that we witnessed in this episode was the open and unguarded access that guests on the Enterprise had to Engineering, the area of the ship that provides all the power, without which the Enterprise couldn’t move, fight, or support human life.  Why did Elaan’s former suitor have a free ticket to stroll into this most vital part of the ship and sabotage systems?  Again, good on the writers for allowing him to be discovered, be it many minutes later, only to allow the discoverer to be summarily executed for his weak efforts to question someone he'd found messing with the thing that keeps the ship alive.  If only this random trespass in Engineering were rare.  Previous episodes sported children again, along with genetically advanced conquerors, self-aware talking space probes, and Klingons traipsing merrily into the bowels of Engineering. 

Where before I said that 15% of Kirk’s problems could be solved by securing the Bridge, 99% of problems could go away if Engineering had a couple guards working shifts to protect the very heart of this starship. 


If only Kevin Riley were on duty, none of this would have happened.  So long as he's sober…

Historically there have been some areas of the ship that have been kept secure week after week.  Areas that no one can casually walk into without permission (unless you are a floating cloud of space gas that is). Those would be crew quarters.  Even in this week’s episode, crew quarters were better guarded, and their doors are better respected, than what should have been the most sensitive areas of the ship.  Not even Spock and McCoy could casually walk into the room where the captain was passionately kissing Elaan. 

Perhaps future episodes will take the security of the most critical parts of the ship more seriously.  That, or have the crew consider moving the engines and bridge staff to crew quarters, where doors are respected.

For continuing to overlook this easily solvable problem, I offer only 2 stars for “Elaan of Troyius”.  Ignoring the fact that the episode did display some interesting makeup and costumes, and featured a few well-acted scenes, the continued stupidity of the security of the ship is as untenable as its “secure” areas.

Two stars

[Come join us tomorrow night (January 3rd) for the next thrilling episode of Star Trek!  KGJ is broadcasting the show live with commercials and accompanied by trekzine readings at 8pm Eastern and Pacific.  You won't want to miss it…]




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Science Fiction/Fantasy, TV

[December 20, 1968] A failure to communicate (Star Trek: "The Empath")

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by Trini Stewart

This week's episode, “The Empath”, gave Star Trek fans some wonderful interactions from our crew on a rescue mission, but also had them running on a vaguely-guided track throughout the episode.

At the start, the Enterprise is tasked with evacuating a research station before the star it was studying goes nova, but when Kirk, Spock and McCoy arrive at the station, there is no one left to rescue. An enormous solar flare threatens the Enterprise during the search, so the ship leaves to safety just before a record tape reveals where the former inhabitants went. Kirk, Spock, and McCoy watch as the station researchers suddenly disappear while a strange noise shrills on tape, and the three distressed crew members are almost immediately teleported away by the same noise.


Where Kirk was…a very effective effect!

They find themselves in a dark area with a mysteriously mute woman, whom they nickname Gem. While the crew attempts to ask Gem about how they got there, two large-headed figures, the Vians, bluntly introduce themselves and refuse to tell Kirk what is going on. The crew is easily overpowered, the Vians collect data from Gem, and they vanish with the crew’s weapons. A small cut on Kirk’s head is suddenly healed when he checks on Gem, and McCoy realizes that Gem communicates through her highly responsive nervous system; all of Kirk’s feelings and ailments can become hers from just a touch.


The healing power of interpretive dance

Spock then locates a sophisticated lab, where they discover the Vians preparing large perspex tubes for the crew members, and the missing inhabitants of the station dead in tubes of their own. The three officers learn that they are meant to be subjected to deadly tests for reasons unknown, and they flee with Gem through a cave mouth. The Vians trick the escapees with a mirage of a search party to test their wills, and capture Kirk once they observe the crew’s perseverance. Kirk sacrifices himself by insisting he be the one specimen the Vians want for their cruel torture, after which Gem reluctantly heals his potentially deadly wounds at McCoy’s behest.


Shatner is devastated that he's not in the spotlight…

While Spock works out how to attune the Vians’ instrument to allow their escape, the aliens come back to reveal that they plan to gravely injure either Spock or McCoy next, and that the trio must choose the victim when they return. This leads to one of the most endearing displays of the crew’s dynamic I have seen in the show: both officers insist they be the test subject without hesitation, and antics ensue. The two begin to argue that the other is more valuable to leave with the captain, but Kirk insists he will be the one to decide, only to be rendered unconscious by McCoy’s treatment. Spock then notes his approval of the treatment, as it relieved Kirk of a rough decision and put Spock in charge as second-in-command. McCoy punctuates that sentiment by ambush-sedating Spock, saving the critical Vulcan the only way he could. Gem sheds a single tear as McCoy is taken away, since she has now emotionally connected with both Kirk and Spock and feels the depth of their affinity for him.


A single tear—Gem's race has not had time to be acquainted with clichés

The two remaining officers eventually awaken and begin to configure the Vians’ device, acknowledging that the aliens likely wanted them to escape and leave McCoy behind. Instead, Spock transports Gem and them to the lab, where McCoy is found with multiple fatal injuries, and he tries to make light for everyone’s sake. The two realize their only hope for McCoy is for Gem to help him despite the risk, and the Vians restrict them in their force field to prevent their interference. The aliens begin to explain that they must see how Gem reacts on her own, because she is being judged of her worth on behalf of her whole species; Gem’s choice to save McCoy would determine whether the Vians use their limited resources to save Gem’s species. Spock and Kirk escape the force field, and Kirk indicates that the Vians do not know the value of the compassion they claim to idolize. The aliens, humbled all too quickly, mend McCoy and whisk Gem away with a short farewell. The episode ends with the crew appreciating Gem as an entity, and Spock delivering a fun riposte to Scotty in response to his joke at the Vulcan's expense.


"There.  All better.  No hard feelings?"

The episode did a great job at highlighting the main characters, but left the intentions of the new ones blurry in execution. It is unclear why the Vians specifically found compassion to be the only trait worth preserving, especially when they didn’t practice it. It is generally accepted that self sacrifice is the ultimate show of love, but the weight that carries as a theme is undermined by how dubious the whole experiment is.

The crew’s interactions give a good taste of what the impact should have been, but the incomplete understanding of the threat ultimately caused the intense stakes built up for the captives to fall flat. Moreover, the Vians were presented as an overwhelming force, yet they hardly understood why they were conducting experiments, to the extent that insults from Kirk immediately caused them to question their motives. Not to mention that they conveniently and inexplicably had the means to save one of the races in the solar system. The crew’s roles in this episode outshone the disappointing parts, so I still consider this a good episode as far as enjoyment goes.

3.5 stars.

Amateur work


by Gideon Marcus

Joyce Muskat's name is probably new to you.  It wasn't to me—she's a N3FFer (member of the National Fantasy Fan Federation.  Also, a few months ago, her name was mentioned in one of the Trekzines.  I can't remember which one it was, but the author was pleased that her fan friend, Joyce Muskat, had sold a script to Trek on the slush pile.  This was remarkable since Trek officially doesn't take unsolicited manuscripts.  So, good for her.  I love that Trek has opened the door to new talent, particularly women.

I'd really like to know if the inconsistencies in the episode were the result of a spotty understanding of the material or revisions after submission.  I suspect the latter.  No true fan (he said hopefully) would write the Federation as inhuman monsters who would let the sundry races of Minar die when the sun went nova.  No sf aficionado would make the boner mistake of having a planet's atmosphere protect the surface from cosmic rays, but not the Enterprise's shields, not to mention having cosmic rays cause earthquakes.

It's never even made clear whether or not Gem (Jem?) comes from a race of empaths or if she was unique among them.  The latter seems more likely; I find it hard to believe that a race of empaths could fail to feel compassion.  I could see telepaths walling themselves off to avoid a confusion of the psyches ("where do I stop and you begin?") but given that Gem cannot verbally communicate at all, an empathic race would have to rely on its mental powers to relate.  And as Heinlein pointed out, no beings have more compassion than those who "grok" each other.

There's much to like about the episode, from the performances of the leads to the creative use of set and costume (the Vians have excellent Outer Limits-style make-up, though it is strange seeing such in color).  On the other hand, the unremitting score, the odd pacing (Shatner slo-mo-ing to the ground for about a minute springs to mind), the nonsensical motivations for the Vians' experiment, and frankly, the directorial decision to keep focusing on Gem's facial expressions, which made her look somewhat clownish, all drag the episode down to average territory.


If only Harlan Ellison had written this episode of Outer Limits…

Three stars.

Substitutionary Theology


by Joe Reid

“The Empath” is this week’s episode of Star Trek.  In it the crew of the Enterprise explore another strange new world.  Yet again they face forces that are overwhelming.  Yet again they find a way to pull their fat out of the fire and yet again the writers of this show chose to lace in overt theology into their story.  Not only were these salutes to God and the Bible poorly executed, they sought to teach biblical morals without delivering the substance of the message through the narrative of the story, but through imagery and exposition only.  This practice proved to be utter folly. 

In one of the opening scenes we witnessed a recording of two missing scientists going about their work when a quake happened.  This prompted the scientist named Ozaba to quote the first part of Psalm 95, verse 4, “In his hand are the deep places of the earth;…” A verse that when looked at by itself means nothing, but surrounded by the other verses in Psalm 95 that speak of the grandeur and majesty of God.  Ozaba quoting this added nothing to the scene nor did it make his sudden disappearance meaningful.  It was as if the writers desired to open the episode with a random scripture and blindly opened a Bible and picked the first verse they saw. 

At the very end of the episode this time Scotty delivered the references to scripture, without quoting it this time.  It was Mathew 13:45-46, where Jesus speaks about the kingdom of heaven being like a pearl of great price—it being worth selling everything that one has in order to obtain it.  Although closer related to the something in the story, (Gem) this scripture like the previous one was a bad fit for the message that the story was attempting to deliver: sacrificing oneself for the benefit of another. 

Strange use of scripture aside, the troubling part for me was in the main story of the episode: the imagery of Kirk as he was tortured by the aliens.  His hands were bound and his arms were stretched wide as if he were on a cross.  A nearly impossible position to hold as his wrists were bound with two ropes.  It was done intentionally so as to place Kirk in a crucified posture.  Conversely when McCoy was bound in a similar way his hands were above him.


Shatner's double is dying for the episode's sins

The combination of the out of place scriptural references and imagery used for both Kirk and the girl (in particular, the Pietà at the end as she is draped in a Vian's arms) muddy the waters of what this episode is attempting to say.  A much more effective method would be to keep the moral message and the story only based in the environment of an alien world and deliver the message without the forced and uninspired asides to scripture.  I’m fine with teaching morality tales using other mediums. I’m not fine with the poor application of scripture. It has the potential to cause more harm than good if misused—as we’ve seen done throughout the centuries.

Lest I be misunderstood, it's not so much that I found the episode offensive; rather it was too shallow and ineffective to deliver its message faithfully and respectfully.

One star

Staging a Comeback


by Janice L. Newman

When movies and television became widespread, early directors and producers treated them much like stage plays. There’s a static quality to shows, noticeable all the way up through the fifties and early sixties.

Eventually creators began to innovate, finally realizing that they could do things that weren’t possible on a stage. We began to see more creativity in how things were filmed, and particularly in how things were staged. In Star Trek we’ve seen both styles. Some episodes have had more traditional, static staging with actors carefully lined up in staggered and visible rows, while other episodes have pushed the boundaries of what can be done with a camera (the moving shots from Nomad’s point-of-view in Changeling come to mind).

“The Empath” is an interesting hybrid. There are a few scenes on the surface of the planet, and a couple on the Enterprise, but most of it is shot in a dark, empty space with minimal props. This makes it feel like a stage play, but more like a modern production than a traditional play. Gem’s interpretive dance-style form of communication strengthens this impression as well. It’s interesting to see how we’ve come full circle, from techniques drawn from the stage, to more dynamic shots made possible by modern filmmaking techniques, and now returning to a stage play, this time deliberately, to get a particular tone and feeling.


Filming in limbo—next door to Tombstone

There was much I liked in this episode: the interactions between Spock, McCoy, and Kirk were excellent, and I loved the idea of Gem’s special ability. Unfortunately, rest of the story made no sense, with important or dramatic information revealed late and then ignored in ways that were entirely uncharacteristic. I found myself wondering, as Gideon did, how many of the inconsistencies were due to the original script and how much to modifications made by others (certainly Roddenberry never hesitated to cut up or re-write a script, as Harlan Ellison will bitterly tell you). The bright spots and dark spots canceled each other out, leaving me with a somewhat disappointing three star episode and a lot of questions.

A Familiar Song


by Mx. Blue Cathey-Thiele

The Talosians are back! Oh wait, these are different beings with bulbous skulls, silver robes, illusory abilities, and a penchant for experimenting on humanoids. Supposedly the Vians have the power to save an entire planet (but only one!) from the imminent nova, and are deciding the fate of said planet by coercing an empath to absorb injuries to the point of death. Are there representatives from other planets being tested elsewhere? If Gem “fails" will the Vians save their own planet? Why does an entire world need to reach a certain standard of “compassion” to deserve being rescued from annihilation? Pay too much attention and you will start to wonder if the Vians are making it up as they go along. Note the dead scientists stored in macabre tube displays! Nothing says good intentions like having three more tubes ready and labeled for when the landing party eventually dies!


"The Red Cross is getting overambitious with their blood drives…"

The Talosians- sorry, the Vians pay strangely little attention to Gem, for all their claims. It's hard to tell if Gem was left on the sidelines more from being a woman, or from what translated in human terms as a disability. Captain Pike is one of the few men who have been equally dismissed by an episode at large, and it's very clear that his role in The Menagerie was impacted by his limited means of communication. Despite clearly being able to comprehend what was happening, his binary Yes/No indicator left him largely out of the conversation. Even when he did express an opinion, it wasn't always respected. Gem had a more interpretive means of communication, but she too was often overlooked. In a future with translators that can talk to glowing clouds, and in the company of Spock, a touch telepath who has expressed a growing willingness to meld with aliens he encounters, it's beyond me how the crew ever opts not to try to communicate.

Upon first finding Gem, Kirk wants to know what is wrong, why she won't speak. Most aliens they've met have compatible languages, after all. McCoy's analysis: “She appears to be perfectly healthy. As for the other, her lack of vocal cords could be physiologically normal for her species, whatever that is,” provides a good reminder about human norms and poses the question, is a being “mute” if their species doesn't speak to start with? If her entire civilization uses empathy to connect, then the landing party likely seems just as restricted to Gem as she does to them. Being an alien, she doesn't nod or shake her head, but she does press McCoy's tricorder into Kirk's hands when the question of where to go arises. Given the option of escape, she votes to rescue the doctor.

Katheryn Hays brought a lot to her role as Gem, when the episode remembered she was there at all. Her performance, the set, and some choice scenes between the landing party couldn't make up for the surrounding episode, though.

3 stars

[Come join us tonight (December 20th) for the next thrilling episode of Star Trek!  KGJ is broadcasting the show live with commercials and accompanied by trekzine readings at 8pm Eastern and Pacific.  You won't want to miss it… Plus early coverage of the Apollo 8 launch!]

