Star Trek: Start to Finish

Turnabout Intruder

TOS’s final episode, Turnabout Intruder (Netflix; Memory Alpha), gives the whole crew a chance to go out acting, and all but the most important role does great.

The Enterprise finds a decimated colony whose lead scientist is Janice, an old Starfleet flame of Kirk’s (who isn’t, right?). She’s still mad because women can’t be captains and she wanted Kirk’s life, so she uses Alien Technology™ to switch bodies with James.

Let’s pause here and count the bits of free-floating silliness we’ve already got. First, what the hell with the sexism, Starfleet? You guys are the future but you’re still doing things that are obviously on the way out in the 60s? Second, why is that Alien Technology never ever mentioned again? Last, Kirk is put into the body of a woman and not once does he play with that. That’s an opportunity Kirk wouldn’t miss.

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But back to the episode. Janice-as-Kirk gets Kirk-as-Janice put into sick bay, but Janice-as-Kirk is obviously acting weird. Spock and McCoy get suspicious, but they can’t prove anything. Spock mind melds with Kirk-as-Janice and then makes an ill-considered jailbreak attempt, which leads to a courtroom bit and mutiny charges for everyone and a sit in and another jailbreak and a silly resolution involving special effects and no sense.

This episode is basically the archetype of Season 3: it takes characters you love, puts them in a slightly new odd situation, then completely fails to deliver anything resembling a logical resolution while nevertheless churning out a few perfect moments.

Let’s go over the best one before we return to trashing the episode. Scotty and McCoy are outside the aforementioned mutiny trial. They’re two thirds of the jury tasked with convicting or acquitting Spock, and they discuss what will happen if they go against the increasingly deviant Captain. The weight of the decision is obvious, and they know both what they have to do and the insanity and labor ahead. It’s well written and well acted, and you can tell how comfortable these two are in their roles.

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But it’s got, buried in the brilliance, this line:

Scotty: “I’ve seen the captain feverish, sick, drunk, delirious, terrified, overjoyed, boiling mad. But up to now I have never seen him red faced with hysteria.”

That they actually use the word ‘hysteria’ is the kicker. This episode, see, is one long tirade about how women are weak. Let’s return to Starfleet’s apparent sexism. It’s not clear who we’re supposed to be mad at about this. The policy seems crazy and stupid to my mind, and I initially assumed I should feel a good women’s-lib vibe and blame The Man for all our woes. But the episode resolves around how obvious it is that Janice isn’t cut out to be a captain anyway. And it’s not too big a leap from there to why the policy exists, except for Kirks throwaway line at the top of the episode that he’s against the rule, too. Are we supposed to blame Janice’s insanity on this rule, and think that if she was allowed to become a Captain it would have all been fine? That seems ridiculous, not only because Kirk says she’s not fit for the post “temperamentally or by training”. We see this theme echoed with Nurse Chapel being a willing patsy to keep Kirk-as-Janice locked up in sickbay, with Uhura missing and a weaker woman in her chair, and with repeated focus to Janice’s womanly wiles and petty grievances.

And don’t even get me started on the scene where Janice-as-Kirk uses a nail file while talking to senior staff, or I might have to kill someone.

Grade

C-, but only that high because Scotty and McCoy get a great scene.

Requiem for Methuselah

Requiem for Methuselah (Video; YouTube; Memory Alpha) gives too much away in the title, but is otherwise excellent.

The crew is suffering from Rigelian Fever, which will kill them all in a few days. They need ryetalyn quickly to make an antidote, and when they land on the only planet within range that’s got it, they’re shot at by a robot drone and threatened by an old guy who owns the place.

But when they threaten him back, he invites them to his house, introduces himself as Flint, offers them all the ryetalyn they need, and even offers to make the antidote for them. As if that weren’t fishy enough, he’s got never-catalogued da Vinci paintings and scores by Brahms and expensive manuscripts. And a hidden girl (there’s always a girl).

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I hesitate to even put this in the spoilers box, because the title already gives it away: this guy has been a live for thousands of years; he can’t die and has collected all this stuff, and claims to have been the historical da Vinci and Brahms. No surprises there, but it is interesting that he’s not an alien or anything; he’s just naturally and inexplicably immortal. He has no idea why and no explanation is given or even tossed out as a possibility.

