THE CAPTAIN HAS DISAPPEARED

Episode Title:  The Tholian Web

Air Date: 11/15/1968

Written by Judy Burns and Chet Richards

Directed by Herb Wallerstein

Cast: William Shatner as Captain James T. Kirk    Leonard Nimoy as Commander Spock             DeForest Kelley as Dr. Leonard H. McCoy AKA “Bones”              James Doohan  as Lieutenant Commander Montgomery Scott AKA “Scotty”        George Takei  as Lieutenant  Hikaru Sulu              Nichelle Nichols as Lieutenant Nyota Uhura          Sean Morgan as Lieutenant O'Neil                 Roger Holloway as Lieutenant Lemli   Frank da Vinci as Lieutenant Brent     Walter Koenig as Ensign Pavel Chekov                 Majel Barrett as Nurse Christine Chapel      Jeannie Malone as unnamed Yeoman          Bob Bralver as unnamed  Berserk Engineer         Louie Eliass as unnamed Crazed Crewman         Jay D. Jones as unnamed Crewman         Paul Baxley as unnamed  Defiant Captain      Barbara Babcock as Commander Loskene   

Ships: USS Enterprise NCC-1701, USS Defiant NCC-1764, two unnamed Tholian vessels

Planets:  none

My Spoiler filled summary and review: The Enterprise is out looking for her sister ship, the Defiant, that had gone missing in this sector.  They find it adrift with life support off line.  Kirk forms an away team that consists of himself, Spock, McCoy, and Chekov.  When they beam aboard, they find the entire crew dead in what had been a full-scale munity on the ship.  According to Spock such a thing has never happened on a Starfleet vessel before, if you don’t count the time their entire crew decided to abandon the Enterprise for Omicron Ceti III.  I suppose you can say that in that particular case the crew were not in their right minds so it doesn’t count.  As time goes on, they will find the same for the Defiant. 

            The away team continues to explore the ship and it as bad as it seems.  In the sickbay, Dr. McCoy finds dead patients strapped to their bio-beds.  When he goes to put his hand down, he finds it passes through the table as if the table is immaterial!  He notifies Kirk that the ship is dissolving and the Captain orders them all to the bridge.  This area of space has been inter-phasing with other universes occupying the same space in different dimensions.  The Defiant seems to be phasing out of our reality.  They prepare to beam back but the inter-phasing space is playing havoc with the Enterprise’s transporter as well and they can only beam a few at a time.  Kirk orders everyone to go and he decides to stay behind.  As the rest of the away team is safely aboard the Enterprise, Scotty and O’Neil try to beam Captain Kirk back but the Defiant fades away before they can. 

Ship is in a bad state!

Not good!

Despite the Defiant’s disappearance Spock determines that the Captain is not permanently lost.  He calculates the precise time the ship will return with Captain Kirk.  There is however a problem.  The Enterprise can cannot activate any of its systems not already on—like life-support—or it will disturb the area of space and its phasing.  This means they have to sit still for a few hours, but doing so means more exposure to this space for the crew and they are already starting to experience symptoms that is too similar to what they saw on the now vanished starship.  Several members of the crew, including Ensign Chekov, have mental break downs and attack others.

Trying to save Captain Kirk!

Matters suddenly get worse when a Tholian ship arrives claiming that this is their space and Enterprise is violating it by being there.  Despite that status of this space is currently disputed, Spock is able to convince the Tholians that their mission is genuine and if they would just wait a short while the other ship will return.  The Tholian Commander agrees to give them this time.  However, Spock doesn’t consider until it is too late the effect of the Tholian engines on this space.  It causes the Defiant not to appear on its scheduled time. 

The Tholian ship attacks the Enterprise forcing Mr. Spock to retaliate.  The Enterprise easily defeats its opponent but then the defeated ship returns with a friend.  The two Tholian ships combine and then they begin building a giant energy web that if they complete it will sap the Enterprise of its remaining energy and destroy them.  On to top of that the space battle that was forced upon them has destabilized things so that they can no longer hope to recover the Captain.  James Kirk is dead.

Since Captain Kirk is now dead and the ship is breaking down and about to be looked in an energy cage, now seems to be good time for a funeral.  Spock and McCoy feud a bit about McCoy’s attendance.  McCoy reports to Spock that the Klingon nerve gas Theragen could be the key to curing what is causing the madness.  Spock thinks McCoy should be doing nothing but working on that, but McCoy won’t allow Kirk to have a funeral without him attending.  The funeral ends with another crewmember going mad. 

