50th Anniversary Rewatch Thread
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One thing today's fan will notice about "The Cloud Minders" is the giant leap in fx quality that CBS Digital achieved for the TOS-R version. Stratos goes from a simple, toy-like model in a big cotton puff to a photo-real floating city, rich in detail and "natural" lighting. If you have the Blu-ray set, this is one to watch the new fx version rather than the original.
Vanna really jumps out to me re-watching this episode. She's possibly the best portrayal of a female guest star in the entire series. Right from the jump she's involved in the hand to hand combat and more or less holds her own, she's presented as the righteously outraged leader of the revolt, she's intelligent and resourceful, she's the one who strikes a deal with Kirk in the end despite Plasus, and she diffuses the lizard brain fight between Kirk and Plasus twice.
Compare that to numerous other women on the show who are hopelessly smitten with men to the point of their own downfall (Dehner, MacGivers, Romulan commander), literally insane (Lenore Karidian, Miranda Jones), shallow love interests (so many), or basically set dressing (entire cast of Spock's Brain, Mira Romaine). Even the stronger female characters in the show are often defined by their relationship to the male leads (Nona, Marlena Moreau), but Vanna stands out as having enough agency and competence to be a leader in her own right and avoids falling hopelessly in love with Kirk. A low bar, but noteworthy given the other characters presented.
The hopelessly vapid Droxine suffers from sharing the stage with Vanna, of course. I was honestly trying to figure out if they kept her in the episode just to show off the amazing costume, but I guess she's also there to show how the indoctrination of the city dwellers is passed on through the generations with little critical though but that, with time, there's hope for change. A flimsy justification for her ridiculousness but it's something ...I guess?
I wonder how long she lasted in the mines?
The rest is a paint by numbers have/have-nots allegory, with the added bonus of being even more relevant in modern times than in the '60s arguably. The denial that the Zenon gas could be harmful despite scientific consensus felt like a clumsy bashing of GOP politicians and their supporters denying climate change, except that silliness didn't even exist yet. And the workers rising up after being unfairly suppressed via a campaign of miseducation could be applied to any number of racist and/or classist circumstances in the 21st Century. So kudos to the writers for putting together a cookie cutter parable that can stay relevant over time, if nothing else. This one may play better in 2019 than 1969.
The production is, of course, an adventure. All kinds of bad cuts/edits with Kirk's pantomime being the most famous, but I also got a kick out of how poorly cut together the last scene on Stratos was. The fight at the beginning was a bit better than a typical Star Trek fight of the era, and the director did some decent use of height/perspective to really drive home the have/have nots angle.
So, yeah, it may be heavy handed, but I kinda liked this one! didn't expect that honestly.
Compare that to numerous other women on the show who are hopelessly smitten with men to the point of their own downfall (Dehner, MacGivers, Romulan commander), literally insane (Lenore Karidian, Miranda Jones), shallow love interests (so many), or basically set dressing (entire cast of Spock's Brain, Mira Romaine). Even the stronger female characters in the show are often defined by their relationship to the male leads (Nona, Marlena Moreau), but Vanna stands out as having enough agency and competence to be a leader in her own right and avoids falling hopelessly in love with Kirk. A low bar, but noteworthy given the other characters presented.
The hopelessly vapid Droxine suffers from sharing the stage with Vanna, of course. I was honestly trying to figure out if they kept her in the episode just to show off the amazing costume, but I guess she's also there to show how the indoctrination of the city dwellers is passed on through the generations with little critical though but that, with time, there's hope for change. A flimsy justification for her ridiculousness but it's something ...I guess?
I wonder how long she lasted in the mines?
The rest is a paint by numbers have/have-nots allegory, with the added bonus of being even more relevant in modern times than in the '60s arguably. The denial that the Zenon gas could be harmful despite scientific consensus felt like a clumsy bashing of GOP politicians and their supporters denying climate change, except that silliness didn't even exist yet. And the workers rising up after being unfairly suppressed via a campaign of miseducation could be applied to any number of racist and/or classist circumstances in the 21st Century. So kudos to the writers for putting together a cookie cutter parable that can stay relevant over time, if nothing else. This one may play better in 2019 than 1969.
The production is, of course, an adventure. All kinds of bad cuts/edits with Kirk's pantomime being the most famous, but I also got a kick out of how poorly cut together the last scene on Stratos was. The fight at the beginning was a bit better than a typical Star Trek fight of the era, and the director did some decent use of height/perspective to really drive home the have/have nots angle.
