Series: The Original Series – Season One Episode: “Miri” Trek Installment # 105 Grade: C- Viewing Date: December 9, 2009 Earth? Wait, what? The planet’s surface was cool, if not very Hollywood. I felt bad for the dying guy in the beginning. I don’t know why, but he was presented kinda pathetic. Kirk boarders between nice and creepy here. The whole episode was a little creepy. The kids were creepy – especially that green-haired girl. The episode reminds me of a slightly more interesting and better “Terra Nova,” in that it deals with some of the same ideas. It doesn’t do that great of a job. I kinda get the idea they were going for, but there were too many distractions – I spent most of the episode wondering about how it could be a second Earth than the wrapped up in the kids drama. Even though they were children, they were still a little too child-like for being around for 300 years. I mean, I can understand the maturity problem, but at the same time, it seemed like they should have evolved in some way. Somehow.
Series: The Original Series – Season One Episode: “The Conscience of the King” Trek Installment # 106 Grade: B Viewing Date: December 9, 2009 I actually surprised myself by liking this episode. It was a great mystery story and had some real emotion to it. I liked the little things about the episode. I liked McCoy’s attempt to get Spock to drink. Spock’s mention of Kodos and his interest in Eugenics echoes the Eugenics Wars and Eugenics arc from Enterprise. The background music at the cocktail party was great. And Kirk, man, he wanted Lenore bad. I enjoyed their time on the ship, with him giving her a tour of the Enterprise. Riley is awesome. He’s probably one of my favorite secondary characters. The scene where Uhura’s singing for him is pretty nice and lends to the atmosphere of camaraderie that I love so much. I had to laugh at the way his drink was poisoned – was that Windex being shot in there? The shot of Lenore’s eyes on the stage was great, but I’m still surprised Kirk just let her sit there and prattle on and on about Shakespeare. I felt bad for her, but that scene went on and on.
Series: The Original Series – Season One Episode: “The Galileo Seven” Trek Installment # 107 Grade: A Viewing Date: December 11, 2009 This was one of my favorite episodes. In fact, the one scene I don’t like is the very end, when everyone was laughing so freaking hard, it looked like they were hit with a Joker bomb. Spock was obviously the star of the episode and received a ton of great characterization and development. His struggle to use only logic in a command situation and eventually having everything collapse in the end was very well executed. His final decision, being an illogical and emotional one, ended being the right one. Spock’s command style and internal conflict notwithstanding, his approach with the fellow officers, from denying a proper funeral to finally helping with one, marks the same kind of arc from logic to emotion – though it came off as more of an attempt appease the humans. Everyone else was spot on. Kirk had a great scene at the end, when he learned that they were alive. Fantastic acting by Shatner. His stubborn and intense search of the planet was pretty cool and I loved his back-talk to the commissioner. Sulu and Uhura had small roles, but were pretty important overall. McCoy gave Spock reminders that he needed to embrace his humanity; Scotty was a miracle-worker. The Redshirts were pretty smart and spot-on for being Redshirts. The special effects (as I’m watching the remastered versions) were pretty cool too – the quasar itself was neat and the shuttle’s thrusters in orbit was cool. Even the aliens and the planet were well done. Overall, a great episode filled with the kind of emotion, suspense, and drama that one would expect from Star Trek. I could watch it again – easy.
Series: The Original Series – Season One Episode: “Court Martial” Trek Installment # 108 Grade: B- Viewing Date: December 14, 2009 Pretty strong showing here. I really enjoyed this episode, even though the ending was a little over-dramatic for my tastes. Sam Cogley was great and I wish we would have seen him again (of course, he’s no Denny Crane). Cogley really popped with me and gave the episode a more grounded feel. Jaime Finney looked really strange in that sailor suit outfit. Seriously, what the hell? I did like that she turned around in the end. Jaime had a nice role to play in this episode and fulfilled it well. The Enterprise looked really good in this episode. Starbase 11 also looked good too – nice and busy, though Kirk’s academy pals were real asses to him. I love it whenever it’s stressed just how important being a captain is; Stone does a great job of that. But I think Stone was a little too quick to shove Kirk off to court martial. The guy is experienced, decorated and regarded as a pretty damn good captain. For him to be sent to court martial simply because the computer says something is a bit much.
