Star Trek TV Series

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Star Trek: Operation – Annihilate

There’s something destroying civilisations, spreading some kind of mass insanity and the crew of the Enterprise have their best investigating hats on to find out what.  Luckily the spread of crazy flu has moved from planet to planet in a straight line making the task of anticipating where the disease is going next easier.

On their way they spot a spaceship heading into the sun.  However, despite Uhura’s best efforts they cannot communicate with it and despite Scotty’s best efforts they can’t tractor beam it.  What do they pay these guys for?!  The matter resolves itself when they hear a voice on the radio saying “I’m finally free!” before the ship plummets into the Sun.  I know how he feels.  I’ve had mobile phone contracts that have left me feeling like that.

It turns out that crazy disease is heading straight to the planet Denova where, coinidentally, Kirk’s brother lives.  A Kirk family get together sounds like a lot of fun, sitting around, catching up, having Shatner-style sing-alongs.  When the landing party beams down, Kirk, Spock, Bones, Scotty, Ms Spacegirl and a random extra find nobody around.  It’s eerily quiet until an angry mob of… four people attack.  Bizarrely, they shout at the landing party, warning them to run and protect themselves, but act as if they want to bash in their heads.

Kirk visits his brother, only to find a hysterical woman, who turns out to be Kirk’s sister in law.  Kirk’s brother Sam lies dead on the floor.  Peter, Sam’s son is unconscious.  You would think that Kirk would break down, distraught.  This is his brother, after all.  However, he composes himself swiftly and beams up with Bones and Peter, leaving Spock on planet.

In sick bay, Kirk talks to his sister-in-law.  She manages to blurt out, “They came eight months ago.  Things. Horrible things”.  Vague it up a notch please, you’re being too specific, love.  McCoy says that she has to fight to get answers out.  I wish she’d fight harder.  She says that the people on the planet’s surface are being forced to build ships.  And then she dies.  It’s sad.  ish.  Since Kirk doesn’t seem too cut up by it, why should I be?

Kirk beams back down.  He and the landing party go investigatin’ with phasers set to kill.

As they look around, we see a selection of jellies stuck on a wall.   Without warning they fly at the crew.  Wibbly.  Wobbly.  Phaser.  Dead. “It doesn’t even look real” says a space girl.  You can say that again.   Just as they are leaving Spock suddenly gets jellied in the back.  Never turn your back on a jelly, Spock!  Everyone knows that!   Kirk peels it off, but it’s too late and Spock is left, like, all spaced out, man.

After examining Spock, McCoy reports to Kirk that there’s nothing he can do.  Spock then gets out of bed and runs to the Bridge to take on the entire room in a fight.  You have to admire his self-belief.  Hey look!  All the cast are in this one scene.  Not many scenes where that happens.  Anyway, they restrain him and return him to sick bay.

Despite Spock’s assault on the Bridge one scene ago, he advises that he is able to return to duty.  He believes he can control himself.  I know how he feels.  I get that way around chocolate biscuits.  We see spock giving himself a pep talk and then bursts through his restraints.  I find chocolate biscuits also have this effect on me.  Spock then attacks the transporter engineers: Scotty and Mr Random.  However, despite Spock’s strength and skill, it takes more than that to defeat a Scotsman and Scotty soon recovers and locks his phaser on Spock, holding him until Kirk gets there.

It seems that Spock was intending to beam down to capture a jelly.  He tells Kirk that he is the only man for the job as he has control of his actions despite the influence of the Jelly.  Of course, jelly is no match for Mr Spock when he’s armed with a lunch box.  We learn that the jelly is in fact a one-cell creature.  It is a single brain cell which although not physically connected to the others, does form part of the same being.  After many attempts to terminate it’s influence, they fail.  However, Kirk remembers that the captain of the ship flying into the sun said he was free.  This is the clue that they need to figure out how to escape the creature.

Kirk comes up with one wacky solution: to exterminate the entire planet.  Deep breath.  Let’s call genocide our Plan B, Jim.

Spock and McCoy cannot see a solution.  Hmm… why did the sun free the captain of the spaceship earlier? Well it wasn’t heat or radiation, but what other properties could the sun possibly have?  Nope, nobody can figure it out.  Suddenly Kirk blurts out the thought that the audience has been screaming for minutes now: “Light!”  It seems so obvious now!   Why didn’t a collection of Starfleet’s best officers think of that earlier?

Duh!

With this new theory to test, McCoy rigs up an experiment and it works!  The light has turned the jelly into a flat squishy pancake!  But will it free somebody under the jelly’s influence?  Spock volunteers to sit under the intense light to see if it will free him of the influence of the jelly.  Insanely, though, he says that as there will be no goggles on the planet, he won’t wear any for this experiment.  What?!   This is utter madness!  Firstly, I’m sure some people will have goggles.  Secondly, why not try it first with goggles so that if it doesn’t work, he’ll still have his eyesight to try more tests with.  Anyway, it’s academic because they flood the chamber with light with Spock and no goggles inside.

Spock exits the chamber saying that he is free of the creature.   Hooray!  However, he has been left blind.  Didn’t see that one coming, no pun intended.  So there’s no more looking at Nurse Chapel’s legs for you, Spock.  Only after the experiment does McCoy realise that the entire spectrum of light was thrown at Spock.  It wasn’t necessary.  His eyes could have been saved!  What a mistake-a to make-a!

Anyway, to cut a long story short, they drop satellites around the planet, switch ‘em on and operate ‘em.  Many dead jellies later and all is well.  A message reports that it is working and everyone is freed.   So it’s high fives and Mexican Waves all around the ship!  Except for McCoy who looks upset.  Kirk tells McCoy  that Spock’s eyesight wasn’t his fault.  McCoy doesn’t respond.

However, Spock then wanders on to the Bridge.  It transpires that his blindness was only temporary.  Hooray. It all worked out.  No need to recruit a guide dog with pointy ears!

So it’s all laughs at the end.  I do love a happy ending.

…but wait just a second, didn’t Kirk’s brother just die?!  His brother!  His sister-in-law too.  Kirk got over them pretty quickly.  Who’s going to look after Kirk’s nephew?  Also, by killing all the jellies, didn’t Kirk just commit genocide (or jellicide at least)? These questions are conveniently forgotten as the episode draws to an end.

Watching this episode decades after if was made is the best way to watch it, in fact nowadays it is the only way to watch it!   This is the last episode of the first season of Star Trek.  Looking back on season one, it shows what an inventive show it was.  It was very much a product of its time, with all the colour, fashions, attitudes and designs of the sixties, and as a result is filled with surprise, wit, vision and charm.

You can’t beat a bit of Trek.

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Star Trek: City on the Edge of Forever

City on the Edge of Forever begins, excitingly enough, with a Red Alert. Everything shakes as the Enterprise passes through ripples in time. It all seems like fun until an explosion sends Sulu to the floor. Luckily Dr McCoy is at hand with a booster full of his home brew Cortrozine, which rapidly sorts him out. However, the good times are short lived when 100 times the dosage is accidentally pumped into McCoy himself. This is not recommended and causes McCoy to go completely bonkers and run off.  Security alert.

McCoy assaults an engineer and beams down to the planet’s surface to the source of the time ripples. Kirk follows with a landing party, for once making the excellent choice of taking Uhura along as well as Spock, Scotty and two random red shirt wearing crewman.

It transpires that the cause of the time disturbances is a large stone circle which acts as a portal to another dimension. It’s a bit like Stargate. Unlike Stargate, however, Star Trek’s portal can talk! It’s the guardian of forever.  In your face, Stargate.

While McCoy runs around, demented, the stone cheerio displays images from Earth’s past and claims it to be a gateway to history. Just as Kirk considers what he could go back and do, barmy old Bones jumps through the hole. Uh-oh.

Imediately, the landing party are told that the Enterprise, the crew, the Earth as they knew it – have gone. McCoy changed the past, deleting the days from that point onwards. This means that landing party have no choice but to go back, find McCoy and stop him breaking time.

Kirk and Spock jump back a month or so before McCoy arrives, finding themselves in America during the great depression. The general public stare at their crazy futuristic outfits as if they’ve never seen two grown men in Starfleet uniforms. Don’t these people watch Star Trek?! One swift outfit change (and a hilarious scene with a police officer) later and they blend in perfectly.  As hobos.

They are spotted by, of all people, Joan Collins! Okay, okay she’s playing the part of Edith Keiller: hobo helper! That’s right, kids, she runs a mission for hobos! Kirk and Spock offer to work for her in order to get some cash to buy radio equipment. Meanwhile, Joan talks to random hobos about the future, space travel and atomic power.  Coincidentally, three things they’ll never get to experience.

Spock builds a piece of equipment which displays the future!  Handy! It identifies the point in time at which history changed and reveals two possible futures. Kirk discovers that either Edith Keiller will either become president in 6 years, or will die this year. They can’t both happen. There’s a chance that in order to set things straight, she must die.

