Yeah its kind weird episode. I like episode its just the Lazerous guy I think is werid, because its like he's fighting with himself, kind reminds me of Jekel and Mr. Hyde thing.
Alternative Factor: What did I just watch?
- Thread starter thew40
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Just watched this as part of my rewatch - though I nearly fell asleep in the first half hour it isn't all bad. The basics of a good story are there, but there's plenty that doesn't make sense. Was it Harve Bennett that said Star Trek is like sex, even at its worse it is still good.
I'm interested how the remastered version treated this. I've not seen any of the remasters, but I would assume that most of this episode could be redone - the whole "wink explosion" and "negative corridor" things. But as a previous poster pointed out - excellent shot of the Enterprise firing phasers at the planet.
I'm interested how the remastered version treated this. I've not seen any of the remasters, but I would assume that most of this episode could be redone - the whole "wink explosion" and "negative corridor" things. But as a previous poster pointed out - excellent shot of the Enterprise firing phasers at the planet.
Yeah I suppose there could have been a good sci-fi story at the heart of this. The idea of encountering and hating your parallel universe self is certainly an idea that had legs in future sci-fi.
The execution is just so convoluted. The episode drags. And drags. AND DRAGS! It is not good when you are already looking at your watch and the episode is only half over. I put a lot of blame on the actor. To this day I can never tell which is supposed to be the "crazy" Lazarus and which is supposed to be the "sane" Lazarus when they are on the screen.
The execution is just so convoluted. The episode drags. And drags. AND DRAGS! It is not good when you are already looking at your watch and the episode is only half over. I put a lot of blame on the actor. To this day I can never tell which is supposed to be the "crazy" Lazarus and which is supposed to be the "sane" Lazarus when they are on the screen.
Hell, I don't like either. CoToF is implausible in about as many ways as The Alternative Factor.
MikeS said:
I thought the quote was "pizza," but if I'm wrong, then Harve needed to have more bad sex--ugly visuals, genital injury, and the shame, the desperate shame of it all. Yeah, I guess Star Trek can be like bad sex. Except maybe for the genital injury.
I think that was Louis Wu in Ringworld.
Never could figure this one out...I am an avid collector and I avoided buying this set due to Alternative Factor being included...
Heh. How about: Doomsday Device from Dr. Strangelove = the Doomsday Machine. M5 as HAL-9000 (or vice-versa). And how about the "fight music" from Star Trek playing during the fight in Barry Lyndon? Full Duranium Jacket--that'd be a good one. I'd better stop now before I get into some of the more X-rated Kubrick territory; besides, I can't decide whether to go with Clockwork Gorn or Spockwork Orange.This episode melted my brain. First there's Lazarus, who is lying and telling everyone he's chasing some super-evil anti-life guy. And then he goes in and out of being sane and insane. His beard is constantly changing. His ship looks like something from the Jetsons. There's time travel, holes through space, an anti-matter universe, head wounds that disappear then reappear, crazy negative brawls, and stolen dilithium crystals. Not to the mentioned the universe blinked out of existence like five times!
You've just watched Stanley Kubrick's wet dream.
No, I've got to go with the grain rather than against it here: public opinion is correct in its relative rankings of these episodes. "Alternative Factor" gets my vote for worst TOS episode ever. And, yes, I have watched all of the TOS episodes.
Yup, it takes a mightly lame script to knock "Spock's Brain" off of its traditional perch.
At least "Spock's Brain", as silly as the ending is, made a little bit of sense.
At least "Spock's Brain", as silly as the ending is, made a little bit of sense.
actually, it took me perhaps 15 years to finally appreciate this episode. i watched it for the first time when i was 12 yrs old, and had no idea the the hell was going on, but saw many years later, and it clicked. also those mentioning the cool effects shot of the one phaser bank (from the unusual angle, no less) are right on when they say "well done!"
I think one of the reasons I don't hate this episode as much as some of the more modern viewers has to do with my background.
When I was a kid, there were no home VCR's, no Hulu, no DVDs. The sole source of viewing ST was through syndicated reruns. This meant that you got to see one individual episode every few months. You watched them when they showed them, and when you missed your favorite episode, you had to wait till they showed it again. No watching at your lesiure.
However, there was one other source for having the dialogue and action of any given episode availible to you whenever you wanted it. That was in a print form, in the series of book adaptations written by James Blish. Blish accomplished the herculean task of adapting all of the original episodes to book form. (Or nearly, he had just one volume left to go at the time of his death which was completed by his widow J.A. Lawrence.)
What this meant to those of us ST fans growing up i the seventies was that we had the opportunity to read these stories in cold print before we had a chance to actually see an episode. In a few instances, Blish's adaptation of an episode was arguably more compelling than what was shown on screen. I think that "Alternative Factor" was one of these stories which was more effective (and perhaps made more sense storywise) in print, in fact I remember my first reading of the Blish story much more vividly than my first actual viewing of the episode. So I think Blish's storytelling abilites probably colored my view of this story more positively than it otherwise might have been.
When I was a kid, there were no home VCR's, no Hulu, no DVDs. The sole source of viewing ST was through syndicated reruns. This meant that you got to see one individual episode every few months. You watched them when they showed them, and when you missed your favorite episode, you had to wait till they showed it again. No watching at your lesiure.
However, there was one other source for having the dialogue and action of any given episode availible to you whenever you wanted it. That was in a print form, in the series of book adaptations written by James Blish. Blish accomplished the herculean task of adapting all of the original episodes to book form. (Or nearly, he had just one volume left to go at the time of his death which was completed by his widow J.A. Lawrence.)