A visit from a ghost!

McCoy and Spock decide it is time to get back to work but McCoy insists that part of that work is hearing the Captain’s final orders.  They go to Kirk’s quarters and prepare the recording of his final orders.  In the recording Kirk predicts exactly how Spock and McCoy were going to be bickering with each other.  He then basically gives the two officers and pep talk and sends them on their way.  

Kirk pep talking from the grave!

Lt. Uhura gets a shock when the “ghost” of Captain Kirk appears in her quarters.  She reports it but everyone assumes given the state of the ship that she hallucinated and her mind was breaking down like the rest.  However other people start seeing it is well and assuming people aren’t having the same hallucination they can rule Uhura sane and Kirk alive.  McCoy is able to develop an antidote for the mental breakdowns that Scotty is happy to mix with some scotch. 

Three toast with a cure!

Spock figures out a way to save Kirk and the ship.  He calculates where the Captain will fully be pulled into our universe and uses the Enterprise’s tractor beam to grab Kirk’s space suit.  Then they tap into the energy discharge from the inter-phasing universes to move themselves free and clear of the Tholian’s web with Captain Kirk in tow.  Once the ship has stabilized they beam Kirk aboard and McCoy treats him quickly to deal with any lingering problems. 

When all is said and done, we return to the bridge of the Enterprise where Kirk gets done explaining to his crew what it was like to be trapped in the other universe.  He then asks Spock and McCoy how useful were his final orders, and the two of them pretend never to have seen them citing the crisis as reason not to have the time.  

A reflective trio of Starfleet officers

Additional thoughts: This episode is really mistitled.  It is called “The Tholian Web” but both the Tholians and their little web have little to do with the story.  They are plot devices and nothing more.  Unlike the Romulans in The Balance of Terror or the Klingons in Errand of Mercy where the new adversaries were the central attraction, the Tholians could have been substituted for anyone else.  Now I do like them using a new bad guy it shows how large space is.  However, if you put them in the title, I would expect them to at least be important.  The title of this episode should have been “Vanishing Starships!”

What an odd time for a funeral.  Spock tries to tell the Doctor that he has more important things to do than attend.  Isn’t that true for everyone?  The ship is physical danger from fading into another dimension or the Tholians whatever gets them first shouldn’t Spock be working on those problems and after they are out of danger arrange a funeral?  What is the point of the funeral if half the attendees lose their mind part way through? If they all die do they think Captain Kirk’s comments to them in the afterlife would be “I’m sorry this ship was destroyed before that happened, did you have my funeral?”

We may all die but we did give the Captain a funeral!

It seemed to me that McCoy was already getting a little crazy with his irrational accusations against Spock for coveting Kirk’s command.   If he didn’t covet it during The Paradise Syndrome, why would he be coveting it here?  Even though he was affected he still was able to whip up a cure in no time.  McCoy’s talent as a doctor can never be understated.

Tholians taking a punch!

However, it was Spock who really shined in this episode. Not only does he have his normal role of explaining everything, he saves Kirk, and gets the Enterprise out of harm’s way to boot. It’s a good thing that Captain Kirk’s space suit is lot sturdier than Captain Christopher’s plane.  Had it been otherwise, Kirk would have been in lot of trouble as they were thrown from the web!

Why is it almost every time we see another Constitution-class starship it has either a dead or soon to be dead crew?  First it was the Constellation.  Everyone on that ship was dead except the Captain, when he ordered them all down to the planet.  The same thing for the Exter, except its crew should have gone down to the planet and stayed for a while, instead only their Captain was on the planet alive.  There was what happened to the Farragut from Kirk’s past and the Intrepid might have been a connie too.  Now we have the Defiant where everyone is dead after being driven crazy.  Seem like the only time we saw a Constitution-class fly next to the Enterprise and live to tell about it was the Lexington, and even that episode saw a few go down.  I suppose since our daring crew is always getting close to being destroyed by the threat of the week it makes since to show a captain and crew that weren’t so lucky.  It helps to reinforce that what they do is dangerous. However, sometimes it makes the rest of the fleet look less than competent.

FINAL GRADE 5 of 5

SHE FEELS TOO MUCH!

