"THE MARK OF GIDEON" is the most disliked episode of season 3.
Well, that's a surprise. Gideon is not my favorite, but it's a decent TOS episode. I thought for sure that the Gorgan would beat out the Space Hippies for the final dishonor.
"THE MARK OF GIDEON" is the most disliked episode of season 3.
Mark of Gideon doesn't even make my bottom 5.
I think my bottom 5 of season 3 are:
Plato's Stepchildren
And the Children Shall Lead
Turnabout Intruder
The Way to Eden
Whom Gods Destroy
But, the only ones I actually actively dislike are Plato and Turnabout.
Shatner says that the cast and crew knew that Turnabout was their last episode. The feeling of doom and gloom seemed to permeate the atmosphere of TOS' last episode.
Scotty got a girlfriend! Scotty got a girlfriend! THE LIGHTS OF ZETAR lives.
AND THE CHILDREN SHALL LEAD
IS THERE IN TRUTH NO BEAUTY?
THE MARK OF GIDEON
THE WAY TO EDEN
The E replica is certainly a stretch. I wonder if they ever considered making it a mind prison for Kirk that took the shape of the Enterprise.Whether or not "The Mark of Gideon" is the most disliked episode of season 3, it surely is a strong candidate for being the greatest insult to the audience's intelligence.
I thought Gorgon would win again, but I'm ok with Mark of Gideon "winning" It's the reason "bottle shows" have a bad name, there are so many bad premises that I think it's bad, it's in my bottom 9.
1. People that are practically immortal naturally--That have terribly overpopulated their planet
2. respect life so much that their only solution is to give everyone a terrible disease and let them die horribly
3. Have the capability to create a replica Enterprise that fools it's Captain, that last part is the kicker, anyone can build from a schematic, how are they going to recreate the "feel" of the Enterprise?
4. It takes Spock and Scott to notice the coordinates are not the same? Like that shouldn't have raised a massive red flag as soon as something seemed wrong?
5. and last, the episode "cheats"! It shows Kirk beaming down and materializing in one scene as it has in many other episodes, but it didn't happen that way, they got him and intercepted him and then somehow made him think he'd just beamed down?
Unless you consider the message of "Turnabout Intruder" to be that women should know their place and not try to achieve high positions that they'll never be suitable for.
Yeh I'd prefer it to be that Kirk is special and you have to earn your position and the reason Lester couldn't be a captain was that she didn't earn/was suitable for the position.I can understand that interpretation and it may even be what Roddenberry intended the message to be, but in Star Trek's setting I think the message is not everyone can be a starship captain. This was also brought up in Bread and Circuses with Merrick, but he not being a woman and somewhat redeeming himself in the end might make it seem it's more against women in general*, but in the 23rd century that would not occur to the characters, and that's how I interpret it.
*Merrick died allowing the Enterprise crew to escape even though he allowed his crew to be killed, Dr. Lester actively killed her people and was unrepentant and disappointed she didn't kill Kirk and also threatened to kill several Enterprise officers.
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