Production Order Group Viewing 2018

Remember, I'm one scary dude...

 

No doubt!

 

RETURN TO TOMORROW

The actors do a good job in this tale, but for all Sargon's confidence about having a superior mind, Sargon comes across as extremely naïve and only narrowly averts a major disaster to the Enterprise crew. Henoch reveals his evil plan so quickly that I almost had whiplash. Maybe brooding for half a million years left him somewhat impatient?

This is not the first time that the Enterprise has encountered non corporeal, super powerful “near god” beings. However, this is probably the longest that we have maintained continual contact with them. Usually they turn up at the end of the episode, tidy up plot threads and leave (Charlie X, Arena, Errand Of Mercy). The Talosians, Trelane and Apollo were powerful in specific areas, but had finite limits.

The events of this episode show why keeping them around longer is detrimental to the plot as Sargon’s powers are somewhat vague and ill defined: scene after scene he pulls a new power out of his incorporeal hat – at first seeming similar to the Talosians, then his MIND has the ability to affect physical matter like control panels, then he boosts the capabilities of equipment like the Transporter exponentially, he can transfer his mind out of the sphere into a living being, then a mechanical being whilst retaining all his powers and anything else that the plot should require.

Kirk is in full on “explore the unknown” mode in this episode – he takes Sargon’s abduction of the Enterprise, the manipulation of events and the coercion of their bodies all in stride! Remember when “military” Kirk used to object to these things on principle?
Is it possible that Kirk is not acting entirely under his own influence, even before his body was “borrowed” by Sargon?
Thankfully, McCoy is still around to be the voice of caution. I find his objections in the mission briefing extremely compelling (great performance by Deforest Kelly). Of course, his fears are borne out by Henoch’s actions, leading to another great scene: “I will not peddle flesh!”

Other thoughts:

• How is Sargon’s planet similar to Earth, when atmosphere is non existent? That’s a mighty big part of what makes our planet so special!
• In his “big speech” meeting, Kirk refers to “android robots”. Henoch in Spock’s body does the same later on. Isn’t the double term a little redundant?
• Henoch sure masters Mr Spock’s telepathic powers quickly!
• So, now that Spock and Chapel have shared one body, does that change their relationship going forward?

I thought so too - but it seems that this episode is in fact the first notion of an alien seed across the galaxy! I had entirely forgotten about Sargon’s claims in this episode.

 

I never understood why Sargon would develop powers vastly higher than both Thalassa and Henoch. Maybe he developed the mind in a bottle technology and saved the best features for himself, that selfish bastard!

SARGON: In either case, I do not know. It was so long ago, and the records of our travels were lost in the cataclysm which we loosened upon ourselves.
KIRK: A war?
SARGON: A struggle for such goals and the unleashing of such power that you could not comprehend.
KIRK: Then perhaps your intelligence wasn't so great, Sargon. We faced a similar crisis in our early nuclear age. We found the wisdom not to destroy ourselves.
SARGON: And we survived our primitive nuclear era, my son. But there comes to all races an ultimate crisis which you have yet to face.
KIRK: I don't understand.
SARGON: One day our minds became so powerful, we dared think of ourselves as gods.
[and later...]
SPOCK: When the struggle came which devastated your planet
KIRK/SARGON: Only the best minds were chosen to survive. Thalassa, my wife, as you may have guessed. Henoch, from the other side. Realising our mistake, we attempted to perpetuate both sides. We built this chamber here in order to preserve our essence in this fashion.
SPOCK: Fascinating.
KIRK/SARGON: We knew the seed that we had planted on other planets would take root, that one day you would build vessels as we did, and one day you would come here.
SPOCK: These others, they were stored differently than you, but it was your task to remain in the receptacle out there
KIRK/SARGON: and search the heavens with my mind, probing, waiting, probing. And then one day my mind touched your vessel and brought you here.​

Sargon says wars destroyed their planet. Sargon and a few survivors fled into the underground bunker where they put themselves into the spheres for longterm storage.

 

I don't dispute all that - it's Kirk and Spock's initial observations that I find fault with:

SULU: Planet dead ahead, Captain. Becoming visual.
SPOCK: Class M planet, Captain.
KIRK: Close to Earth conditions.
SPOCK: With two very important exceptions. It's much older than Earth, and about a half million years ago, its atmosphere was totally ripped away by some sort of cataclysm. The planet has evidently been dead since then. Sensors detect no life of any kind. ​

I suppose my question is - how is that NOW in any way a class M planet, close to Earth conditions?

 

I like the idea of a female Lt Commander, but Mulhall's rank is subsumed by her credentials. It makes no sense that a biologist should wear red either. I assumed she was also an engineer (which is why she was summoned) but then why not just make her an engineer? None of her dialogue has anything to do with astrobiology.

I find the main plot a bit soapy. It's nice that Chapel gets something to but they should have given her some proper dialogue, let her use her qualifications to supervise and assist Henoch, rather than just being there to carry the hypos. A call back to her previous experience with android bodies would have been nice. Similarly, some kind of effect from her housing his consciousness would have been cool. I like to think it's what inspired her to complete her doctorate.

Nimoy as Henoch is great. That charming smile and his psychopathic disregard for life are both compelling and very creepy. Muldaur on the other hand is way more fun as Mulhall.

I also dislike any ill defined powers of 'omnipotent' aliens but at least they didn't leave behind any information on how to make computers sentient.

 

I think I read somewhere that the actress looked better in red. Or was that Nichelle Nichols?

That would have been great! Sadly, we had our season's worth of continuity points used up last week

I seem to recall her pining over Spock less in subsequent episodes too. Time will soon tell how accurate my memory is...

 

Sargon choose Mulhall because he wanted his wife to be in a healthy, intelligent and pretty body.

I let her clean the hypo's, too.

Thanks.

 

Yikes, I keep forgetting that we share our board with a complete and utter...natural overlord who am glad to serve

 

But what does God need with a starship?

 

Whatever He wants!!!!

 

Agreed, it can't be Class M with no atmosphere. So, either Spock meant, "[Used to be]Class M...", or, the atmosphere was ripped away and now recovered to Class M. It sounds more like the former.

 

Who tidied up the dead bodies that Sargon and his pals used to inhabit as well?

Is that a new kind of lolly pop you've got there, Henoch? Who loves ya baby!!! Probably no one after what you did!
JB

 

I suspect that this was the writer's intention, but SO poorly worded. And from Spock of all people!

After half a million years? Well, there is a curious amount of dust on the floor, so....

 

Ooops! I hadn't noticed that to be honest!
JB

 

Still need bacteria and weather otherwise you'd still have very brittle mummified corpses. I guess if there was moisture and warmth in the artificial atmosphere, that would have been enough. Likely they planned to have conditions suitable to allow the bodies to decay.

 

Sargon said they had bodies and even talked about how Kirk's body was not unlike his old body, i.e. their own bodies before the mind in a bottle preservation. I assume the survivors who undertook the preservation process would want their bodies disposed in a satisfying manner, and not just left lying around the floor, willy-nilly. There may be another room or crypt where they put their dead bodies, or more likely, they disintegrated their bodies. If Sargon was the last to transfer, then his body may be the closest because we know that he needs to be in close proximity for the transfer. Another idea is that he transferred into some sort of system then moved through circuits into the tripod-stand device then into his globe; so, his body could be anywhere, or he set a time delay or triggered some device to disintegrate his own body.

 

Soylent Green is Sargon!

 

The same thing that put all the balls on the shelf.

 

Well they could have done that themselves before transferring into them!
JB