McCoy then materialises out of thin air, ranting about assassins and other wacky shenanigans. Even the craziest of hobos finds him a bit too mad. So while McCoy has a little cry and a sleep, a hobo steals his phaser and vaporises himself.  That’s certainly one way to resolve the city’s homeless problem.

The next day McCoy stumbles into Edith’s kitchen, but Spock is too busy focusing on his soup-dishing duties to spot him. It’s soup, Jim, but not as we know it.

Soon, Spock discovers how Edith will destroy his future. She will lead a peace movement which effectively lets the Nazis win the second world war. Somehow, McCoy prevented her death. Kirk announces that he is in love with Edith. In the 23rd century, this will be referred to as ‘crazy talk’.

The fresh 1930’s air has done wonders for McCoy’s condition. He wakes up and seems to be back to his old self. Hooray, the drugs didn’t do any permanent damage! As least, none that we can see. For all the viewer knows, McCoy’s nipples may now dispense custard.

In a powerful scene, Kirk and Spock are reunited with McCoy, but as Edith runs across the road to join them, a car hits her and she, dramatically, becomes road pizza.

They go back through the stone circle to find that normal history has resumed, although nobody seems very happy about it.

Overall, this is a wonderful episode of Star Trek. One of the problems with Star Trek’s numerous time travel tales is that they didn’t have a consistent method of achieving time travel, so there’s a lot of ‘wasted’ episode given over to establishing the time travel mechanism for this particular tale. In this case, the way of travelling through time is more than a little bizarre: a talking stone circle? Really? That’s the best you could come up with? However, that said, the story is really excellent and genuinely presents the main characters with a proper problem.  Kirk puts the future before his own feelings and before the life of Edith. He makes a choice that kills her. This episode doesn’t pull any punches and remains as one of the best written episodes ever made. Each character is well-realised and given great dialogue. City on the Edge of Forever proves the versatility and quality of the show.

Cast & Creative Staff Cast: William Shatner as James T. Kirk Leonard Nimoy as Spock DeForest Kelley as Leonard H. McCoy James Doohan as Montgomery Scott Nichelle Nichols as Uhura George Takei as Hikaru Sulu

Guest Cast: Dave Armstrong as Kartan Craig Hundley as Peter Kirk Majel Barrett as Christine Chapel

Creative Staff: Director:  Herschel Daugherty Written By: Stephen W. Carabatsos

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Star Trek: The Alternative Factor

The Enterprise scans a lifeless planet and, finding nothing, prepares to leave.  However, a sudden low budget visual effect invades the screen causing the planet and everything else to fade out of existence for an uncomfortable few seconds.  Rechecking the ship’s instruments, Spock discovers a living creature now on the planet below.  Bloke on a planet?  Hardly Star Trek’s most exciting moment,  Nonetheless, it’s reason enough to investigate.

A landing party of Kirk, Spock and four security men beam down and find a tiny spacecraft and a bearded man. Or is it a tiny man and a bearded spaceship. I forget. Either way: man and spaceship.

It would seem that the effect which faded everything out of existence centered around the planet. Starfleet sends out a red alert warning that the effect affected all quadrants of space. Kirk and the Commodore believe it could be the start of an invasion. It’s worse than that, Jim. It’s so much worse than that.

The bearded man, Lazarus to his bearded friends, helpfully explains that his race was killed by a ‘thing’, a monster that looks like a man. However, Kirk seems suspicious. Another party beam down to the planet in search of the monster. Things get all ‘effecty’ again, and we are ‘treated’ to a negative image fight sequence. Things wobble.

Lazarus says “The ‘thing’ is all white / black!”.  Must be a penguin.

In sickbay, McCoy observes that Lazarus has healed ludicrously quickly. We see him convulse and the effect happens again. Lazarus’ scar returns. How strange. I certainly don’t expect that Lazarus and the ‘thing’ are the same person. Nope, I don’t expect that at all. Anyway, let’s see how this plays out…

A source of radiation is detected on the planet. I wonder what it is. Oh look! It’s a rip in the universe. Does anyone have a stapler?

Lazarus learns that dilithium crystals can be used to trap the enemy and sneaks into Engineering to pilfer a couple of them.

Lazarus’s beard is sometimes thick and sometimes thin. His scar is sometimes there and sometimes not. The effect keeps showing up with irritating regularity.  Let’s hope it’s all part of the plot or it’s likely the production team have a continuity guy with a drink problem.

Eventually, Lazarus tells Kirk everything that’s going on. The radiation comes from a parallel universe, which in turn causes the effect. We also discover that Lazarus is really two men! Hence the changing scar and beard. Didn’t see that coming. One version of Lazarus is made of matter. The other is made of anti-matter and if the two ever exist in the same universe, it will result in the annihilation of everything, everywhere.  That’s bad.  The universe is where I keep my stuff.

So we have two Lazarus’s. One good. One bad. The bad one wants to destroy everything in existence. Think about that for a second. Everything in existence. Kirk asks the Good Lazarus why. It’s a fair question. The answer? Because Evil Lazarus is mad. Really? That’s the best you can come up with? He’s mad?!

Anyway, it ends up with both Lazarus’s (Lazari?) being dragged into corridor between universes. Trapped together in a fight forever and ever.

The end.

It is the fact that Lazarus is not a particularly likable character that makes this episode difficult to invest in. Although the concept of matter and anti-matter is a new spin on the Good Twin / Evil Twin storyline, this concept has been realised in Star Trek many times over using characters we actually care about. Compare this to The Enemy Within and the overall story is not too dissimilar, but the Enemy Within is an exciting and absorbing plot where the characters are shown to be in peril. In this story, they are effectively in greater peril but the threat is over the top to the point of nonsense (the entirety of existence is under threat?) We never really see the crew showing any worry about this fact.  I normally love Star Trek and look for the best in all stories, but even I struggled to find the merit in this one. Perhaps, in a parallel universe, this is the most celebrated episode ever made. Sorry, that’s my evil twin talking.

Cast & Creative Staff

Cast: William Shatner as James T. Kirk Leonard Nimoy as Spock DeForest Kelley as Leonard H. McCoy Nichelle Nichols as Uhura

Guest Cast: Robert Brown as Lazarus A and B Janet MacLachien as Lt. Charlene Master Richard Derr as Commodore Barstow

Creative Staff: Director:  Gerd Oswald Written By: Don Ingalls

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Star Trek: Errand of Mercy

As Sulu pilots the ship through space we learn that negotiations between the Federation and a war-like race known as the Klingon Empire have broken down.  While this is bad news for the crew, for viewers familiar with Star Trek there is a lot of air punching and shouting of "Yes!" Kirk''s mission is to go to planet Origami (or something like it) to negotiate a Federation base being set up. 

When the Enterprise crew learn that the Federation has gone to war, it becomes even more crucial that they stop the Klingons taking control of this strategically important base.  Kirk and Spock beam down to the planet's surface, leaving Sulu to babysit the Enterprise.  He's under orders not to engage the Klingons in combat if he can avoid it, and to make sure he returns it with a full tank of gas.

The planet Organia (I didn't think Origami sounded right) appears to be a primitive culture. Kirk meets with the council of elders.  He tells them that their strategic location makes them attractive to the Klingons who enslave them.  The Federation offers them the hand of friendship.  However, the elders do not want to give up their traditional way of life and decline Kirk's offer.  No matter how hard he tries, he cannot convince them that it is in their interest to accept his help.  He even offers free biscuits.

The Klingons attack the Enterprise.  Now that wasn't very nice now was it?  Kirk tells Sulu to get the heck out of there, leaving himself and Mr Spock trapped on a primitive planet in he middle of a Klingon occupation.  When the Klingons appear on the scene, they don''t look Klingon-like!  No wrinkly forehead = no Klingon, in my book.  Yes, Movie Klingons and Mr Worf have spoiled me for all earlier incarnations. Kirk and Spock dress as locals to blend in, with Spock claiming to be a visiting Vulcan trader.  The Klingon leader,  Koor, taunts our heroes. Kirk shows that he is the worst undercover operative in the history of undercover operatives, behaving in no way like the Organians with a defiant attitude towards the Klingons.

Despite this, when Koor tells the council he is taking over, he selects Kirk to liaise between the Organians and their new Klingon rulers. Kirk and Spock hatch a plan to take the Klingon's weapons.

Under cover of darkness they set off an enormous explosion.  Kirk attempts once again to convince the Organians to revolt,  However it is overheard by Klingons monitoring the Council's chambers.  Koor comes for them and when the Klingons threaten violence, the council reveal who Kirk and Spock really are.  Even Spock seems disappointed!\

Koor wants to know where Starfleet's ships are dispersed. Kirk has 12 hours to tell him or he'll start throwing his weight around.  Surprisingly, the Organians break Kirk and Spock out of their cell and lead them away. They explain it by saying that violence is unthinkable. They hear Klingon phasers and are told that 200 Organians had just been killed, and that this would continue to happen every 2 hours until they are returned.