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Science Fiction/Fantasy, TV

[November 14, 1968] "'S'cuse me while I touch the sky!" (Star Trek: "For the World is Hollow and I have Touched the Sky")

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by Gideon Marcus

After several weeks in science fiction's New Wave, Star Trek returned last week to its roots—specifically, the pages of Astounding Science Fiction.  Those who read Robert Heinlein's Universe when it was serialized in the 1940s or the novelized version, Orphans in the Sky in the early '50s, will be thoroughly familiar with the plot of the latest Trek episode.

We start in medias res: the Enterprise is under fire by a cluster of missiles.  After dispatching them with phasers, Captain Kirk orders the ship to investigate the source.  On the way, Dr. McCoy gives Kirk a bombshell announcement—McCoy is dying from a terminal disease and has one year to live.


"I'm (about to be) dead, Jim."

In short order, the Enterprise arrives at the missiles' point of origin, which turns out to be a large asteroid.  It looks just like the one "The Paradise Syndrome", and the parallels do not stop there.  For the asteroid is actually hollow and has engines.  It's a generation ship (a sort of slower-than-light space ark on which people will live and die for centuries) called Yonada, and the people onboard have lapsed to primitivism, unaware that they are even on a mobile vessel.  The ship is on a collision course with the highly inhabited world, Darin 5.  Impact date: about a year hence.


For the walnut is hollow, and I have eaten the pith.

Kirk, Mr. Spock, and McCoy beam down to investigate, because, of course, it's always those three these days.  They are taken prisoner by a bunch of mooks in parti-color sheets led by the beautiful Priestess/Queen Natira, and presented to The Oracle. This is a black monolith with a camera eye and a menacing voice (pretty sure it's the versatile Jimmy Doohan, once again) who zaps the Federation trio to let them know what he's capable of.


The Yonadan handshake.

When the three awaken, McCoy is the most affected thanks to his illness.  Upon learning about McCoy's condition Spock grips Bones' shoulder with an intensity that belies his stoic demeanor.  They are clearly very close friends, bickering aside.



"Put your hand on my shoooouldeeer…."

Queen Natira is quite taken with Bones and candidly asks if he'll be her mate.  It's all very sudden, but if you reverse the sexes, it's actually not unusual for the screen—after all, James Bond seduces even more quickly.  Anyway, since Bones digs Natira and he only has a year left, why not?  Meanwhile, Kirk and Spock monkey around in the Oracle's room and get sentenced to death for blasphemy.  They are saved by McCoy's intervention and beam back to the ship, leaving McCoy behind at his request.  As part of his citizenship rite, Bones is implanted with The Instrument of Obedience, a subcutaneous pain inducer installed in a person's left temple.

Kirk and co. are about to warp away from Yonada on the direct orders of an Admiral, when Bones calls the ship on his communicator.  In the Oracle room, McCoy has seen a book that contains all the knowledge of the folks who built Yonada, a super-advanced race called The Fabrini. He thinks it has the key to getting the ship back on course so it won't hit Darin 5. But as he relays this information, his Instrument begins to glow, and Bones collapses.


"Chicago Mobs of the 1920s?"


Excedrin headache #1701

Kirk and Spock beam back to Yonada, the latter extracting McCoy's Instrument, the former convincing Natira of the truth of her situation.  They all confront the Oracle, who is displeased, but as we've all guessed, he's just a computer and easily deactivated.  Kirk and Spock get the asteroid back on course (but the destination is still, apparently, Darin 5) and the day is saved.  Natira asserts that, much as she loves Bones after the 38 minutes they've spent together, she must stay behind with her people and guide them, now that she knows the truth.  But McCoy can catch up with her in a year when they reach their goal.

There's not too much to say here.  I enjoyed the return to classic SFnal fare, and I particularly liked Natira, who is bold but reasonable, and there's no "a woman?" reaction to her leading her people.  I guess Kirk learned his lesson from "Spock's Brain."  It's a pretty episode, particularly this great through-the-stairs shot as our heroes descent into the ark proper (which, as a watcher pointed out, also saved a lot of money since the rest of the set didn't have to be shown).

But the episode sort of plods.  There is a bit of padding, which the show can ill afford given how much it tries to do in 60 minutes.  My biggest issue is Kirk deducing that Yonada is somehow broken.  How can he tell the Oracle doesn't plan to decelerate once the ship gets to Darin 5?  And, of course, the Fabrini data tapes coincidentally having the cure to McCoy's illness, cheapening the whole "Bones is dying" plot.

Three stars.

Eve's Bitten Apple is a Hollow Fruit


by Amber Dubin

With a title including the words “I have touched the sky,” I expected the the writing quality in this episode to reach a bit higher in metaphorical heights. Unfortunately, the intellectual peak of this episode is the lofty language of the title. I say this because the plot appears to be a sex-reversed version of Adam and Eve.

At first blush, Natira seems to be an original character. A strong-willed priestess/queen who is a decisive and effective leader and emissary for the authoritative voice of the Ancients. However, this illusion of originality quickly fades when she is viewed through a biblical lens as Adam, the founder of humanity and the only one entrusted with hearing the Voice of God. While it is a slightly interesting spin to cast McCoy as Eve offering her the apple of knowledge, it’s a frustratingly over-done concept. I may be biased, as I also take issue with the biblical moral being that seeking knowledge is worthy of punishment, but I don’t see why this story needs to keep being told ad nauseum. And, more importantly, how is it that even though the woman is playing Adam this time, she’s still being punished?

Adam famously pointed the finger at Eve to avoid being branded with the title of ‘original sinner,’ and yet when Natira doesn’t pluck the apple herself, she is still painted with the same brush as McCoy. Also, I am not a fan of the fact that the Ancient Ones are once again an all-powerful race with the forethought to sustain their people for 10,000 years (a la the Eye-Morgs in “Spock’s Brain” or the Creators of “The Paradise Syndrome”) and yet their grand plan to support their people is an authoritarian, theocratic government with shock collars to keep their subjects in line? Again? Can all these ancient, powerful, alien races truly be that intellectually evolved when not one so far has established a system whose fabric doesn’t completely unravel at the slightest pull on a thread tugged by a single dynamic thinker? Did they truly expect to be able to exterminate every single person who ever suggested climbing the incredibly accessible fence posts on their containment unit? Did that actually work for 10,000 years? Is a species so devoid of curiosity even worth saving at that point? I’d argue no, but that’s speaking as someone who would have been eliminated from the gene pool immediately under those parameters.


For the world's a set, and I have touched the walls.

I did like that McCoy got his moment in this episode. I’m always refreshed when Kirk isn’t seducing every woman on screen with the power of being the main character. I also enjoyed seeing a woman maintaining strong leadership when she chooses duty and responsibility to her people over love of a stranger. The love at first sight concept was slightly more tolerable being presented from the perspective of a female pursuer, and it may only have raised my hackles since I'm a bitter old maid myself.

Overall I didn’t love this episode but it wasn’t horrible. I may be harping on it so because of the motif fatigue I’m experiencing after it followed such other innovative and unique episodes in this season. Though I do think that the poetic title earned it an extra half star above average.

3.5 Stars

Why to Try Touching the Sky


by Trini Stewart

Hello, my name is Trini Stewart, and I showed up to the Star Trek party in a similar fashion to how I arrive at most parties- unreasonably late, and with no idea what’s going on at the moment. My journey with Star Trek began recently with “Is There in Truth No Beauty?,” and now I am happy to be strapped in for the ride.

As the title of this week’s episode implies, “For the World is Hollow and I have Touched the Sky” tells a story of questioning and exploring one’s reality, and does so effectively through the frame of a conflicted leader’s pursuit of objective truth.

The Priestess and Queen of the hollow world Yonada, Natira, is introduced with no clue that Yonada was actually a vessel. Natira clearly has no intention of questioning the stern punishments and vague promises of the Oracle, that is, until the Enterprise officers challenge the queen’s understanding of her world and its fate. The initial cracks in Natira’s worldview can be attributed to lowering her guard around Bones, as she is earnestly smitten with him the moment she sees him captured, and she dares to hope that “men of…other worlds hold truth as dear as (Yonadans) do.” Subsequently, Natira seems to be more receptive to questions about the Oracle from the foreigners, and, in a show of trusting McCoy’s testimony for Kirk and Spock, she openly defies the will of the Oracle to pardon them from a death sentence.

These subtle changes within the queen are suddenly imperative when she later faces Kirk, who insists he has a warning regarding the fate of her world. For Natira to acknowledge that her world is in peril is to reject that the Oracle knows what is best, let alone how merely listening to a truth that is not “Yonada’s truth” is precarious heresy in itself. In contrast to the Oracle’s mysterious promises, Kirk’s transparency and willingness to reason appeals to Natira, and though it is incredibly difficult for the queen to withstand the Oracle’s threats, she is convinced to confront her authority for the sake of her home. Natira pleads that she listened to the outsiders because they spoke the truth, and remarks her new understanding of truth, exclaiming, “Is truth not truth for all?” Even willing to die for the safety of her people, the queen exhibits her newfound reverence for objective truth in one last, defiant plea, “I must know the truth of the world!” before collapsing at the behest of the Oracle.


The truth will set your teeth on edge…

Ultimately, Natira’s new understanding of what is true shifts her relationship with McCoy; formerly enamored by McCoy to the point of locking him into a hefty vow of obedience, she opts to honor the intended course of the Generation ship and to hope for a fulfilling life for the doctor, even when he resists. It is Natira’s receptiveness to new ideas that reveals the state of her world and saves billions of people, thus revealing the importance of both appreciating different perspectives and reforming one’s own comprehension of the world around them.

On that note, I as a viewer can truly appreciate this episode’s call to challenge ourselves, to challenge authority, and to even challenge "truth". Now, more than ever, that "Law and Order" Nixon is about to be our next President.

At the very least, I can hope that between this week’s message and the pacifist musings of “Day of the Dove,” Star Trek watchers will reflect on how we react to political discontent in our personal lives. 3.5 stars.

Short Shrift


by Janice L. Newman

The scriptwriter crammed a lot into this week’s episode, and unfortunately the episode suffered for it. While the ideas introduced were intriguing and potentially poignant, the rate at which the story had to be told to fit within the time slot left me frustrated and unsatisfied. The pacing of the episode itself was fine, that is, it didn't hit the story beats too fast. But by its very nature, the story had too much to do and not enough space to do it in, which left the beats themselves feeling shallow or curtailed.

McCoy’s illness could have been a wonderfully dramatic plot point if it had been introduced in a prior episode or at the beginning of a two or three-part story. Instead, it falls flat. The illness feels like a contrivance and the solution feels horribly pat.

The romance between Natira and McCoy feels similarly forced. The scriptwriter did their best to make it plausible. One can say that McCoy’s knowledge of the limited time he has left to live drives his choices, or that he’s mostly manipulating Natira to save his friends’ lives, just as Kirk has done on many occasions. Yet the whirlwind ‘romance’ between Spock and the Romulan Commander in The Enterprise Incident had far more emotional impact, even when we knew or guessed that Spock was ‘faking’. McCoy’s and Natira’s romance just feels weird, almost a developing relationship shown in quick cuts.


"Goodbye, sweet what's-your-name…"

The background of Natira’s race could have been fascinating, if the author had been able to do more with it than the barest sketch. A ten thousand year-old race that sent a generation ship to the stars when its sun went nova is a compelling concept deserving of some screen time. The fact that they had medical advancements sufficient to cure Dr. McCoy’s illness but that their weapons weren’t advanced enough to hurt the Enterprise is suggestive and interesting.

I imagine multi-part stories are not what a network or syndicator wants. Being forced to show certain episodes in a certain order, all the while risking pre-emption or cancellation if a sports game runs long or a political speech comes on, must be anathema to broadcasters. They must want neat, tidy stories that fit within their time slot and don’t have any connection or major changes from episode to episode; in other words, interchangeable, truly episodic pieces that they can fit into whichever slot they want without worrying about audience retaliation. (Batman and soap operas seem to be the exception to this.)

Unfortunately, limiting the story to a tidy 50-something minute block means that no matter how good the acting and direction, no matter how hard the scriptwriter tries, some kinds of stories are going to get short shrift.

This was one of those stories. Or to put it another way, great ideas, mediocre execution.

Three stars.

Spring of Hope


by Joe Reid

“For the World is Hollow and I have Touched the Sky” was the title of this week’s episode of Star Trek.  The title is a mouthful but does a decent job of giving us a feel for what we saw in this entry.  The title is one that evokes hope out of despair.  This episode was a tale filled with many hopeful outcomes springing out of situations heading towards tragedy.  In fact, despair and hope were so perfectly bookended by this airing that it would make your local librarian proud.  Let’s examine a few ways that this was accomplished.

The opening shot was that of missiles flying through space heading for the Enterprise.  Granted these missiles barely caused a concern for the crew of the powerful starship as they were dispatched with a quick command from Captain Kirk.  No, the real despair inducing news came in the following scene where we learned that our beloved Doctor McCoy was inflicted with an illness that would kill him within a year.  That he would die a lonely bachelor.  This caused a tonal shift in every scene we saw McCoy in, giving a gravity to this scene, it perhaps being the last time that we might see our favorite TV doctor. 

If that wasn’t bad enough, Bones, Kirk, and Spock were soon violently attacked by a mob, electrocuted and imprisoned.  After that they were scheduled for execution due to committing crimes against the creators. Shortly after that they were forced off the alien world one crewmember short as greater than 2 billion lives hung in the balance.  With so many worry inducing elements coming forth in an episode, it’s a wonder that any one of these tragedies didn’t become the focus of the entire episode.  No, the beauty of this episode was that no desperate situation was left without hope for very long.

After being attacked and mistreated on the alien world the inhabitants quickly changed to welcoming them as friends, granting them free access to the entirety of their world. The lonely doctor found love on the alien world, meeting and marrying the priestess and leader of the people.  He was then able to save Kirk and Spock from execution, getting their lives as a gift from his new wife.  The ultimate hope-filled outcome is that not only do the billions of people find salvation, but also our favorite doctor is cured from the illness plaguing him at the start of the episode.

Sadly as the episode drew to a close we witnessed the parting of McCoy and his wife as she chose to stay with her people as they were finally heading to a new homeworld for themselves.  Even this scene was given a happy ending as we soon learned that the Enterprise would be present as the people found their new world and that he would be reunited with his wife.

“For the World is Hollow and I have Touched the Sky” was a well-acted episode, with great wardrobe, and a plot that felt original.  It was refreshing to see McCoy be the object of feminine attention and DeForest Kelly's performance was the standout of the show.


Next year, Natira will get to wake up to this handsome face every morning!

Four stars.

[Come join us tomorrow (November 15th) for the next thrilling episode of Star Trek!  KGJ is broadcasting the show live with commercials and accompanied by trekzine readings at 8pm Eastern and Pacific.  You won't want to miss it…]





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Science Fiction/Fantasy, TV

[November 8, 1968] A Diplomatic Tiger by the Tail ("Day of the Dove")

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by Amber Dubin

As a Captain, James T. Kirk has always been known more as a soldier than a diplomat. In the same way that Captain Kirk was forced to move past his initial, violent, problem-solving instincts in "Spectre of a Gun," here, yet another great and powerful alien species drops the crew of the Enterprise into direct contact with a combative, unreasonable opponent, making him take a "diplomatic tiger by the tail" that Captain Kirk must use every tool in his skill set to tame.