So, yeah, it may be heavy handed, but I kinda liked this one! didn't expect that honestly.
Droxine got sent to the mines? How do I not remember that?
"The Cloud Minders." This was the first episode I saw when I was a kid, probably in 1970 maybe '71. It made quite an impression.
My favorite moment hands down is Kirk stopping Vanna from being tortured. For me that's in the top ten moments of the entire series.
The Cloud City set is a triumph. I love their transporter platform and their transporter effect too.
I still have to ding the episode for depicting Spock way out of character, regarding his discussion of Vulcan mating with Droxine. None of the rationalizations that I've seen work.
I remember having to comfort one of my grade school friends when she was horrified that the Troglyte miner jumped. Ah, childhood....
So, yeah, for many reasons this episode will always hold a special place for me, mixed bag that it is.
My favorite moment hands down is Kirk stopping Vanna from being tortured. For me that's in the top ten moments of the entire series.
The Cloud City set is a triumph. I love their transporter platform and their transporter effect too.
I still have to ding the episode for depicting Spock way out of character, regarding his discussion of Vulcan mating with Droxine. None of the rationalizations that I've seen work.
I remember having to comfort one of my grade school friends when she was horrified that the Troglyte miner jumped. Ah, childhood....
So, yeah, for many reasons this episode will always hold a special place for me, mixed bag that it is.
Vanna is a great character for sure; one of the stronger characters whose role is story driven rather than revolving around one of the men.
I think the notion that poverty stunts development and that too wide a gap between the rich and the poor is toxic to society is actually something for which there is even more evidence today. As one of the more subtle (and I use the the word subtle very loosely ) allegories in the series, the episode is as relevant if not more relevant today.
I concur that Droxine was vapid despite her education but this is also not uncommon in the growing instagram generation where some people can earn a living by putting every boring thing they do out to tender.
Star Trek
"The Cloud Minders"
Originally aired February 28, 1969
Stardate 5818.4
What was going on the week the episode aired.
Going directly to the mine seems like a stupid move. You gotta go through channels, the grunts in the mines might not be authorized to hand over the stuff that they just mined. For that matter, if these guys mine zenite all the time as a regular thing, exporting it all over the galaxy, you'd think there'd be some out there on the market, so you didn't have to go directly to the source. For that matter, you'd think the Stratos-dwellers would have people on the ground keeping the Troglytes in line. One would also think that being constantly exposed to the zenite, the Troglytes would have developed a tolerance. And there's no sign of any infrastructure on the surface. The whole operation seems penny ante...like the city and the mines are run by the small handful of individuals that we see.
What they're doing here isn't new...Wells did it in The Time Machine. But the basic situation can stand for any number of inequitable situations in the real world, from caste systems to apartheid to American segregation.
Diana Ewing comes to us the same week that she made an appearance on Mission: Impossible.
Spock's litte voiceover contemplation is an unusual touch.
The fit of the filter masks is laughable.
I always got a laugh out of how the knob on Spock's viewer just drops when he lets go of it. Such a finely honed instrument!
"Captain! The zenite gas!" Kinda makes me nostalgic for the early days when he yelled everything.
Two score and ten years ago next week:
"The Cloud Minders"
Originally aired February 28, 1969
Stardate 5818.4
H&I said:
What was going on the week the episode aired.
Going directly to the mine seems like a stupid move. You gotta go through channels, the grunts in the mines might not be authorized to hand over the stuff that they just mined. For that matter, if these guys mine zenite all the time as a regular thing, exporting it all over the galaxy, you'd think there'd be some out there on the market, so you didn't have to go directly to the source. For that matter, you'd think the Stratos-dwellers would have people on the ground keeping the Troglytes in line. One would also think that being constantly exposed to the zenite, the Troglytes would have developed a tolerance. And there's no sign of any infrastructure on the surface. The whole operation seems penny ante...like the city and the mines are run by the small handful of individuals that we see.
What they're doing here isn't new...Wells did it in The Time Machine. But the basic situation can stand for any number of inequitable situations in the real world, from caste systems to apartheid to American segregation.
Diana Ewing comes to us the same week that she made an appearance on Mission: Impossible.
Spock's litte voiceover contemplation is an unusual touch.
The fit of the filter masks is laughable.
