Closet Sci-Fi Geek

Star Trek: The Original Series - “Errand of Mercy″

Kirk and Spock travel to the planet Organia to convince them to let the Federation take on their planet as a base instead of the Klingons. The episode consists of Kirk arguing a lot with the Organians, who are peace-loving and do not intend (or ultimately need) to fight the Klingons.

This is an important episode, as it is our first introduction to the Klingons. John Colicos of the original Battlestar Galactica plays the lead Klingon. He was sooo good at playing well-mannered bad guys.

Of course, in the original series, the Klingons didn’t have those special ridges on their heads. The discrepancy was joked about in the Deep Space Nine episode “Trials and Tribble-ations,” where the DS9 crew travels back into the past and sees the old-style Klingons.

Since that episode, an entire canonical explanation has been developed over the discrepancy, involving a genetic mutation and virus. If you ask me, going to such ridiculous lengths to explain what is obviously a costuming issue is a bit extreme. Though, I suppose it’s just as well. If they hadn’t made up a fictional explanation for it, someone would have tried to go back in and digitally add head ridges onto the old Klingon actors.

Remastered Trek Photos

From the episode “Miri.” Old:

New:

Star Trek: The Original Series - “The Menagerie Parts 1 & 2″

The Menagerie is an interesting two-part episode because it is the first episode in Star Trek that alludes to the Enterprise ever belonging to another Captain, as well as helps create a rich back-story for the series. It is also the only two-partner in the three seasons.

That Gene Roddenberry did this with the failed original pilot, “The Cage,” is even more impressive. The events in this episode are supposed to be 13 years prior, and it really does seem this way; when in fact it was only a couple of years in real time. Even the overly-emotional Spock from the original pilot seems appropriately youthfully exhuberant. Continue reading Star Trek: The Original Series - “The Menagerie Parts 1 & 2″…

Star Trek: The Original Series - “The Enemy Within”

What’s better than one Captain Kirk? Two! And how about if one of them is totally horndog? Woo-hoo! Thus the episode, “The Enemy Within” begins with a transporter malfunction that splits kirk into the Good Kirk and the Bad Kirk.

How can you tell which is which? Well, the Bad Kirk wants Saurian brandy and to molest Yeoman Rand. Oh and he has on dark eye-liner that makes him look…well…hot.

The Good Kirk is a little paler than usual and very reticent as the Bad Kirk is the one who got the cojones. Fortunately the Good Kirk keeps his intellect otherwise fusing and merging them back into one whole appropriately frisky Kirk would not be a possibility.

This episode is well-regarded as some of Bill Shatner’s best acting in the series. The Good Kirk is brilliantly understated - as if the air has been let out of his tires (or his balls are missing since the Bad Kirk has them). The Bad Kirk in contrast is over the top - hysterical, violent, filled with ego and rage and lust. In all not a half-bad guy (half, get it?).

This is also a great episode for Spock and McCoy, who are very sensitive to the Captain’s needs as well as being strong support for the ship and the crew during this crisis. They shoulder the responsibility well and work terrific as a team. Spock has a few great lines too, such as speaking of being half-human and half-Vulcan:

Spock: “Being split into two halves is no theory with me, doctor. I have a human half, you see, as well as an alien half…submerged, constantly at war with each other. I survive it because my intelligence wins out over both, makes them live together.”

Once again, Yeoman Rand (who fortunately will not be around on the Enterprise much longer) is the object of someone’s lust. I mean DEAR GOD, has anyone noticed that her hairdo actually contains an enormous beehive? Or a small alien civilization? Or the Who’s from Horton Hears a Who? I mean, seriously. Would Captain Kirk have to unweave the basket that is on top of her head before he even got down to the funky stuff? Could take a while.

Meanwhile on Alfa 177 poor Sulu and the landing party are freezing to death, so something has to happen to get Kirk back together with his shadow-self and the transporter needs to be repaired.

I love these internal ship/character episodes. Brilliant. Take something as inocuous as the geologist who cuts his hand sliding down an ore-filled cliff and look what happens - two Kirks and a frozen landing party. Oh, and don’t forget the peach dyed unicorn dog. Every episode needs one of those.

This episode is the first time Bones says, “He’s dead, Jim” referring to the unicorn dog. And it is the first time Spock uses the Vulcan Nerve Pinch (on the Bad Kirk).

