50th Anniversary Rewatch Thread

Another one of the BBCs banned episodes apparently! This one because it makes fun of the mentally ill so I've read!
JB

 

When the series got CGI fx in 2006, they could have had Marta's green blood and guts spatter the window when she blew up.
http://tos.trekcore.com/hd/albums/3x14hd/whomgodsdestroyhd0846.jpg
But it would be controversial.

Is it good that Star Trek killed people by making them vanish instantly and completely? I think it made killing too neat.

After that scene, the inner shutters are discretely closed:
http://tos.trekcore.com/hd/albums/3x14hd/whomgodsdestroyhd0982.jpg

 

If anything I'd say gore would make the situation look more ridiculous rather than serious.

 

Whom Gods Destroy is more of a comedy but I agree that Yvonne Craig is the highlight. If Garth had escaped, he could have got up to all sorts of mischief.

I love the magnetic straitjacket used to suspend prisoners - possibly useful to give them a sonic shower? Administer drugs? Not sure what else would be ethical...

The security of the colony seemed a bit all or nothing. I would have thought that there would have been some equivalent of a Prefix code as a fail-safe.

I can get on board with Garth's super powers, more so than Flint's, because his involved genetic manipulation by an alien race which also affected his sanity.

It's also why I felt Garth would have made a better villain in ST Into Darkness. Tactical genius with tenuous grip on reality disguised as someone else with a band of followers being used as collateral, whose genetically altered blood could accelerate cell regeneration. It could have been fun. And who knows what side effects Kirk might have suffered? At the very least, he could have morphed into a cheaper actor for Star Trek IV. ;-p

 

Next time they start a movie saga like a new new StarTrek in a decade and a half;.. They should use a CGI Kirk, that way no matter how famous he'd become he would remain cheap! I am guessing that in fifteen years CGI actors will be indistinguishable from the flesh and blood ones, IOW there won't be any flesh and blood ones.

 

Ha ha! I'm counting on it. I've seen someone layer a Deepfake Princess Leia over the CGI version in Rogue One and it's an improvement on the original in just a couple of years.

I'd love to Deepfake Grace Lee Whitney onto some of TOS extra Jeannie Malone's appearances, maybe even in place of Yeoman Ross or Yeoman Atkins or to edit her entering the bridge in the background to feature some classic concerned softglow close ups in Arena, Savage Curtain, or Tholian Web. There's even dialogue in Grace's Outer Limits appearance that might fit into Shore Leave or Turnabout Intruder using these techniques. A project for after my retirement.

 

The Federation claims to have made a cure that fixes ALL mental illness, so really who exactly is being crazy in this one?

Yeah, it does seem implied from the way they talk about the Axanar peace mission that the Federation came about after that.

Me too!

This one's a bit silly in both the premise and the execution, but I love Yvonne Craig, and it's entertaining enough that i find it rather enjoyable.

It's convenient that in an episode that hails the UFP's glorious past we also apparently get the United Federation of Inmates, with one last remaining insane person for each founding member, probably those that signed the declaration in the first place.

When Garth boasts that he's gonna take over the ship and blow up Antos, Kirk says that the crew would never go along with such orders, but he himself gave out similar orders in A Taste of Armageddon and everyone seemed fine with it back then...

Garth's crew did mutiny against him when he tried it last, so Spock's "there has never been a mutiny on a starship" a few episodes back was an oversight. Spock's method of determining the Real Kirk wasn't very logical either, really the simplest way would have been to shot them both in the first place and let Bones sort them out.

With the repeated mentions of being Masters of the Universe I'm always hopeful for a Skeletor cameo while watching this one, alas...

 

That... actually makes a lot of sense.

 

All we need is to ask Zach Quinto to redub their lines: "I... AM... GARTH" and obviously , "GAAAAARTH!" And we're set for a fan edit.

 

Whom Gods Destroy is a decent episode. Steve Ihnet and Yvonne Craig are both entertaining. Shatner(as Lord Garth) is entertaining when he starts having his temper tantrum. The one thing I do not like is that McCoy is on board the Enterprise. He should be down on the planet with Kirk and Spock. The best episodes tend to be when the big three are working together. I can see him getting some good humorous comments in with Garth.
P.S. Why wasn't McCoy down there? They beamed down there to bring needed medical treatment for the inmates. Seems like Dr. McCoy would have been a necessary member of the landing party.

 

Scotty: Queen to Queen's Level 3?
Bones: Dammit Scotty, I'm a Doctor, not a chess player!

 

The end is nigh, this week we start the countdown of the final ten episodes...

 

And then it continues with TAS but a good deal later...

 

If we go down that road, we'd have to ask why the Captain and First Officer are beaming down at all, at such a cost to the ship's operation and oversight. Just think of one of our nuclear-powered aircraft carriers, and how preposterous that is. The only people going ashore in this one should be McCoy, his aide, and maybe a security guard or two to give him a little contingent.

The only in-universe reason I can think of for Kirk himself to beam down so much is that rank has its privileges, and after being cooped up for weeks at a time, he has cabin fever. He wants a change of scenery.

 

Probably, no one was going to beam down in this situation, but Kirk and Spock went to show respects to Captain Garth and see if he was being treated well and if he needed anything. Garth was a very important symbol to Starfleet and the Federation. To Kirk (and maybe to Spock) he was a hero.

As to Kirk and Spock and usually McCoy beaming down to every planet they see, I got nothing. Maybe Spock and/or McCoy go along because they know they have the only chance to keep Kirk out of trouble. Look how well that turns out...

 

Regarding Kirk and Spock going down there, I think Henoch is right. They wanted to show their respect to Captain Garth. A major figure in Federation history. I want McCoy to join them because he adds something to the story when he interacts with Kirk and Spock. With Garth ranting and raving, I am sure McCoy would have had something funny or profound to say. In show, McCoy bringing the medication was the most logical choice. So that was a head scratcher for me.

 

I definitely enjoy episodes that don't hive off the leads from the supporting characters more than ones that do. The troika is great but there are only so many ways to keep it fresh. This is definitely an example where the writers did what they wanted despite story logic. This is an example where the landing party should have included medical staff like McCoy or Helen Noel. You could even see why a yeoman might have made sense on this type of administrative mission. That said, the way the story plays out, they probably would have just been kept in a cell for the episode.

 

"Let That Be Your Last Battlefield", Episode 70, January 10th

Tonight's Episode: Ebony/ivory and ivory/ebony, live together in perfect dis/harmony...

 

Honestly though, is this episode really any different than the average episode where the leads are used when more logical officers and staff should have been? Even Next Gen stopped relying on “the away team” when the series lead got tired of being left behind.

The only way this would be realistic is if the leads weren’t the senior staff. But Shatner, Nimoy and Kelley were the stars. That means the captain, his first officer and often the chief medical officer would go into danger needlessly. Even good episodes do it.