Even now the Organians do not wish to fight back. Are they on some sort of sedatives?

So it's two against an army, fighting for the freedom of the people, and when night falls, Kirk and Spock attack, successfully getting past the guards and reaching Koor himself.  Koor tells them a federation fleet is en route.  But just when things look like they'll sort themselves out with a good honest punch-up, the space travellers experience extreme heat whenever they attempt to attack each other.  Somehow, all weapons of violence now radiate 350 degree heat.

It's the Organians! They tell both races that unless they finish the war, there will be no supper for anyone (and some other vague threats). Kirk is angry. What about their right to wage war against the Klingons?  The Organians insist that nobody wants war.  In the future the Klingons and humans will be friends.

That''ll be the day! Then, as things wrap themselves up, we learn that the people on the planet were not really people. They just had that appearance for the sake of Kirk and Koor as "conventional points of reference". The Organians are as high above the human race as the humans are above the amoeba.Looks like the war is off.

Roll credits.

Hang on a second though! Why wait until end to explain the situation? If they had intervened at the start they could have saved everyone a lot of heartache and hassle.  Either way, this is a great introduction of the Klingon Empire into the Star Trek universe. And while much of the human / Klingon story is presented as a straightforward good versus evil affair, there is also an opportunty to see how this looks from a higher level, and see that perhaps it wasn't good versus evil after all. It was just two opposing viewpoints whose differences could have been settled without violence.

Yeah, right.  Tell it to the Klingons.

Cast: William Shatner as James T. Kirk Leonard Nimoy as Spock Nichelle Nichols as Uhura George Takei as Hikaru Sulu

Guest Cast: David Hillary Hughes as Trefayne Jon Abbott as Ayelborne John Colicos as Kor Peter Brocco as Claymare

Creative Staff: Director:John Newland Written By: Gene L. Coon

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Star Trek: The Devil in the Dark

On a distant world, a group of miners explore caves underneath an alien city in search of a “monster”.  One nervous member of the party is left to stand guard.  Alone.  “You’ll be alright,” he’s told.

Of course, within seconds he’s meat.

The Enterprise respond to the distress signal, and Kirk, Spock and Bones beam down to the planet.  They meet head miner Vanderberg  and Ed, a man with plastic hair and pink coveralls.  Ed claims that he shot the creature but it didn’t even slow it down.  He seems less than impressed by Kirk and suggests that without their fancy starship they’re just a big bunch of nancies.  Yes, well, they’re not the ones dressed head to toe in pink, Ed.

Vanderberg’s desk has a pink football sitting on it.  Spock examines it and is told that there are lots of them lying around the cave.  The miners seem less than happy about Spock’s interest in their balls.

Bones examines the remains of the miner killed by the creature and discovers the body was corroded rather than burnt, as he had initially been told.  Either way, his disco dancing days are over.

Meanwhile, further in the caves, another man is killed by the creature, who then shuffles into the reactor room.  An alert sounds and everyone runs to investigate.  They discover that a hole has been burnt into the door and the reactor pump has been removed.  This is a big problem because without this vital piece of equipment they’ll either suffocate or die of radiation poisoning.  Bummer.

Spock suggests that the creature could be a silicon based lifeform, much like Pamela Anderson.  Kirk had heard that Silicon life was theoretically possible, though McCoy himself does not buy into it.  And he’s a doctor.  So there.

Scotty beams down to the planet to try to repair the reactor, but he can only delay the problem.  For everyone to survive, they need that pump back.  For something so critical, you’d think they’d have a spare lying around.

Kirk addresses a line of red shirted men and sends them all out in search of the creature.  An army of red-shirts?  A murderous creature?  This could get messy.  Kirk and Spock search too, and detect a silicon based life form nearby but, unfortnately not before it kills off a crewman.   Kirk takes a moment to mourn, reflect and then, without blinking, move on with his life.  It’s like the seven seconds of grief.

The creature appears behind Kirk and Spock, looking like something you’d scrape off the bottom of your shoe.  They fire at it, cutting part of its back off.  That rarely feels good!  It shuffles off, excreting that powerful corrosive substance you kids love so much.  Kirk reminds everyone that there’s nothing more dangerous than a wounded animal.  Thanks for that Kirk.  We all thought it was going to lick our faces and fetch our slippers.

Spock’s tricorder picks up the creature and he realises that there is only one  of it.  He believes that this must be the last silicon creature in existence. To kill it would be genocide.  Kirk doesn’t seem to mind.  They’ve threatened genocide before (A Taste of Armageddon).  It’s all the rage these days.

When Kirk and Spock separate, a cave-in traps Kirk with the creature.  He tries talking to it, but he might as well be talking to a kangaroo for all the good it does him. Spock rushes in and, after a brief chat with Kirk to catch up on the latest Star Trek news, suggests that he could attempt to communicate with it by joining with it’s mind. It works!  He screws up his face and tells Kirk that the creature is in enormous pain.  Well what do you expect?  You and Kirk shot a chunk of its back off.

Once Spock breaks off communications with it, it burns the phrase “No kill I” into the rock.  In English.  Surely it either picked up English or id didn’t.  If it can manage the phrase “No kill I”, it must be able to handle “Please do not kill me” or even “Sod off, freaks”.

Kirk tells Spock to re-establish communications, but in order to do so, Spock will have to touch it.  Yeesh.  Remember to wash your hands afterwards.

Spock speaks on behalf of the creature,  It’s rambling on about murderers, and striking back.  What a downer.

McCoy shows up, not sure what he’s walked in on, “What in the name of…?”

Kirk tells McCoy to help the creature.  “Help that?” says McCoy. “I’m a doctor, not a bricklayer”.  (Students, take a drink now!).

Kirk makes a discovery.  The silicon balls Spock was so interested in were actually eggs.  Delicious, nutritious eggs.  Except make of silicon.

With that, the miners charge down the tunnels toward the creature, intent on killing it.  They’ve already bashed in the heads of the Enterprise security men who were holding them back.

 That’s just plain unsporting.

However, once Kirk explains that the Silicon based life (now known as the Horta) was merely protecting its young.  It returns the pump and everything is sweetness and pancakes again.  He even arranges for the Horta to work for the miners as a tunneller.

Bones then cures the creature with concrete, and hey presto – creature and miners live in harmony.  Don’t you just love a happy ending where a tortured alien rock creature can either work down a mine or be killed?

Cast & Creative Staff Cast: William Shatner as James T. Kirk Leonard Nimoy as Spock DeForest Kelley as Leonard H. McCoy James Doohan as Montgomery Scott

Guest Cast: Janos Prohaska as Horta Ken Lynch as Chief Engineer Vanderberg Barry Russo as Lt. Comm. Giotto Brad Weston as Ed Appel

Creative Staff: Director:  Joseph Pevney Written By: Gene L. Coon

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Star Trek: This Side of Paradise

The Enterprise has been sent to planet Omicron Ceti III to rescue a group of settlers from deadly rays which can be very damaging to people over long periods of time.    However, when the Enterprise attempts to contact the colonists, there is no response.

Fearing the worst, a party comprising of Kirk, Spock, Bones, Sulu and a few stragglers beams down.  However, much to their surprise, they find everyone still very much alive.  The leader of the colony, Elias Sandoval, assures Kirk that all is well.

Living amongst the settlers is Layla, a girl that Spock knew from many years earlier.  She shows him around and tells him that they want for nothing.  She leads him to a bunch of artificial-looking plants which expel their spores at Spock.  Spock looks pained at first until a relaxed, happy expression falls upon his face.  He tells Layla that he loves her.  This is most unlike him.  Most unlike him, indeed.

Bones discovers that the settlers are impossibly healthy.  Elias’s appendix even grew back.  Yeesh - that feels uncomfortable.

It transpires that the plants which affected Spock were also responsible for healing the settlers, allowing them to survive on the planet despite the deadly rays.  Not only did they have this medicinal effect, but they were also responsible for the strange attitudes of those under the influence of the plants.  Somehow the plants make people feel satisfied with their situation.  However, as the plants start to affect the crew, Kirk loses control.  Nobody obeys his orders.

For some reason, Kirk is unaffected by the spores, and in a genuinely touching moment, Kirk finds himself alone on the ship.  He makes an entry in the log confessing that he doesn’t know what to do, and at his weakest moment, the spores get to him.

Just before he beams down, he suddenly comes to his senses, realising that anger has freed him of the spores influence.  Immediately, he beams Spock up and, in an effort to provoke him to feel anger, starts insulting him, resulting in a big fight between our two central characters.  It’s a great scene, and it works!  Spock returns to his old ways.

Spock and Kirk broadcast a signal onto the planet which makes everyone angry, freeing everyone and returning their personalities.

Spock confronts Layla and she comes to realise that he can never feel the way about her that she feels for him.

