And The Children Shall Lead...

[Poltargyst]

I have never understood why people hate And The Children to be honest! But Plato is bad, real bad! And the Kirk/Uhura kiss isn't really a kiss but more a type of mentally forced attack upon her! It was banned in the UK by the BBC for nearly twenty five years so that must say something about it?
JB

And once again I will come in and argue with you that Plato's is not as bad as you make it out. You don't like the humiliations scenes, I don't like the humiliation scenes, nobody likes the humiliations scenes. Other than that, though, it's pretty good.

 

[johnnybear]

Nah, it ain't!
JB

 

[Commishsleer]

And once again I will come in and argue with you that Plato's is not as bad as you make it out. You don't like the humiliations scenes, I don't like the humiliation scenes, nobody likes the humiliations scenes. Other than that, though, it's pretty good.

Its great - one of my favourites. Great interaction, self-sacrifice, bravery and understanding between Kirk, Spock and McCoy. Alexander was great. Ha Ha,

 

[johnnybear]

Okay, okay! But you haven't won me over one bit!
JB

 

[Poltargyst]

Okay, okay! But you haven't won me over one bit!
JB

Tell me you don't like Alexander.
Tell me you don't like a story where the heroes use their ingenuity to defeat bullies at their own game.
Tell me you're not moved by Spock trying to deal with his anger and breaking the cup.
Tell me it's not a moment to cheer when the knife is turned aside, and Parmen says "who did that?" and Kirk says "ha ha ha, I DID."

GOOD STUFF.

 

[Vger23]

Plato's Stepchildren is one of the worst hours of Trek ever produced.




....and I still find redeeming elements of it.

 

[ZapBrannigan]

Plato's Stepchildren is one of the worst hours of Trek ever produced.




....and I still find redeeming elements of it.

Apparently, the reason for the humiliation scenes was that NBC wanted some eye-grabbing stuff to show up in an episode trailer or promo. That's what the hot iron and whip-cracking over women in slinky gowns was all about. It was intended as crass exploitation, and Star Trek had to find a way to work it into a meaningful story, just to save the show's dignity.

 

[Maurice]

Apparently, the reason for the humiliation scenes was that NBC wanted some eye-grabbing stuff to show up in an episode trailer or promo. That's what the hot iron and whip-cracking over women in slinky gowns was all about. It was intended as crass exploitation, and Star Trek had to find a way to work it into a meaningful story, just to save the show's dignity.

What's the source of this assertion?

 

[ZapBrannigan]

What's the source of this assertion?

I don't recall where I read it, but it's out there, I assessed it as credible when I came upon it, and it more than makes sense. It's not like the producers of serious one-hour dramas, to say nothing of Star Trek, sat around trying to think up the most demeaning and degrading ways to lower the tone of their shows. They were nudged.

During the three-network era, TV shows often faced pressure to film "promotable" scenes that would punch up an episode promo. The quintessential example would be the brief glimpse of a woman in lingerie or a bikini. That bit was certain to make the promo because it was only put in the episode for the purpose of spicing up a promo.

You know how many episodes of T.J. Hooker just so happened to have a scene unnecessarily set in a faux strip club, with a dancer writhing suggestively in a bikini? That moment, unrelated to the plot, would always be in the promo. "Plato's Stepchildren" just seems to have taken the ploy to an unfortunate extreme at a time when Star Trek might have been desperate for a ratings bump.

 

[Maurice]

So, no citable source. Thanks.

 

[ZapBrannigan]

So, no citable source. Thanks.

What do you think this is, a court of law? Is someone on trial for their life? I'm passing on information. Can you remember where you learned each and every thing you know?

 

[Maurice]

I simply asked what the source was. You can't say. I said thanks. Did I grill you? No.

 

[UnknownSample]

Plato's Stepchildren is excellent. I got that the humiliation scenes were meant to horrify, when I was 10 seeing it on first run. I get this chill when Parmen asks McCoy "How can you let this go on?" Michael Dunn is incredible.
---------------------------
AtCSL--- I'm glad fan opinion seems to shifting toward this as worst episode. I have always maintained, though, that they all have good stuff in them, because a very dedicated, talented team of professionals who believed in ST tried as hard as they could, to make bad stories as good as they could get, compensating as best they could for FF's decisions. Everyone was always in character!
------------------
I can think of only one scene, ever, where Star Trek ceases even to BE Star Trek. That's the climactic scene in this story. All sense and all science fiction disappear. I am very aware when magic and the supernatural creep into what are supposed to be science fiction stories. All of a sudden, Kirk talks like he's in a children's fairy tale, and he is. He teaches the kids that ugly equals evil, by predicting Melvin is about to show us his ugly evil, which he then does. So it's not just a kiddie show but one teaching a bad lesson.
-----------------
Spock makes speeches about "evil", a basically magical concept. The backstory he discovers about the people the Gorgan belongs to seems supernatural. Still, until that last scene, they could still have pulled this one out of the fire... it could have been wrapped up in some SF fashion...
-------------------
It starts out as if it could be a good and smart episode. McCoy has some good, adult lines. The guards' beam out into space is jarring. This toughens the story up nicely. Scotty getting all fussy about his engines was fun. The image of the knives in space left a big impression with me.

