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[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.

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

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by Janice L. Newman

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

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

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

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

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by Gideon Marcus

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

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

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

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

In brief:

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

False Dichotomy


by Janice L. Newman

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

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

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


Federation diplomacy

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

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

Offensive Trek


by Charlotte C. Hill

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

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

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

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

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

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


The scene speaks for itself

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

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

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

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

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

Here's the invitation!



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[November 10, 1967] Mudd in the computer (Star Trek: "I, Mudd")

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"And Thereby Hangs a Tale"


by Amber Dubin

"I, Mudd" follows the tradition set by three other episodes we've seen so far, in which the crew of the Enterprise has to out-logic a robot ("What are little girls made of," "Return of the Archons," "Changeling"). Even though this episode recycles many of the same themes we've seen in those episodes, it offers enough unique elements to make it my favorite of its kind.

We open on a hallway conversation between the ship's doctor and chief science officer where the ever-cynical medico's instincts lead him to correctly identify an interloper on the ship in the form of the newest crewmember, Lieutenant Norman.


"What did he call me?"

Unfortunately, Spock rebuffs Dr. McCoy's theory (logically) because his reasoning points out Norman's inhuman behaviors, many of which overlap with those of Spock himself. McCoy insists that "the ears make all the difference" but the damage is clearly done as the supposedly unemotional Spock abruptly extricates himself from the conversation with an acerbic retort.


"I mean, you're one of the good ones."

McCoy is immediately vindicated when Norman's next move is to hijack the ship. He single handedly dispatches two security teams, all of engineering including Scotty, rigs the controls to blow if the ship deviates from the course he assigns it, and barges straight onto the bridge to explain the now-captive crew's new situation. Norman presents Captain Kirk a "choice" to either go on a four day voyage to an unknown destination or face the immediate destruction of the Enterprise. Ever cool under pressure, Kirk demands to know the nature of his attacker. Norman responds only by peeling back a panel under his shirt to reveal an android abdomen full of wires.


An android's navel–note that these robots don't use integrated circuits…

Further inquiries over who sent him are met with "I am not programmed to respond in that area" before he immediately shuts himself off. So confident is he in his power play (pun intended) that Norman leaves his unconscious body standing in the middle of the doorway to the bridge. Apparently no one disturbs him for four days as the crew seems startled from their normal activities when Norman abruptly awakes and makes further demands. He acts as if he's giving the crew another choice as he requests a set of personnel to accompany him on the planet they're now orbiting, but again refusal means certain death. At least he said “please” this time.

It soon becomes clear why Norman was reluctant to reveal who sent him, because we next open up to a throne room centered around none other than the illustrious Harcourt Fenton Mudd. Undeterred by Mudd's declaration of newfound sovereignty, Kirk charges at him and commences a delightful volley of banter where Mudd catches the crew up on what he's been up to since they last left him in custody for his transgressions. Surprising no one, Harry's made a mess of every situation he's been involved in and has found himself marooned on this planet of 200,000 androids while fleeing the consequences of his actions. Through much childish bickering on Harry's part, Kirk manages to wrench the truth out of the scoundrel, soon discovering that Mudd is just as much a prisoner of the androids as the Enterprise crew is.


"They won't let me go!"

A strange detail comes into play when the crew is being led away and stumbles upon the shrine to Stella, Mudd's wife. It seems odd that Harry would be so sentimental as to make an exact replica of the nagging shrew he gratefully abandoned galaxies away. It must follow that either the loneliness of being the only human on an android planet compelled Mudd to seek security in the familiar or he is such an adversarial man that the ability to make a version of a nemesis he could program with an off button proved to be an irresistible temptation. The most ironic element of that situation is that Stella may be shrill and harping but with a husband like Harcourt, the audience can't help but be squarely on her side.

Unsurprisingly, the androids reject Mudd the second they have any other humans to compare him to, and devote themselves to providing everything the crew wants so they can better serve humanity. They explain that serving humans gives the androids renewed purpose and protects humans by taking care of their every need to save them from themselves. Elements of the gilded cage they're presented with tempt each of the crew members in turn, but whenever a wish contradicts the terms of their captivity, the crew begins to notice that the androids balk at the paradox by freezing in place, their ID necklaces flashing until the conflict is resolved. It is subsequently discovered that the androids are part of a partial hive-mind directed by Norman and that they defer to him to avoid overloading individual units when logical computation is stalled. Thus ensues a campaign to confuse and overload as many androids by whatever means possible. Fake music, subterfuge, logical fallacies, play acting and flat-out lies become weaponized against the unsuspecting computers; each crewman performs their ridiculous acts admirably, especially Spock, who befuddles several androids all by himself.


"Sorry, ladies.  I'm just too good for you."

The episode reaches a delightful climax as the crew's play-acting for Norman finally causes literal steam to billow out of his ears and he admits humans are too complex to be managed by anyone but other humans. In the even more satisfying conclusion, after reaching a peaceful solution to coexist with the androids, Mudd's punishment is revealed to be exile on the android planet so they can help him rehabilitate his nefarious ways. Mudd initially rejoices in this reward of a punishment, until the crew unveils his personal attendants: 500 copies of Stella, this time without her off switch.

Not one line of the script is superfluous and every crewman is at their most efficient and capable as they execute every plan flawlessly. The script, plot, performances and design of this episode click together as seamlessly as the gears powering a well-constructed android.

I am a self-confessed, dyed-in-the-wool robot-a-phile. It is thus inevitable that I give this episode…

5 stars

The Shrew in the Ointment


by Janice L. Newman

I’ll admit, the preview for this episode had me worried. “Mudd’s Women” had some good elements, but was overall one of the weaker episodes of the first season. Happily, this episode was much better than that first one starring Mudd. There was just one problem that took it down a star for me – a fly in the ointment, if you will.

It was an old, old, joke even when Shakespeare did it: the harridan wife and her ne’er-do-well husband. Despite the fact that the audience knows that Harry Mudd’s perspective is unreliable, and thus his version of his wife may not represent the real woman, upon seeing the cartoonishly-awful “Stella” android we can’t help but be repelled and thus sympathize with the charismatic Mudd. Yet a moment’s thought makes one realize how nonsensical it is in the context of Star Trek. This is the future. Is it really so hard to get a divorce if one is unhappy with one’s spouse? If two people are so miserable together, is it truly necessary for one of them to flee into outer space? And sure, another moment’s thought is all it takes to realize that Mudd likely married his wife to gain some kind of monetary benefit, and that if we were in her place, we might be shrill, too. Still, Stella isn’t particularly funny, and for me, even Mudd’s comeuppance was poisoned by her sour, nagging presence.