As the episode ends, it seems as if life has returned to normal.  The colonists agree to leave the planet and the crew return to the ship, but the true beauty of the episode comes from the final line.  Spock reveals that despite everything he had lost on the planet, for the first time in his life, he was happy.  And on that powerful note, the end credits role.

This is a phenomenally powerful episode of Star Trek, delivering wonderful performances from both Shatner and Nimoy.  Guest star Jill Ireland as Layla is a joy to watch in every scene.  Yes, this is a good, in fact great, episode, and I assure you I’m not under the influence of any weird alien spores.

Cast: William Shatner as James T. Kirk Leonard Nimoy as Spock DeForest Kelley as Leonard H. McCoy Nichelle Nichols as Uhura George Takei as Hikaru Sulu

Guest Cast: Eddie Paskey as Lt. Leslie Jill Ireland as Leila Kalomi Frank Overton as Elias Sandoval

Creative Staff: Director:  Ralph Senensky Teleplay By: D. C. Fontana Story By: Nathan Butler and D. C. Fontana

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Star Trek: A Taste of Armageddon

In star cluster NGC321 (the party star cluster), the Enterprise receives a message from planet Eminiar 7, giving code 7-10, meaning not to approach the planet.  Ambassador Robert Fox, along for the ride, orders the Enterprise to approach anyway.

Kirk, Spock, an Asian spacegirl and some security men beam down in the first instance to ensure the Ambassador’s safety and find themselves in an advanced city.   The team  are met by an attractive woman in soft focus.

The landing party are taken to a council of elders.  Kirk tells them they want to open diplomatic relations however they claim they cannot do this because they are currently at war.  There is no evidence that this is true, and when an attack occurs during the meeting, it becomes apparent that no ‘real’ strike took place.

It seems that a system had been devised between the two warring parties where all strikes are mathematically calculated by a computer.  If someone is classified as having been killed then they must step into a disintegration booth to kill themselves.  It means the war doesn’t destroy the culture.

Unfortunately the Enterprise has been designated as a hit and the entire crew are to be disintegrated.  The team are taken away, but thanks to Spock’s mind melding, they hypnotise a wall and escape.

The planet fires upon the ship, Ambassador Fox demands that they open communications.  Scotty responds with, “The best diplomat I know is a fully operational phaser bank”.  I’ve never been more proud to be Scottish.  Malky him, big yin!

They arrange for Fox to beam down, and he orders Scotty to lower the screens and keeps them lowered.  Scotty refuses, and is threatened with court marshall but holds his ground.  It’s a good thing because the viewer knows something the crew don’t.  As soon as the shields are lowered, the planet intends to attack again.  “The haggis is on the fire and that’s for sure,” says Scotty.  What? That’s not a real Scottish expression!  Whoever wrote Scotty’s lines should really do a wee bit more research.  Rent Trainspotting or buy a Proclaimers CD.

Kirk confronts the head councillor, but while his back is turned a secret button is pressed, bringing in guards.

Fox and his life partner beam down only to be told they are to be killed, but in the nick of time Spock rescues them and persuades them to join the fight.

Kirk gets a message through to Scotty to destroy the entire planet.   They have 2 hours to comply.  I’m pretty sure that genocide is a decision above your pay grade, James T.

Kirk and crew gain control of the situation and destroy the war computers.  Kirk tells the councillor that now would be the time to negotiate peace.  And y’know what?  It blinkin’ well works.  Good work, chaps.  Another society saved.

Summarising the episode into a single word: Unlikely.

Cast: William Shatner as James T. Kirk Leonard Nimoy as Spock DeForest Kelley as Leonard H. McCoy James Doohan as Montgomery Scott Nichelle Nichols as Uhura

Guest Cast: David Opatoshu as Anan 7 Gene Lyons as Ambassador Robert Fox Barbara Babcock as Mea 3 Miko Mayama as Yeoman Tamura David L. Ross as Lt. Galloway Sean Kenney as Lt. DePaul Robert Sampson as Sar 6

Creative Staff: Director:  Joseph Pevney Teleplay By: Robert Hamner and Gene L. Coon Story By: Robert Hamner

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Star Trek: Space Seed

On board the Enterprise, a vessel has been spotted drifting in space and giving out old morse code signals.  It’s one of those old starships from the 1990s.  Don’t laugh, this is serious stuff.

The Enterprise crew detect heartbeats on the ancient ship, the USS Botany Bay.  Spock reminds everyone that in the mid 1990’s the last world war took place between genetically enhanced supermen and everyone else.  I remember it more as the era of the sitcom ‘Friends’ and the Spice Girls, but then my memory isn’t what it used to be. Kirk orders McGivers, spacegirl historian, to join the away team. Why does the Enterprise need a historian and where was she during Yesterday is Tomorrow when they needed her?

The Botany Bay, it transpires, is a sleeper ship. All the crew are in suspended animation.  They revive the leader, a handsome fellow in a He-man costume with gold net over-robe.  Hang about, he looks familiar. Dare I say it?  It’s… KHAAAN!!!

McGivers is fascinated by Khan, a genetically enhanced man, twice as powerful as the men of Kirk’s time period.  On board the Enterprise, Khan recuperates from his slumber, grabs a scalpel and points it at Bones.

Kirk introduces himself.  He tells him he will revive the crew when they reach starbase 12.  Khan asks Kirk if he can study the technical specs of the Enterprise.  Alarm bells, anyone?  Kirk hands them over, unphased.

Later, Khan woos McGivers with his smooth words, lets down her hair, slightly.  It’s a little creepy.  He starts to hurt her, asking her to help him take over the ship.  She says she’ll do whatever he asks.  This is when Khan breaks out the bunny costume.

Kirk figures out Khan is actually a former dictator and ruler of 1/4 of the world in the nineties.  Oh yeah, I didn’t recognise him without his Poncho of Power.

Khan escapes and revives his 70ish crew.  Only the ladies wear the same outfit Khan did.  Something you want to share, Mr Khan?

He takes over the Enterprise by starving the bridge of oxygen.  Uhura takes a hit for the team and Kirk is put in an airlock, slowly being depressurised.  Unless the crew join Khan’s crew, he will kill Kirk.

Luckily ol’ McGivers decides to switch sides and rescues Kirk, who then floods the ship with anaesthesia gas.  Everyone is knocked out, except, somehow, Khan.  Kirk tracks him down, leading to an action-packed showdown.  Ultimately Kirk’s fightin’ moves defeat Khan and save the ship.

Rather than sending everyone to prison, Kirk decides to take the law into his own hands and drops Khan’s crew off at a deserted world to build a colony.  And that should have been the end of it, but as anyone who has seen the second movie knows, it was actually just the beginning, the seed, the space seed.

Apart from the small detail that they got life in the nineties completely wrong, this is a beauty of an episode and Ricardo Montalbán’s performance is everything you would hope from a genetically engineered supervillain.  This is Trek at it’s best.

Cast: William Shatner as James T. Kirk Leonard Nimoy as Spock DeForest Kelley as Leonard H. McCoy James Doohan as Montgomery Scott Nichelle Nichols as Uhura

Guest Cast: Ricardo Montalban as Khan Madlyn Rhue as Lt. Marla McGivers

Creative Staff: Director:  Marc Daniels Teleplay By: Gene L. Coon and Carey Wilber Story By: Carey Wilber

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Star Trek: The Return of the Archons

In an old fashioned town, Sulu and crewman O’Neil run, stopping only to call the Enterprise, desperately requesting an emergency beam-out.   Impatiently, O’Neill doesn’t wait around and keeps running.  Sulu, on the other hand, decides to hold his position.  It’s the wrong choice.   Hooded men appear and zap him with a uh, didgeridoo(?) moments before he dematerialises.  In the transporter room, he reappears but something is amiss.  Poor old Sulu is talking like madman and gazing into space as if admiring some sort of invisible ostrich.

The Enterprise is orbiting planet Beta 3 in search of Starship Archon, missing for 100 years.  Yes, it’s taken 100 years for Starfleet to send out a search party.  I hope they’re not expecting to find any survivors.

A handful of crew members beam down in old-fashioned clothes in order to blend in (clearly having learnt a lesson from Yesterday is Tomorrow). Spock wears a massive hood which is, ironically, more conspicuous than if he let his pointed ears show.  They observe the townspeople walking and talking very slowly.  It’s a little eerie, but in a nice civilised way.  There’s a lot of talk about following Landru’s will.  There’s also a lot of talk about the upcoming festival, happening at noon.  A festival?  Golly gosh, that sounds nice.  And as it’s just a few minutes to noon, it’s probably worth sticking around for candy apples and the bottle stall.

Noon strikes.  The “Festival”, it transpires, is not full of dancing maids, beer-swilling fat men and home bakery stalls.  No, the festival is, in fact, a riot.  Women are attacked, men fight, property is damaged.

I feel the writers missed a great opportunity for Spock to turn to the camera and say “When in Rome…” and start head-butting nearby locals. But no, instead the landing party run and hide.

