Not quite.
The Savage Curtain in Season 3. He splits 'em while wrestling with Colonel Green.
Apparently...
Charlie X
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The Savage Curtain in Season 3. He splits 'em while wrestling with Colonel Green.
Apparently...
I LOVE this episode. Nothing scarier than a teen with superpowers. And although Robert Walker did look older than the character he played, i thought his performance was incredible. You actually do feel sorry for him even though he does some very nasty things to some of the crew. And agreeing with Brutal Strudel, that line, "I can't even touch them" is heartbreaking. Aside from the really bizarro scene in the gym, this is a fabulous episode!
Right on re that 'I can't even touch them' line....
When Charlie was taken back to the planet, with their power I thought that they could've created a companion for him. After all his biggest problem was not a power crazy kid but a very lonely person.
I quite enjoyed reading the views held here regarding this episode. However, I must say I found Charlie X hard to sit through without being on pins and needles. I found the fellow who played him kind of creepy and actually scary (which means I found him a very good actor). The crew had no idea of the mortal danger this young man posed for them and that made it doubly intense. Then, when he murdered an entire crew of another ship and did what he did to the young female member of the Enterprise I thought it totally beyond the pale that they (Kirk and the rest) would harbor any sense of regret that this monster should be removed from them. It was as if they did not get the gravity of what Charlie X could do not just to them but to the entire Federation and basically all life forms that this wildly powerful and extremely psychotic youth deemed a threat.
I know they played up the child thing or rather the teenager, but such appearances where just that. In truth this was a seriously dangerous entity that was just on the edge of becoming a genocidal killing machine. I saw no baby in those big blue eyes, I saw insanity. I will admit it was the power he wielded that made him dangerous; however, coupled with his immaturity, and the way he used that power, there was something much more frightening here than awkward youth, jilted love or not fitting in, he was no longer human and actually more dangerous than any salt sucking alien could ever be precisely because he used to be human. What I think Kirk and crew did not get (and that goes for most of us in the real world as well) is that great power in the hands of immaturity, no matter how fair or innocent in appearance is a nightmare unleashed. If he had been hideously ugly and alien I doubt very much his youth would have garnered him any sympathy from them. They would have instantly seen him for the threat he actual was.
I know they played up the child thing or rather the teenager, but such appearances where just that. In truth this was a seriously dangerous entity that was just on the edge of becoming a genocidal killing machine. I saw no baby in those big blue eyes, I saw insanity. I will admit it was the power he wielded that made him dangerous; however, coupled with his immaturity, and the way he used that power, there was something much more frightening here than awkward youth, jilted love or not fitting in, he was no longer human and actually more dangerous than any salt sucking alien could ever be precisely because he used to be human. What I think Kirk and crew did not get (and that goes for most of us in the real world as well) is that great power in the hands of immaturity, no matter how fair or innocent in appearance is a nightmare unleashed. If he had been hideously ugly and alien I doubt very much his youth would have garnered him any sympathy from them. They would have instantly seen him for the threat he actual was.
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I think this episode was very smart and very bold at the same time.
Smart because it drew on a very universal theme that its target audience at the time could relate to: the difficulty of being a teenager and finding ones way in the world. The teenage years are when you finally have to abandon the fantasy world of a kid, but what if at the time you were granted the powers to make your fantasies come true? Would you know how to use your power or would it become too much for you to manage and have it eventually destroy you?
Bold because it continued Trek's daring in ending episodes on a somewhat sad note that not everything will be wrapped up nicely at the end. I mean think about some of those early episodes. McCoy kills his old flame. Kirk kills his best friend. Chapel finds out her old love aint what he used to be. That was some pretty strong stuff back in the 60's.
Smart because it drew on a very universal theme that its target audience at the time could relate to: the difficulty of being a teenager and finding ones way in the world. The teenage years are when you finally have to abandon the fantasy world of a kid, but what if at the time you were granted the powers to make your fantasies come true? Would you know how to use your power or would it become too much for you to manage and have it eventually destroy you?
Bold because it continued Trek's daring in ending episodes on a somewhat sad note that not everything will be wrapped up nicely at the end. I mean think about some of those early episodes. McCoy kills his old flame. Kirk kills his best friend. Chapel finds out her old love aint what he used to be. That was some pretty strong stuff back in the 60's.
Good story, but I did not feel sorry for him, he did manage to kill a bunch of folks and such.
I just watched this episode for the first time and Yeoman Rand is smoking hot in that pink number she's wearing. This ep actually seemed dated and cheesy whereas a lot of other TOS eps do not. Not the story, but the execution which is primarily related to it being made in the 60s.
Plus Chuck's silly, constipated look on his face when he unleashes his wrath upon everyone was just stupid.
That was pretty disturbing. You had to assume the poor girl couldn't breathe and passed pretty quickly.
I saw this one (again) last night, I think it's one of the better episodes honestly. Can you imagine how messed up Charlie's head would be at that age seeing a female for the first time in his life? Lots of pathos in this one.
I always wondered what more they could have done at the end, like maybe they could have tried to arrange some visitation for him? Apparently there was no way they could have removed his powers. Even if he had been allowed to stay somehow, he was still responsible for all those deaths, there would have had to have been some consequences for that.
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