Requiem for Methuselah Review

[TREK_GOD_1]

Spock who was willing to let his father die and incur his mother's hatred by refusing to step away from the command chair BECAUSE THE SHIP AND MISSION WERE AT RISK -- now thinks it's more important to see who wins a brawl over a robot girl.

Spock was evolving. In "Journey to Babel", Spock was conflicted with duty and the still-raw tension with his father, so he was piggybacking the former to justify his resistance to aiding Sarek. By the end of the episode, Spock made strides, and he would continue to do so in the future, including in the episode in question. He would've been lacking as a character if he maintained the exact, same behavior / approach throughout the series (and would make little sense, considering his bond with Kirk and McCoy).

Sorry guys, but I have always loved "Requiem." A lot.

Its not a perfect episode, but it has many great moments, and like another S3 episode--"The Empath"--it illustrated the depth of the Big Three's feeling for each another beautifully.

• Kirk inspecting the 3-foot miniature as if it's the real Enterprise was mind-blowing for a model-building boy like myself at the time, and I like the scene to this day.

Oh, as a childhood builder of AMT's Star Trek model kits, seeing the "3-foot" miniature as a tabletop model was fascinating, as it made me very aware of the structural changes AMT made for their 1701 kit. It inspired me to eventually build another (and what TOS model-kit builder did not?? ), only closer in appearance to the miniature, as opposed to the product photo on the model box.

McCoy's soliloquy to Spock about "the things love will drive a man to" stands alongside his "Balance of Terror" speech ("In this galaxy...") as one of the best things ever written for McCoy.

Easily one of the best, most honest lines of dialogue in Star Trek franchise history, and obviously involving its best characters. Only McCoy--insightful as ever--could pointedly yet softly analyze his friend with a universe of truth about what drives a man toward / fall into decisions all due to the most natural desire of all: to find that special woman to share his life with. Less than criticism, McCoy--as he stated--felt sorry for Spock for not knowing (or closing himself off from) one of the defining life experiences of manhood, (which placed Spock in quite the sad position), while simultaneously supportive of Kirk's tragic journey.

What's more interesting that he doesn't have Kirk forget about, oh, Miramanee... or anyone else

Considering Kirk openly admitted to being a "lonely man" to Spock--probably something he never said after Edith Keeler or Miramanee--Spock felt his friend had suffered enough to warrant the "forget" command.

 

[TREK_GOD_1]

Flint was amazingly god-like with the technologies he wielded. How did he get so far ahead of all of Federation science (the knowledge from multiple races)? Simply living for 6,000-ish years would not have done it, or he would have been off-planet with warp drive by the time he was DaVinci. Granted, an author can do whatever he wants. But sci-fi readers expect some suspension of disbelief.

This is the same franchise where transporters...anything is accepted (think about everything that device has been responsible for across nearly every ST series), most alien species appear to be humans with lumps and ridges on their faces, and conveniently speak a cross between fluent English or something a little above Tarzan-speak, along with other ideas that are just supposed to be accepted at face value. If so, Flint learning / applying the technology of various worlds over a life spanning thousands of years should not raise an eyebrow.

 

[The Salt Umpire]

This is the same franchise where transporters...anything is accepted (think about everything that device has been responsible for across nearly every ST series), most alien species appear to be humans with lumps and ridges on their faces, and conveniently speak a cross between fluent English or something a little above Tarzan-speak, along with other ideas that are just supposed to be accepted at face value. If so, Flint learning / applying the technology of various worlds over a life spanning thousands of years should not raise an eyebrow.

"That's not a Moon, it's a Death Star!"

Flint would probably have planetary defenses and workstaff, wouldn't he? You're telling me the entire freakin' planet runs, adjusts, repairs, maintains everything by Flint's design? Did he hire Mudd's androids? It's been a while since I've actively watched R4M...so deets.

By the date of TOS, he would at least have warp 1 capability in a private craft. A man rich enough to own a planet with habitable air, climate and gravity near a stable Sun while living off the interest earned over millenia is rich enough to own what he wants.

A sequel would have been nice, but Dr. McCoy killed him off.