The setup is masterfully crafted from the very beginning by what appears to be a solitary alien made of pure energy that presents as a wheel of twinkling lights. Twinkling alien energy, who I will refer to from now on as TAE, is not invisible, but takes pains to silently hover just out of direct line of sight from every group of combatants it takes interest in. The Enterprise does not notice TAE on its first appearance when they beam down to an uninhabited planet, searching for what was supposed to be the ruins of a recently destroyed colony described in a distress signal. Chekov remarks, in confusion, that his readings indicate that there was no evidence of a colony nor an attack. Before the crew has time to process this information, Sulu chimes in over the communicator, warning him that a Klingon ship is approaching. Said ship immediately starts showing signs of distress, quickly becoming disabled by internal explosions to which the Enterprise made no contribution.

Commander Kang, the Klingon starship captain, makes no attempt to understand his situation; he beams down and decks Captain Kirk, yelling that since the federation has committed an act of war against the Klingons by killing 400 of his crew and disabling his ship, he is owed command of the Enterprise. TAE glows a menacing red color, apparently delighted with the increase in hostility. Thus the stage is set before the first credits roll of this episode.


The episode's opening salvo

Captain Kirk displays his newfound diplomatic skills, engaging in dialogue with someone whose assault just knocked him flat on his back. When Kang again demands that Kirk cede control of the Enterprise, our captain calmly replies, “go to the Devil.” Kang smoothly retorts “We have no Devil, Kirk, but we understand the habits of yours,“ whom he intends to emulate by torturing crewmen until Kirk hands over control of his ship.

Suddenly, a strange look comes over Chekov’s face and he jumps at the Klingon commander, practically volunteering to be first on the torture block, incoherently yelling about needing revenge for his brother, Pyotr, who had been killed on the colony they never found. In another clever manipulation, Captain Kirk gets Kang to agree to cease torturing Chekov by promising to beam the Klingons aboard the Enterprise, assuring him that there will be no tricks once they are on the ship. Of course, phrasing it like this left a loophole where he wouldn’t be lying if beaming the Klingons up was the trick—they are stuck in stasis until guards can round them up. Back on the Enterprise, Kirk quarantines the angry Klingon landing party with their distressed ship's remaining crewmen stranded.


A gaggle of steaming-mad Klingons

Before our heroes can figure out what’s going, the Enterprise crewmen start falling one by one under the same spell of violent madness that seized Chekov down on the colony site. Unlike with the Klingon crewmen, this wave of violence is very out of character for the Enterprise crew, and they turn on each other using racist, species-ist and otherwise highly offensive rhetoric against each other, the likes of which hasn’t been used on earth in centuries at this point. Chekov even goes on a slathering rampage where he outright defies Captain Kirk and goes to attack the Klingons to avenge his slain brother. This strangeness becomes particularly significant when Sulu declares that Chekov doesn’t even have a brother, as he's an only child.


Chekov disobeys a direct order.

Captain Kirk does the best job of fighting through the madness in order to refocus each crewman one by one towards finding out the root of the issue at hand. It is eventually surmised that TAE is on board, spurring the crewmen to fight and feeding off the negative emotions when its manipulations work and they get at each other’s throats. It is soon discovered that TAE is even more dangerous than originally feared, as it not only can influence the memories and emotions of its victims, but it also has the ability to warp reality itself, healing the scars of the wounded and turning nearly every object at everyone’s disposal into swords, deliberately making every weapon just inefficient enough to prolong conflict and minimize potential fatalities.


Bread and circuses, redux.

In typical Kirk fashion, the seriousness of TAE’s threat doesn’t fully hit him until a female is affected; Kang’s wife, his ship's Science Officer, gets separated from the rest of the group and is set-upon by a completely rabid Chekov. He rips her clothes, but thankfully is interrupted by Kirk and the bridge crew before he can go further. Kirk is justifiably horrified that TAE would be more than willing to push his crew towards that kind of violence. After incapacitating Chekov, Kirk entreats Kang’s wife to join him in uniting her husband and the rest of the Klingons against the real enemy; and it is with great difficulty that he does finally change Kang’s mind and get him to call the rest of the Klingons to a truce. In the end, it’s Kang’s words that finally eject TAE from the ship, as he taunts ”we need no urging to hate humans… only a fool fights in a burning house”


United in defiance.

While it is obvious to see that this episode is once again making a political commentary of our time, this one doesn't rub me the wrong way because the character foils have been fleshed out enough to be likable. Straw men have a tendency to be hollow and weak, but Kang and his wife Mara are anything but that. The Klingons may be violent and aggressive on their face, but they justify their actions with a strong moral backbone and end up proving themselves capable of being reasoned with. Michael Ansara's tremendous presence of voice and body does a phenomenal job of making Commander Kang a formidable yet worthy foe. No slouch herself, Mara shows that she is a leader in her own right, making Kirk work almost as hard to change her mind as her husband's, along the way making some very solid points about Klingon foreign policy. If anything, the Klingons are made to be anti-heroes rather than villains, and in constantly having to take their side against his own men, Kirk shows us the value of humanizing one's enemy, even when that enemy is not human at all.

5 stars.


by Janice L. Newman

When entertainment takes a stance on politics or morality, it’s often a recipe for a bad story. There are plenty of classic parables and fables, of course, but when popular television gets involved in such things sometimes the lesson feels shoehorned in or the plot feels warped around the ‘message’ the writer wanted to send. For example, The Omega Glory and A Private Little War were both attempts to make a point about current political situations, and both were subpar episodes.

“Day of the Dove”, on the other hand, does it right.

This is not a subtle story, yet it maintains a clever mystery plot and dramatic tension right up to the end. The denouement carries a powerful message that I found both shocking and welcome. Shocking, because I didn’t expect to see such blatant anti-war sentiments expressed on prime-time TV. [Janice doesn't watch the Smothers Bros. (ed)] Welcome, because I feel the same way.

There are plenty of intense moments throughout the episode, but the message can be summed up in a few lines of dialogue:

KIRK: All right. All right. In the heart. In the head. I won't stay dead. Next time I'll do the same to you. I'll kill you. And it goes on, the good old game of war, pawn against pawn! Stopping the bad guys. While somewhere, something sits back and laughs and starts it all over again.
MCCOY: Let's jump him.
SPOCK: Those who hate and fight must stop themselves, Doctor. Otherwise, it is not stopped.
MARA: Kang, I am your wife. I'm a Klingon. Would I lie for them? Listen to Kirk. He is telling the truth.
KIRK: Be a pawn, be a toy, be a good soldier that never questions orders.
(Kang looks at the weird light, then throws down his sword.)
KANG: Klingons kill for their own purposes.

(Transcript courtesey of chakoteya.)

There is so much conveyed within these few lines. In the context of the rest of the episode, they inspire all sorts of thoughts and questions:

“Question orders.” “Is it wrong to participate in unjust wars?” “Who is benefitting from our wars?” “Who stands to profit and has a vested interest in keeping a war going?” “Are the people with a vested interest also in authority? Do they have control over those in authority?” “Refuse to fight if a war is wrong.” “War may always be wrong.” “Total pacifism may be a possible path.” “If we do not stop hating and fighting, the hating and fighting will not stop.”

These are messages which, if spelled out clearly in almost any other kind of television show, would be unlikely to be allowed on the air. At a time when young men who choose to flee the country rather than accept being drafted are being convicted of treason, telling people to question orders and refuse to fight is risky. Yet the futuristic setting provided by science fiction makes it possible to convey these ideas without the hidebound network pulling the plug or insisting that it be changed. I’m just stunned that Gene Roddenberry let it through, especially after his reputed heavy influence on the script for A Private Little War. I’m not saying I want Star Trek to turn into a ‘message’ show, but I wouldn’t mind a few more episodes like this.

Five stars.

A Third Party


by Lorelei Marcus

As Janice put it, “Day of the Dove” is a ‘message episode’. It’s there to tell you something about life today under the guise of the possible future. Yet unlike my compatriots who saw a cautionary tale of ceaseless fighting in Vietnam and the larger Cold War behind it, I saw a different war entirely.

Star Trek has rarely shown racial tensions between humans and aliens of the Federation. When it is done, it’s for a very specific purpose, like Kirk aggravating Spock in This Side of Paradise. Even the Federation’s disdain for the Romulans and Klingons has less to do with xenophobia and more the fact that neither will agree to reasonable peace terms. Hence why the blatant hatred between not only human and Klingon, but also human and Vulcan, is so jarringly effective in this episode.

Star Trek is the ideal, bigotry-free future—Uhura and Sulu and even Chekov on the bridge are proof of that—but “Day of the Dove” is the closest it gets to reflecting the ugliness of racial tensions in our own world. Cloaked in the veneer of alien and human terms, I saw the hostility and lack of compromise inherent to the Democratic Convention this year, the hatred from man to man over superficial traits.


A scene from the Democratic convention—taken from the Nixon ad that aired during the episode.

Most of all, I saw small prejudices being stoked and inflamed by an outside force, turning anger boiling hot until it nearly exploded into bloody violence. I know that too well. Every step towards peace and equality we take gets slid back when another Wallace or Nixon comes along. Every injustice we commit against the Black man is another reason for him to take a rifle to the streets. Every school that fails to integrate is a generation of Whites who can’t see past the color of skin. And yet, that’s just how Wallace and his ilk want it. They benefit from it.


Wallace preaching hatred from the pulpit.

Perhaps that’s the scariest part: at least in the show, the alien seems to be fomenting hatred out of a need to feed, a necessity. Our politicians do it in the complete service of self-interest. And with the results of the election, tragically, we seem to be dancing right in the palms of their hands.

I often see shades of our world reflected in Star Trek, but never so viscerally. 4 stars.

Go to the Devil


by Joe Reid

“Day of the Dove” was this week’s episode of Star Trek.  On first reading that title it evoked religious themes in my mind.  I wondered if Star Trek was getting preachy again, the dove being the Christian representation of the Holy Spirit.  Like in “Bread and Circuses” where the crew was jubilant that the people of the planet worshiped the son of God.  When TV shows try to pass on spiritual virtues, they tend to do it in a ham-fisted way.  “Day of the Dove”, although not perfect, does a decent job passing on two themes that I learned in my own religious training.  One from the book of Ephesians, chapter 6, verse 12.  The other from First Peter, chapter 5, verse 8.  So permit me to put on my chaplain's robes as I explore the religious themes I saw in “Day of the Dove”.

Ephesians 6:12 says, “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.” The crew of the Enterprise and that of the Klingon ship were made to think that they were enemies.  Expertly manipulated and set upon by another, with the intent to have them fight.  The real enemy was the outside force.  A powerful alien entity that understood the fears, thoughts, emotions, and technology of each side to create opportunities for conflict.  This scripture I quoted explains that no flesh and blood human is your enemy; we are all victims of outside forces that use us against one another.  As hard as it was for Kirk and Kang to see that they were being used, it is so much harder for all of us to see that we are literally killing ourselves when we raise arms to harm others.  All that does is satisfy the real enemy, that of our very souls.

The second verse that came to mind in this episode, 1 Peter 5:8 says, “Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour”.  At the start of the episode, Kirk told Kang to “Go to the devil!” when Kang slapped Kirk, accusing him of crimes, claiming the Enterprise.  As they left that planet, we saw that Kang didn’t have to go to the devil, because a space devil went back to the ship with them.  The alien, always near the action, remained just out of sight.  It stalked the crew, looking for minds to twist to meet its ends.  Kirk displayed powerful sobriety, breaking free from the influence of the alien.  Although he could not see the alien, he was able to know of its presence and resist its influence.  The message for us is that it takes sober vigilance to prevent wrong actions that may damage other’s lives.  It was awareness of the enemy that helped Kirk stay disaster; it may be awareness that people are not the enemy that may help us.


Kirk prepares to preach to the choir.

This episode read like a sermon.  One that encouraged brotherhood over bitterness.  Which brings us to the close of the episode and yet another verse that came to my mind watching it.  That was James 4:7. “Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.” This was the method Kirk and Kang used to get rid of the unwanted alien influence.  They stopped giving it what it wanted, stopped seeing each other as the enemy and told their dancehall mirror ball devil to leave the ship.  With both Kirk and Kang saying GO to their devil.

In conclusion, “Day of the Dove” was well acted.  It had great costumes and good characterizations of all characters.  Sadly, the dialogue at one point was filled with exposition, explaining to the audience what the alien was even though no one explained it to them, which I never love.  It caused me to knock the score down a couple of points, but that is to be expected when TV shows—and reviewers—get preachy.

Three stars

Only in the movies


by Gideon Marcus

Despite being a show set in the far future of the 22nd Century, Star Trek has always employed themes from our current era.  This has never been truer than in episodes involving the Klingons, the chief adversary of the Federation for which Kirk's Enterprise is employed.

In Errand of Mercy, we saw Commander Kor and Captain Kirk stand shoulder to shoulder, united in their defiance of the superpowerful Organians, who had the temerity to deprive them of their "right" to fight.  The threat of the Organians to demolish both adversaries should they escalate their conflict to a general war, was very much a metaphor for the atomic bomb—specifically the newly minted concept of "Mutual Assured Destruction."

Thus, "The Trouble with Tribbles", "Friday's Child", and "A Private Little War"—the Klingons and Federation now fight proxy wars, engage in cloak and dagger exploits, and occasionally skirmish one-on-one.  That last title was very much a product of last year, when it looked like we might "win" in Vietnam.  Kirk asserted that the only way to prosecute the conflict on the planet of Neural was to arm the hill people so they remain at parity with the Klingon-aided townsfolks.

Contrast that to "Day of the Dove".  Kirk and the Klingon commander (beautifully portrayed by "Mr. Barbara Eden", Michael Ansara) once more stand back to back, but they are resisting the urge to fight.  It is a beautiful bit of synchronicity that LBJ the night before airdate announced a full bombing pause on Vietnam after three years of incessance.  I watched the episode with tears in my eyes: for once, the hope matched the reality.  Maybe we were going to stop the cycle of violence after all.


Would that it could always be this easy.

But Trek is science fiction, and we still live in the real world.  Dick Nixon won the election this week, South Vietnam has retracted its willingness to participate in the Paris peace talks, and the beat goes on.

This is the second episode in a row (the first being "Spectre of the Gun") that has featured a new Kirk, a diplomat first and a soldier second.  I like this new Kirk.  I worry that he will run afoul of his superiors, increasingly conflicted, as John Drake was when working for MI6, ultimately becoming The Prisoner.  But at least he's fighting for peace, a fight I can 100% get behind.

It's not a perfect episode, a little heavy-handed in parts, but boy did it resonate.

Four stars. 

[Come join us tonight (November 8th) for the next thrilling episode of Star Trek!  KGJ is broadcasting the show live with commercials and accompanied by trekzine readings at 8pm Eastern and Pacific.  You won't want to miss it…]




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Science Fiction/Fantasy, TV

[October 31, 1968] How the Western was won (Star Trek: "Spectre of the Gun")

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by Janice L. Newman

This is Not a Test

Star Trek continues to surf the New Wave in this week’s episode, Spectre of the Gun. While the plot incorporated many things we’ve seen before (both in and outside of Star Trek) it combined and presented these elements in new and innovative ways.