Series: The Original Series – Season One Episode: “The Menagerie Parts One and Two” Trek Installment # 109 and 110 Grade: C+ Viewing Date: December 14, 2009 I really don’t know how I felt about these two episodes. Having just watched “The Cage,” it comes as unnecessary to do a review of those elements. “The Cage?” Awesome, but that was “The Cage.” This . . . is weird. Taking it on its framing story, it’s okay. I liked the way Spock stole the Enterprise; that part was really cool. The Talosians were very effective here and provided a good way to show “The Cage.” But at the same time, the way Spock was being handled bothered me. Like, really bothered me. He kidnaps Pike – even against Pike’s wishes, though that was mainly for Spock’s reputation. He takes him to a dangerous planet that going to get Spock a death sentence (why?). And then, in the end, everything’s fine and Kirk just says “we’ll have a talk later.” I mean, really? There’s no talk about violation of trust, no ramifications of this incident? And why is there a death sentence placed on going there? It is just a mentality thing, to make it seem more dangerous than it is? Why not just tell people “there are telepaths there that will mess with your head and make it seem like you’re mating with your dream girl, who wants no more than to fulfill kinkiest fantasies. Don’t go – it’s worse than it sounds.” I don’t get it. I also thought that Pike’s handicap was incredibly stupid. I suppose I need to tell myself that the delta radiation made it impossible for them to create some sort of interface or . . . something like that. It bothered me also that Pike ended up like that, though it says something to his character that he did by pulling out every one of those cadets.
Series: The Original Series – Season One Episode: “Shore Leave” Trek Installment # 111 Grade: B Viewing Date: December 26, 2009 I love this episode. Everyone’s running on all cylinders, its fun, and a little tongue-in-cheek. It presents a mystery that – while Martine and McCoy “died” – wasn’t grim and didn’t cast a pall over the story. Sulu had some shining moments, as did Bones and Spock. I also really liked Yeoman Barrows, as she was 1) hot and 2) not a cardboard cut-out. Favorite scenes: - Bones’ initial reaction to the white rabbit and Alice was priceless - The cabaret girl from Rigel 2 walking over to Spock and hitting on him (Rigel – most popular system ever) - Kirk and Spock smashing into the samurai while being chased by a tiger - Bones’ “not watching” Barrows change
Series: The Original Series – Season One Episode: “The Squire of Gothos” Trek Installment # 112 Grade: B Viewing Date: December 26, 2009 I liked this episode pretty much for the same reasons I liked “Shore Leave.” It was fun and had a great sense of adventure. Trelane himself was a fun character, played very well by William Campbell. I loved his out-dated love of humanity – including his spouting off ancestry, his German dance, and his fancy house. The Salt Monster and McCoy’s reaction to it were nice touches. Spock’s command style while trying to rescue the crew feels like its evolved since “The Galileo Seven.” Kirk was on top of his game him. He didn’t try to push Trelane around, he was trying to beat him by his own rules. Being patient, talking him into doing something more “fun,” talking him down, etc. Great Kirk there. The whole twist at the end really got me thinking about the location of Gothos. Part of me actually wondered if perhaps Trelane’s parents people created the Shore Leave planet for their children, so they don’t interfere with other civilizations. And, in addition to that, it seemed like Trelane gained a lot of his power from technology – but his parents were energy blobs. I’m waxing fanon, but it’s very interesting.
I think Trelane was a Q kid. Possibly THE Q himself, but I doubt they mature in a century. Still, I expect lots of people must have thought "That's Trelane, all grown up" when they first saw Q in Encounter at Farpoint.
You know, I usually go against fandom when they say that the bottle episodes were the worst. I like those that take place entirely on the various Enterprises, Voyager, or the DS9 station the best, but this episode has always been an exception to that. One of the things I like best about it is that like "The Thoilan Web", it pairs off Spock and McCoy away from Kirk and shows us what their relationship is like without him. That and we get to see in both cases, the kind of Captain Spock would make.
Just a head's up, gang. I'll be off the grid for a couple of days while I switch Internet providers, so up-dates will be particularly sparse. I don't know how long this will take. ----- Series: The Original Series – Season One Episode: “Arena” Trek Installment # 113 Grade: B- Viewing Date: December 26, 2009 What really got me about this episode was that it had these little glimmers of greatness. Mentioning the Cetus Three was an incursion on Gorn space added a nice layer to the conflict. The battle in the beginning, while a little on the over-dramatic side, was pretty cool and we’ve never seen anything like that on Trek before. The core of the story – which is the battle between Kirk and the Gorn with the Metrons judging them – is pretty solid. But it falls apart when Kirk fights the Gorn. I know, the special effects back then were, well, what they were, but . . . it looked like he was fighting Godzilla. Admittedly, it wasn’t that bad when Kirk was on his own and the Gorn was wandering around, but when they were fighting . . . ugh. I was also disappointed that the re-mastered guys didn’t use a little bit of artistic license and create a Gorn ship. On top of that, the whole “build a cannon” thing was really contrived. It worked, I guess, but it was just so . . . ugh . . . convenient. I really didn’t care for that either. Taken from a story point of view, this episode was pretty decent, which is why it’s getting the rating it’s getting.