The riot ends as abruptly as it had begun and it doesn’t take long for the locals to figure out that the Enterprise crew had not participated.  It seems that the crew have attracted the attention of this Landru fellow, whose will the locals obey.  All of a sudden everyone in the town stops, turns and starts marching silently towards the crew.  Slowly.   Kirk and the others make their getaway by increasing their own speed to a brisk walking pace.

They find crewman O’Neil and take him into hiding, but a sonic blast renders everyone unconscious.  They later awaken in a prison.  This won’t look good on your permanent record, boys.

The long and short of it is that Landru has been absorbing people’s individuality into a kind of shared consciousness regulated by the Landrumeister himself. Many of the landing party’s personalities are absorbed, including Bones’.  However, when Kirk and Spock are taken away, revolutionaries fiddle the system in such a way as to let them retain their free will.   Using all their acting abilities, they attempt to blend in with the brainwashed masses.  Minutes later, Spock and Kirk are taken to Landru to explain themselves.

They learn that he isn’t a real person but, wait for it… a computer.  So that’s two episodes in a row about the dangers of computers?  I guess the writers must have really hated Microsoft or it’s sixties equivalent: Groovysoft.  After unsuccessful attempts to destroy the computer with weapons, Kirk eventually defeats it by pressing Control-Alt-Delete and baffling it with his smoothly spoken words.

So, having completely destroyed Beta 3’s society, the Enterprise flies away, leaving behind a single sociologist to fix the entire planet’s population.  Let’s hope she doesn’t want a day off.

So, just to recap, a computer took over the minds of everyone, making them civilised and eradicating crime, providing peace at the cost of free will.  Okay, I get that bit.   But what was that crazy riot festival about?  What was the point of sending the crew to look for a ship that crashed 100 years ago?  Why did the locals have to chase the crew so slowly? How did some crew get converted just by using the didgeridoos and others had to be strapped into a big machine?  I’m a little baffled. Perhaps Landru is taking over my mind?!!

Cast: William Shatner as James T. Kirk Leonard Nimoy as Spock DeForest Kelley as Leonard H. McCoy James Doohan as Montgomery Scott Nichelle Nichols as Uhura George Takei as Hikaru Sulu

Guest Cast: Harry Townes as Reger Torin Thatcher as Marplon Charles Macaulay as Landru Brioni Farrell as Tula Sid Haig as First Lawgiver Jon Lormer as Tamar Morgan Farley as Hacom Christopher Held as Lindstrom Sean Morgan as Lt. O’Neil Ralph Maurer as Bilar David L. Ross as Guard Miko Mayama as Yeoman Tamura

Creative Staff: Director:  Joseph Pevney Teleplay By: Boris Sobelman Story By: Gene Roddenberry

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Star Trek: Court Martial

After an Ion Storm threatens the Enterprise, Kirk sends Commander Ben Finney outside with an umbrella. However, with the ship safe, time then runs out to get Finney back and Kirk is left with no choice but to sacrifice his crewman in order to save the rest of the ship. When discussing his actions, he states that he went to yellow alert, then red alert and, only then, jettisoned the pod that resulted in the death of Finney.   

Later, the Enterprise calls in at Star Base 11 for one of their exquisite cheese and wine parties. However, when Commodore Stone reviews the computer log he discovers that the pod was jettisoned while still at yellow alert, suggesting that Finney wasn 't given fair warning that he was about to be vaporised. Oh Kirk, you 're in trouble now.  I feel a Court Marshall coming on.   

The inhabitants of Starbase 11 are not happy to see Kirk. Finney was a much-loved part of their community. His daughter, Jamie, in particular, seems very angry at Kirk for some undisclosed reason.  Probably the dead Dad thing.  After receiving a slap from her, Kirk gives off a look that seems to say "Stop it at once Jamie - you 're not too big to go over my knee." Steady.   

Kirk visits the starbase bar and runs into a former squeeze by the name of Ariel, who, as it turns out, is going to be prosecutor in Kirk's Court Marshall.  Is it me, or is this somewhat of a conflict of interest?  Just a tad, perhaps?    Kirk's own lawyer is Samuel T Cogley, a man with a healthy mistrust of computers.  He should get an iMac.  They're great.

In court, Kirk pleads not guilty. Dan dan daaaaaan!!    Spock, a Personnel Office and McCoy testify. Each attempting to convince the Commander of Kirk's innocence.  However it is all redundant because of the damning video footage, recorded by the ship's computer.  It clearly shows Kirk jettisoning the pod on yellow alert.   

Spock believes that the computer is broken after he beats it at chess. He argues that this isn't possible because he programmed the computer with everything he knows about chess so the best he could hope for is a draw. Alas, poor Spock, your logic is flawed. It assumes you will never get better at chess. If you had programmed it years ago, it makes sense that you would be able to beat it later on, after working on your game. (Also, as an aside, there is evidence that Spock is not a very good chess player.  In previous episodes, Kirk beats him and he thinks they're playing Ker-Plunk.)   

Only 3 people would have the technical skill to reprogram the computer: Kirk, Spock and Finney. Meaning only one possible explanation:  Finney is alive.    The trial moves location to the Enterprise and the entire crew are told to leave the ship.  Even the Engineering crew!  Then, using futuristic microphone technology, the sound of one heartbeat is picked up for the court to hear. Kirk goes to Engineering alone.  Who should he find there?  Finney, alive and well.  And mental. 

He''s always been jealous of Kirk''s success and wanted to frame him.    With no Engineering crew, the Enterprise is in a slowly declining orbit.  Only Finney can unlock the controls.  A savage fight breaks out between Kirk and Finney, but in the end it takes Kirk telling him that his daughter is on board to make him comply.   

The story is, at the end of the day, enjoyable.  Even if the whole Courtroom fiasco was a waste of time.  Also, near the end, Kirk's lawyer disappears from the ship to bring Jamie on board, but we never actually see him again. I''d have liked to have seen Kirk thank him for his efforts.  I need closure!       

Cast:  William Shatner as James T. Kirk  Leonard Nimoy as Spock  DeForest Kelley as Leonard H. McCoy  Nichelle Nichols as Uhura   

Guest Cast:  Percy Rodriguez as Commodore Stone  Elisha Cook Jr. as Samuel T. Cogley  Joan Marshall as Lt. Areel Shaw  Richard Webb as Lt. Comm. Ben Finney  Alice Rawlings as Jamie Finney   

Creative Staff:  Director:  Marc Daniels  Teleplay By: Don M. Mankiewicz and Stephen W. Carabatsos  Story By: Don M. Mankiewicz

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Star Trek: Tomorrow is Yesterday

Somebody in the Star Trek production Office has been in the stock footage library perusing US Air Force films.  Tomorrow is Yesterday begins in contemporary times with aircraft taking off, setting the scene for the Air Base where much of the story takes place.  A UFO has been spotted in the sky and you’ll never guess what it is.  It’s only the chuffing Enterprise!

So how did all this come about?  Well, a black star started to pull the ship towards it, and in an effort to break free, Sulu put the pedal to the metal, broke free and flew back to sixties Earth.  The Enterprise is damaged, the crew look rough and beaten up and the engines can only manage impulse power.  Unfortunate, but on the plus side, what a great chance to buy some Beatles collectables.

The Air Base launches nuke-bearing planes to intercept the “UFO”, and in the Enterprise’s current state this could be a problem.  The only thing for it is to beam the pilot aboard.  Captain John Christopher is somewhat disorientated at first and Kirk is less than forthcoming with the answers.  When Captain Christopher sees a space girl, he says, “A woman?”.  “Crew,” Kirk explains.  Everyone loves a space girl.

Scotty soon fixes the shields, but this leaves Kirk with a problem.   They can’t send Christopher back.  He’s seen too much and could influence the future.  He’s gotten himself a Starfleet uniform, he’s seen the futuristic computer system, Spock’s ears and more spacegirls than you could shake a stick at.   On the other hand Scotty doesn’t even know how to get the Enterprise back to the future.  Great Scot!  Wait a second, what about The Naked Time episode in which they invented time travel at the end?

When Spock discovers that a future son of Christopher’s will be historically significant (he invents the parsnip).  So, that settles it, he has to return.  This means Kirk and the crew have to go down and steal all the evidence that the Air Base had gathered so that even if Christopher does tell his superiors about it, there’s nothing to back him up.  He’ll look like a raving nutter.

So Kirk and Sulu beam down.  In their Starfleet uniforms.  I can see that these guys don’t get a lot of undercover work.  They walk down the corridor then break into the lab.  Why didn’t they just beam directly into the lab in the first place, I wonder.  Things, of course, don’t run according to plan resulting in another local being beamed up and, after taking on three guards, Kirk being taken into custody.

Needless to say, things work out in the end, with Scotty having figured out a way of slingshotting around the sun and the Air Force men being beamed back to their bodies before they encountered the crew.   This does actually present a small flaw in the logic, in that they are going into the future, not the past, so how could they have sent Captain Christopher to an earlier point in time and… oh my god… I’m a nerd.