The story opens with the ship encountering a strange object floating in space. All of the crew receive a message, ‘hearing’ it in the language they are most familiar with: Vulcan for Spock, Russian for Chekov, and in a nice call back to earlier episodes, Swahili for Uhura. The message warns them to stay away from the area. The crew, under orders to make contact with the Melkotians (the race who left the warning) choose to disregard it and beam down to the planet. Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Scotty, and Chekov make up the team.


The Melkotian buoy—to Trek's credit, they didn't simply reuse the music from The Corbomite Maneuver

Shortly after they arrive on the planet, a threatening figure appears. It’s one of the aliens, a Melkot. It tells them that they will be punished for disregarding their warning. Since Captain Kirk is in charge, their deaths will be ‘patterned’ on him.

Aliens can be difficult to render convincingly on television, but I was impressed at how effective the Melkot is. The image is of two glowing eyes piercing through a surrounding haze and the suggestion of a bulbous, hairless head on a stalk-like, armless body. Since it’s surrounded by mist and weird lighting, we don’t get a close look at it, which adds to the menacing quality and keeps it from feeling fake or cheesy.

No sooner does the Melkot pronounce judgment, than the five men find themselves in the middle of a western town. Except, it’s not a fully-realized town. It’s made up of pieces of scenery, just enough to suggest a town in broad strokes. It puts one in mind of a theatrical production, where a facade is used to represent a building and one can see inside a shop or house. It’s unsettling in this context: signs and clocks hang on empty air, and unlike the actors in a musical, the crew are well-aware that the buildings are unfinished.


Open air bar

It takes a few minutes and an interaction with one of the ‘locals’ to jog his memory, but Captain Kirk puts the pieces together to deduce that the setup represents the shootout at the O.K. Corral. He and his men are the Clanton brothers, destined to die to bullets shot by the Earps and Doc Holiday. Bullets that will kill them, as they discover when Chekov is shot down in the street.

Our heroes try to avoid their fate through diplomacy, trickery, and ‘the better part of valor’. Nothing works, not even the sleeping gas bomb that McCoy and Spock build together. But the fact that it doesn’t work when it should have worked convinces Spock that none of what they are experiencing is real. The bullets cannot hurt them, he tells the others, unless they believe they will.

In order to make sure the humans are all as convinced that the bullets are harmless as Spock is, he mind melds with each of them in turn. Then they stand, unworried, as they’re shot at. The fence behind them is filled with holes, but they, as Spock promised, are unharmed. Afterward Kirk has the opportunity to kill the Earps and Holiday, but chooses not to, even though he badly wants revenge for Chekov. The Melkotians, surprised at Kirk’s choice, agree to open diplomatic relations with the Federation.


A touching moment

We’ve seen a lot of these bits and pieces before. Westerns are ubiquitous, and the story of the shootout at Tombstone is an oft-visited well for modern-day storytellers. But how many of them cast the Clantons as the good guys? We’ve seen the Vulcan mind meld before, but never on multiple people in turn, and never to convince them of the unreality of their senses. We’ve seen powerful, telepathic aliens before. But unlike many of the others, the Melkotians aren’t messing around with the humans for their own amusement, or to protect us from ourselves, or to ‘test’ us. It’s clear that they don’t expect the humans to survive the punishment, and that they’re shocked that Kirk chooses not to kill the aggressors in the end. Whether the form of punishment was meant to be humane, giving the humans a familiar setting to die in, or whether it was supposed to remove the weight of responsibility from the Melkotians by forcing the humans into a ‘kill or be killed’ situation, or whether it was for some other reason entirely, we cannot know.

What we do know is that these familiar pieces fit together to make an entirely new kind of story, one that’s clever, compelling, and up there with the best of the Star Trek episodes we’ve seen.

Five stars.

Best Western


by Amber Dubin

I was pleasantly surprised that this episode marked another in the inspiring trend of season 3 episodes that absolutely knocked my socks off. The overarching premise is nothing special on its face: a shadowy, menacing entity issues an ominous warning a-la-Dante's-Inferno "abandon all hope, ye who enter here." Kirk promptly ignores the warning buoy, charging head-first into danger like the reckless adventurer we know him to be, and at first we appear to be treated to another "Catspaw"-like simulation with a western twist. This is where the similarities end between the season 2 and season 3 Halloween episodes, because this time around, the simulated world is much more intricate, meaningful and all around well-crafted.

Starting with the aliens' motivation for submerging the crew in this simulation, they explain that "you bring violence like a disease." This is a very valid threat and makes a lot of sense that the Melkotians would want to have this simulation in place to protect their planet from approaching unknown cultural contaminants.The crewmen have already refused to heed the initial warning, so it could hardly be called an escalation to issue this execution edict as judgment for their trespass. They prove themselves to be much more fair judges than some of the other alien species we've encountered, because they essentially allow a loophole in their trial, wherein the participants have one final chance to prove themselves worthy of access to their planet. It is fair too, that they design the interactive tribunal from details found within Kirk's mind, as it was Kirk that chose to disobey their warning and therefore Kirk should bear the bulk of the responsibility for their punishment.


Here come the Judge(s)

This is the first time, in my opinion, that they have found a valid reason to recreate ancient American history, as Captain Kirk has always been a stand-in for the audience's 1960's perspective, and one of the points in our history that Americans enjoy recreating most in film and fiction at this time is the Wild West. This time, incorporating our perspective is neatly explained by saying that Kirk has both the genetic memories of ancient North Americans from this era, and memories from his fan-crazed obsession with all things historical and fictional from American History. I even found it radically creative that the director manages to elegantly justify the half-finished western set pieces, as it was not only necessary that the crew know that the simulation was false, but also it was encouraged that they use that to their advantage to beat the system.

I also love that the trial that the crew endures this time is branded not as a trial but as an execution, further setting up the crew to fail as they would be inclined to see it as an inescapable punishment rather than an simulation whose outcome they could influence. The Melkotians may well have hoped the humans would fail. Certainly, they were surprised when they didn't.

I'm particularly impressed that this episode got me to do something I previously thought unthinkable: enjoy western-themed television.

5 stars

Unexpected Diplomacy


by Lorelei Marcus

Captain Kirk took an unexpectedly persistent talk-before-phasers approach to interacting with the Melkotians and their executioner puppets.  At the beginning of the episode, he mentions the importance of contacting the Melkotians and implies the goal of peacefully adding them to the Federation.  Given the importance of the mission, and our Enterprise captain's previous track record handling aliens, I can only imagine the training exercise Star Fleet put Kirk through to prepare him for his task:

"Alright, Captain.  On the table, you will see a phaser and a communicator.  The scenario is you are attempting to make contact with a peaceful alien species.  Please choose the object you feel is best suited for this situation."

(Kirk reaches for the phaser and is shocked with an electric buzzer.)

"Ouch!"

"Please choose again."

(Rubbing at his wrist, Kirk reaches for the communicator this time.  A green light turns on and a pleasant song starts playing.)

"Very good, Captain.  Onto the next task…"


"I can't just kill them!  I won't get any candy!"

In any case, I found this episode to be quite fun, particularly our new, diplomatic captain.  Four stars.

We Come in Peace


by Erica Frank

"We come in peace," said Kirk… as he raised his phaser. No wonder the Melkot didn't believe him.

The Melkotians were clear that they wanted no part of the Federation. When the Enterprise decided to visit anyway –"establish contact at all costs"–the Melkotians were ready for them. (Kirk, you did establish contact; you met and conversed, and their response was No. If you meant "establish regular communications and diplomatic negotiations," well, that dance takes two willing partners.)

Kirk and his team wound up somewhere that looked more like a movie set or a stage play than an actual town. They thought this was "the Melkotians' idea of a town" rather than "a construct taking place in our own minds," despite having substantial experience with powerful telepaths who can make them experience entire landscapes that don't actually exist.


Why did it take them half the episode to attempt to leave town and discover the force field blocking their exit?

They spent most of their time trying to figure out how to get out of the impending gunfight, instead of looking for loopholes in the "reality" that they should recognize as false. However, even as they accepted the storyline they're stuck in, Kirk looked for ways to avoid the ending.

I don't know if he insisted on not fighting the Earps because he honestly believes it's wrong, or because he recognized that, in this story, once the shooting starts, his entire team will be killed.

They passed the Melkotians' test by refusing to shoot. (…Spock's getting awfully free with the mind-melds, recently.) I'm not sure I'd accept the results: Kirk knew that there was no way to win a shoot-out. Perhaps that was the point–not, "prove you are a non-violent species" (obviously not true), but "prove to us that you can find other ways to solve problems."

I like the Melkotians. They're only the third near-omnipotent aliens we've met that aren't petty tyrants. The Metron had a similar test, making Kirk fight the Gorn–they, too, were pleasantly surprised that Kirk found a way around killing. And we never learned the name of the race that built the Shore Leave planet.

Four stars.


I suppose he is the "Spectre of the Guns."

A Near-Shakespearean Paen for Nonviolence


by Jessica Dickinson Goodman

With death served up on the doorstep with the morning paper, I needed this episode this week. Bracketed by political campaign ads crowing about violence in various cities and jungles, I found Kirk's passionate nonviolence struck a powerful chord. The episode's overall contrast with the morning death toll was satisfying but somehow it was Commander Spock's cool lines that I loved the most.


"A radical alteration of our thought patterns must be in order."

In that moment, the episode twists reality to reach the profound fantasies of those of us whose loved ones are – or tomorrow will – lay in the grave, or in the mud, waiting for a G.I. sniper or Viet Cong fighter to take what life they have lived and in all their future lives. To restate it, Spock's idea is that in the constructed world of this week's impossibly powerful alien, if you know you cannot be killed by bullets, you cannot. "Know" because "believe" requires the acknowledgment of the potential for doubt, but knowing requires a perfect certainty. In Spock's psychic certainty there is physical safety and real, true resurrection for the marooned crew.

This is what I love about science fiction, the fantasies that science fiction allows us, fantasies that give us enough breathing room to imagine a better world. Sometimes that world has to be far simpler for the conceit to play out. The world of this episode is much simpler than our own, which is why this trick of Commander Spock's is so intuitively effective. It felt in many moments like a stage play, and made me wonder how the Bard would have set the prologue:

Two families, both alike in indignity,
in fair Tombstone Arizona is where we lay our scene,
from lukewarm grudge break to new mutiny,
where uncivil blood makes uncivil hands unclean. 

There is a little bit of a sweet Romeo and Juliet going on with Chekov in this episode, though it doesn’t entirely play out, ending up more of a joke than driving the narrative.

It really is our dynamic trio who make the episode, in their debates as to how to avoid furthering the cycle of violence the alien of the week has thrown them into. Kirk's attempt to explain was so satisfying to watch as he shouted and fought not to fight. His framing of his own family's history added a depth of character for me, as many of the passing references in this season do.

While we can understand that his ancestors were part of the genocide against the Native Americans of the American West, I like to think if Kirk was alive right now and his draft number came due, he would hike over the border to Canada. Draft dodging in this way would be a key way to keep his hands and mind and blood from being complicit in killing, whether of one man or entire families, entire communities. If no one fought, there would be no wars, and we see how that can start with someone like Kirk refusing to fight. In this case, there are no deadly consequences for the draft dodgers, as Spock's science fictional defense is perfectly effective.

In our more complicated reality, it is not so easy. There is no curtain call on the battlefield, and no alien to blame for the violence that engulfs us. So many occupied graves may make draftees feel obligated to fill in a few more before they punch their final ticket. But I do fervently hope that those who are conscripts or reservists or draftees called to slaughter can watch this episode before they board their planes and tanks, before they load up their all-too-lethal guns with human-killing bullets. I hope it inspires them as only science fiction can to consider another path, the all-too-human journey of nonviolence.

5 stars.

The Greatest Show off Earth!


by Gideon Marcus

Most of my colleagues were impressed by the story, the message, and so forth.  Those are all laudable topics, and I'm glad they've covered them more eloquently than I would have.  However, I just want to comment on how much I've been enjoying the third season of Star Trek, how far this show has come.

1968 is an interesting moment.  Laugh-In has infected all other media.  Psychedelia is de rigeur It's a time of experimentation and irreverence.  As I noted in my last review, the New Wave has made it to Trek.  Indeed, my friend, part-time Journeyer Brian Collins said that, if he didn't know better, he'd have thought Phillip K. Dick wrote this episode!

So it's no surprise we get all sorts of neat stuff, visually, aurally, literarily.  According to my friend Maurice, the partial "limbo" that comprises the setting actually borrows a lot from the 1953 musical comedy Red Garters.  However, "Spectre" uses the setting to unsettle, to connote things unfinished, and also because it's just cool and weird!

The score is once again brand new.  That makes it the fourth or fifth new score we've had this season, and as usual, it is excellent and fitting.  Trek has the best music this side of Hollywood Palace.

Vince McEevety's direction is, once again, excellent.  I don't think it's a coincidence that his episodes ("Balance of Terror", "Miri", to some degree "Patterns of Force") have not only been innovative in their execution, but have also wrung out good performances from its actors.  Shatner, in particular, has had a tendency to ham things up (very unkosher!) since the end of the 1st season.  There's none of that in this episode.  His encounter with Sheriff Behan, when he plaintively yells that he can't kill the Earps, his mourning over Chekov's death, his subtle reactions to his crew, particularly in the gas testing scene…all terrific.  Chekov finally gets a role he can chew on, and he's great.  Scotty as well.  The Big Three are thoroughly in character, up to and including McCoy arguing both sides of the fence—"Cheer up, Jim!" followed by "Shut up, Spock!  We're grieving!")


"I am not someone you can marry, although marriage was inwented in Russia."

And the guest stars, particularly the Earps/Doc Holliday, turn in performances that are nearly robotic, but highly emotive nevertheless.  It's a hard needle to thread, but they manage it.

I find my esteem for this episode rising in the glow of the morning after, and in the conversations it has sparked with my comrades.  I was going to give it 4 stars, but I think it moves up to 4.5 now.




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Science Fiction/Fantasy, TV

[October 24, 1968] The New Wave comes to TV (Star Trek: "Is There in Truth No Beauty?")

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by Gideon Marcus

Star Trek is usually defined as an "action-adventure show" or maybe just a "science fiction program".  While it is the first truly SFnal production on television (The Twilight Zone and The Outer Limits had their moments, but for the most part, their science fiction was primitive), for its first two seasons, it tended to hew close to its '40s era Astounding Science Fiction roots.

With last week's episode, that all changed.  The 1960s, and the experimental New Wave movement, has arrived on television.

Diana Muldaur returns to Trek as Dr. Miranda Jones, a human telepath who has never seen Earth, but who spent four years on Vulcan learning to master and tame her profound powers.  She has been tapped to serve as ambassador to the Medusans, a race of inchoate aliens of sublime thoughts and profound navigational abilities, but whose appearance is so hideous as to render all humans who see them insane.  Jones is accompanied by the Medusan ambassador to the Federation, Kollos, who spends most of his time in a box for the safety of the crew.


Ambassador Kollos is brought to his quarters by Mr. Spock and Dr. Jones

Jones is a meaty role, much more interesting than when Muldaur played Dr. Ann Mulhall in "Return to Tomorrow", and Muldaur plays it perfectly.  Her demeanor is largely arch and cool, as befits Vulcan stoicism, but there are flashes of the human, too: jealousy regarding her unique relationship with Kollos, which she feels is threatened by Spock, who can both look at Kollos and communicate with him; irritation at the parochial behavior of the Enterprise's senior officers, who can't believe she'd give up on men to live with a monster; resentment when things do not go her way.