His relationship with the hidden girl Rayna is more mysterious, and it’s fittingly the axis around which the plot turns. But let’s ignore the Rayna/Flint dynamic and focus on the inevitable Rayna/Kirk dynamic. Kirk meets her briefly for two scenes and is smitten. He loves her, says as much, and when he claims with certainty that she loves him back, she doesn’t argue. Later Flint and Spock both affirm that love. A possibility that I had never even entertained before suddenly hit me:

What if Kirk isn’t just a womanizing wanderer? What if he actually likes these girls? What if he’s just the most lovesick person to ever set foot on a starship, and he just has the best luck at finding people but the worst luck keeping them around? What if Kirk is, in short, a tragic hero, whose capacity for love drives him to greatness, but whose heart is always dashed on the rocks by fate?

That’d be a pretty awesome, moody, interesting character. But I don’t really think that’s who Kirk is. Kirk is a womanizer, he does just wander into relationships and then have no problem taking off, and when things do get serious the universe kindly shatters all possibility of a lasting commitment by conveniently killing off whomever Kirk banged this week.

And the Flint/Rayna bit is interesting, but you’ll have to watch the show for the full details. All I’ve got to say about that is: why is Data so novel, since the universe is apparently teeming with androids?

Now all this is good. Great, even. You get Kirk dealing with who he is, an interesting pair of guests, a neat dynamic between those three, Spock there to support, McCoy there to comment, and a messy, tragic end that leaves almost everyone shattered. But then the last scene is an absolutely perfect capstone, where Spock uses his Vulcan Mind Meld to help Kirk in whatever little way he can, because he knows that his friend needs it. We as an audience are left wondering if he knew by himself or because he listened to McCoy’s fantastic paean to love. We also get to wonder whether Kirk ever finds out. But it’s a wonderful show of mercy (an emotion?) on Spock’s part, and it’s woven so perfectly into the plot that it pulls everything together and emphasizes all the right points.

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Best Bit of Dialog

McCoy: You see, I feel sorrier for you [Spock] than I do for him [Kirk] because you’ll never know the things that love can drive a man to. The ecstasies, the miseries, the broken rules, the desperate chances, the glorious failures, the glorious victories. All of these things you’ll never know simply because the word love isn’t written into your book.

Grade

A+; easily one of my favorite episodes in a long time, if not the whole series.

That Which Survives

That Which Survives (Video; YouTube; Memory Alpha) is the episode where Mr. Spock is as annoying as he actually would be if you knew him, and you want to punch him in the face. Sadly, no one in this episode does so.

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There is, though, a holographic woman who kills by touch, an artificial planet, a black second-in-command in sickbay and a woman helmsman. There’s the continued confusion over how fast the Enterprise can go before it blows up, and a not-terrible plot. But mostly this episode is completely forgettable.

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Best Dialog

Spock: “Can you give me Warp 8?”
Scotty: “Aye, sir. And maybe a wee bit more. I’ll sit on top of the warp cores meself and nurse them.”
Spock: “That position would not only be unavailing; it would also be undignified.”

Grade

C

Mirror, Mirror

Mirror, Mirror (Memory Alpha; SD Video) is that episode where they go to the alternate universe where everyone has a goatee.

Except only Spock has a goatee.

Now, everyone remembers the savage-alternate-universe thing, but it’s played rather nicely as a foil against the planet this episode takes place in orbit of. The inhabitants are a peaceful people who are refusing to give their dilithium crystals to the Federation, because they as a people are pacifists. The episode begins with Kirk’s assurance that the Federation can be trusted with the crystals, since they are good guys. And immediately we’re thrown into the goatee universe, where no one is a good guy.

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Except the one guy with a goatee. Chekov attempts to assassinate Kirk, and fails. Sulu does, too. So all the foreigners are sinister in the mirror universe, but the jewish guy is alright. There’s some subtext here, and it’s not buried very deep.

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There’s also a nice talk by Kirk about society, and how harmonious living is beneficial for all and sustainable, whereas the kill-or-be-killed mirror universe is destined for destruction down it’s path of constant sorrow. I read this as Kirk’s preëmptive rhetorical strike against the neoconservatives. Especially this bit, which seems rather prophetic:

Kirk: Conquest is easy; control is not. We may have bitten off more than we can chew.

