The Galileo Seven
The Enterprise is required to deliver some urgently needed medical supplies, and to that end, High Commissioner Ferris is aboard to see that all goes to schedule. However, the ship has some time in hand and the prerogative to explore can’t be ignored, especially when the Murasaki Quasar is in range of the ship’s shuttlecraft. Spock takes a team of seven, himself, Scotty, McCoy, Boma, Yeoman Mears, Latimer and Gaetano, aboard the shuttle Galileo and head off into the quasar. But the quasar disrupts the shuttle’s systems causing it to crash on an M Class planet inside the quasar’s influence. With the ever-present Commissioner Ferris reminding Kirk of his obligations, the Enterprise must race against time to locate its missing crew. Meanwhile on the planet, Spock must apply his logical command style to a crew of illogical and irrational humans, as they face repairing the shuttle before the ship departs the region, a shortage of fuel and the threat of the planet’s indigenous humanoid population, giant in stature and primitive in nature.
What idiot drafted the regulation that states that the need to explore supersedes an emergency situation as long as time permits? I mean what kind of idiot would ignore a developing humanitarian crisis in favour of less significant more material concerns? We have to be thankful for this particular idiot however, otherwise Kirk might just have delivered the medical supplies first, and then come back to explore the Quasar at leisure, and we would have had to do without this splendid episode.
I find that my perception of this story has been coloured by subsequent Trek literature, in this case Diane Carey’s Dreadnought. I was all set to praise this episode for having the gumption to portray Boma as a racist, (The idea of a person of colour being portrayed as a racist would have been ahead of its time in the sixties, and certainly considered un-PC today). But to my surprise there is no such portrayal in this episode, Boma’s character was actually re-invented to fit the storyline of Dreadnought, and in no way resembles the character in this episode. I find that this lessens my perception of the book while strengthening my opinion of this episode, I feel quite foolish for forgetting Gene Roddenberry’s vision of a future where bigotry is no longer an issue. The conflict and antagonism that does occur in this episode do so not because of the colour of Spock’s blood, or the shape of his ears, but rather his attitude to the rest of the shuttle crew, and the decisions he makes while in command. While attitudes may have hardened, and the atmosphere became heated, no one ever generalised Spock’s actions down to his Vulcan heritage, rather they attribute his behaviour specifically to him.
The presence of Boma, and the strength of his character are specifically because of this tense situation. Spock’s command skills are to be tested, his ability to relate to a human crew challenged. It’s a tense dramatic situation; tempers fray and things are said that can’t be taken back. You can’t have a series regular say these things; otherwise you drive a wedge between the characters that irreparably damages the character dynamic. Boma as a guest star can say these things, and indeed he is the one that crosses the line into insubordination. It’s a narrow and faint line, given McCoy’s personality and tendency to speak plainly to all around him, but it’s there nonetheless. Where McCoy, berates, cajoles and generally grouches his way into making others re-examine their actions, he never speaks out of malice.
The oddest part of this story is the revelation that the mission on the Galileo is Spock’s first command. I find that impossible to believe, given that he is the second in command of the Enterprise. I take McCoy’s statement to mean that this is the first time that Spock has been cut off from the chain of command, the first time that the assigned mission has become irrelevant and that he has had to redefine parameters and command a new mission, that of keeping the shuttle crew alive long enough to be rescued. But even with that rationalisation it still remains implausible that Spock has never had to work without training wheels before.
But this is an essential plot point, as this is the first episode more or less devoted to Spock, where we get to know the character and what drives him to a greater extent than before. We understand now, just what role logic and pragmatism play in his life as he tries to get the Galileo repaired and off the surface of Taurus II. It’s brought out in stark relief against the emotional and sentimental behaviour of the crew, many of who insist on a burial for their fallen crewmates in the face of attack by the indigenous primitives. The shuttle crew aren’t all of a piece though, and where McCoy and Boma allow their emotional sensibilities to colour their responses to Spock, it is Scott the engineer who seems the most simpatico, working relentlessly to repair the shuttle. I think that Spock acted as a deflector, taking much of the conflict on himself. Were Spock not there, I feel that Scotty would have been just as pragmatic and logical as Spock. This episode also highlighted Spock’s lack of social understanding, and it is McCoy who points out to a totally flummoxed Spock the sheer illogic in expecting irrational beings, whether they are human or the primitives, to behave rationally. This is a Spock who can’t have had much social contact with humans, although whether through circumstance, or whether through personal choice is unclear. I get the feeling that this incident was a turning point for the character in that he must learn to understand and accept irrationality, both from without and within to understand the universe. It’s this naivety in the character that sells the still bizarre idea that this was Spock’s first true command, despite his position on the Enterprise.
The weakness in the story occurs back on the Enterprise in the form of High Commissioner Ferris. This is a wholly unnecessary character whose presence blights an otherwise fine episode. He begins the hallowed tradition of high and mighty muckety-mucks, screwing up situations or getting underfoot on the Enterprise and requiring a timely rescue, or some icy put-down by Kirk. The knowing smirk that the character delivered when the Galileo vanished established him as a villain of the highest order, yet his only purpose in this episode is one of an ambulatory chronometer, popping up regularly to remind Kirk that time was running out. Frankly this episode didn’t need the external conflict, and would have been far stronger with Kirk having to feel the internal strain of duty and loyalty, without a convenient villain to demonise.
This episode also is noteworthy for the technobabble, or sheer lack of it. Uhura gets to deliver a lot of the dialogue normally attributed to Spock, and if you listen to the scientific jargon, you’ll find that it is all valid and real world. They talk about the Quasar’s radiation output and they use measures in Angstroms. McCoy examines the atmosphere of Taurus and he talks about partial pressures of Nitrogen and Oxygen, and traces of inert gases like Argon and Xenon (absolutely no made-up-elementiums). Listen to Kirk talk about the difficulty of finding the shuttle, at first in the Quasar and then on the surface of a planet, and you get a sense of the immense vastness of space. “Finding a needle in a haystack would be child’s play in comparison,” he says. I miss this scientific rigour and reality in Trek in particular, and in television in general, where even police shows have 30-minute DNA tests.
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However, Angela Martine/Teller’s resurrection passes by unnoticed. The episode ends, as it should, with a collective bridge chuckle at a Spockism, although Shatner holds it a little too long, sending it into awkward Dr Evil territory. 