"Gentlemen, surely we can patronize Dr. Jones a little more intensely. Perhaps if we tower over her!"

The fly in this episode's ointment is another kind of emotion: one-sided love.  Accompanying Jones is Lawrence Marvick, an illustrious engineer who is ostensibly there to contemplate how a Medusan might integrate into the crew of a starship.  His real aim, however, is to convince Jones to abandon her mission to stay with him.  To attain this goal, he is willing to resort to murder.  Unfortunately for him, when he confronts Kollos, phaser in hand, all the alien has to do is open his protective box.  Marvick is violently repelled by Kollos' appearance and, insane, takes control of engineering just long enough to drive the Enterprise into the barrier that surrounds the galaxy.  The ship becomes lost in the zone, and none of the crew can navigate the ship out.



Where 430 men (and women) have gone twice before.

But Kollos can.  Spock, with his telepathic abilities and his Starfleet training, volunteers to fuse minds with the Medusan, resulting in an astonishing hybrid, which successfully navigates the ship out of the zone with no difficulty.  I cannot adequately express how marvelous Nimoy is in this role, subtly uniting the sober Spock with the somewhat whimsical, profound Kollos in an absolutely unique performance.


Sp/ollos makes an excellent navigator.  I'd love to see a Medusan/Vulcan gestalt in a future episode!

The crew is not out of the woods, however.  Upon returning Kollos to his box, Spock inadvertently catches a glimpse of the Medusan and goes insane.  Only Jones and her telepathic abilities can save him—but her pettiness causes her to hesitate.  It is up to Kirk, frantic with worry for his friend (indeed, seemingly more worried than he was for his ship, for once) to convince the doctor to do her utmost.  In the end, what convinces her is the thought that Kollos would never forgive her if she let Spock die.


Kirk gives Dr. Jones a tough talk.  To his credit, he is immediately concerned he did it wrong.  (For the most part, he does…but one arrow hits the mark.)

I must express how excellent Shatner's performance is in this episode, as well.  Missing are his usual, scenery-chewing tics.  I have to think that the superlative jobs the cast did in this outing must be somewhat attributed to director Ralph Senensky.

Indeed, all of the "staff officers" of the show, from the cinematographer to the score master to the costume designer, work to elevate the production of "Truth".  There are unusual angles, edits, and lenses to convey the disjointedness of insanity and to give a fresh feeling to the show; the score is entirely new and very evocative (though the distinctive "fight" theme is used perhaps one time too many); Dr. Jones' dress, which turns out to be a sensor web, enabling the normally sightless doctor to navigate (an excellent twist tastefully revealed), is terrific.

To be sure, the episode is not completely unexplored territory.  Ugliness not equaling evil was a significant message in "The Devil in the Dark", with the monstrous Horta being a gentle, desperate mother being.  The Enterprise has visited the galactic barrier twice before, in "Where No Man Has Gone Before" and "By Any Other Name".  Both Spock and the ship are put in danger, two occurrences which the show-runners have made almost de riguer as plot drivers.


Amok Spock—don't drop acid, kids.

But it's the way it's all done that's special.  Beyond the first class work turned in by the cast and crew, the writer must be credited.  The pacing is unusual for Trek, with the episode's four acts of unequal length adding to the dreamy sense of madness that suffuses the episode.  There is no one crisis to be resolved, but a mounting series of crises all revolving around the Spock/Miranda/Kollos relationship.  In the end, the episode is not about Spock surviving or the Enterprise crew getting home safely, but about an unique woman in an unique situation navigating the fusion of not two but three alien races.

It's a rich, beautiful thing.  Jean Lisoette Aroeste is a new name to me.  This may well be her very first screenplay, and it is her newness that brings such a fresh cast to the show.  Just as IF has made it its mission to bring new writers into the literary SF genre, it appears that the mature show of Star Trek may be providing that same vehicle for SF screenwriters (particularly women—the upcoming script, "The Empath" is also by a TV novice, the friend of a fanzine-writing friend).

I can't wait to see how the show develops as a result.  5 stars.

You've come a long way, baby


by Janice L. Newman

Most of the time, Star Trek gets it right. Women are frequently shown in positions of power and authority, and are given the respect such positions deserve. But even in the future, they occasionally run afoul of the undercurrent of sexism omnipresent in our own society. The dismissive attitude about Lieutenant Palamas in Who Mourns for Adonais, for example, or the exasperation shown toward Commissioner Hedford in Metamorphosis (not to mention the lack of concern for her ultimate fate), jar uncomfortably against our hopes and visions of a world where women have true equality and are allowed to pursue their dreams without facing condemnation or condescension—regardless of whether their dream is to be an engineer, a mother, or both.

The silver lining is when the women turn the sexist expectations of the male crewmembers on their heads. The treatment of Dr. Miranda Jones by the senior officers of the Enterprise (excluding Spock) borders on insulting. Dr. McCoy questions her career choice, while Captain Kirk is convinced of his own ability to divert her attention to himself, and patronizingly explains to her what she really wants.

Some of the best moments of the episode are when Dr. Jones defies the men’s expectations. Consider this exchange:

Dr. McCoy: “How can one so beautiful condemn herself to look upon ugliness the rest of her life? Will we allow it, gentlemen?”

All the men at the table: Certainly not.

Dr. Jones: How can one so full of joy and the love of life as you, Doctor, condemn yourself to look upon disease and suffering for the rest of your life? Can we allow that, gentlemen?

Or this one:

Captain Kirk: You're young, attractive and human. Sooner or later, no matter how beautiful their minds are, you're going to yearn for someone who looks like yourself, someone who isn't ugly.

Miranda: Ugly. What is ugly? Who is to say whether Kollos is too ugly to bear or too beautiful to bear?

Miranda’s quick witted responses, turning the men’s words back on themselves, are enormously satisfying. Her resistance to Captain Kirk’s charms is equally delightful. As much as I dislike any portrayal of sexism in the future, Miranda’s counters made it worth it. They made me wonder about the author of the episode, who she(?) is and whether she encounters such comments in her own daily life. Were the words of Dr. Jones intended to give professional women everywhere a blueprint for how to deal with such difficult situations?

Four and a half stars.

The Ambassadors


by Joe Reid

An ambassador is one that represents their country to a host country.  This week in Star Trek we got to see several ambassadors of several races…and of more than one variety.

From the onset of the episode, when we were introduced to Dr. Jones, her desirability as a woman was heavily stressed.  Kirk paid Jones several compliments that would lead one to think that Kirk really had a strong interest in her.  These were followed by McCoy, and even Spock, who later dressed in Vulcan formal attire with the intent of honoring Dr. Jones. 

All the males in this episode seemed strongly drawn to Dr. Jones, even the poor lovesick fellow who lost his life pursuing her.  What was also clear was that Doctor Jones had absolutely no interest in the attention of these men in the episode.  She was essentially at war with those who wanted her (perhaps a necessary battle to win status as a woman).  What piqued her interest was the possibility of building a stronger connection to ambassador Kollos through a mind melding.

Her desire for Kollos was so all-encompassing that when it was revealed that Spock would have an opportunity to meld with Kollos ahead of her, she screamed out in frustration.  Her rejection of the attentions of all other men throughout the episode demonstrated her desire for Kollos.

In the end, her desires were requited.  Kollos did indeed have some measure of desire for her as well.  We saw this as when he joined with Spock, Kollos paid special attention to her, highlighting the fact that her future and his would be intertwined going forward on his world in their near future.  Although this was complicated when he also paid special attention to Uhura, Jones was able to receive confirmation of Kollos’ feeling for her when she melded with Spock in order to save his life.  That connection to Kollos through Spock was all that she needed to assuage her fears and insecurity about her future with Kollos.

This successful conclusion to the story had Spock himself playing as the ambassador from the heart of Kollos to the heart of Jones, thus ending the quiet war between men and the doctor.


Happy endings for everyone.

It was a fantastic story with solid acting, great costumes, and three-dimensional characterizations.  More of this please!

Five stars




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Science Fiction/Fantasy, TV

[October 18, 1968] Little monsters (Star Trek: "And the Children Shall Lead")

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by Janice L. Newman

Star Trek is, first and foremost, a science fiction show. But science fiction is a special genre in that it need not be constrained by the same rules as other genres. A story that’s science fiction can also be a Western, a romance, a mystery…or a horror story, such as Wolf in the Fold and Catspaw attempted to be. On the first Friday in October, we gathered our friends in our backyard and watched on our portable 13" one of the scariest episodes of Star Trek I’ve seen yet.

The story opens with a landing party (which includes the Captain, Mr. Spock, and Dr. McCoy, as has become standard these days) investigating a research colony that has fallen out of contact with the Federation. They find the research team dead, all of them having drunk poison. One member is conveniently still alive, but can only gasp out a few cryptic words before collapsing.

The heroes’ shock is interrupted and then multiplied when a group of children (of varying ages and ethnicities) burst out of the shelter and immediately begin playing noisy games, apparently unconcerned that their parents are lying there dead.

This theme is repeated when the children are brought back to the ship. At first they’re cooperative, but when asked questions about their parents and their family life they ignore or dismiss them, pulling each other into games involving shouting and running.

The whole setup is pretty creepy, with the contrast of the dead bodies and the unconcerned children being particularly effective. Soon, the viewer learns that there’s more going on with the children than meets the eye. Out of sight of the adults, they use a singsong chant to summon an alien who instructs them to ‘control the crew’ and tells them ‘you know how to do that’.


The "friendly angel" exhorts his minions as they pound the table with Nuremberg rally fervor

So begins the truly scary part of the story. The children scatter to different parts of the ship. By making a pounding gesture with one hand, they can force the crew to see what they want them to see, usually an illusion that taps into a deeply-held fear. One by one the crewmembers fall under the spell, even Spock at one point asking the Captain, “Why are we bothering Starfleet?” when Kirk orders him to send out a distress call.

Seeing the normally unflappable crew caught up in the children’s illusions is genuinely disconcerting – Sulu grabs Kirk’s arm to keep him away from the controls, Scotty threatens him, Chekov points a phaser at him – but the children in the background of each shot are the ones that carry the real menace. Whether it’s the red-haired ringleader on the bridge or the tiny boy partially-obscured in engineering, it’s clear that the kids are the ones really in charge, and that’s a terrifying thought. Maybe on a larger TV screen or a well-lit room it would have worked less well. On our small color TV, watched outside on a chilly October night, it was riveting.

Spock and Kirk eventually manage to overcome the control and, after inspiring doubts in the children’s minds about their alien friend, use a recording of the children’s chant to summon the alien. Kirk breaks through the children’s seeming apathy by showing them recordings of their parents, then cutting to shots of their parents’ bodies and gravestones. It’s tough love, but it works. The children turn against the alien and it disintegrates, yelling, “Death to you all!” as it dies.

Kirk comforts the weeping children, telling them, “It’s all right.” I’m not sure it is all right, at least not for the kids. After all, their parents are dead, and they helped kill them. Thus we are left with a lingering horror despite the ‘happy ending’.

I liked this episode more than I’d expected to. Child actors are notoriously tricky to work with, but their performances weren’t too bad. In fact, far worse was the children’s alien friend, who they called ‘angel’ and Kirk called, ‘Gorgon’. He was played by Melvin Belli, perhaps most famous for being the attorney who represented Jack Ruby, the man who shot Lee Harvey Oswald; for an actor, he's a pretty good lawyer. Perhaps the stilted delivery to the children was intentional, but I couldn’t help but feel a better performer could have delivered the lines far more convincingly and with greater menace.

Still, it was a great start to the spookiest month of the year, and a nice return to form for Star Trek. I’m taking off half a star for the Gorgon’s poor performance, leaving it with three and a half stars.

Who's Responsible?


by Lorelei Marcus

There's a new show this season that rivals Star Trek in popularity for us young folks.  It's called Mod Squad, and it stars three young adults who work as undercover cops.  Unlike most of the police shows on TV, it has a lot of heart, and it's not afraid to tell it like it is.  Most compelling, though, is the hope it portrays.  It gives us the cops we want to see—diverse, young, relatable, and trying to do good and protect people.


The Mod Squad and their Captain (the Klingon in "Friday's Child")

The Mod Squad leads are a far cry from the militant, "law-and-order" brutes who aim firehoses at kids in a sit-in or beat protestors bloody at the Democratic National convention.  All the adults of today are calling for law and order, scared of what the kids will do.  Funny enough, I think we all really want the same thing: peace.  But to get it, we need to stop shipping our boys to die in Vietnam, stop packing black people into city slums, and stop ogling girls like they're nothing but pieces of meat.  We need change, and sadly, I don't think any of the old politicians of today can give us that change.

I feel a kinship with the children of last week's Star Trek episode.  Those kids wanted freedom, and the right to happiness, and time with the ones they loved.  Yet they also terrified me, because under the right (wrong) guidance, they had great power, and that power was misled.  With that power, they plunged the Enterprise into anarchy, rendering each of our beloved and competent crew useless by playing on their fears.  Even Captain Kirk was reduced to a dithering, anxious fool for a time.  Most horrifying was the children being tricked into causing the death of their own parents.  Like those kids, we (me and my generation) are pent up and we want change.  We have the power to make it happen.  But is it worth it if it costs us our loved ones?


From a recent Nixon for President commercial: how he wants you to see kids

But the thing is, kids aren't inherently scary—just, under the right circumstances, desperate.  We don't have money or experience.  We're growing up in uncertain times and we're scared to death we won't make it past 20.  Ultimately, we don't want to hurt anyone.  We just want to save ourselves.  But I can see that fear makes us dangerous, and the adults, too.  We're all scared, like stampeding zebras, unsure of where we're going, and who we're trampling in our path.  I can bet those kids on the Enterprise were scared.  How might the episode have ended differently if one adult stopped to see their point of view?

Who will stop to see ours?  Or will we have to keep shaking our firsts to be heard, playing on fears until someone gets hurt?  Something will bridge the gap, I hope.  Maybe it starts with a conversation sparked by this episode.  For that, and its compelling pacing, story, and acting, I give this episode four stars.

Successes and Failures of Fear


by Mx. Blue Cathey-Thiele

In the face of overwhelming odds, the core Enterprise crew remains frighteningly efficient. Those same strengths are devastating when turned back on our heroes. Scotty's steady, unmoving presence and protection of the auxiliary control blocks Kirk and Spock from the engines. Sulu's precision is narrowed to keep the ship on course and unscathed, unable to question if the weapons he sees are real. Chekov's loyalty is strained, torn between his Captain and the even higher authority of Starfleet command.


"You die, Captain—and we all go up in rank!"

The odd one out is Lt. Uhura. While her colleagues' fears and perceptions revolved around duty, she was shown a painful death in old age, reflected in a mirror only she could see. This was just the latest time a woman on 'Trek was derailed by loss of youth or beauty. Yeoman Rand, distressed over her legs in Miri, Lt. Galway afraid to sleep after aging rapidly in The Deadly Years (at least the mirror she complained of actually existed). The trio taking the Venus drug in Mudd's Women. Uhura herself already encountered this when she was offered an immortal, youthful robot body in I, Mudd – and importantly, chose not to accept. She's a professional, and there was already the perfect moment to set her fear: when Kirk's instruction to the bridge security came out as garbled nonsense. Communication is her specialty, and she's had to relearn language before when Nomad erased her knowledge in The Changeling.