 

Episode Title:  The Empath

Air Date: 12/6/1968

Written by Joyce Muskat

Directed by John Erman

Cast: William Shatner as Captain James T. Kirk    Leonard Nimoy as Commander Spock             DeForest Kelley as Dr. Leonard H. McCoy AKA “Bones”              James Doohan  as Lieutenant Commander Montgomery Scott AKA “Scotty”        George Takei  as Lieutenant  Hikaru Sulu              Roger Holloway as Lieutenant Lemli            Bill Blackburn as Lieutenant Hadley              Dick Geary as unnamed security guard        Davis Roberts as Dr. Ozaba         Jason Wingreen as Dr. Linke          Kathryn Hays as                Gem               Alan Bergmann as   Lal                      Willard Sage as Thann

Ships: USS Enterprise NCC-1701

Planets:  Minara II

My Spoiler filled summary and review: The Enterprise is on a simple mission to pick up some scientists that were observing the end of a star.  They head to the planet Minara II where the scientists are stationed.  Kirk, Spock, and McCoy beam down to pick them up.  As they enter the facility they find no one there.  The landing party gets a call from the ship and Scotty reports that they need to leave because of intense solar flares.  The ship will have to be gone for about 72 hours.  Kirk elects for the landing party to stay on the planet as the atmosphere will protect them. 

After the Enterprise leaves they get a video recording on the station’s security system.  The moment they saw it they must have immediately regretted sending the Enterprise away.  In the recording an annoying noise goes off forcing the scientists in the footage to cover their ears.  In a short time they both disappear.  As soon as the two men disappear on screen the landing party starts hearing it live.  The three of them vanish like the scientists.

Finding Gem underground!

The landing party find themselves transported to an underground facility.  While there they discover a woman lying on a bed.  She wakes but says nothing to them.  McCoy quickly discovers that she is mute and that is a natural condition of her species.  She seems friendly enough and McCoy decides to nickname her “Gem.”  At this point two figures appear.  They identify themselves as Vians and their names are Thann and Lal.  They demand the Enterprise trio not interfere and they have the ability to create powerful force fields that draw power directly from the victim’s body’s metabolism.   Kirk injures himself trying to resist but Gem using a special ability absorbs Kirk’s injury onto herself and then her body cures it completely.  

Two really weird guys!

The Vians leave and Spock begins getting new readings from his tricorder that he didn’t have before.  They investigate and discover a lab of horrors.  For in the lab are the dead bodies of the two scientists in giant jars and frozen in pain.  If there was any doubt to their identity their names are on the jars.  In addition there are three empty jars with the name “Kirk,” “Spock,” and “McCoy.” 

Humans used in science experiments!

Thann appeared and when Kirk demands and explanation he claims that those scientists died because of their own imperfections.  Spock delvers Thann a nerve pinch and the four take off, as they leave Thann wakes up rather quickly.   It doesn’t seem like it has been 72 hours but they are looking to get back to the Enterprise.  They think they see Scotty leading a second landing party.  However it turns out to be a mirage and Scotty and party were never there.   The landing party is the transported back underground.

Kirk's shirtless torture scenes

Since Kirk separated from the other three when he saw the two Vians watching them, he was not transported back to the same underground facility that the other three were.  Instead we are now getting shirtless Kirk bondage scenes.  Kirk is tortured and sent back, now fully dressed, to the others. The Vians restrain Spock and McCoy with their force field.  McCoy calls out to Gem to help Kirk; she does with great pains to herself.  After it is over the Vians leave and McCoy attends to both Kirk and Gem.  Although Kirk is cured from the majority of his injuries he is still suffering from McCoy says is an equivalent of the bends.  Gem was the one who saved him.  They go over the possibility that Gem could kill herself trying to heal someone but McCoy believes that self-preservation would win out.

McCoy's self-sacrifice 

The Vians return and demand that Kirk choose either Spock or McCoy as next to receive torture.   How they are set up to torture will mostly kill the one who goes.  Spock may survive but he would certainly go insane.  While Kirk is thinking McCoy knocks both he and Spock out with hypos and goes when the Vians return.

McCoy gets tortured but gets to keep his shirt on, it doesn’t help and he is sent back dying to his friends.  Kirk and Spock are restrained by the force field.  Gem seems to give her all to save McCoy.  Spock realizes the force fields can be broken with controlled emotions.  They escape but it doesn’t matter because Gem passed the test. 

McCoy returned from being tortured!

We are then told that the supernova is going to destroy two planets with advanced life on them.  The Vians have the technology to save one.  They wanted to make sure the one they were going to save would be worthy of survival.  So they decided to test one of their species to see if she would be willing to sacrifice herself to have another.  Since she was she passed and her species will survive.   