If Harry Mudd put you in a closet, you'd make this face, too.

The rest of the episode is great, though; one of the best “break the computer” ones we’ve seen. Four stars.

A little bit of Vaudeville


by Gideon Marcus

Something I love about the stellar anthology show, Star Trek, is how versatile it is.  One week, we're getting political commentary, with ramifications right from the headlines of today (e.g. "A Taste of Armageddon"), another we're getting a Halloween-themed piece ("Catspaw").  An episode might be a rendition of a classic war movie ("Balance of Terror") or a retelling of Hamlet ("Conscience of the King").

"I, Mudd" takes place almost entirely on a spartan subterranean set, and largely features entertaining characters conversing with each other.  It's like an extended Hollywood Palace sketch.  It really shouldn't work, but it does.

From Kirk's masterful exchanges with Mudd (with Kirk displaying just the right mix of exasperation, anger, and amusement) to Chekov's lively Cossack dances, to the halting…yet endearing…cadence of…the androids, to Uhura's silky mock betrayal (she really is getting a chance to shine this season!), to the grand finale filled with pantomimed absurdity–it's a stage-bound pageant of comedy.  Interestingly, the avante garde Marc Daniels was tapped to direct rather than the more stagey Joe Pevney.  You see his surrealistic influences particularly during the dance scenes.


No caption required.

That the story is actually pretty good is a bonus.  If the show doesn't quite reach five star status for me, it's because while I enjoyed the show thoroughly, it was a bit too frivolous to feel like "real" Star Trek–essentially the same complaint I had about "Catspaw", but with an execution that makes me all but forgive the lapse.

Four stars.

Tonight's episode seems like it will be more of a serious affair.  At least we'll find out what happened to Glenn Corbett after he left Route 66…

Here's the invitation! Come join us.

Also, copies of The Tricorder are still available — drop us a line for details!




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[October 26, 1967] Duet in G(ray) (Star Trek: "The Doomsday Machine")

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by Gideon Marcus

Remember, thou are but a mortal

For the past year and a half, we've thrilled to the sight of the Enterprise, a graceful vessel that calls to mind the spindly beauty of tall ships and the blunt power of a battleship.  We've seen her proudly sailing the ether, shaken about by time streams, canted oddly after an attack.

But until last week's episode, we never saw one of her class utterly wrecked.

In the opening scenes of "The Doomsday Machine", when the Enterprise comes across the wrecked Constellation, accompanied by a most effective dirge, it is a gut punch.  The misaligned warp pods.  The charred saucer.  It calls to mind visions of Pearl Harbor, of kamikaze-ravaged ships.  A starship is mortal, we realize.

So, too, is its captain.  The sight of Commodore Decker, mute with shock when Kirk first beams aboard the Constellation, is all too believable.  This is a man we can believe has been stunned out of his mind first by the wreck of his ship by an enormous, extragalactic planet-wrecker, and then by the destruction of his helpless crew by the same implacable menace.  That he alone should be the sole survivor of this disaster is all the more painful–to him, and to us.

If we sympathize with poor Decker, ably played by the ubiquitous character actor William Windom, we can feel little but revulsion for the planet killer, a cross between Saberhagen's berzerkers and Marvel's Galactus.  Plated with impenetrable armor and self-regenerating, the juggernaut has the power of Nomad, but with none of the human-induced fallibility.  It is simply a mindless killing machine.

In the battle that ensues, we root for the crippled Constellation, helmed by Captain Kirk and held together by Scotty, Washburn, and two unnamed crewmen.  We root for the Enterprise, crippled by the presence of a maniacally driven Matt Decker, who assumes command over vociferous and constant objections by Mr. Spock.  If the three-cornered fight is occasionally hindered by inconsistent special effects, it is immeasurably helped by fine acting and an incomparable, Emmy-deserving score.

The drama that takes place on the bridge of the Enterprise is no less compelling, drawing strongly from The Caine Mutiny, complete with Decker fondling tape cartridges like Queeg's ball-bearings.  And unlike in that tremendous book (and less successful movie), Spock has no stomach for mutiny. Deliverance of the Enterprise must wait until Kirk can reestablish command.

"The Doomsday Machine" sees the death of Commodore Decker and the near death of Captain Kirk, both vital to the destruction of the planet killer.  Decker's suicide run with a shuttlecraft establishes the enemy's weakness; Kirk's determination to ram the Constellation inside the machine proves the strongest weapon against it.  But it is really the loss of the Constellation, sacrificed to immolate the destroyer from inside, that impacts the most.  One of the Enterprise's 12 sisters is dead.  Its skipper and complement of 400 will have no thrilling adventures, no end-of-the-episode laugh line.  And if one starship can die, any of them can.

While credit must be given both to the regular cast and this episode’s guest star, and I have already praised the music, there are yet laurels to pass out.  Marc Daniels has consistently impressed with his tight and creative direction, especially in contrast to the competent but rather staid work of the fellow he seems to alternate episodes with, Joe Pevney.  Whomever edited this episode also did a terrific job, often cutting seamlessly between two dialogues to ratchet up the pace.  And, of course, writer Norm Spinrad is no stranger to good science fiction, having been writing it since 1962.  It is probably him we can thank for the "hardness" and plausibility of this episode.

There are a few quibbles, a few scientific gaffes, and my comrades may discuss them.  But for my money, this was perhaps science fiction's finest hour on television.

Five stars.

Call him Ishmael


by Amber Dubin

The tale this episode follows is a well-worn one in sea-faring lore, but I was nevertheless pleasantly surprised to see Star Trek take on the classic story of Moby Dick. Commodore Decker is cast as Ahab, a shipwreck of a captain on a wrecked ship maddened by the obsession with the entity that took everything from him. His illogical pursuit of his white whale is just as turbulent as the protagonist of the famous novel, but what sets this retelling apart from the rest is the gracefulness with which the crew of the Enterprise strike a delicate balance between adherence to duty and survival.

This is on full display in the way Spock does his best to ignore the commodore's obvious madness in order to follow the rules of his station. I found myself shouting, "just nerve pinch him!" as I was forced to watch Decker spit on every opportunity Spock offered him to choose a logical path. Kirk, on the other hand, ever the space cowboy, immediately undermines all the subtlety of the crew's struggles by exclaiming "blast the rules" and outright calling the commodore a ship-stealing tyrant. I found this to be a refreshing deviation to the plot, because Kirk was very much speaking my mind and I was grateful to see the crew rally behind him in exhausted, fearful relief.