Pushing the crew in the wrong direction is a masterstroke. These people are exceptional at what they do and they don't know the harm they are causing. This is where the horror crept in. Not only was the crew unaware that they were helping the "angel" towards its destination, they were convinced that they were keeping the ship safe. Modern day propaganda may not manifest visions or change perception so literally, but if everything you know is telling you one thing, how do you begin to question it? A sense of justice or duty isn't enough, and the most well-intentioned can still cause great damage. Kirk orders a security shift change, and two officers are transported to where the planet is supposed to be, only to die silently in empty space, off screen. These deaths feel entirely preventable – no one was shooting at them, there was no need to fight! And yet, horribly, there was no way for any of them to know. Like his crew, Kirk did everything right, and it still resulted in tragedy. The children induced an artificial anxiety, but the aftermath will haunt the crew for much longer. How to know if a future mission is doing more good than harm? Or perhaps even worse, has the Enterprise been an unknowing party to devastation in the past, all while under the impression of a successful mission?

4 stars

Without Followers, Evil Cannot Spread


by Robin Rose Graves

Initially, I was annoyed by yet another “magical children” plot in Star Trek, as in the first season we had "Charlie X", and overall I’m not fond of Trek including magic as a seemingly limitless device. Despite my initial hesitation, the episode won me over with its appropriately creepy tone and mastermind behind the children’s behavior, who I feel has great political relevance to our own history.

To summon the Gorgon, the children chant “hail, hail, fire and snow…” which could possibly be a play on the word “heil.” Perhaps the Gorgon targeting children for recruits was a nod to Hitler’s youth – or maybe it has something deeper to say about the followers who enable such evil men to rise to power. Perhaps the children represent naivete that can be preyed upon, a selfishness that can be manipulated, and a lack of regard to consequences. “Evil does seek power by suppressing the truth,” Spock noted of the children being unaware of what they were doing. “Or by misleading the innocent,” McCoy added. The Gorgon was not just an alien version of Hitler, but every demagogue we’ve known and are yet to know, from Lincoln Rockwell to George Wallace.


"Segregation now, Segregation tomorrow, Segregation forever!"

“They’re children being misled,” Kirk said, in defense of the children, to which Spock replied “they are followers. Without followers, evil cannot spread.” Within these lines, Spock exposed the Gorgon’s strength and weakness, and reminded us that it is the people who give leaders power, but those same followers can take that power away. That, I believe, is the true message of the episode.

Appropriately, this episode was followed by a commercial for Richard Nixon aimed at today's youth.


3 stars.

Un-asked Questions


by Joe Reid

“And the Children Shall Lead” is this week’s episode of Star Trek.  It is frankly an episode that leaves much to be desired.  It has too many open questions that could have been answered, but in the end were not, coupled with a threat that is so easy to spot that it makes one wonder whether the outcome couldn’t have been avoided by asking a few simple questions.  How about we go over a few of the questions that might have saved our heroes a lot of hassle?

Question 1 – “Do you think that these children might be responsible for all the dead adults on this planet?"  When you come to a place where all the adults and parents are dead, and you find a bunch of playing and laughing children who could care less, there is something wrong.  Perhaps it would not be a good idea to take them to your ship full of adults.  Those children are as queer as a three-dollar bill!  Leave them on the planet and watch them closely.  There is no need to endanger the crew by rushing to rescue ill-mannered brats.


"You do see these bodies, right, kids?"

Question 2 – “Who is letting all of these rude children into restricted areas?” There was a child in Engineering, a child roaming the halls driving crew members around like cattle, and multiple children on the bridge.  These children were not invisible and were clearly in areas where visiting children should not be visiting.  If Nurse Chapel was to see these children to their quarters and they end up roaming the ship, there should be disciplinary action taken against her.  [To be fair, Kirk did order a security guard to watch the kids.  Said guard was immediately co-opted by Tommy Starnes.  Indeed, this is one of the few episodes with appropriate (though inadequate) levels of security) (ed.)]

Question 3 – “Did anyone else see that glowing intruder over there?” If anyone at all had been alerted to a translucent glowing alien on the ship, folks might have been more careful.  Perhaps people might have anticipated a danger to themselves or to the “defenseless” children that were guests on the ship.  How about we go to yellow alert until this uninvited alien is abducted? [None of the crew saw the gorgon until the final encounter; by the time Kirk suspected an alien on board, the crew had already been co-opted. (Ed.)]

I find all the things that occurred in this entry to completely lack credibility where this normally overly inquisitive crew is involved.  Usually asking a few questions would trigger Kirk’s powers of “Kirk-sposition”, where the captain would exposit to a degree as to turn the very Oracle of Delphi green with envy with his level of accuracy.  The fact that simple questions such as the ones presented above were left un-uttered, left me questioning why I failed to switch the television off.  It was not good in my opinion.

One star

Give kids a chance


by Jessica Dickinson Goodman

This is my first creepy-child Star Trek episode review since having my first child last November and all of it hit so much harder than it would have a year ago. The ages of the kids, their games, their attempts to control the world around them using whatever tools consistently work, much of it reminded me of my little guy.

Which made this exchange so horrifying I nearly turned off my TV:

KIRK: They're children.
SPOCK: Captain, the four hundred and thirty men and women on board the Enterprise and the ship itself are endangered by these children.
KIRK: They don't understand the evil that they're doing.
SPOCK: Perhaps that is true, but the evil that is within them is spreading fast, and unless we can find a way to remove it
KIRK: We'll have to kill them.

Um, what? Have you no brig? Have you no tranquilizers? Have you no compassion? [Have you no stun setting on your phasers? (ed)]

The easy slip from 'they're a danger to us' to 'we must kill them' could only be made by someone without kids, or perhaps without the caregiving responsibility for them. Like many people who give birth, my kid endangered my life during his time entering this world; but I would not more kill him than kill myself. We're a dyad, he and I, less and less biologically the older he gets, but certainly still emotionally. Once one has had that experience of one body becoming two, it is difficult to look at any child and not see the halos of your own. And the cries of children? Not only do they get the milk flowing, but the tears too.

Dr. McCoy laughing in delight at the children crying was nearly as chilling to me as the horrible ways they were manipulated by this week's evil alien.

The alien way in which the children were treated made me realize how strange life on the Enterprise must be. They had no children-sized beds, no play area, no children's library or jungle gym. I wrote in the fanzine Tricorder I about what it might take for Yeoman Rand to seek an abortion using teleporter technology, but even there I had assumed in my heart that this advanced civilization could find a way to keep families intact while allowing parents to be the great explorers we all are every single day (and explainers, and shoe tie-ers, and booty wipers and tear driers…).


There are alien contact specialists on board the Enterprise—perhaps one of them might have been better qualified to talk to them than the fellow who couldn't explain the Birds and the Bees to Charlie Evans…

The fact that the Enterprise has no children is newly shocking to me. So much of the universe must be missed by excluding that unique perspective. So many potential alien diplomatic relationships must be missed when societies first encounter Star Fleet and are confronted by a uniformed crew of mostly-singletons. Of course, there is for many people everything right and nothing wrong in being single, being child free, or some mix of the same. Both are states whose partisans I wish joy to. But parents too have our own well-earned perspectives and skills, as do the children we protect and harbor and launch out into the wide, wide galaxy.

What would this episode have been like if, as Lorelei mentioned, someone had actually tried to communicate with the children: another parent or another child? The best interlocutors are sometimes the ones most closely sited by those to whom they wish to speak, and integrating this troubled and troubling group into an existing, healthy culture of children aboard a starship would have been a fascinating twist to this story. I hope one day to watch a Star Trek where both children and parents have a voice and role in the narrative, beyond guest stars and evil foils.

Three stars for threatening to kill traumatized kids who were being manipulated by an adult. No me gusta.

[Come join us tonight (October 18th) for the next thrilling episode of Star Trek!  KGJ is broadcasting the show live with commercials and accompanied by trekzine readings.  You won't want to miss it…]




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Science Fiction/Fantasy, TV

[October 4, 1968] (Star Trek: "The Enterprise Incident")

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by Erica Frank

This episode begins with Kirk acting strangely, and everyone on the Enterprise has noticed. He is snappish, angry, arbitrary; he gives orders that defy Federation law and threatens people who argue with him.

His crew is loyal; they have been through many hardships together—so when he orders them into the Romulan Zone, they obey, although they are obviously nervous.


The Captain's orders are final

They are, of course, discovered, surrounded by Romulan vessels of a new, Klingon design. Kirk and Spock are compelled to beam aboard the Romulan ship to discuss matters, in exchange for two Romulan prisoners sent to the Enterprise. Kirk insists their location is a matter of instrument error: by the time they discovered the mistake, they were too deep in Romulan territory to get away quickly. The Romulan Commander (the first woman flag officer we have met in the show) says that sounds like—well, she doesn't call it the produce of a hind end of a male cow, because she is being politely formal, and this is a television show for families (and the Romulans may not have cattle), but she obviously indicates that it sounds implausible to her.


Color her unconvinced

Spock… confirms her opinion. Says the captain has been irrational recently. That he ordered them past the Neutral Zone. Kirk gets angry and threatens him, and is removed to the Romulan brig. Later, he injures himself enough that they call McCoy to attend him, and he attacks Spock. Spock defends himself with the "Vulcan death grip," an attack we haven't seen before, that looks surprisingly similar to the mind-meld grip.


The closer Jim gets, the worse he looks…

The Romulans send the captain's body back to his ship while the Romulan Commander attempts to convince Spock that he'd be much happier in the Romulan empire.

Have we seen this before?

McCoy revives Kirk. (I wonder if anyone actually thought Kirk died.) Kirk tells a select few people that his supposed insanity was a ruse, a form of dodging accountability in case they were captured. This is an undercover mission. 

The interesting part of the episode, for me, is the Romulan Commander's discussions with Spock. She attempts to seduce him in multiple ways, first laying out how much more power he'd have in the Romulan empire, and when Spock says he does not want command of a ship, she switches tactics. She offers him fine Vulcan food, which he admits is better than what's on the Enterprise. Pours him drinks—first a clear blue-green liquid, and later something orange, served in small glasses like liquor. Spock eats tiny food on toothpicks, and relaxes with her.

She puts herself into the bargain: "Romulan women are not like Vulcan females; they're not… dedicated to pure logic." She drapes herself enticingly, making sure he knows what she's offering. She whispers her name in his ear, and he tells her it's beautiful.


Oiling her traps

At each point, he makes appreciative comments, tells her that the offer is indeed a good one. That he can tell he'd have more power, more freedom, more creature comforts in the Romulan empire.

Eventually, he agrees to her terms: he will lead a small party of Romulans aboard the Enterprise, and from there order the ship to surrender at a Romulan port, her flagship at its side.

It doesn't matter what the terms are. He's lying. He's obviously lying—at least, it's obvious to anyone who knows him. Maybe outsiders who think Vulcans are actually emotionless would believe that Spock agreeing that the food is good means he's content to betray his heritage and his captain and wander off to a government with helmets designed to cover pointed ears.

Predictable but not boring

Instead, it turns out Spock was stalling for time so Kirk could sneak back to the Romulan ship in disguise and grab the new cloaking device. Scotty then has to install and use it before the Romulans get their phasers online—of course there's a deadline. But if we didn't believe Spock used a death grip on Kirk, we weren't going to believe the Romulans would succeed in blowing up the Enterprise. We wonder how they will escape, but not whether.

We could see the Commander convincing herself that her seduction was working—and we could also see Spock watching her reactions, feeding her facts that would convince her that he agreed, without actually admitting to being moved by her offer. Since he's a Vulcan, she doesn't expect him to offer an emotional reaction—and she fails to notice that not only is his enthusiasm lacking, so is any admission that he's actually been persuaded.

He says that the food is better than what the Enterprise has—he doesn't say that he'd leave his position for it. "Please give up your career; we have better snacks" is not going to work on anyone who actually likes their job.

Four stars. I loved the nuanced interactions between them, and I could tell something was off about Kirk but wasn't sure what until McCoy revived him.

Rewriting the present


by Gideon Marcus

Somewhere in North Korea, 83 American sailors and officers are interned, their captain occasionally forced to make confessions as to why his spy ship, the U.S.S. Pueblo, was inside Communist waters in January of this year.  I'm sure you all remember the news—air units were redeployed from Vietnam to Japan, the U.S.S. Enterprise (the aircraft carrier, not Kirk's ship) was stationed off the North Korean coast, and there were rumbles of an impending World War 3.  Indeed, if it hadn't been for the North Vietnamese launching their Tet holidays offensive at the end of January, shifting our focus, who knows where things might have ended up?

With The Enterprise Incident, the metaphor couldn't be more blatant.  The Romulans have been remolded.  Gone are the Kriegsmarine/Roman hybrids that populated "Balance of Terror".  Now they are cloaked in Orientalism, down to the little sideburns Joanne Linville sports, with their smooth speech reminiscent of every movie that features a sinister Red Chinese or Korean.  Vina's exotic theme from "The Cage" has been reworked for the Romulan Commander (effectively, I might add).  The defense-minded Romulans, who showed no interest in capturing the Enterprise when it violated the Neutral zone in "The Deadly Years", suddenly want nothing more than the prize of one of Star Fleet's finest vessels, a greed that proves their undoing.

And so, the American public gets to have its cake and eat it, too.  The Romulan Commander has the right of it when she accuses Kirk of entering Romulan space on a Federation-sanctioned espionage mission to get the cloaking device.  Yet, thanks to a series of Mission: Impossible-style exploits, the "good guys" get away with not only bearding the lion, but stealing the lioness. Rah, rah.  We win.


For ease of maintenance, you can't beat the easy-to-remove Cloaking Device!

This episode is only the latest in what has become a kind of motif.  Earlier this year, John Wayne's "The Green Berets" (the movie that took Sulu away from us for much of Trek's second season) turned Vietnam into World War 2, complete with a platoon with soldiers named Muldoon and Kowalski—and precious few black troops.  David Janssen, no longer a fugitive, plays a jaded reporter, who comes to learn the value of the American presence in Southeast Asia.  And so, contrary to any news you might have read this year, we win the war in Vietnam.

And just last month, the movie Anzio came out, detailing that SNAFU of a landing on the Italian coast in January 1944.  Robert Mitchum plays…a jaded reporter, who comes to learn the pointlessness of the American presence in southern Europe.  Thus, the anti-war movement comes to World War 2.

Mind you, "The Enterprise Incident" is better than either of those two movies.  It's superlatively paced, the dialogue crackles, the chemistry between Nimoy and Linville is palpable, and Shatner makes a convincing Romulan.  I'm even getting used to Scotty's new hairdo.  But the flag-waving has not been so blatant since "The Omega Glory".  Juxtaposed with the nauseating Nixon ad that aired halfway through, lambasting American policy in Vietnam and promising "peace with honor", the episode just didn't sit well with me.

Four stars.  Just have your Maalox tablets handy.

The Lady IS the Tiger


by Janice L. Newman

I’ll admit, when I watched The Enterprise Incident the other night, at first I was frustrated by the behavior of the Romulan Commander. But upon watching the tape we made of the episode with our trusty “Videocorder”, my feelings changed.