The Kirk Factor: This is all Kirk and double the pleasure at that. I can’t decide which I like better. The Bad Kirk is hotter certainly and I love the snarling and throaty way he asks for the brandy and then walks around drinking from the bottle. But then the Good Kirk is so compassionate. So kind. So dreamy. Ah, well put ‘em together, make one good one.

Star Trek: The Original Series - “The Man Trap”

One of the early episodes, this one lays the groundwork for a romantic interest out of McCoy’s past. It’s a highly creative episode, with a message (don’t destroy all the buffalo, that kind of thing - hinting at the fact that as humans spread like a virus into the galaxy and start colonizing planets one of those risks is what happens to the creatures native to those planets.).

The salt-sucker creature was fairly scary to me as a kid. I can remember having bad dreams about it.

Now it looks slightly absurd. Although if I look too closely I could have bad dreams again. Shiver. However, the morphing effect when Nancy would take on (Nancy was McCoy’s ex-girlfriend who is really the creature) a new guise was neat even for then.

The acting is somewhat stilted and a little over the top in this one (imagine that - over the top!). Captain Kirk goes off on one of his moralistic tirades too at poor lonely Professor Crater:

Kirk: You bleed too much, Crater. You’re too pure and noble. Are you saving the last of its kind…or has this become Crater’s private heaven here? This thing becomes wife, lover, best friend…wise man, fool, idol, slave. It isn’t bad to have everyone in the universe…at your beck and call. You win all the arguments.

Jeez, Jim, whatever happened to walking a mile in a man’s moccasins before you condemn him?

Also in the climatic scene McCoy hesitates badly while the salt-sucker is trying to suck the salt out of Captain Kirk and Spock nearly goes hysterical telling him to shoot it but doesn’t even try to pull it off him, which is kind of bizarre, considering that he’s already told everyone that it doesn’t have a taste for him. The whole thing is a little awkward. Eventually Spock intercedes and tries to beat the stuffing out of Nancy. This is very humorous, watching Spock beat up this rather petite woman who is actually the salt-sucker creature.

Of course it all comes down to McCoy pulling the trigger on his ex-girlfriend which is a bit horrendous to watch. But she fortunately turns into the salt-sucker creature in her death throes, so he doesn’t feel so bad, though I bet he needed a nice big glass of Saurian brandy. I know I sure did.

The Kirk Factor: Is there anything my Captain can’t do? Though here he is not really a sensitive ecologist. I did feel a little bad about them killing the creature. They could have just sent her back to the planet with a five year supply of salt tablets. She did kill crew members but only by instinct and only to feed. They could have had a better plan. But I forgive you Captain Kirk.

Star Trek: The Original Series - “Charlie X”

Charlie Evans, the Charlie X of the title has an immensely odd-shaped head. I mean, really bizarre. For me, it has always been the thing about this episode that upset me other than Spock’s spontaneous poetry reading, Yeoman Rands nipples poking through her pink dressing gown, Uhura’s extemporaneous song about Mr. Spock and his “devil ears” and Captain Kirk shirtless in red tights that show he is in fact, of Jewish heritage. Ok, scratch that. I actually liked him in the red wrestling tights. So sue me.

This is one of those episodes where you have to wonder what they were smoking. It’s just all over the place with too much Yeoman Rand and Spock not sure of how Vulcan he is. He is almost smiling in the recreation area scene when Uhura sings to his Vulcan harp playing. They really needed to be wearing berets and smoking truth be told. Continue reading Star Trek: The Original Series - “Charlie X”…

Star Trek: The Original Series - “Tomorrow is Yesterday”

I recall seeing this episode as one of my very first when I was about six years old in 1974. Star Trek had been off the air for five years and was run in the afternoons at four o’clock at the time. I had been introduced to Star Trek by my cousin Ricky (four years older) at the age of five. I was obsessed. There was a big resurgence in the TV series now that it was in re-runs and an entirely new generation was being turned onto it. Since I was already a baby-geek and loved to watch Lost in Space in the afternoons after kindergarten class, Star Trek was made for me.

And Star Trek had something no other TV show did. Captain James T. Kirk. Sigh.

One of the best things about this episode was, the connection between the current era and the future world of Star Trek. It did indeed seem like two different worlds in sharp comparison.

There was a bit of bumbling in the episode, especially when Captain Kirk gets captured at the Air Force Base, where he and Sulu have beamed down to get the photographic evidence of the Enterprise. I like this aspect. I like to see them make mistakes. They are fallible.