 

[johnnybear]

Each person had a weakness that the children under Gorgon's influence exploited!
JB

 

[Phaser Two]

Plato's Stepchildren is excellent. I got that the humiliation scenes were meant to horrify, when I was 10 seeing it on first run. I get this chill when Parmen asks McCoy "How can you let this go on?" Michael Dunn is incredible.
---------------------------
AtCSL--- I'm glad fan opinion seems to shifting toward this as worst episode. I have always maintained, though, that they all have good stuff in them, because a very dedicated, talented team of professionals who believed in ST tried as hard as they could, to make bad stories as good as they could get, compensating as best they could for FF's decisions. Everyone was always in character!
------------------
I can think of only one scene, ever, where Star Trek ceases even to BE Star Trek. That's the climactic scene in this story. All sense and all science fiction disappear. I am very aware when magic and the supernatural creep into what are supposed to be science fiction stories. All of a sudden, Kirk talks like he's in a children's fairy tale, and he is. He teaches the kids that ugly equals evil, by predicting Melvin is about to show us his ugly evil, which he then does. So it's not just a kiddie show but one teaching a bad lesson.
-----------------
Spock makes speeches about "evil", a basically magical concept. The backstory he discovers about the people the Gorgan belongs to seems supernatural. Still, until that last scene, they could still have pulled this one out of the fire... it could have been wrapped up in some SF fashion...
-------------------
It starts out as if it could be a good and smart episode. McCoy has some good, adult lines. The guards' beam out into space is jarring. This toughens the story up nicely. Scotty getting all fussy about his engines was fun. The image of the knives in space left a big impression with me.

Hm. But plenty of TOS episodes deal with evil. The Enemy Within. Wolf in the Fold. Mirror, Mirror. Return to Tomorrow. The Savage Curtain. In Obsession, Kirk says of the cloud creature something like "There's a malevolence about it . . . it's evil." Not that I don't get your point about ATCSL, but saying that the manifestation of evil as a supernatural force there ceases to be Star Trek . . . really? It could have been better plotted, but frankly I find the confrontation on the bridge between Gorgan or whatever his name actually is and Kirk and Spock as the ultimate fearless tough guys to be pretty cool. I'm telling ya, fix about six or seven things about this ep and it could have been well above average. And in any case almost nothing redeems The Alternative Factor, Way to Eden is a mess, and The Enterprise Incident is outrageously overrated. JMO of course!

 

[gottacook]

Spock makes speeches about "evil", a basically magical concept.

Oh, really? If you've never met someone who is truly evil - like my widowed father's second wife, who survived him and is the reason why his estate is still not settled after 4 years (even though they divorced more than 20 years ago!) - then you've gotten off easy.

As Mr. Tagomi realized during the briefing to Japanese officials describing the possible successors to the late Chancellor Bormann in Philip K. Dick's The Man in the High Castle:

There is evil! it's actual like cement.
​

 

[Harvey]

Apparently, the reason for the humiliation scenes was that NBC wanted some eye-grabbing stuff to show up in an episode trailer or promo. That's what the hot iron and whip-cracking over women in slinky gowns was all about. It was intended as crass exploitation, and Star Trek had to find a way to work it into a meaningful story, just to save the show's dignity.

Given that the program manager (Stan Robertson) and broadcast standards (Jean Messerachmidt) both had strong reservations about these elements of the script, I doubt it. Also, Paramount cut and delivered the episode promos, not NBC. Lastly, I haven’t seen any memos in which the network dictated or even made suggestions about the content of an episode trailer.

 

[UnknownSample]

Oh, really? If you've never met someone who is truly evil - like my widowed father's second wife, who survived him and is the reason why his estate is still not settled after 4 years (even though they divorced more than 20 years ago!) - then you've gotten off easy.

As Mr. Tagomi realized during the briefing to Japanese officials describing the possible successors to the late Chancellor Bormann in Philip K. Dick's The Man in the High Castle:

There is evil! it's actual like cement.
​

You misunderstood. I wasn't saying "nobody's bad". There are all sorts of foul people in the world. "Evil" is something else. "Evil" implies doing wrong for its own sake, not because of recognizable human motivations. We don't look at what Satan's motivations might be... we know. Satan is evil, he represents evil, everything he does is evil, period.
--------------------------
No matter how sick and twisted a person gets, s/he doesn't become a moral cartoon who does evil just because.

 

[ZapBrannigan]

Given that the program manager (Stan Robertson) and broadcast standards (Jean Messerachmidt) both had strong reservations about these elements of the script, I doubt it. Also, Paramount cut and delivered the episode promos, not NBC. Lastly, I haven’t seen any memos in which the network dictated or even made suggestions about the content of an episode trailer.

I can believe that. NBC might have had nothing to do with it. Maybe I'm guilty of blaming NBC for things Star Trek did. There's a long history of that in Star Trek fandom.

But maybe Paramount wanted the show to get attention, and putting out a promo with jarring and prurient content was an obvious way. And if not Paramount, then Fred Freiberger. Somebody had to want the tacked-on sleaze for promotional reasons, because the other explanation is that "Plato's" weird perversion scenes came about organically, and the artists who made the previous 66 episodes said "Hey, great idea!" And that would be awful.

 

[Maurice]

The Bird got everyone in the habit of blaming the network or studio for everything, because that chip was on his shoulder long before Star Trek or even The Lieutenant. It was his easy go-to scapegoat.