I always got a laugh out of how the knob on Spock's viewer just drops when he lets go of it. Such a finely honed instrument!
"Captain! The zenite gas!" Kinda makes me nostalgic for the early days when he yelled everything.
Two score and ten years ago next week:
That just makes me like it more.
Agree with the comments about Vanna. She is a strong character, certainly a stronger character than Droxine. I disagree though that Miranda Jones was insane. Dealing with some issues, yes, but insane seems a bit strong. I think Miranda was a great character too.
Of course they don't hold a candle to the great Dr. Helen Noel...
I should imagine that Droxine came out of the mines and said I don't want to do that again! I'll get my Daddy to fix it so I don't have to and the whole thing erupts in terrorism once again with the Federation getting involved! But seriously folks! We aren't meant to find out and it's up to our own minds about what happened next but I doubt Droxy stayed down in the caves for very long! 
JB
JB
Surprised he didn't make some sort of quip and render this an outtake. I guess it didn't strike him as funny.
"Mr. Scott to the bridge. Bring a Phillips head."
The Cloud Minders is a solid episode. I agree that Vanna is a strong character. Very well acted. Jeff Corey is also one of my favorite actors. I was reading Allan Asherman's Star Trek Interview book recently and I found out in the Leonard Nimoy interview that Jeff Corey was his acting teacher. Nimoy had been an actor for awhile but he did not really understand how to be a good actor until he studied under Corey. Corey really opened up his mind on acting. Another bit of trivia was that Jeff Corey was blacklisted in the 1950s during the Red Scare. This must have been about the time that he turned to teaching acting.
I agree that Kirk stopping the torture is a great scene.One of the best. I think it is important for our heroes to be against torture. Forcefully against it. Torture is wrong. I don't like shows that start to fudge on that fact. There are no shades of gray when it comes to torture for me."The Cloud Minders." This was the first episode I saw when I was a kid, probably in 1970 maybe '71. It made quite an impression.
My favorite moment hands down is Kirk stopping Vanna from being tortured. For me that's in the top ten moments of the entire series.
The Cloud City set is a triumph. I love their transporter platform and their transporter effect too.
I still have to ding the episode for depicting Spock way out of character, regarding his discussion of Vulcan mating with Droxine. None of the rationalizations that I've seen work.
I remember having to comfort one of my grade school friends when she was horrified that the Troglyte miner jumped. Ah, childhood....
So, yeah, for many reasons this episode will always hold a special place for me, mixed bag that it is.
I'm appalled at how casually heroes resort to torture in popular culture AND how often it works, despite the evidence to the contrary. I started watching Fear the Walking Dead but stopped after the torture and when the heroes deliberately massacred a hospital. These are the heroes? The last straw was when the writers turned the poor guy who was tortured into the villain to underscore the fact that liberalism only leads to bad outcomes. The right things to do were torture, kill your victim after they've given you information, and then massacre those who associate with people who have different goals to you...
Sounds like a terrible show to me.
I don't mind heroes being flawed as long as the writing acknowledges those flaws. In FtWD, I got the strong impression that any disapproval was directed at characters who were altruistic or humane. Not a single character considered or pointed out that attacking a hospital would be a war crime.
TOS was a mixed bag as far as morality goes but I can at least visualise the characters considering that massacring a hospital was morally repugnant and a crime worthy of punishment.
It always seemed a little over the top for me for Kirk to say that the only way Plasus would use the device again is if it was on him. By all means, stop the torture, but there's no reason for Kirk to offer himself or Spock up for torture.
Didn't she say she would visit the mines with the cute "protectors"?
While I really dislike Droxine I suppose I should give her credit because she's willing to learn here - more than her father. She just appears so privileged earlier on in the episode so its hard for me to like her.
This episode ranks in my bottom 10 because of the Spock Droxine "romance". It comes from nowhere and seems really out of character for him.
Yes Vanna is a good character and shows that in TOS women can be leaders (if not working in Starfleet of course).
I've only seen the first two seasons of FTWD! When does this torture stuff show up in the series?
JB
They did visit a hospital in one of the series but I can't remember any torture except by the policeman keeping everyone hostage at the hospital. Was it here - maybe I've forgotten it. I can't see past Season 5 of Walking Dead. It makes me depressed. Although I think its a great series.I've only seen the first two seasons of FTWD! When does this torture stuff show up in the series?
JB
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