Earlier, Spock incorrectedly determines that the Air Force Pilot they have saved from his own destruction, Captain Christopher, would have to stay with them in the future and not return to Earth not even considering that Captain Christopher’s progeny might have a significant contribution. Of course there is a paradox and Captain Christopher must be returned to father a son who will lead an important future space mission to Saturn.

This is the first time the slingshot effect is used to propel the Enterprise backward and then forward in time. This same situation will be used in Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home to great effect.

This is one of those episodes though which are among my least favorite situations, that focus on a guest star and their story rather than the stories from the crew themselves.

The Kirk Factor: There is an interesting duality here, betwen Captain Christopher and Captain Kirk. They are similar men, though one can imagine that Kirk would never settle for what Spock terms Captain Christopher’s “No significant contribiton.” Christopher is thrilled to find out he is going to have a son, even if that means that his contribution will not be as important as his son’s which demonstrates the core of his character versus Captain Kirk who will not have any progeny to continue his legacy. Well, there was the son with Carole Marcus but he doesn’t even know about him until he’s well into his fifties and besides he was kind of a wuss.

Star Trek: The Original Series - “The Naked Time”

One of my favorites from early in the first season, this episode has the most heart-breaking scenes of Spock and Nurse Chapel. It establishes Spock’s conflict too between his human heart and Vulcan mind. Plus Mr. Sulu running through the corridors of the Enterprise bare-chested with a sword is well worth the price of admission.

On Psi 2000, the dead world that the landing party visits they contract a cold-like virus that makes inhibitions disappear and especially for those Irish crew-members (like Lt. Kevin Riley); makes them seem very drunk, even to the point of repeatedly singing Irish ditties.

It is interesting to see how the virus passes from one another but most interesting is to see that the usually overly emotional Captian Kirk is the last one to get the virus (in a fight with Spock that includes quite a bit of slapping, as in “Slap some sense into the Vulcan”). When he does he lusts after Yeoman Rand (with the second-most absurd hair-do in Star Trek history after Nurse Chapel’s silver-platinum blonde wig) but cannot seemingly resolve his feelings for his number one gal, The Enterprise. This becomes the major theme in Kirk’s later life, that he is never able to balance his love of a starship and his love of a woman.

I love seeing Sulu chasing crewmen with a sword and coming on to Lt. Uhura. Sulu is such a passionate character. This is my favorite episode for him.

The crewman Joe Tormolen, who contracts the virus and passes it on, ultimately dies from it. What bothers me in this episode is that his friends don’t seem too upset, which really doesn’t make sense. I mean, especially Lt. Riley! What does an Irishman love more than a wake?

Nuse Chapel confesses her love for Spock in a well-acted and tenderly portrayed scene. Leonard Nimoy and Majel Barrett have amazing chemistry. Most painful is to watch Spock break-down as he leaves Nurse Chapel with a sincere apology. Oh, Mr. Spock, such torment.

He says later to Captain Kirk, “I never told my mother I loved her. I couldn’t love her.”

There is genuine despair in these words which many years later will be reflected when Spock is re-born (Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home) and his mother asks him to pay attention to and nurture his human half.

The Kirk Factor: He’s a little over the top (which in Shatner terms is like being a “little” pregnant) and I love that when everyone gets infected with the virus, they start sweating. Captain Kirk is good sweaty. And when Bones rips the sleeve of his shirt to administer the hypo, well, lets just say the Captain has the kind of shoulder a girl might like to lay her head against. Hubba, Hubba.

Introduction to Star Trek: The Original Series (Season One)

For my birthday this year I decided to get the boxed set of all three years of Star Trek - The Original Series. I had been watching it on G4 on Saturdays and I thought - you know, I should just buy them on DVD. I ordered them from Amazon and they arrived a few days ago. At first I thought I would follow the episodes by air-date but actually I was too eager to begin, so I picked my favorites from Season One and started there.

Thus in no particular order I will explore the strange new old world of a television show that debuted two years before I was even born!

I hope you will find this some-what indulgent and fawning exploration entertaining or at least interesting. I apologize in advance for going on about how hot Captain Kirk is and will keep my general Kirk - Me - Spock sandwich fantasies to a minimum.

Remastered Trek?

I have yet to see the newly remastered Star Trek, but a kind community member here emailed me a link to the trailer on YouTube. I have to say I was initially skeptical - after all, part of the fun in watching an old sci-fi show is the bad effects - but they seem to be handling this much more respectfully than Lucas did with Star Wars.

And I guess, as one person pointed out in the comments, they had to do something with the effects so it wouldn’t look like crap on High Definition.