Anyone Else Love "Whom Gods Destroy"?

[teacake]

I love this episode and Marta's death tears me up every time, such tragedy when she could have been cured. I love the chess exchanges too.

[Steve67]

teacake wrote:

---

I love this episode and Marta's death tears me up every time, such tragedy when she could have been cured. I love the chess exchanges too.

Really? Tears of sorrow? That's definitely a first for this episode!

[teacake]

Yes I am quite saddened that Marta dies. A cure for her madness is so close, yet instead she's just used in the most awful way by another mad man.

[Gary7]

^ Marta is quite a loopy character. I mean, the whole seduction thing with Kirk and then she wants to kill him saying "I have to kill you because you're my lover!" But with the neural conditioner, there'd be hope. I too was a bit distraught at seeing her demise. It was another facet to Garth that makes you realize what a monstrous personality he'd become. There was really no good reason to kill her. His explosive could've been tested out in a far less permanent manner...

[Steve67]

teacake wrote:

---

Yes I am quite saddened that Marta dies. A cure for her madness is so close, yet instead she's just used in the most awful way by another mad man.

Gary7 wrote:

---

^ Marta is quite a loopy character. I mean, the whole seduction thing with Kirk and then she wants to kill him saying "I have to kill you because you're my lover!" But with the neural conditioner, there'd be hope. I too was a bit distraught at seeing her demise. It was another facet to Garth that makes you realize what a monstrous personality he'd become. There was really no good reason to kill her. His explosive could've been tested out in a far less permanent manner...

While I wasn't saddened by Marta's demise, I found it somewhat disturbing that we're watching her death through the viewscreen at the base. There's a creepy detachment to the proceedings, as if it's some kind of experiment. I doubt this was the intention, but that's what I took away from it.

[LibraryComputer]

Not to bad for a third season episode.

[Steve67]

LibraryComputer wrote:

---

Not to bad [sic] for a third season episode.

It's also quite good for, say, a second season episode. It's nowhere near as wretched as Patterns of Force, The Immunity Syndrome, or I, Mudd. In fact, Whom Gods Destroy is head-and-shoulders above a lot of season two.

[RandyS]

Steve67 wrote:

---

It's also quite good for, say, a second season episode. It's nowhere near as wretched as Patterns of Force, The Immunity Syndrome, or I, Mudd. In fact, Whom Gods Destroy is head-and-shoulders above a lot of season two.

You are certainly correct that it's better than Patterns of Force. I'm not so sure about the other two though.

But then, I think Whom God's Destroy is head and shoulders above City on the Edge of Forever, so what do I know?

[T'Girl]

Patterns of Force was heavy handed, but still a decent prime directive story. I also generally liked The Immunity Syndrome, it gave Chekov and Uhura something different to do.

[CobraCommander]

I guess I'm going to raise this thread back to life once more. I've been lately watching seasons 2-3 on laserdisc trying to see all episodes in order. Some episodes I skipped over since I know what happens and some I hadn't seen before. When I saw this episode last night, I personally felt it was a great episode. I especially liked the scene where Kirk was trying to reach "Starship Fleet Captain" Garth by trying to force him to look back at his former life. It was moving the way Ihnalt responded that those memories thought processes were from a time of a previous life that was now alien to him. I also felt that Kirk was Luke Skywalker trying to reach Darth Vader's (Garth's) humanity by practically stating that Garth was his gold standard of what it means to be a Captain. The overacting didn't bother me. Hovever comical it felt at times, it made what happened to Marta shocking and showed that Garth was pretty dangerous. I also liked how Garth received treatment in the end instead of being killed. IMHO, it is the shades of gray that made Star Trek great. On the flip side, I saw "The Mark of Gideon" tonight and felt that that was the worst TOS episode I have ever seen so far. Cobra

[CobraCommander]

I forgot to mention a funny story. When watching the scene where Garth/ Shatner has a tantrum and completely loses it, there was a cat in my backyard that started screaming and going berserk itself! It freaked me out since it was 2AM at the time and it sounded right next to my house.

[ssosmcin]

Steve67 wrote:

---

I think that Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea (and to a lesser degree, Lost in Space) must hold some kind of record for being "more sixties" than even TOS! I'd like to give Voyage a look through adult eyes.

I know this is like a year and a half old, but I just saw it. Anyway, how could Lost in Space be more 60's to a lesser degree than Voyage? LIS had garishly colored costumes, the two (count em, two) space hippy episodes, and some really groovy music. Voyage was mostly military in setting, which doesn't age in anything other than technology. The costujes were very neutral; khaki's and coveralls. One guy was a surfer for a season, but he cut out the jargon pretty quickly, so he would be the only person to ground it in the era. No women in miniskirts and go-go boots, almost no women at all in the latter half of the series, so the chauvinistic attitudes were barely there (one female guest was actually one of the designers of the Seaview - take that Star Trek's no female captains). Actually, Voyage probably aged better in that regard than either LIS or Trek. Even the effects have stood up better. Also, Richard Basehart. :-)

Nah, Lost in Space was as 60's as 1960's sci-fi got. Then Trek and way down the list, Voyage.

[TREK_GOD_1]

Ziz wrote:

---

She was at WonderFest last year and had some GREAT stories about Shatner's ego and filming that episode. When I have time to sit and remember it all, I'll come back.

In my opinion, she's kind of shameless with her Shatner stories. I recall conventions dating back to the 80s, where she used that one shooting experience as some sort of "insider" insight about Shatner overall. She's also torn apart Bruce Dern (co-starring in a 1970 episode of Land of the Giants) by going on and on about how Dern's alleged body odor.

Using negative stories (which cannot be verified) to pad her limited career is just low. Funny how she does not care to discuss how she's almost universally cited as the most significant reason for the rapid decline of the 60's Batman TV series, when her performance as Batgirl was supposed to boost ratings.

Whoops.

[T'Girl]

Bottom of the Sea was the one actually set in the 1960's.

[Melakon]

I recall a Voyage episode once opening with a year of the 1970s, so it may have intended to be about 10 years in the future... or maybe that was Land of the Giants. I think both were on Sunday night, which was church night (Dad was the preacher), so I never saw much of either.