Never mind.  The script is actually exceptionally good with well-written, funny, dialogue.  The action scenes are very exciting.  When Star Trek breaks away from its usual format to tell a different type of story sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t.   With Tomorrow is Yesterday it really, really works.

Cast: William Shatner as James T. Kirk Leonard Nimoy as Spock DeForest Kelley as Leonard H. McCoy James Doohan as Montgomery Scott Nichelle Nichols as Uhura George Takei as Hikaru Sulu

Guest Cast: Roger Perry as Captain John Christopher Hal Lynch as Air Police sergeant Richard Merrifield as Webb John Winston as Lt. Kyle Ed Peck as Colonel Fellini Mark Dempsey as Air Force captain Jim Spencer as Air policeman Sherri Townsend as Crew woman Majel Barrett as Computer Voice

Creative Staff: Director:  Michael O’Herlihy Written By: D. C. Fontana

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Star Trek: Arena

A landing party prepares to beam down to planet Salsa 3 (a spicy tomato planet) but when a message arrives suggesting they beam down a tactical team, Spock becomes suspicious. Everyone scoffs. Oh Spock, lighten up you old stick-in-the-mud. Spock’s concerns, however, turn out to be justified for when he, Kirk, Bones and three limited life expectancy crewmen materialise, trouble rears its ugly head almost immediately. Within minutes a crewman is killed, the Enterprise is attacked and the landing party can’t beam up. Shoulda listened to the Spockmeister!

On the Enterprise, things have gotten bad: they’ve had to raise their ‘screens’. Must be expecting a Mosquito attack.

As bombs rain down upon the landing party, Kirk runs from his shelter into an unprotected open area. What do they teach at Starfleet Academy these days? Nevertheless, his foolhardy efforts lead him to a tennis ball launcher, into which he loads a blue ball and fires it. Phew. Area secured.

The Enterprise beams up Kirk, Spock and Bones and they set off in hot pursuit of the alien vessel who had attacked them and Salsa 3. Kirk steps on the go-go juice and cranks the Enterprise engines up to Warp 7. A sustained Warp 7 could result in the ship exploding (which is not good for morale). Spock starts moaning about how killing the aliens is unnecessary, but his words are drowned out as Kirk shifts up to warp 8 and breaks out the nukes.

Just as he readies himself for action, the ship comes to a complete halt and everyone lurches forward. They really should install seatbelts, especially at warp speed. A voice informs Kirk that they have been stopped by the Metrons. They are going to resolve the conflict by putting Kirk and the captain of the enemy vessel (The Gorn) onto a planet to duke it out. The winner can go free. The loser will be destroyed along with his ship.

Quite what’s in it for the Metrons is unclear. Surely if the two ships were about to fight, one would be destroyed anyway, so the Metrons’ intervention is quite unnecessary. Nevertheless, Kirk and the Gorn captain are taken from their ships and materialise on a barren planet.

The two warriors are told that the planet has weapons, but only if they know how to use them. So Kirk starts off by throwing a rock at the Gorn. It bounces off him as if made out of polystyrene. Which it probably is. The Gorn retaliates by picking up a boulder and throws it at Kirk. Kirk side-steps it. Kirk then sees an even bigger boulder on top of a cliff. Inspired by Roadrunner cartoons, Kirk runs up the cliff and waits for the Gorn to walk underneath it. That is, to walk to the exact spot under the cliff where the boulder will land. The Gorn obliges and gets hit by the rock. However, even this cannot stop the Gorn.

The crew on board the Enterprise observe what’s going on. Spock sees Kirk running through the desert. He notices some powder on the ground and says to himself that unless he’s mistaken, that substance is potassium nitrate! What? Is this for real? He recognises a powder and knows what sort of chemical compound it is?

The Gorn captain contacts Kirk and tells him that the colony on Salsa 3 was an intrusion on their space. The reason for their attack was to defend their territory. Well, Captain Gorn, why didn’t you say so? All is forgiven! Not.

Kirk suddenly figures out that the power he’s been sprinkling on his chips was potassium nitrate, and remembers seeing a sulphur deposit earlier and also recalls seeing some coal and hey presto! He realises he has all the ingredients to make gunpowder!

(Seriously, I’m not making this up.)

Spock, watching, says “Gooooood, goooooood”, because he too knows what’s going on. He also watches as Kirk uses a hollow tube and rocks to build a cannon, not too dissimilar to the one he used on Salsa 3. What is this? McGuyver?

At the rate the Gorn approaches, Kirk should just have enough time to assemble it, take cover, set the fuse, order a pizza, learn Japanese up to Standard Grade level and build a set of patio furniture, before the Gorn reaches him.

Boom! The Gorn takes a direct hit.

Kirk approaches to finish the job, but at the last minute decides Spock was right all along and they should just try to make friends. At this point a glowing Metron appears, acknowledges that everything has worked out for the best and sends the Enterprise halfway across the Galaxy. That wasn’t very nice now was it?

Cast: William Shatner as James T. Kirk Leonard Nimoy as Spock DeForest Kelley as Leonard H. McCoy James Doohan as Montgomery Scott Nichelle Nichols as Uhura George Takei as Hikaru Sulu

Guest Cast: Carole Shelyne as Metron Vic Perrin as Metron’s voice Gary Coombs as Gorn Captain Bobby Clark as Gorn Captain Vic Perrin as Gorn’s voice Grant Woods as Lt. Commander Kelowitz Tom Troupe as Lt. Harold Eddie Paskey as Lt. Leslie Sean Kenney as Lt. DePaul

Creative Staff: Director:  Joseph Pevney Teleplay By: Gene L. Coon Story By: Fredric Brown

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Star Trek: The Squire of Gothos

While the crew discuss mirages, a foxy space girl hands out drinks. Let’s hope the Enterprise control panels are spillproof. Whilst sipping space-juice, Kirk is told that the ship is passing an uncharted planet. Possibly remembering the trouble he’d got into investigating the space-sneeze last episode, Kirk decides not to examine the planet. Absolutely not. No way. Not going to do it. Sulu and Kirk promptly vanish from the bridge.

Spock calls out to go to Emergency Reverse Power, destroying the credibility of the song Star Trekkin’ by the Firm. A message appears on the view screen saying “Greetings and Felicitations” in a ye olde font. Curious. Bones and a couple of his pals beam down to the planet only to discover the atmosphere is breathable and that they cannot communicate with the ship. Perhaps it’s time to change your cell phone provider, Bones?

As they explore, they find an old castle and enter without knocking. It’s full of antique furniture, artwork and hey! Look who it is! It’s Nancy the salt monster from The Man Trap, stuffed and mounted. With all that salt in her, she’ll be preserved for a long time to come. Amongst the artifacts stand Kirk and Sulu, frozen.

Before Bones and friends have time to arrange them into hilarious poses, a man at the piano waves his hand and unfreezes them. Dressed like a big jessie and with an accent that could best be described as variable, he introduces himself as Trelane, the Squire. It doesn’t take long before he starts throwing his weight around by magically taking guns off crewmen and temporarily transporting Kirk to an unbreathable atmosphere, all smoky and smelling of unripe herring feet.

But ol’ Trelane doesn’t count on Spock suddenly beaming up the crew members and, basically, legging it out of there. Of course it would be a very short episode if that was the end of it, and Trelane soon appears on the bridge, making lewd comments about the ladies and then whisking the bridge crew off to his castle using those handy magical powers of his.

Trelane takes a shine to the two space girls he brought down to the planet, Uhura and Theresa Ross (the drinks dispenser). He makes Uhura play the piano while he dances with Theresa. He may not be the best villain ever, but he certainly knows how to have fun. He even conjures up a nice dress for her. A wasted bikini opportunity if ever there was one.

The crew soon realise that the food has no taste, the fire has no heat and everything seems a little fake. Like an Orlando theme park. Trelane is merely creating a mirage of sorts, powered by some sort of machine. Somehow, Kirk and Spock figure out that it is behind the mirror, and after challenging Trelane to a duel, Kirk uses his bullet to shoot the mirror. Everything goes wonky.

The crew beam back to the ship and attempt, for the second time, to leg it. This time Trelane confuses them by making it appear as if they are on a collision course.

Trelane takes Kirk away to a courtroom, finds him guilty of, I dunno, biscuit theft or something and sentences him to hang. Kirk, persuades him that a hunt would be more entertaining, but he would only willingly participate if the ship was freed. The hunt begins and Kirk is quickly caught. He tries to fight but Trelane’s powers give him an edge Kirk can’t compete with.

Just as things look grim, a green swirly thing appears and scolds Trelane (as if he were a spoilt child). Trelane is taken away and a bemused Kirk is returned to the Enterprise, with an apology. And, as a viewer, I feel incredibly let down. Not only is it an utterly unsatisfactory ending (with a resolution coming from a brand new plot element, and the crew’s struggle playing no part in their release), but worse, it is the exact same ending as Charlie X. Swirly green entity takes spoilt child with magical abilities away. They didn’t even change the colour of the entity.