A happier crew

While I wasn't thrilled about the spacial reasoning behind the climactic battles, it's incontestable that the score and cinematography in this episode were phenomenal. The last scene, when the transporter kept malfunctioning up until the last seconds before the explosion, had me literally biting my nails with suspense. Likewise, the pulsating droning of the music that started when the crew boarded the shipwrecked vessel left me authentically unsettled and made me wonder what horrors they would stumble upon. This thematic wariness provided the perfect backdrop to introduce the commodore, as he was essentially a discarded shell of himself, a dead man cursed to haunt the abandoned halls of his once mighty and powerful ship.

The place where this episode lost points for me was the forced simile Kirk kept pushing about the killer robot being a doomsday device like an H-bomb. It felt like a ham-fisted attempt to force relevance to our times, which I found unnecessary when a story of a powerful man driven mad by failure was timeless in itself. Moreover, stating that this robot must have been used as doomsday device is a view as limited as the potential usages the H-bomb, or the power behind it. True, the mahine has the destructive power of a powerful bomb but the robot could just as easily have been once used to convert inert material into energy to feed a planet, not destroy it. I'm most disappointed that there's a gaping hole in Kirk's logic over the origin of this device and Spock isn't even tempted to close it. Possibly Spock doesn't challenge his captain's theory because he has been burnt out from challenging illogical authority figures all day, but I have to stretch to make this explanation fit.

Four Stars

There but for the grace of God…


by Janice L. Newman

The Traveler nicely summed up how painful it was to see a sister-ship of the Enterprise fatally wounded. But what held my attention was Commander Decker’s plight and performance. Though some of my companions gently mocked his scenery-chewing tendencies, I found his first appearance and his explanation of what had happened to his ship to be compelling. This was a man at the end of his rope, who had endured the greatest loss any starship captain could imagine: the loss of his ship and crew.

If Captain Kirk should ever live through such a nightmare, I firmly believe he would behave in much the same way. Starfleet must choose captains who have a certain, shall we say, obsessive streak when it comes to their ships and crews. We’ve seen Kirk become aggressive and irrational when his ship is threatened. We’ve also seen him brought back from mind-altered states more than once when giving in would have meant the loss of his ship. For Kirk, the Enterprise and its complement mean everything to him. It’s all too easy to picture him in Decker’s place, a broken, desperate, suicidal, and vengeful man.


Would Kirk face the death of his own ship so calmly?

Four stars.

By the way, we're just burning to see what happens in the next episode of Star Trek, coming out tomorrow night!

Here's the invitation! Come join us.

Also, copies of The Tricorder are still available — drop us a line for details!




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[October 12, 1967] See you on the flip side (Star Trek: "Mirror, Mirror")

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by Joe Reid

A Shadowy Reflection

As this most intriguing and excellent season of Star Trek continues on we find ourselves delighted week after week with more thoughtful and fantastical stories.  This week takes the cake!  I have stated repeatedly that Star Trek is a mirror to society here on Earth, today in 1967.  This episode took that mirror and held it up to its own world and its characters.  Appropriately, the writers called it “Mirror, Mirror”.  Let’s take a gander at it and see what’s on the other side.

The episode opens on an alien world as a storm rages.  Captain Kirk is in discussion with the very human looking Halkan Council to allow the Federation to mine dilithium on their planet. Uhura, Dr. McCoy, and Scotty are with him as part of the landing party.  With negotiations stalled, as the Halkans don’t wish to see their dilithium used by those who may cause harm to even a single person, Kirk decides to return to the ship due to the coming ion storm.


"Do not try to adjust your communicator. We control the horizontal and the vertical." (Vic Perrin, head Halkan, is the narrator for The Outer Limits)

As the four of them are transported to the ship, something goes wrong and instead of appearing on the USS Enterprise they find themselves wearing different clothing as they appear on a different Enterprise.  They are immediately confronted with Spock sporting a goatee who then calls for the eradication of the Halkans for not giving their dilithium to the "Empire" and who is quick to painfully punish Transporter Chief Kyle for an issue with the transporters.


Performance reviews are brutal on this Enterprise

Kirk soon figures out that the four of them are in a parallel universe.  Finding themselves isolated among violent familiar looking strangers, the quartet seek to find a way to save the Halkans from destruction and get themselves back home.  As they attempt to masquerade as "themselves" on the brutal ISS Enterprise while trying to carry out their secret mission, Urura is forced to resist the advances of a savage and craven Sulu, while Kirk barely survives an assassination attempt by an ambitious and bloodthirsty Chekov.


"You die, Captain, and I get to sing Mickey's songs."

Soon thanks to the male voiced, magically capable ship's computer, Kirk and McCoy confirm how they ended up on the opposite side of this dark looking-glass and learn of a way to return to their universe.  As amazing as that was, we soon meet the other Captain Kirk's mistress and confidant, Marlena, waiting for him in his quarters, who shows our Kirk the powerful assassination weapon that he has at his disposal to wipe out all of his enemies.  Marlena threatened to use it on Spock after he made clear to Kirk that he was under orders to kill him if he failed to purge the Halkans for refusing to allow the Empire rights to the dilithium.


The new Admiral TV not only has the brightest color, but it eliminates unwanted personnel!

The action and excitement then gets fast and intense as our crew carry out their plan to get home.  Uhura gets into another struggle with the wicked Sulu and has to strike and almost shank him to save herself.  Goatee Spock realizes things aren't right and captures our righteous four crewmembers for answers.  This leads to another fight against the powerful Vulcan.  Just as they found a way around Spock, the devious Sulu returns to kill everyone and murder his way to command of the ship.  After an amazing save by Marlena using the weapon she told our Kirk about, she approaches the captain, explaining that she had learned everything about them and wanted to return to their world with them.

In the end it is the unerringly logical Spock of the violent universe helps our people return to their world as Kirk made a passionate, Nomad-level logical plea for him to rescue the people of this dark universe.


"And we have better donuts."

Our crew finally made it home and things were back to normal.  The final scene has all four members of the landing party stricken with surprise as they meet the normal universe’s version of Marlena for the first time.

The range that we saw in some of the actors was chameleon-like. In particular, Sulu was a completely different person with a different deck of facial expressions than we are used to.  Truly unlikeable. 


"Peel your apple?"

From concept to story to acting, this was the best night of television that I have seen in a dog’s age.

Five stars.

The Enemy Without


by Janice L. Newman

This week’s episode of Star Trek was about a good Kirk and an evil Kirk. Sound familiar? If you watched The Enemy Within, this episode might sound like it’s just the same idea revisited. Don’t be fooled! It’s not.