Also, Uhura is actually important this episode. She gets not one but two good scenes, and a fight sequence. She almost but doesn’t say that she’s frightened. She actually makes a difference.

And Marlena is another female character who’s interesting and strong and smart, who takes a stand. She’s a love interest, but not really; her interest is the other Kirk, and the internal conflict she plays with “our” Kirk is well done.

All told, this is a strong episode. The mirror universe is cheesy, but not really more so than the “actual” universe. And the mechanics for interdimensional travel are all sorts of vague while also being a snap for the computer to calculate. But if you overlook that, it’s well-constructed and does a fine job.

Grade

A

Who Mourns for Adonais?

Who Mourns for Adonais? (Memory Alpha; SD Video) is a rather smart little episode where the Enterprise stumbles upon the hiding place of the Greek God Apollo.

To fulfill the corny quota, he stops them with his giant green space-hand. Then he requests the officers to join him on his planet. Kirk and friends oblige. Chekov, who as far as I know isn’t an officer, gets to come along for his first on-screen away mission.

Apollo wants the crew to stay and worship him, to be his servants and he their protector. Pretty standard stuff.

But this episode gets at a few deeper points. Gene Roddenberry was a staunch atheist, and held fast to the idea that in his future, humanity had progressed beyond a belief in gods. This episode tilts heavily toward this viewpoint, but at one point, Kirk quips that “mankind has no need for gods. We find the one quite adequate.” So it appears that there’s still at least a monotheistic view still surviving.

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And in the final line of the episode, Kirk wonders aloud if they had tried to learn a bit from Apollo by behaving for a while, as thanks for services rendered five thousand years ago. Kirk and Bones obviously acknowledge that Apollo was an important part of their racial history, and they know that they should respect that more than they do.

This episode also waxes poetic about another of Roddenberry’s favorites, how humanity must stick together. It’s well known that before he died Roddenberry decreed that no Trek would feature wars among the humans. And here, we have Kirk talk at length– and rather well– about what connects the Earthlings.

Kirk: Give me your hand. Your hand! Now feel that. Human flesh against human flesh. We’re the same: we share the same history, the same heritage, the same lives. We’re tied together beyond any untying. Man or woman, it makes no difference: we’re human, we couldn’t escape from one another even if we wanted to. That’s how you do it, lieutenant: by remembering who and what you are, a bit of flesh and blood afloat in a universe without end and the only thing that’s truly yours is the rest of humanity. That’s where our duty lies.

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But a side plot of this episode is just bizarre. It starts out in the cold open with this dialog:

McCoy: Lieutenant, you look a bit tired this morning.
Pretty Young Thing: Well I was up all night working on this report, sir.
Scotty: Well in that case there’s nothing like a wee bit of coffee to get you back in shape. Join me, Caroline?
Pretty Young Thing: All right, Scotty. Just let me give this to Mr. Spock.
Kirk: Bones, could you get that excited about a cup of coffee?
McCoy: Well even from here I can tell his pulse rate’s up.
Scotty: Gentlemen!
Scotty: [To the Pretty Young Thing] Come along, my dear.
McCoy: I’m not sure I like that, Jim.
Kirk: Why, Bones? Scotty’s a Good Man.
McCoy: And he thinks he’s the right man for her. But I’m not sure she thinks he’s the right man. On the other hand, she’s a woman. All woman. One day she’ll find the right man; off she’ll go. Out of the service.
Kirk: Um-hm. I like to think of it not so much as losing an officer as gaining a… [Beat] Actually, I’m losing an officer.

All alone, this is just a bit of banter. But in the full context of the series, it’s a tipping point. This show treats women terribly. There are no strong female characters. Yeoman Rand was the closest they came, and they axed her character midway through the first season. When a woman appears, she’s inevitably a love interest for someone, and she often has some special skillset that the crew needs but that she neglects because she’s smitten.

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This episode fits this formula perfectly, and then at the end throws in a surprising strength on the woman’s part. On the one hand it’s admirable that she gets to be the one who saves the entire crew, but on the other hand the audience is led to believe that you can’t trust her to do her job, because she’s a girl.

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In spite of it’s shortcomings, however, this is a well-done episode that manages to talk about multiple topics while keeping an interesting plot aloft. Good job.

Grade

A-