Overall, it’s a very unlikely episode with an irritating villain and disappointing ending. The viewer is left with a feeling that the crew’s efforts were, ultimately, futile, despite the heroic efforts of the Captain. The theme of mirages and illusions was handled infinitely better in the Menagerie, the concept of deception examined better in Balance of Terror and the omnipotent antagonist better realised in Charlie X.  Nice space girls though.

Cast: William Shatner as James T. Kirk Leonard Nimoy as Spock DeForest Kelley as Leonard H. McCoy James Doohan as Montgomery Scott Nichelle Nichols as Uhura George Takei as Hikaru Sulu

Guest Cast: William Campbell as Trelane Michael Barrier as Lt. DeSalle Venita Wolf as Yeoman Teresa Ross Barbara Babcock as Trelane’s Mother’s Voice James Doohan as Trelane’s Father’s Voice

Creative Staff: Director: Don McDougall Written By: Paul Schneider

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Star Trek The Galileo Seven

The Enterprise is delivering vital medical supplies to some or other space colony.  It is such an important mission, Commissioner Ferris has been assigned to oversee the delivery and complain about stuff to Kirk.

Things are going swimmingly until they pass by a big green splotch in space, as if a giant has sneezed into a starfield.  Kirk can’t resist sending some of his crew in for a better look, much to the annoyance of the Commissioner.  However, they have five days to get the supplies to the colony, and the journey should only take three.  Plenty of time for space-sneeze investigation.

The shuttle (Galileo) investigating the space-sneeze is piloted by Spock with Scotty, Bones, three random blokes and a space girl (hence the title The Galileo Seven).  However, due to radioactive green splotch energy, the shuttle crashes into the only planet in the entire nebula capable of sustaining life.  Phew, that was lucky!  Unfortunately, however, the same energy that made them crash, also prevents the Enterprise’s sensors from detecting the shuttle’s exact location.

On the planet, McCoy asks Spock how he’s going to cope being the highest ranking officer.  Spock, of course, answers that he will make logical decisions, and boy oh boy does he go for it with gusto!

Scotty discovers that there isn’t enough fuel on the shuttle for it to be able to take off with all seven crew members.  Three would have to be left behind.  How will Spock choose?  Eeny meeny miney mo… Spock, Scotty, McCoy and the space girl live, three unknown forgettable men die. Problem solved.  However, the tried and tested ‘keep the named crew members’ method isn’t logical enough for Spock.

Before Spock can logically figure out who should live, they hear noises from outside and two crew members go to investigate.  One is speared in the back.  Fatally.  At least it makes Spock’s decision a little easier.

With limited time, Spock faces with the choice of whether to bury the body of the fallen crewman or whether to repair the ship that will save the rest of their lives.  He opts for repairing the ship.  That seems logical to me, and I’m not even Vulcan.  Frankly, given the limited supplies, burial wouldn’t be an option when crewman kebabs could be on the menu.

Then there’s the issue over how to deal with the hairy apes which are threatening to kill them.  Spock orders the crew to fire warning shots to frighten them away, not kill them.  This very much goes against the feeling of the landing party who would enjoy nothing more than mounting an ape-head on the front of the Galileo as a trophy.

Scotty comes up with a solution to the Galileo’s empty fuel tank.  By draining the phasers power into the shuttle’s fuel cells, they’ll have enough power to take off.  Spock sees it as their only chance and agrees to it, effectively leaving them defenceless.  Hmm… call that plan B, Mr Spock?

When a second crewman is killed by an ape creature, the party are angry at Spock for firing warning shots instead of killing the monkey men.  Nobody seems happy about the prospect of a second helping of crewman kebab.

While all this is going on, the Commissioner repeatedly bothers Kirk about making their medical supply delivery.  He doesn’t give a tinker’s cuss about the lives of the stranded shuttle crew – he just wants the meds.  What could be driving the Commissioner to be so heartless?  Has anyone considered that the Commissioner might be keeping the drugs for his own personal consumption?  Either way, after a lot of badgering, Kirk is forced to leave the area.  Defiantly, he leaves at warp factor: walking pace.

Meanwhile on the planet’s surface, a hairy ape throws rocks at the shuttle.  It’s time to go.  They have to leave behind every ounce of excess weight.   It all counts.  Logically, the crew should leave their clothes behind.   However, this doesn’t occur to Spock.

In a dramatic conclusion, the shuttle blasts into the sky, with the crew aware it can only fly for 45 minutes.  Spock does the only logical thing he can think of: panic!  He jettisons all their fuel into the atmosphere, creating a green streak in the sky.  Luckily, the Enterprise spots it and beams the crew aboard.  Phew!  It’s all over.

Kirk orders the ship to complete the medical supply delivery.  I wonder how many lives would have been saved if the delivery had arrived two days earlier?

Cast: William Shatner as James T. Kirk Leonard Nimoy as Spock DeForest Kelley as Leonard H. McCoy James Doohan as Montgomery Scott Nichelle Nichols as Uhura George Takei as Hikaru Sulu

Guest Cast: Don Marshall as Lt. Boma John Crawford as High Commissioner Ferris Peter Marko as Lt. Gaetano Phyllis Douglas as Yeoman Mears Reese Vaughn as Lieutenant Latimer Grant Woods as Lt. Commander Kelowitz Buck Maffei as Creature David L. Ross as Transporter Chief

Creative Staff: Director:  Robert Gist Teleplay By: Oliver Crawford and S. Bar-David Story By: Oliver Crawford

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Star Trek: Shore Leave

Kirk has a sore back so one of the crew members, space girl Tonia Barrows, gives him a back rub.  It’s great being Captain!  In fact, it is such a good back rub, Kirk decides that the entire crew need a break, so he parks the Enterprise outside the nearest planet and beams down Bones and Sulu to establish whether it’s safe for the crew to chill out down there.

When Bones makes a passing reference to Alice in Wonderland, moments later the White Rabbit character from the book, complete with waistcoat and pocketwatch, runs by.  Amazingly, Bones doesn’t immediately start chanting “Playboy Mansion, Playboy Mansion, Playboy Mansion” to test out whether he made it happen.  So when Bones tells Kirk about the rabbit, Kirk thinks it’s a joke.  Who can blame him?

The first batch of crew members beam down to the planet, including Kirk and Barrows.  It’s all smiles until Bones shows Kirk the White Rabbit’s footprints.  Kirk immediately cancels shore leave until they figure out what’s going on.

Bones and Kirk hear gunshots and run to investigate.  It’s only Sulu!  He found a gun lying around and did the same thing any one of us would do, and that is to shoot it randomly into the nearby woodland.   Fortunately there are no fatalities.

Next up, Kirk finds himself talking to Bones about a former classmate, a real practical joker.  Seconds later, that same classmate is there.   They fight.  Good times, good times.

They hear screams.  It’s Barrows.  She’s been assaulted.  Her uniform is ripped so badly that she has to hold it up in order to remain decent.  She says she was attacked by a cloaked man with a dagger.  One can only imagine how terrifying this attack must have been for her.   Careful now Kirk, you must be extremely sensitive here.  Or not.  Old blundermouth Kirk blurts out “Are you sure you didn’t imagine it?”   Luckily for Barrows, the writers are as unattuned to the concept of an female assault as Kirk, and the incident is largely forgotten moments afterwards.

There are hints that a romance is developing between Bones and Barrows.   Barrows discusses a princess fantasy of hers and a beautiful gown appears.  At first she is hesitant to wear the outfit.  Understandable, really, because if the gown were to disappear as suddenly as it appeared, her modesty could be severely compromised.  In the end she can’t resist the dress and puts it on.  I guess the Starfleet uniform must be optional when on duty.

Spock beams down to the planet to inform Kirk that they are stranded on the planet’s surface.  Then it dawns on him that he’s now stranded too.  Looks like Scotty has to take command.

As Bones discusses Princesses with Barrows, he makes the mistake of mentioning brave knights, so one appears and spikes him with his jousting stick.  Spikes him to death!  Poor Bones.  Maybe it won’t take?

When Sulu opens the Knight’s mask, he discovers that the knight was just a waxwork.  Moments later Bones and the knight disappear.  After finally figuring out that whatever they think of comes true, Kirk orders everyone to stop thinking.  Spock then adds: “And whatever you do, don’t think of a tiger”.

One tiger attack later, the crew regroup.

Barrows is back in uniform.  It has healed itself!  A man appears, the caretaker of the planet.  He explains that they have in fact beamed down onto a big amusement park, which brings fantasies to life.  Bones then appears with his arms around two girls in fuzzy bikinis.  Barrows looks annoyed.  Bones has some explaining to do!

And so the crew are allowed to go on shore leave after all.  Except Spock.   In your face, Spock.