Women have an interesting, inconsistent place in the Star Trek universe. Sometimes they are slaves or seemingly exist only to titillate the male characters, like Shahna or Kara (the dancer from “Wolf in the Fold”). Sometimes they have positions of power and importance, like Uhura, Commissioner Nancy Hedford, or Sylvia. Yet even the women in the latter group often give up their position or power when tempted by romantic love. I originally thought the Romulan Commander fell into this same trap, but upon re-watching the episode, I realized I was wrong.

The Romulan Commander is doing her job.


These boots are made for commanding

When the Enterprise flew into the neutral zone, what a plum it must have seemed had fallen into their lap. After the ‘shoot first, ask questions later’ response from “The Deadly Years”, perhaps the Romulans re-evaluated their policy for when a ship like the Enterprise strayed into their territory. Or perhaps this particular commander was just especially ambitious. Regardless, rather than immediately blowing up the ship, she looked for a way to capture it and its wealth of intelligence. Knowing that the crew would surely self-destruct rather than let themselves be taken, she sought a crack in their armor that she could exploit.

Her interest in Spock thus becomes a rational, considered strategy rather than that of a woman letting her heart overrule her mind. She is believably attracted to him, but she is also doing her duty. If she can ‘turn’ Spock, and if he then orders the crew to surrender rather than self-destructing, not only will she win the starship, but the cooperation of a high-ranking Starfleet officer.

Perhaps her reach exceeds her grasp. Perhaps she is too greedy. With the benefit of hindsight and inside knowledge of Kirk’s and Spock’s personalities, it’s easy to be judgemental and say, “She should have just blown up the ship,” or “She should have known better.” But these are still better than, “She should have been thinking with her head rather than her heart.”

When her actions are viewed as those of an ambitious Romulan Commander who wants to get ahead and who is loyal to her people, they make perfect sense. After all, how many times has Captain Kirk used seduction to manipulate women and get what he wants? Can we blame the Romulan Commander for taking a gamble and trying the same? She may have lost, but I can’t help but respect her for trying.

I also appreciated Spock’s acknowledgement that no other outcome was possible, because she would not have truly respected him if he’d made such a choice. No matter how attracted to him she might have been, in the end she would merely have been using him, and they both know it. If there were any doubts that she was seducing him for political more than personal reasons, this line lays them to rest.

Three and a half stars.

The bounty


by Mx. Blue Cathey-Thiele

Two officers beam onto a ship. The captain is confident and capable, skilled at manipulation, and fools even the audience. One provides a distraction and the other collects a valuable asset in a dangerous gamble.

No, I don't mean Kirk stealing the cloaking device.

It was a neat trick and one that allowed the Enterprise to escape without a trace, but I would argue that it was not the actual mission goal, or at least, not the only mission goal. As Kirk and Spock went up against the Commander – who could serve as the Romulan answer to Captain Kirk – this was yet another layer of the ruse. Romulan technology is advanced, but what is more powerful? Knowledge.

It was only in "Balance of Terror" that Romulans were even seen for the first time in a century. Additionally, Starfleet intelligence had already told some of the Bridge crew that Romulans were now using Klingon ship design. Between a cloaking device and the weapons capability to obliterate entire outposts, why switch to a design that the Fleet is not only more familiar with but has dealt with more often? The Enterprise could be destroyed before they ever make contact with a ship past the Neutral Zone. An alliance with the Klingons could change the terms of the Organian peace treaty. Klingon/Federation battles may not be possible but bringing in allies might circumnavigate the way the Organians neutralized fighting capabilities. Finding a way to disrupt a power consolidation such as that seems a far more compelling reason to risk losing the Enterprise or potentially igniting a new conflict with the Romulans.


Spock obtains the real prize of the expedition

With Kirk "dead" and the more immediate threat "discovered", Spock was free to act. He and the Commander shared cultural information, confirming aspects of what the species knew of each other. He also had time to observe Romulan command structure, the quarters of the Commander, and possibly even collect information from her mind. This would be a gamble, as they share distant ancestry and Spock can be vulnerable when connecting with another mind, but not inherently riskier than the plan for Kirk.

Whether they escape with the cloaking device or intelligence, Starfleet gains something to use.

5 stars

Mission: Possible


by Joe Reid

In his letter to the Corinthians, Saint Paul says, “…I am made all things to all men, that I by all means save some.” This episode, “The Enterprise Incident”, epitomized becoming many things to a varied audience.  This episode skillfully blended multiple themes and genres into a cohesive quilt that when looked at from a distance you realize isn’t a quilt at all.  It is a beautiful tapestry, a singular thing that through different sets of eyes will reveal itself differently. 

In the past I complained about episodes that attempted to do too many things in one airing: “The Gamesters of Triskelion” comes to mind.  The different themes in that episode were not blended, to the point of being jarring.  “The Enterprise Incident” presents a military thriller, a heist story, a secret agent tale, a romance, and a science fiction story all rolled into one.  This unified, multifaceted story is not the only reason that I loved this episode.  Here are some other reasons:

It didn’t go out of the way to tell the audience what was happening.  The events told the story.  There was no long explanation from Captain Kirk as to what was happening.  We were given no reason why Romulans were flying Klingon ships.  There was no discussion as to why the commander of the Romulans was female and whether that was common.  The audience was given no revelation as to whether or not Romulan commander had feelings for Spock or if she was simply tricking him.  In this episode things were what they were, and it was up to the audience to make sense of the event for themselves.  An intelligent tale for intelligent viewers.


Even Subcommander Tal is impressed

Another reason to love this episode is because of the amount of respect that was given to the Romulans.  There were not overtly evil, mustache twirling, or stupid enemies in this episode.  The Romulans made no logical missteps in the episode.  Their actions were based on information that they verified.  The Romulan commander didn’t take it for granted that Kirk lost his sanity, she allowed the information to be verified by both Spock and Bones before believing it.  The Romulans monitored transmissions from their own ship and acted when they discovered alien/human signals.  They remained vigilant and intelligent in every scene.  Spock and the others didn’t defeat the Romulans, they simply outmaneuvered them by being slightly more clever in the way they responded to the information that each person had at the time.  Outside of Kirk faking his death, no one was even killed in this episode, which for Star Trek is rare.

Seeing what came before it, I would have thought it impossible for Star Trek to tell a unique and novel multifaceted story, representing so many things to so many people, without speaking down to the audience.  I’m happy to say that they successfully completed the mission in more ways than one.  For that I am grateful.

Five stars




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Science Fiction/Fantasy, TV

[September 26, 1968] Brain drain: (Star Trek: "Spock's Brain")

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[Star Trek is back for its third season!  Accordingly, we've devoted a great many inches to this rather uneven debut….]


by Janice L. Newman

This week we gathered all our friends together to start off a new season of Star Trek. We served dinner, then put our little portable color set outside and everyone enjoyed the lovely late summer night.

Well, everyone except me, that is. I was stuck inside with a VERY nasty cold that, oddly enough, no one else wanted to share with me. It made watching Spock’s Brain a lonely experience, but it did give me space to focus on the episode without being distracted by gasps, groans, or laughter—except my own, that is.

With the recent threats of cancelation and huge fan response, I expected NBC to put their best foot forward starting the new season. For Season 2 they knocked it out of the park with Amok Time. Could they do it again?

In a word, no.

Spock’s Brain had a lot of good elements. The set up was interesting, if fairly typical by now. An unknown alien vessel confronts the Enterprise. An alien woman appears on the bridge and knocks everyone out with a gadget worn on her wrist. When the crew awakens again, they are horrified to discover that Spock is missing. Then, in a twist I could not have predicted, they find that Spock’s body is in Sick Bay, but his brain has been carefully removed!


Kirk's brain doesn't pass muster…

Somehow Spock’s “incredible Vulcan physique” (McCoy’s words, not mine) allows him to survive without a brain until McCoy can get him on futuristic life support. However, they must get back Spock’s brain within 24 hours, McCoy tells Kirk, or they won’t be able to reconnect it.

Kirk, furious and terrified, orders the navigator to follow the trail of the other ship. When it dead ends in a known system, they must determine which of the three planets has Spock’s brain. Playing a hunch that the audience knows will be correct, Kirk chooses the one that seems the least likely.

The surface of the world is cold and barren, populated by all-male tribes of primitive humans. Beneath the ground, women live in luxury and comfort. But both groups are strangely childlike. Neither understand what Kirk wants when he demands “Spock’s Brain”.

The away team consists of Kirk, McCoy, Scotty, and Mr. Spock—or rather, his body, controlled remotely by McCoy with a little gadget. He is even more inexpressive than usual, and little ticking sounds are heard whenever he moves. If it sounds ridiculous, that’s because it is.


Own your own clockwork Spock!

The team is captured, escape, and eventually make their way to where Spock’s brain has been hooked up to the machine controlling the entire complex. His autonomic functions have been repurposed to control the air, water, heating, and so on. It’s not a new idea in SF—Anne McCaffrey’s The Ship Who Sang did something similar if I recall correctly—but it was one of the more interesting plot points in the episode.


Spock's brain after getting the Sargon treatment

The team learns that the childlike people occasionally get temporary boosts to their knowledge by wearing a funny helmet with pins sticking out of it. This is how their leader was able to remove Spock’s brain. When they force her to again partake of the forbidden knowledge, however, she refuses to help them. If Spock’s brain is removed, the machines will cease to function and her people will die.

McCoy, left with no other choice, dons the helmet himself, receives a temporary boost in knowledge and skill, and proceeds to reattach Spock’s brain. The knowledge runs out before he can finish, but fortunately he’s able to connect Spock’s vocal cords, and the Vulcan is then able to guide him through reattaching the rest.

Kirk, meanwhile, tells the leader not to worry her pretty little head, because soon the women and men will be living together like they should have been all along, and the Federation will ‘help’ them.

Spock is unusually garrulous as the episode ends, lecturing them all on Ancient Rome as the theme swells triumphantly.


Spock is all better now—he didn't even muss his hair!

The frustrating thing about Spock’s Brain is that there’s so much good in it. The acting is very good. Kelley, Shatner, and Nimoy feel like they’ve really started to slot together as a team. Their banter is smoother than ever, Kirk’s over-acting is kept to a minimum, and they deliver the most nonsensical lines with absolute sincerity and straight faces. For that alone, they all deserve Emmys.

Added to that is Marc Daniels’ excellent direction, with interesting angles and innovative camera work. The music, too, was new.

Yet none of it mattered, because the fundamental plot was such schlock that it was impossible to take seriously. Every time McCoy screamed out, “Where are we going to look for Spock’s brain?” or Nimoy robotically walked across the screen as little ticking sounds followed along in the background, I was thrown right out of the world of Star Trek and into a bad B-movie. It was funny. It just wasn’t Star Trek.

Hopefully next week the studio will have something better to offer us.

Two stars.

A Sow's Ear from a Silk Purse


by Amber Dubin

This episode started with promise, the way the scantily clad, mysteriously powerful alien women that smoothly and silently dispatches the entire crew harkens back to the hostile takeovers we’ve seen in other episodes like Norman from “I, Mudd” or the Kelvans from “By any other name.” We expect, then, the plot to follow a similarly cerebral path where this new species of alien demonstrates how their improvements upon humanoid society have allowed them to surpass us in power while sacrificing one very human trait whose immense value they’ve forgotten. That would be following a tried and true formula of an episode that, while banal, can still be entertaining. It is seemingly from this scaffold that this episode attempts to reach to higher heights, without recognizing that it never truly took the time to support itself beforehand.

This reach is visible in the beautifully presented viewscreens, the dramatic "behind the captain's chair" camera angle they debut in this episode, the smooth score, matchless acting and the shiny new svelte uniforms they've adorned the cast with. They took a step backwards with Scottie's new haircut, which is so devastatingly unflattering that it makes Chekov's Monkees wig look tolerable, but it's a small misstep when compared to the unforgivable sin of completely forgetting to attach these shiny tassels to an intelligible script or plot.


For once, Chekov's hair looks better than Scotty's…

The most obvious problem with the plot is the concept of removing Spock's brain. Spock has had his body hijacked countless other times but the insistence of using the removal of his physical cerebral organ this time, instead of just his consciousness, makes all the subsequent actions ridiculous. Also, the fact that none of the Imorgs even seem to know what a brain is is absurd. This leads me to my second biggest problem with the episode, and that is that the alien societal structure is incredibly poorly designed. Ostensibly, the species is segregated across gender lines with the females (the Imorgs) living underground, most likely for their own protection as the males (the Morgs) seem to have descended into violent, brainless savages. The most interesting implication I find with this structure is that Imorgs are described by the Morgs as “bringers of pain and delight.” This implies, to me, that their society must survive by the Imorgs periodically returning to the surface, not just to discipline the Morgs, but also to.. ahem.. milk them of their genetic material for reproductive purposes.

While this is a comical concept, the explanation for this setup makes no sense. It is explained that they became so advanced and so comfortable that their species' intelligence gradually atrophied like an unused muscle, thus requiring the externalization of said intelligence in the archival brain-training headset that certain members of society can put on to receive the combined knowledge of the ancients at their intellectual peak. Yet this raises the question: how did their loss of intelligence happen so slowly that it was unavoidable and yet so quickly that they were able to see it coming in order to store it externally to be used later? Perhaps there was a brain-eating disease that only spared the less intelligent? Yet this does not explain how McCoy's readings picked up evidence of a gradual degradation and does not explain how the best solution that these highly intelligent beings could come up with is to turn their habitat into a body controlled by a physical cerebral organ sustained for 10,000 year periods; meanwhile the remnants of their species are left to crawl around said body mindlessly like ants in a glass-bound ant hill.

As absurd as this premise makes the episode, it introduces what I see as its most redemptive quality: the positive sexism. As often as this show strives for portraying women as valued members of an advanced society, it's my personal opinion that it falls short too many times. This episode seeks to bend the needle at least a little bit in favor of a 'women being smarter than men' narrative, and I am a fan. The Imorgs, while dumb, are no more dumb than the Morgs, and I am quite fond of the fact that their highly intelligent ancestors chose the females as the more reliable receptacles into which to download the collective knowledge of their species. I also enjoyed that, while graced with the knowledge and basically the consciousness of the ancients, the Imorg priestess is successfully able to out-smart Kirk and is completely immune to his powers of persuasion. I find it infinitely refreshing that Captain Kirk doesn’t once again save the day by aggressively teaching the femme-fatale the value of love. Although when said woman decries that they can’t control the men without systems of punishment and reward, Kirk does sneak in a snide “there are other ways.” I could be reading too far into it, but the way he delivered the line made me think he was more than willing to provide instructions as to techniques that women can use to get men to do what they want (maybe he’d even suggest a hands on approach to the milking process).


"How about some lessons in healthy sexual relations?"

Despite this episode's obvious flaws, which there are many, I wouldn't overall say this is a bad episode. It's a testament to the commitment of the actors that they're willing to deliver solid performances of the sometimes silly lines with depth and sometimes deadly seriousness (Nurse Chapel’s 10 second fall alone is Oscar-worthy). In general, the characters appear much more polished than we've seen in some other episodes; and the lighting, which I think is a little too severe for Shatner's face in a couple of scenes, was an interesting departure and a bold choice. What the episode lacked in structural continuity, it tried to make up for in fluid pacing, an exceptional score, and special effects opticals that I believe have vastly improved from even the last season. Ultimately, however, the failure of editors to cut the obvious silliness out of the script makes all the high quality elements feel like lipstick on a pig.