What this meant to those of us ST fans growing up i the seventies was that we had the opportunity to read these stories in cold print before we had a chance to actually see an episode. In a few instances, Blish's adaptation of an episode was arguably more compelling than what was shown on screen. I think that "Alternative Factor" was one of these stories which was more effective (and perhaps made more sense storywise) in print, in fact I remember my first reading of the Blish story much more vividly than my first actual viewing of the episode. So I think Blish's storytelling abilites probably colored my view of this story more positively than it otherwise might have been.
No one yest has mentioned that the plot has gaping holes, regardless of "production values", bad actor, or continuity problems. Now, maybe these could've been corrected with a re-write, but they weren't.
1. +Lazarus and -Lazarus switch places multiple times in the episode when one of them isn't anywhere near his ship. Why does this happen? They must automatically switch places, so there is no danger of them ever meeting. This happens even when -Lazarus (insane one) is the one "jumping in" and presumably using his ship, and he is *trying* to meet up with +Lazarus.
2. Both Lazari need to get dilithium crystals to power their ships. However, they are jumping back and forth multiple times before they get them.
3. If you try to explain both of the above as some effect of the two parallel universes being "close" so they are jumping back and forth because of "proximity", then why doesn't that happen to other parallel universe characters?
It can be neat episode if you totally ignore the gaping holes in the story. I thought it was a cool episode when I was 10 years old, but I'd like to think that I've become at least a little more intellectually sophisticated in 38 years.
Yes, "The Alternative Factor" shows signs of having been EXTREMELY rushed in both writing and production. The plot is wafer-thin, the science incomprehensible (how does the antimatter Lazarus exist in our matter universe, and vice versa?), and yet, instead of having expository scenes that might clear up some of the confusion, the running time is padded out with footage of spinning starfields and two stuntmen fighting in a closet filled with dry-ice fog.
IMHO, it's the only truly bad first-season ep of Trek TOS. As for Lazarus' spaceship -- excuse me, time-ship (?) -- I found it rather interesting when I first saw the episode at age 13. Now, it just looks like an oversized toy.
BTW, I love your username. Best regards from Gilligan, the Professor and the Howells!
I always wondered about that timeship. Did it actually travel anywhere? It seemed to work by shifting people thru universes as they walked thru the open doorway while the ship just sat there. Seemed like you could park it in the driveway and do all your traveling from there.
I noticed that, too. I thought it might have been a shuttlecraft modified to serve as an alternate universe gateway. Or something like that. Probably best not to scrutinize this episode too much...
I must be among "The Select" who like The Alternative Factor. I like its surreal, "high concept" rendering. I'll even forgive it for not having a good "payoff", seeing as the journey, not the destination, is what I found intriguing about it. I just enjoyed watching it in terms of effects and general Sixtiesness rather than anything they could "wow" me with in terms of story. I read that Lazarus and Lt. Masters were to have a romance, but 1960s Mayberry-loving America could not handle it. 
I thought Robert Brown was quite good, even if his New York/New Jersey accent came through a few times, Lt. Masters was a welcome addition (even getting billing over Nichelle), and the early friction in the relationship between Kirk and Bones, when the Captain was curt and impatient with the good doctor. Kirk even threw some impatient words at Spock ("I want facts, not poetry!").
Were there flaws? Sure! By no means is it classic or top-tier Trek, but at least it wasn't a "Theme Planet" like those who blindly worship season two seem to love and it wasn't the preachfest that several subsequent episodes would become.
The Alternative Factor gets a lot of stick from fans, but I'd place it above Charlie X, Conscience of the King (the first season's true stinker), and probably a few other season one episodes. Despite the fact that the plot may not have moved along like many would hope, the concept itself is fascinating and I really liked this, after years of dismissing it.
Edit: And Mr. Lesley gets lines!
I thought Robert Brown was quite good, even if his New York/New Jersey accent came through a few times, Lt. Masters was a welcome addition (even getting billing over Nichelle), and the early friction in the relationship between Kirk and Bones, when the Captain was curt and impatient with the good doctor. Kirk even threw some impatient words at Spock ("I want facts, not poetry!").
Were there flaws? Sure! By no means is it classic or top-tier Trek, but at least it wasn't a "Theme Planet" like those who blindly worship season two seem to love and it wasn't the preachfest that several subsequent episodes would become.
The Alternative Factor gets a lot of stick from fans, but I'd place it above Charlie X, Conscience of the King (the first season's true stinker), and probably a few other season one episodes. Despite the fact that the plot may not have moved along like many would hope, the concept itself is fascinating and I really liked this, after years of dismissing it.
Edit: And Mr. Lesley gets lines!
Over the years I heard and read a lot of flak dumped onto this and yet I've never really had a problem with it. Yes, it could have been better and so it's not anything awesome, but neither do I find it bad or even poor. In the end it all washes out as okay for me.
As mentioned upthread I agree that the James Blish adaptations sometimes helped fill-in-the-blanks for some episodes. To this day I love the backstory Blish gives us for "Balance Of Terror" as well as his background for "Miri" makes a helluva lot more sense than what we saw onscreen.
Blish also gave us a different ending to "Operation--Annihilate" in that the Enterprise tracks down the parasites' home planet and destroys it.
As mentioned upthread I agree that the James Blish adaptations sometimes helped fill-in-the-blanks for some episodes. To this day I love the backstory Blish gives us for "Balance Of Terror" as well as his background for "Miri" makes a helluva lot more sense than what we saw onscreen.
Blish also gave us a different ending to "Operation--Annihilate" in that the Enterprise tracks down the parasites' home planet and destroys it.
Did we ever actually see the 'sane' Lazarus at all in this episode, apart from the ending bit where Kirk finds himself in the antimatter universe? Seems that all the Lazari that were on the Enterprise were equally nutso. When they supposedly switched, I didn't notice any difference!
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