After taking McCoy's injuries but not yet healing them!

They Vians let the landing party go and all is well that ends well, unless of course you are the two tortured to death scientists or the people of the losing planet who have now been guaranteed death topped with extinction.     

Additional thoughts: This episode was probably pretty cheap to make.  Through the vast majority of it they are just running around in a dark empty studio.  I also think McCoy should have been less shy while being tortured.  Kirk was willing to get tortured with his shirt off and as his reward he still had his shirt intact by the end of the episode.  While McCoy who clearly insisted on being tortured with his shirt on, had his uniform all torn up when he was returned to his friends and Gem.  If he had been less shy he wouldn’t have lost that uniform. 

For some reason I have a real hard time with the idea that a solar flare could threaten the Enterprise, isn’t that what shields and deflector dishes are for? Also it didn’t seem like 72 hours had expired from the events in the episode.  In The Paradise Syndrome we know months have gone by not only because they tell us but we also see time passing on the planet and on the ship.  This episode makes it seem like they were only gone for maybe twelve hours at best.

So what about the people on that other planet?  Do they get a test too?  Or does only a one species get tested and they pass they are saved and their failure means the other group is saved.  Or were the people of the other planet already tested with the dead scientists?  Maybe if instead of using Starfleet and other Federation personal as guinea pigs, they could have reached out for help and combined resources allowing them to save the people of both worlds.  I hope we never see the Vians again. 

FINAL GRADE 3 of 5

IT IS SO UGLY YOU CAN’T EVEN LOOK AT IT

 

Episode Title:  Is There in Truth No Beauty?

Air Date: 10/18/1968

Written by Jean Lisette Aroeste

Directed by Ralph Senensky

Cast: William Shatner as Captain James T. Kirk    Leonard Nimoy as Commander Spock             DeForest Kelley as Dr. Leonard H. McCoy AKA “Bones”              James Doohan  as Lieutenant Commander Montgomery Scott AKA “Scotty”        George Takei  as Lieutenant  Hikaru Sulu              Nichelle Nichols as Lieutenant Nyota Uhura          Eddie Paskey as Lieutenant Leslie                 Roger Holloway as Lieutenant Lemli   Frank da Vinci as Lieutenant Brent     Bill Blackburn as Lieutenant Hadley              Walter Koenig as Ensign Pavel Chekov                 Jeannie Malone as unnamed Yeoman          Bob Bralver as unnamed Yeoman               Vince Deadrick Sr. as unnamed engineer        Louie Elias as unnamed engineer         Dick Geary as unnamed security guard        Diana Muldaur as Dr. Miranda Jones         David Frankham as Larry Marvick                  

Ships: USS Enterprise NCC-1701, unnamed Medusan vessel

Planets:  unnamed planet

My Spoiler filled summary and review: The Enterprise is picking up Ambassador Kollos of Medusa from an unnamed world.  Their task is to transport him back to his people.  This seems simple enough except for one problem.   Medusans are not humanoid they have a form that is so ugly that if a human sees one of them that human will go insane.  Kollos travels in a silver box and has a companion in a human doctor named Miranda Jones.  Before those two come up to the Enterprise another individual a man named Larry Marvick is sent up first.  Scotty is excited because Marvick is one of the engineers who designed the Enterprise herself. 

Dr. Miranda Jones

When Marvick arrives, he reminds Kirk of the special conditions that Kollos needs.  He notes that Spock will be immune to the Medusan effect so long as he wears a pair of protective goggles.  The humans leave Spock by himself and when gets to the bridge Captain Kirk orders the corridors cleared from the transporter room to the Kollos’s quarters.  Spock operates the transporter and the Ambassador arrives in his box with Dr. Miranda Jones.  Jones is wearing the same goggles that Mr. Spock is.  She is a human but one born with telepathic abilities.  Her job is to form a mind link with Kollos allowing him to enhance his diplomatic opportunities. (I think that last part is mostly implied not outright stated.)  As Spock and Dr. Jones transport the Ambassador to his room their conversation allows the viewer to know that Spock was once considered for this assignment and turned it down because he likes his life on the Enterprise.  A fact that makes Dr. Jones burn with jealously.  Spock has an encounter with Kollos with his goggles on. 