Cast: William Shatner as James T. Kirk Leonard Nimoy as Spock DeForest Kelley as Leonard H. McCoy Nichelle Nichols as Uhura George Takei as Hikaru Sulu

Guest Cast: Marcia Brown as Alice in Wonderland Emily Banks as Yeoman Tonia Barrows Oliver McGowan as Caretaker Perry Lopez as Lt. Estaban Rodriguez Bruce Mars as Finnegan Shirley Bonne as Ruth

Creative Staff: Director:  Robert Sparr Written By: Theodore Sturgeon

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Star Trek: Balance of Terror

Captain Kirk is performing a wedding ceremony. A lucky crewman is marrying a space girl, or at least he would be if there wasn’t a red alert going on.   Panic!

It’s an exciting episode. The Romulan Empire exists right next to good ol’ British Earth space. After a long war, space was divided up and a series of outposts were set up. We learn that despite the long history, no human has ever seen a Romulan. What? How did they negotiate the different territories if they‘ve never seen each other. Oh well, never mind.

A Romulan ship has violated the neutral zone between Romulan and Earth space and is destroying the outposts. After a big build-up the Romulan vessel appears, blasts an outpost to smithereens, and then vanishes. Spock tells the crew that invisibility is theoretically possible. Which explains why I can never find my car keys.

Styles, a particularly racist member of the crew (shouldn’t they screen for this at the academy?) suggests that there could be Romulan spies on board. The Enterprise manages to tap into the Romulan ship’s webcam and they finally discover what the Romulans look like. They look like… Vulcans!

All eyes turn to Spock.

Inside the Romulan ship, some of the crew wear pumpkins on their heads. It must be Hallowe’en.

The Enterprise crew discover that the Romulans out-gun them by a mile, and that their weapons turn the hardest known substance into wafer. However, the price of their weaponry is that they cannot fly quickly.

As the story develops, Kirk has to make some tough decisions. Starfleet Command had ordered that no ships should ever enter the Neutral Zone, and that the Enterprise should not engage in combat with the Romulans, even going as far as to say that the Enterprise is expendable. For Kirk, however, rules are made to be broken, and much of the rest of the episode is a cat and mouse game between the two ships.

The Enterprise starts to figure out the Romulan vessel’s weaknesses. Their weapons have limited range (and the Enterprise can outrun their weapons.  Handy.)  The Romulans have to de-cloak in order to fire, making them vulnerable.  Kirk damages them with a burst of phaser fire.

Then the Romulans start to turn things around.  The captain remembers that they have an old-style nuclear weapon lying around.  Oh yeah – I forgot about that rusty old thing! He nukes the Enterprise!

Styles and Tomlinson (the man who was to be married at the start of the episode) go to repair a leak.  Spock offers to help but is sent away for being a dirty Vulcan!  However, it’s all smiles after Styles and Tomlinson are knocked unconscious and Spock saves the day and fires a direct hit upon the Romulan vessel.

Sadly, Tomlinson died, meaning there’s one space girl still available at the end of the episode, and thanks to a Kirk-Cuddle™, she’s alright!

Cast: William Shatner as James T. Kirk Leonard Nimoy as Spock DeForest Kelley as Leonard H. McCoy James Doohan as Montgomery Scott Nichelle Nichols as Uhura George Takei as Hikaru Sulu

Guest Cast: Mark Lenard as Romulan Commander Lawrence Montaigne as Decius Grace Lee Whitney as Janice Rand Paul Comi as Lt. Andrew Stiles John Warburton as Centurion Stephen Mines as Spec. Robert Tomlinson Barbara Baldavin as Spec. 2/C Angela Martine

Creative Staff: Director:  Vincent McEveety Written By: Paul Schneider

[startrektvseries]

Star Trek: The Conscience of the King

To Trek or not to Trek, that is the question.  The Conscience of the King begins with a scene from Macbeth, in which that rascal Macbeth (played by famed Shakespearean actor of the future, Karidian) murders King Duncan, delivering the line “Will all Neptune’s great ocean wash this blood clean from my hands?” (a line which, incidentally, seems to sum up the storyline of this episode).  In the audience is the familiar face of Captain Kirk, eating popcorn and drinking from a 20oz bladder-bustin’ beverage.  Kirk doesn’t seem the type to watch Shakespeare.  Not enough monster trucks.  Perhaps they’ve tweaked the ending to include some stunts?

Leighton, the person sitting beside Kirk whispers that Karidian is none other than Kodos the Executioner!  We learn that Kodos was the leader of a colony on the planet Tarsus IV (This time it’s personal) who  murdered half of its population. Of the survivors, only a handful ever saw the face of the man nicknamed ‘the Executioner’.  However, Kirk (as a child) was one of those select few, and so was Leighton, the fellow who invited Kirk on their Macbeth date.

Leighton still bears the scars of his time on Tarius IV (The Voyage Home).  In fact, he doesn’t just have an eye-patch, he has an entire side-of-head-patch.  Now that’s serious.

Karidian, the actor, has a daughter Lenore, 19, who sends Kirk’s head into a spin.  He likes what he sees and immediately goes into ’smooth-mode’.  It sends her into soft-focus.   Kirk has that effect on a lot of girls.  However, as they go out on a date (Monster Trucks this time) they discover a dead body!  It’s only ol’ patch-head Leighton!

Kirk now starts to suspect that the Karidian may be Kodos.  He arranges an accident that forces the acting troupe to accept a lift on board the Enterprise, in return for them putting on a performance for the crew.

Remember crew member Lt Kevin Reilly from The Naked Time? No?  Well, he’s back!  It turns out that of the nine survivors of Tarius IV (Citizens on Patrol), Reilly was one of them.  Reilly?   Really?  Really. Reilly.  Kirk transfers Reilly to another post so that he doesn’t accidentally cross paths with Karidian.

Meanwhile Spock does some digging into Karidian’s past and figures out the Kodos link.  Everyone who ever saw Kodos alive has since died, except for Kirk and Reilly.

To cheer up Reilly, Uhura sings him a song using the Space-Lute™ last seen in Charlie X. Unfortunately, her sweet ballad distracts him long enough for somebody to tamper with his meal.  An unseen figure squirts something into his milk.  Yes, the milk he was about to drink along with his delicious meal of… multicoloured cubes.  Multicoloured cubes – Just like Mom used to make.  Reilly drinks the milk and collapses.

Kirk confronts Karidian and asks him if he is Kodos.  Kodos evades the questions like a politician.  Kirk asks him to record his voice for a voice print analysis.  The recording is a close match to that of Kodos.  However, close isn’t good enough for Kirk.  He needs to be sure.

Meanwhile, Bones is treating Reilly in the sick bay.  He stops to give Kirk the results of the voice print analysis and Reilly overhears.  Oh Bones!  Surely as a doctor you must have learned something about keeping information confidential.  What did they teach you at medical school?  Dammit Jim, I’m a Doctor, not a keeper of secrets liable to result in a mass-murderer, posing as an actor, being killed by one of his former victims’ family members!

An attempt on Kirk’s life is made in which a phaser, set on overload, is left in his quarters.  Kirk puts it in the trash!  Problem solved.

Meanwhile, the Karidian troupe put on their play.  Reilly, with a stolen phaser, drops by to exact his revenge on the man he believes to be Kodos.  Kirk manages to talk him out of it.

Then comes the twist.  It wasn’t Karidian who killed the survivors, it was his daughter, the space girl Lenore.  She knew that her father Karidian was Kodos and wanted to remove the threat that his identity may be discovered.  So she killed anyone who ever saw Kodos.  Karidian is horrified.  As she points the gun at Kirk, her father steps in and absorbs the blast. killing him dead.  If you thought Lenore was insane before she killed her father, she becomes absolutely bananas afterwards!  Yeesh!

The episode is an interesting one and raises a lot of questions.  Kodos had to kill half of the colony to save the other half.  In some ways it could be viewed that he made a tough decision that saved 4000 lives.  It’s a difficult moral dilemma.   However, I can’t help but think that if he didn’t want to get caught, he went about it the wrong way.  If you were to go into hiding, there are certain jobs you could still do, low profile things like Mail-Sorter or Online Gambler.  The one career choice that really doesn’t suit a person in hiding is acting!  People tend to see your face!  Frankly he deserved everything he got!

Cast: William Shatner as James T. Kirk Leonard Nimoy as Spock DeForest Kelley as Leonard H. McCoy Nichelle Nichols as Uhura

Guest Cast: Arnold Moss as Anton Karidian Barbara Anderson as Lenore Karidian Grace Lee Whitney as Janice Rand Bruce Hyde as Lt. Kevin Riley William Sargent as Dr. Thomas Leighton Natalie Norwick as Martha Leighton Karl Bruck as King Duncan Marc Adams as Hamlet Eddie Paskey as Lt. Leslie Majel Barrett as Computer Voice

Creative Staff: Director:  Gerd Oswald Written By: Barry Trivers