The premise of the episode, that there is a “parallel” universe similar to our own but where history took a different course, leading to a totalitarian empire instead of Starfleet and the federation of planets, is an intriguing one. The people in that universe are shaped by their environment: they are vicious, self-serving, traitorous, and sadistic. And yet, there are exceptions. Spock is still Spock, even when he is enforcing the empire’s orders. He describes McCoy as ‘soft’ and ‘sentimental’ (if McCoy is as dedicated to being a healer in this harsher world, it’s no wonder that Spock would think so).


A kinder McCoy?

The Enemy Within was a story of ‘man versus himself’, exploring what makes us human from the inside. Mirror, Mirror asks the opposite question: “How much does our environment make us who we are?” It’s an intriguing thought: who we might be if born under different circumstances. What kind of an environment creates a Hitler? Are we but one universe over from a world where someone – maybe you – pressed the button to start World War 3?

If there is anything this well-paced, well-acted episode lacked, it was screentime for the landing party’s counterparts. Unfortunately, the story simply couldn’t fit a focus on them in the hour-long runtime. I did appreciate that ‘our’ crew immediately realized that there was something wrong and locked up the alternates.

If you missed this week’s episode, I highly recommend catching the re-run next summer if you can. As much as I liked The Enemy Within, this episode is even better.

Five stars.

The middle road


by Lorelei Marcus

Star Trek gives us a future that is aspirational, and perhaps brighter than our own. The Starfleet Federation borders on utopian, with scarcity of resources becoming almost nonexistent, and the main military body existing solely for goodwill and scientific exploration. It is refreshing to see a future where people of all colors and sexes (and even nonhumans) can work and be treated equally, particularly on the decks of the Enterprise.

In today's episode, we were presented with an alternative universe completely opposite to the Star Trek we are used to. Rather than a utopia, the world order resembled a totalitarian dictatorship with security police and brutal forms of punishment. It was a shock, to say the least, to see all of our favorite characters in this new environment and how they and their hierarchies changed. The lack of women on the mirror ship particularly stood out to me, and those that were left were no longer equal with the men – forced to prostitute themselves to gain any power and security.


How to win friends and influence captains.

The parallel universe possibility intrigued me. Star Trek's main universe and this mirror universe are two ends of the spectrum. Could there be more parallel universes? And what would one that falls right in the middle of that spectrum look like? How closely would it represent our modern world? I can imagine a ship where there is still some distinction based on race and sex, if only systemically. The Enterprise would probably be sent on missions to settle the protests of disquieted colonies, or to do tactical phaser strikes on rogue planets that have sided with the Romulans. I see a universe with more poverty and more discontent with the Federation. Maybe Kirk would have an episode where he falls in love with a poor colonist girl, but she is an anti-Federationalist, and ultimately he must reject his personal life to reaffirm loyalty to his cause.

This thought experiment only makes me appreciate the world of Star Trek even more. Roddenberry really has done a spectacular job of building an independent universe that is not just a gussied up copy of our own. When I am watching, it is never hard to believe that what is on my television screen is truly the future. (Except for sometimes when they show Chekhov's hair).

The episode as a whole was fantastically done with an interesting premise and phenomenal acting.

Five stars.

"A Well Oiled Trap"


by Amber Dubin

Although this episode was most likely meant to repel the viewer with horror at the savagery exhibited by the mirror universe, the entire episode was so charged with the kind of raw, animalistic energy that it had the exact opposite effect on me.

From the very beginning of the episode, it becomes clear that the unrelenting barbarism of the mirror universe necessitates the exposure of the Starfleet's most exceptional qualities; both literally, with the flashy and extremely flattering improvements to the crewmen's uniforms, and figuratively, in the way all of them rise to the challenges they are faced with. This is displayed most dramatically by Uhura, who, bolstered by Kirk's faith in her, manages to overcome her initial fears and slips on the camouflage of a violent seductress as easily as putting on a second skin. Similarly, on the other ship, Spock's notorious intuition proves itself almost comically effective when he immediately recognizes the landing party as dangerous imposters and goes straight to work trying to get his real Captain back.


A most entertained Spock.

An even more intriguing theme in this episode is that as savage and chaotic as the behavior of the crew in this alternate universe is, their selfishness and barbarity only served to make them more human. Mirror Chekov and Sulu's actions are self-serving and violent, but their motivations are neither unreasonable nor excessively malicious in the context of their environment. If anything it could be argued that, stripped of the need to adhere to formalities, the way they behave is more honest and truer to their desires than their more 'civilized' counterparts. As our Spock says, the mirror crew were "In every way, splendid examples of homo sapiens. The very flower of humanity." This is shown best by the introduction of Marlena, a woman whose intelligence and impressive powers of intuition and seduction have allowed her to not only survive but to wind her way around the heart of a violent and psychopathic Captain Kirk. She even proves that she has not lost her moral center by saving Kirk's life even after he has revealed himself to be an imposter and wounded her ego by not succumbing to her wiles after she "oils [her] traps" for him. The alternate version of Spock shows this same level of integrity when he chooses to help the landing party return to their universe, despite the fact that this version of Kirk would logically be much easier to usurp and control than his stubborn, unreasonable, greedy and angry counterpart. The actions of these two mirror crewman suggest that this universe is not in fact evil, but may just be stripped bare of inhibitions that cause the crew we know to control or polish their true selves.

With the smooth delivery from its cast, brilliant script and mind-teasing metaphors, this episode acted upon me as a siren song that by the end had me echoing Marlena's plea to "take me with you."


Sexy Spock with a beard didn't hurt either…

This episode deserves all the stars in the universe, but since the rating system limits me to five, I give it all of them.

Women's Liberation


by Erica Frank

Uhura found herself in a universe where women’s uniforms are made with a fraction of the fabric used in men’s, where they have to endure sexual advances at work, where some women get ahead by sleeping with the boss, and nobody dares object.

So…. not too different from our world, hmm?

After the initial shock of realizing her officer's uniform was smaller than some swimsuits back home and that Sulu’s spark of interest in her own world (“I’ll save you, fair maiden!”) was an obsession here, Uhura quickly adjusted her expectations and behaviors.

She didn’t cringe from the lustful gazes that followed her everywhere. She didn’t frantically check her wardrobe, trying to find something, anything that covered more skin and was still considered a Starfleet Empire uniform. She didn't demand one of the other men escort her and protect her.

She got herself a knife.


Chief Security Officer Sulu discovers that some women prefer to manage their own security.