Dr. Jones and Mr. Marvick are treated as guests of honor at dinner where the ship’s senior officers wear their dress uniforms.  Kirk points out how interesting it is that Dr. Jones’s twin works for him as part of the ship’s crew.  Actually, Kirk doesn’t point this out but it would be cool if he did.  The audience learns of Jones’s powers.  That she is a human born with full telepathic powers, since humans aren’t typically telepathic, she was sent Vulcan to learn how to control her abilities.  In honor of her upbringing Spock wore the scared Vulcan IDIC symbol.  IDIC stands for Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations.  However, Jones takes offense and asks if Mr. Spock did this to show his superiority to her.  Spock insists that this was not the case.  Most of the rest of the dinner talks about the beauty/ugly dynamic.  Why is beauty good and ugliness bad? Also why does a beautiful person like Dr. Jones want to spend her entire life surrounded by things so ugly they can drive you crazy?  Things at the dinner got really weird when Jones suddenly declared that someone was plotting murder.  The dinner ends tensely to say the least.

It turns out that our engineer Marvick and Jones use to date.  She dumped him for a career with Kollos.  He confronts her and attempts to win her back but fails.  So, he decides to murder the Ambassador.   His attempt fails when he sees Kollos and driven insane by the ugliness.  (Personally, I already think he was few cards short of deck going into it, but that is me.)  Now insane he heads down to the engineering room and Scotty welcomes him to engage a bet they had earlier about the Enterprise’s controls. By this point Kirk and the command crew have discovered what happened and issues and alert to the entire ship.  Unfortunately, Scotty and his engineers do not have the fighting skills that Captain Kirk has and they quickly defeated by Marvick.  He takes control the ship and send the Enterprise flying outside the galaxy. 

Mr. Spock and Dr. Jones taking Kollos to his quarters

It’s a good thing they didn’t have any Espers on board the ship that could have caused a problem.  However, they have another problem: they are so far outside the galaxy that they have no reference points and cannot find their way back to the Milky Way.  Spock proposes that Kollos might be able to help because of the navigation capabilities of the Medusans.  Spock explains that the two of them could form a mind meld and Kollos could pilot the ship using Spock’s own body.  The only problem is Spock is concerned that Dr. Jones won’t allow it due to her jealousy. 

Spock and Jones discuss telepathy

Kirk answer to this is turn up his sexy and distract Dr. Jones while Spock makes his appeal directly to the Ambassador.  This almost works but the Jones’s telepathic powers allows her to figure it out.  She then confronts Spock and McCoy and argues that she should be the one to make the telepathic connection and pilot the ship.  This leads McCoy to out her as being blind and incapable of flying the ship.  Dr. Jones’s dress is laced with sensors that allow her to navigate the world quite well.  However, she still would have to be able to see the controls to navigate the starship.  With that it is decided that Spock will make the connection.  

Kirk trying to flatter Dr. Jones

The mind meld is successful and Kollos requires some adjustment being in Spock’s body.  Nevertheless, the Spock/Kollos hybrid manages to pilot the Enterprise back to the Milky Way.  There is a momentary set back when they go to undo the link, they forget to put Mr. Spock’s protective goggles back on.  Spock sees the ugliness unshielded and loses his sanity.  Fortunately, Dr. Jones can use her powers to cure him.  Kirk thinks she might not want to because of her jealously. So, he goes into the room and yells at her for a minute and this convinces her to do a good job.

Kollos as Spock!

Spock is cured and he has a good final meeting with Dr. Jones as she and the Ambassador leave for their new ship.    

Additional thoughts: I have a number of questions after this episode.  The first is why is it every time we meet somebody who helped design the Enterprise, they turn out to be a compete creep?  I had a hard time excepting the general premise of the episode that something could be so ugly it would drive people insane.  How ugly does it have to be? Since Miranda Jones clearly has extra sensory perception why didn’t she develop god-like abilities when they went across the galactic barrier?   I also had a hard time accepting that they couldn’t find their way back to their galaxy.  They had been out here before; do they not remember? Why does Spock try to wave his hand in front of Jones’s face when we learn she is blind?  She just explained how her sensors work, she even moves her head as his hand comes forward.  Maybe Spock was focusing on her eyes?  Why is the Medusan ship an old Starfleet vessel?  I thought these guys were advanced.  Why are they using our hand-me downs? 

This one was a snoozer. It wasn’t unwatchable this cast rarely produces something that is but it needs the cast the story can’t stand on its own.

FINAL GRADE 2 of 5