They say you can’t make a silk purse from a sow’s ear but apparently you can make a sow’s ear from a silk purse. This episode makes for one very stylish pig, but if it’s just going to dunk its head in the mud, I don’t see the point of the wasted effort.

Three stars.

The Mental Divide


by Joe Reid

Star Trek has returned for a 3rd season!  I've missed our weekly sneak peek into the future as well as that regular glance into the mirror of our present.  “Spock's Brain” is the name of this entry.  Spock's brain is the apparent focus of this episode, at least on the surface.  As I stated before, Star Trek is sometimes a mirror to show us who we are or may become.  In “Spock's Brain”, we don't look good.

Watching shows like Star Trek, we see ourselves as the heroes.  We picture ourselves as Kirk.  We are Uhura.  We are Chekov.  From a narrative standpoint, we are actually the silly characters that the crew of the Enterprise are fighting, kissing, lying to, or helping each week.  This week, we are the inhabitants of Sigma Draconis 6.  What do the people of this planet tell us about ourselves?

The people of Sigma Draconis 6, which I will call Sixers from here forward, were divided by sex.  The Sixer males were ignorant of relationships with the females outside of knowing them as the ones that bring pain and pleasure.  Similarly, many men in our world don’t understand women.  We sometimes reduce women to being instruments of pleasure, which if not handled correctly might lead to intense pain.  Of course, it doesn’t help at all if men are uneducated and uncultured.  Such men are reduced to seeing women in the context of either, “Heavens!  She makes me feel good!”, or “Dammit! She is a pain in the neck!”


Women gain the upper hand in the battle of the sexes.

The Sixer women, being physically weaker than the men, and as ignorant as them, defaulted to using instruments of pain and pleasure to get what they wanted from men.  Although the episode didn’t offer what pleasures were given to the men, I myself am intimately aware of the pleasures that today’s women use to get their way from a man and of the pain some of them inflict when they are not satisfied.  Bill Shakespeare wrote about the fury of a woman’s scorn.  I find myself questioning which is better—the long deep pain caused by a woman who hurts your soul or the short and intense pain of this episode’s futuristic torture device.  Both seem equally bad ways of dealing with the opposite sex, based on an utter lack of compassion.

This portrayed male/female struggle, although interesting, was not a perfect mirror to our culture in that it gave no example to the pain that men have caused women today and throughout history.  Also giving no notion that men could bring pleasure to women outside of what they can physically provide through their labor. In the end, "Spock's Brain" shows us that there must be more to successful human relations than simple Pavlovian techniques.

Another key lesson of the episode involves Spock’s brain and how it was to be used on Sigma Draconis 6.  Sixers females could only continue their way of life if a controller was there to run their world.  Without a controller, the females and males would have to rely on each other in a different way.  This may seem far from reality, but I think this lesson should be taken as a warning rather than an indictment of our society.  We should be wary of any leader, religion, philosophy, or machine that promises to take care of our needs or manage our lives to such a degree that it reduces our interdependence with those around us.  Women and men need each other to survive, but all are better served through understanding and love over pain and pleasure.  Families need each other in the same way.  As do neighbors.  Coworkers.  Citizens of a country.  People of a planet.  Dependence on a solitary thing to care for us may lead to retardation of how we relate to one another.


Why think for yourself when you can just be force-fed knowledge?

For this exciting and thought-provoking episode of Star Trek, I offer 4 of 5 stars.  It told a compelling and suspenseful yarn laced with relevant social commentary and caution—exactly what one wants from science fiction.

Four stars

Third Season Drinking Game


by Erica Frank

Take a drink every time you spot bad science, male chauvinism, Federation cultural supremacy, or the Enterprise crew pretending that an alien culture has human needs, interests, and abilities. …For this episode, make them small drinks. Sips only. Optionally, take long drinks; you may bypass a few others while you're raising your glass.

I'm leaving it to others to discuss the computer technology (take a drink), the womens' clothing (take a drink), and Kirk's ethics (take another drink), so as to focus on the split communities: Women living underground in the warm, computer-controlled facility; men living without technology on the frozen surface.


How are they making their clothes with "no sign of industrial development?" Those are awfully straight seams for hand-worked leather!

They have lived this way for thousands of years, long enough to have long forgotten why, even if they had attempted to keep records. They seem mostly content (or at least resigned): The men fear the women, but they do not band together to attack them; the women see no reason to change anything until they need a new "Controller."

(I have no idea how children happen. They're aliens. Maybe they lay eggs and the Controller keeps them in an incubator.)

But we are probably supposed to believe they are human-like, just split into communities so separate they don't even have words for sex or gender. Are we to believe these people, human-like enough to prefer buildings that are well-suited for our crew, wearing clothing that seems designed for human cultures, have no concept of human-like relationships? Of course not!

We have plenty of examples of what kind of relationships humans have, if you segregate them by sex: sailors, military forces, and even nunneries have a long history of homosexual behavior.

Of course, the residents of Sigma Draconis 6 won't have "gay" relationships that look like modern human ones: They have no notion of "husband and wife." They don't raise children together, don't have one employed partner and one housekeeper. (The men probably need every able-bodied person working for survival; the women's physical needs are all met by the Controller.) So their relationships – which may not be limited to pair-bonding the way that child-raising couples tend to be – would be mostly invisible to casual, short-term visitors like Kirk and his crew.

When the Morg realize that Spock is Kirk's oath-bonded partner, his assault on the women's complex will make so much more sense to them!

Two stars – mostly for the fascination of "how does that work?"; bump it to three if you've been drinking enough to put yourself in a pleasant fog.

Anything but Star Trek


by Lorelei Marcus

I think we're entering a new era.  The music feels different, as if it's finally finding its groove after many years of experimentation.  The politics are different, too, with black delegates trying to sit at the convention (and a young Julian Bond making a plausible run for Vice President!), and a weird match-up between two Vice Presidents.

Most of all, the TV is different.  It's all in color, and there's just so many shows, most of them new.  From Julia to The Mod Squad, everyone's jumping to be the fresh, hip thing.

Except, apparently, Star Trek.

It's ironic that this show, which broke new ground on television in not just science fiction but ethnic diversity chose to take such a step back into the past for its Season 3 debut.  "Spock's Brain" felt like a plot straight out of the '50s.  The society separated by men and women, the spooky science beyond our understanding, and even the new, tighter-fitting uniforms made the episode feel right at home next to Forbidden Planet.

What's worse, this quaint exploration of an alien society clashed sharply with the actual Enterprise and crew.  For instance, the (excellent!) scene in which the bridge crew decide which of the three Sigma Draconis planets to investigate in search of Spock's brain feels like a scene from another show—and might as well be: the sentient races on the other planets never become relevant to the episode.


The bridge becomes the briefing room in one of the best scenes of the episode.

I didn't actually have much problem with the whole "brain removal" element of the plot, just how it was executed.  A lot of the lines felt forced and corny, particularly Spock's indifferent voice-overs.  His dialogue should have been the highlight of the episode, not the drag.  Also, the surgery montage at the end of the episode was cheap, taken straight from Ben Casey or maybe even General Hospital.  I was laughing too hard at that point to care whether or not the brain restoration surgery was a success.

Don't get me wrong.  I did enjoy the episode at the time, and the actors salvaged what they could with the lines they were given, but it ultimately left a bad taste in my mouth.  I'm disappointed that "Spock's Brain" was chosen to be the debut of Season 3.  Perhaps a tongue in cheek episode like this (assuming the camp is deliberate) could have been fine midseason, but putting it front and center feels disrespectful to the show and characters, not to mention the audience.  I don't regret writing all those letters to Mort Werner to keep Star Trek alive, but I fear the result may be a degraded, less sophisticated program.

Let's hope this episode is a fluke and not representative of the rest of the season.

Three stars

Minority Report


by Gideon Marcus

I'm going to go out on a limb here.  I enjoyed this episode.  Perhaps it was the endless summer over which I was starved for new Trek.  Maybe it was the terrific giggles I got out of every time one of the gifted cast had to seriously pronounce the words "Spock's Brain" (usually preceded by variations of "Where are we going to look for…" and "Give back…")

The story didn't bother me.  Was it rushed with intriguing concepts left undeveloped?  Sure, but that's par for the course.  There are only 50 minutes each week with which to introduce a plot and resolve it.  The rest must be done with shorthand.  Indeed, the episode wastes little time, clanging into action with a red-alert signal.  And while Kirk does destroy a 10,000 year old society with no compunctions, he's done so before, under similar conditions ("Return of the Archons" and "The Apple"), and the Federation has specialists to help clean up the ensuing mess.  Plus, in this case, it was personal—they'd taken (chortle) Spock's Brain!

Speaking of plots we've seen before, Spock's Brain (guffaw) is really just the inverse of "Return to Tomorrow".  In that episode, three disembodied brains want Spock's Body (and those of Kirk and Dr. Ann Mulhall).

Of course, in the cold light of day, when I can't be swept along by the superb pacing, the new scoring, the slick new uniforms, the beautiful Daniels-shot bridge (how about those lovely viewscreen shots?!), getting to see all of the B-team doing their jobs, Scotty's disaster of a new hair style (did Jimmy's new wife Anita approve of this?), I can see there are issues with the episode.  For instance, the idea of snatching a brain to power a society is fine.  The notion of finding the best brain for the job makes sense.  But Sigma Draconis had three class M planets in it.  Surely there were scholars on Planet 3 or scientists on Planet 4 who could have done the job.  (Also, Planet 4, with a technology grade of "G" or 2030 A.D. presumably has space travel and perhaps even warp drive—why hadn't they settled/explored Planet 6?)

Also, all this gas about "ion propulsion" being the cat's meow made no sense.  Ion propulsion is something we use today, which I talked about in my article on the (failed) satellite ATS 4.  It is a low thrust , economical drive that uses the constant ejection of cesium atoms to propel a spacecraft.  Maybe Scotty's "ion propulsion" means something different, but it sounds goofy without further explanation.  It's why Trek moved from "lasers", which are new but well known, to "phasers", which are made up but sound cool.  Call it "muon" propulsion or better yet (to make up a word) "buon" or something.


"She's steam-powered, Cap'n!  Far beyond what we can do with antimatter…"

All that said, I want to think that this rather silly script was Trek's essay at deliberate camp, sort of how The Trouble with Tribbles and A Piece of the Action were deliberate comedy and Catspaw was deliberate Halloween creepiness.  In any event, the episode accomplished the main goal, which is that I'm eager to see what's on next week…even if it means I have to stay up past my bedtime to watch the furshlugginer thing, now that they've moved the air time to 10 P.M.!

3.5 stars




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Science Fiction/Fantasy, TV

[August 8, 1968] The Little Witch Girl and The Little Ghost Boy (Mahoutsukai Sally and GeGeGe no Kitaro)

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by Janice L. Newman

We visited Japan earlier this summer, and had a lovely time. It’s always interesting comparing how life is different in Japan from our Southern California home, whether it be fish and rice for breakfast or the excellent train system that got us around Tokyo quickly and easily.

Our hotel room had a television, and since we craved immersion whether inside the hotel or out, we often have the boob tube on. Sadly, Japan has a "vast wasteland", too. Between the sumo bouts, the soap operas, the game shows, and the period dramas, there wasn't much of interest to us, although the fact that everything was in Japanese was a plus.

However, we found that if we tuned in at the right time of the day, there was gold to be found. Indeed, we found them in the surprising form of a couple of children’s cartoon shows. They both echoed Western shows in familiar ways, yet also had elements we’d never seen before.

A Magical Girl

The first show was “Mahoutsukai Sally”, or “Sally the Witch”. This charmingly silly show is about a little girl who is the princess of a ‘magical kingdom’. She comes to earth and makes friends here, hiding her magical abilities, which apparently allow her to do almost anything. Most of the time she uses her magic to stop ‘bad’ people; burglars, kidnappers, bullies, and the like.

Stylistically, Sally reminds me of Disney’s early cartoons, the old black and white ones with Mickey Mouse. There’s a strong slapstick element, and the episode plots aren’t particularly concerned with things like consistency or the laws of physics.

On the other hand, the story, with its focus on Sally and her friends, is unusual. Most of the cartoons I’ve seen on American TV have had main characters who are boys. There are superhero shows and adventure shows, like The Amazing Spiderman, The Fantastic Four, Superman, and Johnny Quest. There’s no reason a girl can’t watch superhero shows, of course, but “Mahoutsukai Sally” not only stars a little girl, it focuses on everyday elements of her life in ways that are unusual in American television. For example, she makes new friends at school, invites them over, and secretly magics up a cake for them to share. There’s plenty of drama and adventure, but there are also moments of domesticity, like Sally helping her friend babysit her little brothers. Though infused with ridiculous and sometimes nonsensical plot twists, making the story about a little girl’s life and giving that little girl power makes this cartoon something special. Sure, we’ve had a few cartoons with a girl in the lead, like the Little Audrey shorts, but children’s TV in the USA these days is much more likely to give you a show with a powerful boy (or a man, or a group of men) as the main characters. Sally is a breath of fresh air.

On the third hand, Sally does resemble a different kind of American TV show: recent sitcoms! There’s been a trend in American TV over the past few years toward ‘spooky’ or supernatural family shows like The Munsters, The Addams Family, and especially Bewitched. Sally strongly resembles the last of these, but fashioned for small children instead of adults, with a little girl witch instead of a grown woman. In fact, word has it that the original Mahoutsukai Sally comic was inspired by Bewitched!

A Magical…Boy?

This one, we discovered both the television show and the "manga" (comic) at the same time. GeGeGe no Kitaro, though no less charming than Sally, is perhaps a bit more alien. It is a story focusing on a Japanese youkai. “Youkai” is a difficult word to translate because it’s used as a bit of a catchall for supernatural beings like ghosts, demons, and other sorts of mysterious spirits. “GeGeGe” is an onomatopoeic word that sounds like cackling, or perhaps a ghostly giggle. Kitaro, the hero, is not a scary youkai, though. He’s a kind and helpful lad who uses his powers to fight bad Eastern youkai, evil Western youkai (like Dracula and the wicked witch) and even giant Godzilla-like monsters!

Kitaro is fascinating to watch because it’s a deeply Japanese show. The closest analog would be Casper the Friendly Ghost, which also has a little boy ghost who helps people. But Kitaro’s roots in Japanese folklore and the villages he helps protect offer Americans a glimpse into what life is like in Japan today: older villages existing alongside slick new cities, just as people still walk around in kimono and yukata almost as often as people wear western suits and dresses. Kitaro himself is a product of an old and new world: an old folktale brought to new life on the television screen.

It's also tremendously funny, and extremely good-natured, though the themes can be heavy for a children's show. Indeed, in the aforementioned battle between Eastern and Western horrors, there are a number of deaths (though, technically, the youkai are already kind of dead, as is Dracula…) This heaviness, and the deeply regional nature of the show means that American companies will not likely scramble to re-dub it for American audiences. Sally might fare better, but it, too, seems to have been neglected.

Oh well. At least we got Astro Boy and Kimba the White Lion! And thanks to our knowledge of Japanese, we can look forward to our next trip across the Pacific, not just to visit our friends, but to see what new children’s shows Japan will come out with!




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