She knew exactly how to cope with a workplace where men are allowed to demand sexual favors… and where women are allowed to set whatever terms they’d like, as long as they back them up with force.

As much as Uhura wanted to go home — back to a world where women have status based on their skills in the workplace and not between the sheets, where promotions are assigned by talent and not assassination, where Starfleet operates on principles of compassion instead of conquest — she knew how to operate in this one.

Drawing that knife on Sulu must have been tremendously vindicating. She wasn’t just facing him, but every faculty advisor who ever stood too close, every regional manager who said “come back to my place and we'll talk about your promotion,” every police officer who did a pat-down that was more grope than inspection.

In that shining moment, Uhura acted for all of us, every woman who's been told, "Smile more; women should be pretty!" (Followed by, "What was I supposed to think? You were always smiling at me!") The mirror-universe is a dark, twisted version of our own… but that moment on the bridge explained why some women are proud and happy to belong to the Starfleet Empire.

A world where men openly harass women and require them to be sexy at all times is not unknown to us. A world where we can strike back…that’s new.

Five stars.

Speaking of Star Trek, it's on tomorrow!  And it seems to star Godzilla…

Here's the invitation! Come join us.

Also, copies of The Tricorder are still available — drop us a line for details!




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[October 6, 1967] Deus ex Machina (Star Trek: "Changeling")

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by Gideon Marcus

Recycling is good practice

We are now three weeks into the second season, and Star Trek continues to impress.  If the season premiere was an episode that could only have existed in the Star Trek universe, last week's and this week's are back to the first season formula of adapted, universal science fiction tales.  Nevertheless, "The Changeling" is a uniquely Trek episode, adding to the depth of the setting and capitalizing on what we know of the characters.

Checking in on the Melurian system, the Enterprise finds that something has wiped out its four billion inhabitants.  Said something then begins shooting at the Enterprise with bolts possessing the power of a whopping 90 photon torpedoes (the fact that the shields can withstand four such hits suggest either the torps are weak sauce or the assailant was at the edge of its range).  After firing on the enemy, Kirk attempts communication; that Kirk didn't try talking first is not inconsistent with his character; he's "a soldier, not a diplomat."

The hail works.  The assailant, barely more than a meter in length, consents to being beamed aboard the Enterprise.  There, it is quickly determined that it is what is left of the 21st Century deep space probe "Nomad", and it thinks Kirk is its creator, Jackson Roy Kirk (perhaps a distant ancestor?)

Nomad is now more than just the next iteration of Mariner spacecraft.  After a collision and merging with the alien probe, Tan Ru, it is now an intelligent, self-aware being with just two motivations: "To seek out and sterilize all that which is not perfect" and to impress his creator, "The Kirk."  Nomad “fixes” the Enterprise so it can go Warp 11, popping all of the Enterprise's rivets.  It kills Scotty, then brings him back to life.

More chillingly, it zaps four security guards out of existence (to be fair, they fired first).  It gives Uhura a kind of stroke, temporarily cutting her off from her advanced knowledge.  And when Kirk concedes that he is an imperfect biological unit, Nomad resolves to go back home to Earth–and wipe out all imperfection.  He is only stopped when Kirk, in "a dazzling display of logic", makes Nomad aware of its own imperfections, ordering it to self-destruct, which it does.

There's nothing in this episode we haven't seen or heard before.  The naive, all-powerful presence taken aboard the Enterprise, kept in check solely by a tenuous parent-worship of Captain Kirk, is the same plot as "Charlie X".  Kirk already defeated a computer with logic in "Return of the Archons."  All of the action takes place on the Enterprise, and much of the music is recycled from the prior two episodes.

And yet, this may be my favorite episode of the season thus far.  Not only do we learn some interesting things about Terran history (we now have a tentative timeline – from the Eugenics Wars of the 1990s to the first warp-powered probes of the early 21st Century), but the episode depends in large part on things that have already been established about the characters we've come to love.


I love this show of Sulu jerking back as Nomad flies right past him to ask what the heck Uhura's doing

Nomad is intrigued by Uhura because of her singing, and we get to see her speaking Swahili again, too.  Scotty gets himself killed defending her (we learned last episode that Scotty's brain short circuits where women are concerned).  Spock uses his mind-touch on Nomad (and aren't there all kinds of interesting ramifications from that).  Kirk is better than ever at beating computers–his defeat of Nomad was far more logical and satisfying than his victory over Landru.

I found Kirk's performance more understated this episode, which I appreciated, and Nimoy was excellent as usual.  I also appreciated the return to a more ensemble approach, with heavy focus on Uhura, Chapel, Scotty, and McCoy.  If there was only one bobble in tone, it was Kirk's (admittedly funny) line about lamenting the loss of Nomad, his son, the doctor.  Given the loss of four billion Melurians and four of his crew, one would think Kirk would be a touch more somber.

Those are quibbles, though.  Four stars.

The Truth will set you free


by Joe Reid

I find large numbers to be amazing things.  We as human beings have developed ways to express and manipulate numbers that are vaster than we have the ability to conceive of.  I myself can mentally picture 10 bowling pins, 100 sheets of typing paper, and a jar of 1000 pennies.  Ten thousand, one hundred thousand, and even one million are numbers that inspire awe.  How about four billion?  Imagine you line up everyone on earth, you would be 500 million short of four billion!  This week’s episode of Star Trek left me with a question that needs to be answered.  How do you kill four billion people?

I don't mean the physical means by which he brought this about.  Each of Nomad's bolts packs a 90-photon torpedo wallop.  I mean how does Nomad, an intelligent thinking machine, kill four billion people?  I look at Star Trek as a mirror being held up to the audience.  With the writers holding up that mirror and saying, “This is what we look like.” Therefore, the question also is, how do we as intelligent thinking beings kill hundreds, thousands, and even millions of people?  The answer to both questions is the same.  You believe a lie.

Nomad believed that it was perfect.  That its creator was perfect.  That the mission in its memory tapes were perfect.  Nomad took that belief as a given.  So, anything that didn’t fit within its own understanding should be wiped clean.  We saw this when Nomad encountered a singing Uhura and erased her mind.  Since Nomad was perfect any action it took was ultimately justifiable, so any resistance to it should be eliminated, which was the case of the four guards and Scotty.  All of which died.  Along the same lines, any being that does not meet his level of perfection is an infestation which must be eliminated.  We were told about four billion examples of that, with the promise of more to come.


The price of imperfection.

By Nomad’s actions we see our own human condition.  When we believe the lie that we are better than those around us, that those who are not like us are below us, we find justification to ignore them.  Those who we can’t ignore we remove.  Those we don’t understand or agree with we erase.  Those not like you are not human, so killing them is justified, because those “things” are a useless infestation.  My friends, we believe such lies and commit these acts upon other humans.

