Oh Boy "This Side of Paradise" Had Funny Insults

"Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries!"

An agonizer wouldn't be necessary. Just rile the person up with enough insults to drive out the spores. "Yo' momma is so ugly . . ."

 

^

 

Not a favorite of mine either. Jill Ireland is bloody awful and the "2nd Ruth" music that comes on every single time they're together is over the top. Even for a two second kiss before Spock beams up. It's just slathered over it. There are some great moments, but overall, I don't go back to this one. Honestly, this period of the first season is my least revisited.

Kirk's insults to Spock, though, are blistering. Kirk is brutal and Shatner is on fire in that scene. "You belong in a circus, Spock, not a starship. RIGHT NEXT TO THE DOG FACED BOY!"

 

That and McCoy's "...You want to see how fast I can put you into a hospital?" comeback to Sandoval might be my favorite moments of the episode.

 

Let us not forget that the Enterprise was giving out an annoying subsonic frequency to raise the hackles of the colonists and crewmen down on Omicron as well!
JB

 

I'm surprised some people don't like TSP. I always thought it was great. I liked Jill Ireland and the location shooting especially. It was a great favorite for Leonard Nimoy, along with "The Naked Time," as a chance to cut loose and emote.

Icing on the cake: before the era of Star Trek music on CD, this one in '70s syndication was a chance to hear a variety of tracked-in cues I love from prior episodes. That was important. It was actually a matter of urgency for me as a kid. Kirk returning to the empty bridge, with that music from "The Naked Time", made the episode worth watching all by itself. The following is a partial re-post of what I wrote about it in November 2000 on another bulletin board, long before the 15-CD box came out:

When the spores hit Spock and he convulses, we hear a mystical, suspense-building cue. Alexander Courage wrote it for Captain Pike's entry into the Rigel VII illusion in The Cage. The piece is not included on GNP's soundtrack CD, to my infinite sorrow.

When Spock loses his battle with the spores, he takes an immediate shine to Leila Kalomi (Jill Ireland) and the music artfully shifts into a love theme. It's "Ruth" by Gerald Fried, written for Shore Leave. This becomes Leila's leitmotif, to be fully played in her tearful farewell scene with Spock. (Star Trek Vol 3, GNPD 8030).

Kirk's first view of the mentally altered Spock, hanging from a tree, is tracked with "Old English" from Shore Leave. Originally
intended to suggest medieval glamour and gallantry, here "Old English" conveys a jaunty disregard for both Kirk's authority and Spock's own Vulcan logic. (ST Vol 3, GNPD 8030).

A shot of the deserted Enterprise bridge, which a disconsolate Kirk enters and slowly surveys, is scored with "The Big Go" from The Naked Time (Courage). It is a finely wrought, martial lament that accents William Shatner's performance: resolve in the face of unmitigated disaster. (GNPD 8030 again).

The spores are defeated during a climactic brawl on the planet surface, which provides a welcome chance to hear Fred Steiner's most exciting cue from The Corbomite Maneuver. Originally titled "Cube Radiation," it's an urgent, lapel-grabbing scherzo that I can't get enough of. (On two CDs: Best of ST Vol 2, GNPD 8061; and Varese Sarabande's Star Trek Vol 1, VCD 47235. The Varese version is a very good re-recording by Fred Steiner and the Royal Philharmonic).

 

As a child I didn't like this episode much as it didn't have much action or threat until near the end! But then I never liked The Doomsday Machine much either back then! But now I rate both episodes very highly and Doomsday as one of the very best ever! I think Paradise is an episode you enjoy as you get older and believe that such a lovely place could exist in real life outside of the hustle and bustle of everyday real life!
JB

 

Like some posters!

I know what you mean about not liking this as much when younger but appreciating it more now later in life.

One thing that's very interesting, telling really, is Spock really does have all of these emotions but he's so disciplined that someone that doesn't know him thinks he's emotionless.

The scene when Kirk is calling Spock right after he is infected by the spores is gold, I wouldn't care if the whole rest of the episode was bad (which it isn't) that scene would still stand out.
KIRK : Spock!
SPOCK: Yes, what did you want?

KIRK: Spock, is that you?

SPOCK: Yes, Captain. What did you want?
KIRK: Where are you?
SPOCK: I don't believe I want to tell you.

KIRK: Spock, I don't know what you think you're doing, but this is an order. Report back to me at the settlement in ten minutes. We're evacuating all colonists to Starbase Twenty Seven.

SPOCK: No, I don't think so.

KIRK: You don't think so, what?

SPOCK: I don't think so, sir.

KIRK: Spock, report to me immediately.

KIRK: Spock? Acknowledge.

KIRK: Spock. The frequency is open, but he doesn't answer.
MCCOY: That didn't sound at all like Spock, Jim.
KIRK: No. I thought you said you might like him if he mellowed a little.
MCCOY: I didn't say that.
KIRK: You said that.
MCCOY: Not exactly. He might be in trouble.

Reading it doesn't do it justice, everyone acts and delivers the lines so perfectly, especially the end between Shatner and Kelley.

 

Interesting thought. For all McCoy and Kirk knew at the time, Spock could have been being held hostage and this was his clever way of telling them not all is well with him...as those who know him best know he never normally talks like that.

 

Capt. Kirk) "I said get back to your station."
(Lt. Leslie) "No, sir."
(Capt. Kirk) "This is mutiny, mister."
(Lt. Leslie) "Yes, sir. It is."

(Capt. Kirk) "My orders are to remove all the colonists and that's exactly what I intend to do, with or without your help."(Elias Sandoval) "Without, I should think."
(Dr. McCoy) "Would you like to use a butterfly net on him, Jim?"

 

I never thought about the threats from outer space like the Doomsday Machine, The Vampire Cloud, The Giant Amoeba and the ever present dangers of a Klingon invasion! Although the Klingons would probably also have to submit to the power of the Spores once they beamed down to Omicron!
JB

 

Not a favorite episode of mine as some others have said. May be the script/dialog but seems like a lot of forced acting. I thought McCoy/Kelley's old southern, country doctor was too much over the top and some of Kirk and Spock's bits were too much.

I thought the concept was intriguing as it resonated with "Day of the Trifiids" plant power story but overall a clunker for me.

 

But in a time of when everybody is under stress such a scenario and planet would be irresistible surely?
JB