Cogratulations! You're now as far as I got with my chronological review thread before giving up. One more episode, and you've beaten me.
KA-POW! Series: The Original Series – Season One Episode: “The Alternative Factor” Trek Installment # 114 Grade: C Viewing Date: December 26, 2009 I really have no idea what the hell I just watched, but I did in fact like it. This episode melted my brain. First there's Lazarus, who is lying and telling everyone he's chasing some super-evil anti-life guy. And then he goes in and out of being sane and insane. His beard is constantly changing. His ship looks like something from the Jetsons. There's time travel, holes through space, an anti-matter universe, head wounds that disappear then reappear, crazy negative brawls, and stolen dilithium crystals. Not to the mentioned the universe blinked out of existence like five times! CRAZY. Really need Daniels to come and clean this up. Anyways, even with all this madness, it wasn’t too bad of an episode. I liked Charlene Master’s character, small part that it was. The tragic fate of both sane and insane Lazarus was well delivered and I liked Kirk’s brooding on it. (I cheated with this review a little -- I actually used a portion of a post I did in the TOS forum. Lazy!) ---- I'll be off-line for a few more days as I deal with some really idiotic internet issues. Further, my hope was to have the Trek through Trek done before me and Mrs. W had any babies. Whoops. She's six weeks pregnant. If it's a boy, I'm so naming him Spock.
Thanks buddy! Series: The Original Series – Season One Episode: “Tomorrow is Yesterday” Trek Installment # 115 Grade: B- Viewing Date: December 26, 2009 Ah, yes. A nice and simple time traveling episode. Unlike the previous episode’s debacle and without having to wonder what it has to with the Temporal Cold War, this was a nice straight-forward, fun episode that just got a little weird at the end. Like, really, what was up with the transporter? But this episode was pretty good. I really liked Captain Christopher’s character and thought he was fun. However, I do have to point out just how contrived the time travel was in this one. They hit a black hole and are tossed into the past, and just happen to park right above Earth. It would have made more sense if they had been heading towards Earth instead of “generally in that direction.” [sic] Like I mentioned, the time warp + transporter solution at the end was a little bizarre. I didn’t like it at all. It just felt . . . cheap, I guess. But I did like the episode. Like I said, it was fun and enjoyable.
The backwards clock didn't make sense. The fact that they transported people into themselves didn't make sense. The fact that they did this while still at warp speed didn't make sense. The fact that they didn't run into a past version of their own ship didn't make sense. It just didn't make sense. I agree it was fun. One of the better examples of CGI enhancing too.
I remember that I found this episode just OK, and since I had previously heard that it was really good, I found it rather overrated.
Series: The Original Series – Season One Episode: “The Return of the Archons” Trek Installment # 116 Grade: C Viewing Date: December 28, 2009 I wasn’t exactly impressed with this episode as it was just really Kirk knocking out a computer god by feeding it illogic and then basically turning to the pussy behind him and going “well, your society in chaos is all on you, buddy, see ya later.” There’s a certain smugness to that that really kinda bothered me. Yeah, the society sucked ass, but who was Kirk to do that? Just because the starship Archon crashed there shortly after Archer’s time doesn’t mean that the Prime Directive doesn’t apply. If there’s one thing about Star Trek that I don’t care for, it’s the smug superiority that characters sometimes take on. This attitude that the ‘human way’ of doing things is so much better than anyone else’s. Kirk’s actions may have saved Bones and Sulu and Redshirt, but he just tossed a whole planet into revolutionary chaos. Shouldn’t he have looked for some other way? Or least something more subtle? Computers can be reprogrammed and obviously, the guy who built it was no dummy. Surely he had something positive to say. The episode in it of itself wasn’t terrible, but these are the sort questions that Spock needed to raise. Why couldn’t Spock just re-program the damn thing? Anyways, that’s how it ended up with a C.