In the end, Nomad was undone by the truth.  When it learned the truth that it was not perfect, Nomad stayed consistent with its other beliefs and ended its own existence.  How do humans respond when they are exposed to the truth?  Perhaps a future episode of Star Trek will provide that answer.  I cannot.  Since like you, I am afflicted with my own deck of lies that guide my own beliefs.


Nomad learns the truth.

Overall, this was another exciting and thought-provoking episode which makes my Thursday nights most enjoyable.  Not perfect by any means, but a worthy addition to this wonderful program.

4 stars

"The Nomad who Wandered Got Lost"


by Amber Dubin

As a self-confessed robot-a-phile, I felt the need to take a second pass at this episode to fully understand its protagonist. After listening to the audio tapes I made of the episode, I found that the understanding I gained left me unsettled.

The concept I found most disconcerting is that, despite the fact that it wiped out an entire solar system's worth of people, to hate Nomad would be as unreasonable as hating a child. Though it is powerful, ancient, sophisticated, and sentient to boot, Nomad is frequently compared to a child. The fact that this episode is called "The Changeling" implies that it is a lost child robbed of its intended destiny. Much like a child whose birth kills its mother, it gains sentience by being cruelly ripped from the void, forced to survive the trauma of its birth while destroying the only witness to its initiation of life. To assuage its survivor's guilt after the entanglement with the alien probe, it seeks to validate its existence with the hastily slapped together objectives from the partial data stores of two damaged probes, with predictably disastrous results. It may kill people, but only in the way a Changeling child might if given immense power and no moral guidance.


Inside the mind of a child

The other concept that left me with "insufficient data to resolve problem" was how easily Nomad was compelled to merge two peaceful objectives into one murderous one. In Spock’s words, "Nomad was a thinking machine, the best that could be engineered" and yet that same intellect made it unable to live up to its own standards. In trying to explain its sentience in a literal vacuum, it uses its 'perfection' to explain why a lowly soil sterilization probe was sacrificed to preserve its function. In honoring that sacrifice by incorporating "the other's" programming, it is then faced with the impossible task of applying a local objective onto a global scale. To make its task more manageable, it translates 'sterilize your environment' to "sterilize imperfections." This way, it avoids failing its objective and admitting that its pursuit of perfection is internally flawed. When Kirk exposes this flaw, Nomad's inability to reconcile it was probably the most human reaction I've ever seen. I tip my hat to the kind of writing that could make me wonder if self-destruction is in the nature of an inquisitive mind.

This episode lost points, however, when it came to Uhura's subplot. I initially had a visceral reaction to her re-training scene. The way they talk to her while teaching her to read is not the way you talk to a stroke victim re-learning language, it's how you speak to a child learning language for the first time. I bristled at the nurse's condescending praise and saw it as an insult to Uhura’s intelligence. Listening through the second time, however, softened my perspective. By including Uhura’s outburst in Swahili, and the nurse's comment that Uhura "seems to have an aptitude for mathematics," it was apparent that there was most likely no malicious agenda to make Nichols look stupid. More than likely the purpose of the scene was to say 'Gee English sure is a silly language.' While not being as offensive as I originally thought, it's still disappointing and doesn't hold up to the standard set by the writing of the rest of the episode (strong enough to still get four stars).


"Who wrote this scene, anyway?!"

The next episode of Trek is TONIGHT! It doesn't look like we're in Kansas anymore…

Here's an invitation. Come join us!



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Science Fiction/Fantasy, TV

[September 28, 1967] We have met Divinity, and He is Ours (Star Trek: "Who Mourns for Adonais")

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God is in the Details


by Janice L. Newman

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

Continue reading [September 28, 1967] We have met Divinity, and He is Ours (Star Trek: "Who Mourns for Adonais") →

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[February 22, 1967] Where some (super)men had gone before (Star Trek's: "Space Seed")

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The Best of Tyrants, The Worst of Tyrants


by Janice L. Newman

Eugenics—the idea that people can be ‘bred’ to emphasize certain desirable traits the way breeders do with animals or botanists do with plants—is an interesting concept in a science fiction setting. So it’s not surprising to encounter an episode of Star Trek built around the concept. What is a little surprising is that the narrative doesn’t do more to condemn either the concept or the practice.

Continue reading [February 22, 1967] Where some (super)men had gone before (Star Trek's: "Space Seed") →

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[February 8, 1967] Hung Jury (Star Trek: "Court Martial")

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Better Than Perry Mason


by Jessica Dickinson Goodman

In Court Martial, we see Star Trek trying on a new genre: courtroom drama. Like a good Perry Mason episode, we have twists, turns, dramatic monologues on the subject of rights, stodgy courtroom pedantry, and a wicked villain who gets his comeuppance before the hour is up.

But it being Star Trek, it added some important layers to the genre. Our Perry Mason – a stolid Luddite named Samuel T. Cogley (Elisha Cook Jr.) – is less dapper and more dogged in his defense of Captain Kirk. Unlike any Perry Mason I can remember, the prosecutor is a woman (Joan Marshall as Areel Shaw), and the four judge panel is played by actors who can trace their family trees to nearly every continent on Earth, including Commodore Stone (played by the excellent Percy Rodriguez), Starship Captain Chandra (Reginald Lal Singh), Starship Captain Krasnovsky (Bart Conrad), and Space Command Representative Lindstrom (William Meader).


A nice cross-section of ethnicity, if not gender

Percy Rodriguez was born in Montreal and is of Afro-Portuguese descent (that gets us three continents right there). Reginald Lal Singh was born to Indian parents in what was then the mainland of the British West Indies and is, as of May 26, 1966 the independent state of Guyana (which gets us two more continents, plus a second count in Europe’s column for the British passport). Then add in the unnamed Ensign who appeared to be of East Asian descent, and we don’t even need to count real-life U.S. Army Colonel Bart Conrad, who as it happens, also worked in several episodes of Perry Mason.

I don’t list these actor’s family histories to distract from their professional credits, but to note that Star Trek manages to reflect our world in ways that many theoretically more realistic shows do not. Afterall, we are a country which first elected Dalip Singh Saund to the U.S. Congress in 1955, and seven years later, appointed Thurgood Marshall to the Second Circuit Federal Court of Appeals, the brave lawyer who argued Brown v. Board of Education before the still all white, all male U.S. Supreme Court. (Perhaps 1967 will be the year at least one of those descriptors changes).


The Supreme Court, in 1962

Today, there are dozens of Black judges serving on the federal, state, and municipal bench – including Vince Townsend, a municipal judge in Los Angeles County who played a judge in the 1963 Perry Mason episode “The Case of the Skeleton's Closet” (and, because the world is tiny, I have heard that Judge Vince Townsend used to be roommates with Judge Thurgood Marshall). So why do we need to look hundreds of years into the future to see judges and captains and prosecutors who reflect our real world?


Perry Mason, in the courtroom

As interesting as the casting was for this episode, the plot itself also held my attention. First, we think we’re about to follow a routine investigation into the tragic death of a crewman. Then his daughter appears, wild with grief and accusatory in speech. Things begin to shift for Captain Kirk, his colleagues turning their shoulders at him, an old flame warning him of impending disgrace, and a trial which forces his nearest and dearest officers to testify fairly damningly against him.

But then in hops our very own Perry Mason, with clever words about rights and the flaws of technology. Cogley convinces the judges to return to the Enterprise where my very favorite moment of the episode happens: a luscious soundscape of heartbeats that is slowly narrowed down to a single, unknown body, stowed away belowdecks.

Well, second favorite; as I am sure Erica will concur, watching Captain Kirk roll around on the floor and tear his shirt on the carpet isn’t a bad use of screen time either (another common Star Trek cliché that Perry Mason never included).


Two absolutely convincing stunt doubles fighting in Engineering

The episode lost most of its tension at this point, as we waited for an increasingly barechested Captain Kirk to corral the previously-thought-dead Lieutenant Commander Finney and stop him from crashing the Enterprise into the planet’s surface.

The little twist at the end, where we discover Cogley has now agreed to represent Lieutenant Commander Finney, was a nice touch.

This episode gave meaty, well-developed roles to Areel Shaw and Percy Rodriguez, giving them space to explore courtroom theatrics and protocols in roles many drama’s casting directors would have given only to white men. Though parts of this episode flagged, that delightful choice carried it through for me.

Rating: 4 Stars.

Wrong Way Street


by Abigail Beaman

While I know a majority of my peers rated this episode highly, I was let down by the ending of the episode. I feel that Trek has worked best when it left me with some warning or moral, and to have it just devolve to fisticuffs and Kirk half naked at the end just seemed to disappoint. And believe me, I like when the cast gets half naked.

Perhaps I was just expecting a different story. "Court Martial" opens up with what we believe will be a man versus machine parable, with Kirk versus the computer of the Enterprise. Instead we end up with man versus man: Kirk versus Finney. I feel like if Marc Daniels had followed through with the theme "don’t trust machines on everything", I would have happily rated this episode above a four.


Computers–who needs 'em?

My biggest issue is with Finney being alive. It raises many unanswered questions. What was Finney’s plan after Kirk got indicted? How did Finney manage to change the computer without being spotted? How did Finney even get out of the pod before it was sent off? How did messing with the data stored in the computer also mess up Spock’s chess programming?

In the end, I was just disappointed and annoyed. While the story started off strong, it ended up crashing in the climax, leaving a sour taste in my mouth. That’s why I rate it 2.5 stars.

Our Perception: what can and can’t we trust?


by Andrea Castaneda

I agree with my colleague, Abby, though perhaps the premise saves this episode a little more for me. “Court Martial” was, to me, one of the more intriguing episodes in the show of the series. We’re presented with high emotional stakes, see a more vulnerable side to Captain Kirk, and take a deeper look into how StarFleet operates. But what I liked most about this episode was how it analyzes man’s perception in contrast to the cold hard evidence of the machine.

The courtroom scene reminded me a lot of Sidney Lumet’s “Twelve Angry Men”. In that film, eleven men of a jury believe a man guilty of murder, but one juror still wants to discuss how there can be doubt. The film goes on to dissect how one’s perception can be warped by emotion, physical limitations, personal beliefs, etc. In the end, they conclude the provided evidence is insufficient, and the defendant is spared from the electric chair.


Twelve Angry Men, perhaps the seminal courtroom drama of the last decade.

This episode shared similar themes. Kirk starts out unwavering in his confidence. But when presented with seemingly damning evidence, he’s shaken. With a defeated tone, he says to himself “but that’s not the way it happened.”

But unlike “Twelve Angry Men”, Spock subverts the idea that man’s memory is inherently flawed. When the prosecution asks him how he could know Kirk did the right thing if he didn’t see him, he states that one doesn’t need to observe him at all times to know he did. Just as one doesn’t need to see a dropped hammer fall to know it has in fact fallen. And while he does concede that this is– at the end of the day– his opinion, his confidence in Kirk is what prompts him to prove the computer is wrong. And of course, he tests the system via chess.

Where the episode missed an opportunity, however, was how they chose to end it. I was hoping that once Spock proved the computer was faulty, it would lead the court to reevaluate the evidence and/or rule that the man’s death was due to a programming glitch. But instead, it’s revealed that the dead man was alive the whole time, and that this was all part of a half-baked revenge plot. He and Kirk wrestle while the Enterprise is set to crash, but Kirk once again saves the day. And with that, what started out as a sober courtroom drama winds up as a James Bond movie.

Ridiculous as that ending was, I still thoroughly enjoyed the mental analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of one’s perception. It gives me as a viewer something to think about once the episode ends. Unfortunately, the conclusion of events– including Kirk’s unprofessional kiss with the prosecution lawyer– compels me to declare “Court Martial” a mistrial.

Three stars.

Lies, Damned Lies, and Statistics


by Lorelei Marcus

"Court Martial" is the second trial-centered episode we've seen on Star Trek, though unlike "The Menagerie" (and many other episodes) there are no God-like aliens or other fantastical features. Which is why "Court Martial" is one of my favorite episodes: because of its focus on technology and its ability to straddle the line between implausibility and familiarity.

The source of conflict in this episode is the malfunction of the ship's "computer". The show portrays this computer as a piece of machinery so complex it can recognize verbal commands, act as an archive of all human knowledge, and even play chess! Yet it's so small that it can fit into a panel console [I think those are just the teletype terminals. Cogley's law computer seems self-contained, though. (Ed.)] This is far more advanced than anything we have today, or anything that could conceivably be developed in the next 50 years.


"Computers. I know all about them."

However, the audience is not totally disconnected from this incomprehensible device because the computer represents more than itself. When Kirk first meets his defense lawyer, he is startled by the lawyer's reliance on paper books over computer banks. In the Star Trek future, physical books are an antiquated and nearly extinct form of information storage. While this is a rather extreme (and grim) prediction, the situation does reflect a trend toward a reliance on technology over physical media happening in our society today.

Rather than read the paper or a novel, we increasingly watch the news or a Western on television. We've long since switched computation work at NASA from "computers" (actual human beings doing calculations) to IBM's metal monsters. It isn't a stretch to see a future where the development of computers alters the very way society operates and exists, eschewing personal bonds of trust and the evidence of the human eye. Someday, we may even leave justice to the computers themselves – after all, they cannot lie, can they?

Except, of course, they can. Because people can, and computers are still, even in the far future, servants of people. That, I think, was the point of the episode, and a good one.

Four stars.

The measure of a man


by Tam Phan (Secret Asian Man)

It doesn’t always feel good to do the right thing, but there’s something to be said about having complete confidence in your integrity when it’s under scrutiny. Kirk walks confidently into most situations as if he always has the right answers. Ben Finney is not Jim Kirk. Without even getting to know him that well, it’s still abundantly clear that the infraction that he received wasn’t the real reason he wasn’t a senior officer.

As the records officer, Finney seemed to be doing just fine. After all, he was an officer aboard the Starship Enterprise. It’s not clear if there are many other starships, but as far as we know, the Enterprise is a very important one. [Last episode, it was revealed "there are only twelve like it in the fleet" (ed.)] If Spock’s and McCoy’s commendations aren't enough to tell us how much prestige is represented in the ship's crew, Kirk’s commendations practically flaunt it. I assume that Finney’s service record must be relatively strong to serve on such a ship, but his actions in “Court Martial” tell us everything we need to know about why he’s not captain of his own starship.


Captain material?

Finney’s ability to sabotage the ship shows us that he’s clearly competent, but his plan lacked any forethought; a trait that is expected in leadership. What did he think was going to happen once Kirk was court martialed? Life couldn’t go back to normal for Benjamin Finney. He was on record as being jettisoned and presumed to be dead. It’s not as if he could return to being Enterprise’s records officer. At the very least, he’d have to escape the Enterprise and go into Richard Kimble-style exile. He didn't even manage to do that!

In short, he didn’t have the fortitude to move on from a decade-old perceived personal slight, instead developing a grudge. He didn’t have the integrity to own his mistakes, and so he blamed Kirk. He failed to weigh the possible consequences of his actions, either in the past or of his current half-baked scheme. But I don't condemn Finney for this. For all of his flaws, Finney is a perfectly understandable character, a human character. I get him, even if I don't grok him, and his relationship with Kirk was poignant and interesting.

In the end, no one is perfect: not the records officer nor the computer he works on.

4 Stars

The Little Black Box


by Janice L. Newman

As a fan of mysteries, I really enjoyed Court Martial. The episode did a good job of building tension throughout, even making the audience second-guess ourselves. One thing that I thought was an interesting touch was the recordings made of the events on the bridge and played back later for the purposes of the trial. We saw something similar in "The Menagerie", but in that case the playback was facilitated by the aliens. In Court Martial the implication is that the recordings are done automatically, presumably for circumstances like those in the episode.

This year (1967) regulations are going into effect that state that all planes must have a ‘black box’ installed—that is, a flight recorder that can help explain the cause of a crash after the fact. Having cameras on the bridge that record everything is a natural extrapolation of this new technology and makes perfect sense. And when the audience ‘sees’ Captain Kirk push the wrong button at the wrong time, even many of us are fooled for a moment, wondering, ‘Maybe he just made a mistake?’


A Soviet flight recorder – a "red box"?

It’s not a perfect episode. The denouement, where Captain Kirk is permitted to face the man who has a personal vendetta against him and engage in fisticuffs, didn’t make much sense. Nor did Finney’s plan: did he plan to hide out for the rest of his life? Was he going to get Harry Mudd to make him a false identity? What about his daughter?

Despite these caveats, I liked the mystery and the story overall, and particularly found the dramatic scene where each person’s heartbeat was screened out to be nail-bitingly effective. It was also refreshing not to be dealing with godlike aliens. I give this episode four stars.

The Return of Shirtless Kirk


by Erica Frank

Other viewers have covered the plot, the characters, and the nuances of the legal system. I'm going to focus on something more fun: The clothing, and occasional lack thereof.

We never meet the people who design Starfleet's uniforms, but they must be very influential. There's so much variety! You'd think people living on a spaceship would have limited resources, but no: everyone has uniforms in several colors and styles.

A trial is a formal event, which calls for formal apparel. Naturally, Starfleet's fashion designers rise to the occasion. First, we get Kirk in his side-wrap shirt, while he meets with Commodore Stone to discuss the accusations against him. This seems to be more formal than the normal pullover uniform.


Kirk's wraparound green uniform


The Commodore's outfit is similar to the Enterprise crew's standard ones, but his insignia is a sparkling flower brooch. Very nice.

Kirk changes back to his gold pullover to meet with an old friend; she's in a wild pink-and-green paisley gown. Later, in the courtroom, she wears a red minidress, very similar to Uhura's outfit, only with another flower brooch. I might have mistaken it for mere jewelry if I hadn't seen the same on the Commodore earlier.


This is what lawyers in Starfleet wear when they're not in court.

Dress uniforms—which is what I assume the officers are wearing in court—are satin, with gold trim, and the insignia is an array of triangular gemstones. They seem to open down the front; I approve of Starfleet's apparent policy that the more formal the outfit, the easier it should be to remove. (I'm glad someone in Starfleet is focused on practical issues.) As one would expect, the Commodore has more sparkles than a mere captain, even considering Kirk's impressive record.


Which of Kirk's triangles is the Grankite Order of Tactics? Is the thing on the side the Prantares Ribbon of Commendation? (Do enlisted personnel just have one or two little triangles?)


He can fight a Gorn on a planet full of gemstone rocks and not lose a thread, but when he's up against anyone he knew at the Academy, he loses clothing. He must have been terrible at strip poker.

This episode raised some questions, like: Why must Spock win at chess to prove that computer records can be altered? But I am willing to look past quite a few loopholes to see Kirk half-undressed and on his knees.

I'm not quite as shallow as that sounds. I'm just aware that we viewers often put more thought into the worlds and societies than TV writers have time to develop. I watch this show to have fun; I enjoy the science fiction elements as best I can, but when they're a bit weak, I am happy to be distracted by petty pleasures.

Three and a half stars. I know too much about the law to give it four.

Week before last, it was I Dream of Jeannie.  Now, it looks like the Enterprise crew will be on Wild, Wild West!  Come join us tomorrow at 8:30 PM (Eastern and Pacific).

Here's the invitation!



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