THE CUTE FURRY CREATURES FROM HELL HAVE RETURNED AND NOW THEY GROW BIG!!!

 

Episode Title:  More Tribbles, More Troubles

Air Date: 10/6/1973

Written by David Gerrold

Directed by Hal Sutherland

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”, Captain Koloth, and Korax        George Takei  as Lieutenant  Hikaru Sulu              Nichelle Nichols as Lieutenant Nyota Uhura          Majel Barrett as Nurse Christine Chapel          David Gerrold as unnamed Ensign          Stanley Adams as Cyrano Jones            

Ships: USS Enterprise NCC-1701, unnamed Klingon K't'inga-class battle cruiser, unnamed Federation scout ship, two unnamed robot ships

Planets: none

My Spoiler filled summary and review: The episode begins with the USS Enterprise escorting two robot ships to Sherman’s Planet where there has been an outbreak of famine.  The robot ships are carrying shipments of the grain quintotriticale which is known to grow so well at Sherman’s planet before whatever caused this famine.  I assume whatever caused the famine had nothing to do with quintotriticale as they wouldn’t be bringing more of it if it had completely failed in just two years.  It must have been a weather-related disaster I imagine.   

Robot ships

The Enterprise gets a distress single from a Federation scout ship.  Kirk orders his ship in on the rescue.  The scout is being attacked by Klingons, the Enterprise moves in and demands the Klingons stop. The Klingons ignore them but Scotty is able to beam the pilot out of his ship before it is destroyed.   The Klingons then turn their attention to the Enterprise and in doing so release a powerful new weapon that immobilizes the Enterprise and shuts down her shields and weapons. It turns out they are fighting Captain Koloth again and he demands they surrender the pilot or prepare to be boarded.  Spock realizes that the power being used to shut them down is so draining that it also prevents the Klingon ship from doing anything offensively while they have it activated.  Kirk refuses Koloth’s demands and since they still have control of the robot ships, he sends them both at ramming speed.  The Klingons try to expand their energy weapon, but it overwhelms them and they have to shut it down.   They manage to damage one of the robot ships but our forced to retreat.

Jones with new tribbles 

With the Klingons gone Scotty can finally get the transporter to complete.  Once complete the crew are once again face to face with Cyrano Jones and his bag of tribbles.  They are quite shocked to say the least. The last they saw of him he was picking up tribbles at the K-7 space station.  Now he is free trying to sell more of them.  However, he claims that these new pink tribbles are different, they don’t multiple like the others do, they only grow fat when they consume food.  McCoy later confirms this.  When asked how he got rid of all the tribbles at the space station Jones introduces them to a “glommer.” The species that eats up tribbles rather quickly. 

The Tribble eater

Since one of the robot ships was damaged and can’t warp, the Enterprise is forced to take on the cargo.  There is so much of it that it takes up a great deal of room.  Almost every hall way in every corridor has buckets of grain.  The Klingons return and the Enterprise quickly fights them off.  They don’t try their new weapon leaving Spock to speculate that they might not be able to just yet.  During the battle the storage units of grain get knocked over and the tribbles get a feast, growing nice and big.  This new breed of tribble is creating its own level of nuisance.  In addition to that the other robot ship is damaged forcing the Enterprise to take it in tow. 

Oh no! Now its Tribble food

 

The Klingons return a third time and with their new weapon working.  With no robot ships to entrap the Klingons their ship is stuck.  When Kirk looks for suggestions, Spock says that they “might throw tribbles at them.”  This gives Kirk and idea he has Scotty use the transporter to once again take the majority of their tribble population and transport it on to the Klingon ship.  The Klingons get the surprise of their life when they head to their transporter room to invade the Enterprise only to find the transporter room overwhelmed with giant tribbles.  Koloth contacts the Enterprise and explains that they only wanted the glommer and they could keep Jones.  Kirk accepts the plan that doesn’t require that they hand over one of their citizens to their enemies. 

Fat Tribbles 

As they proceed to Sherman’s Planet McCoy discovers the truth about the new tribbles.  The giant tribbles are in fact tribble colonies.  When McCoy injects one of the giants it breaks down into tiny tribbles, however they are tribbles that have been sterilized.  The Klingons are not so lucky before the giant tribble colony broke down; its size scared the glommer.  Back on the Enterprise, Kirk tries to break up one tribble colony and gets buried in tribbles for the second time in his life, but this time no carcasses.  

Additional thoughts: After being off the air for four short years the cast was brought back to make Star Trek again, only this time in animated form.  To this we owe to the magic of re-runs! As the number of TV stations grew, they needed content.  So, they started running re-runs of shows no longer on the air. So, Star Trek returned to the small screen and it was doing so much better in the second, third, and fourth go rounds.  With its popularity growing fans started asking for new Star Trek content.  Thus, Star Trek: The Animated Series was born.

The Enterprise under attack!

Like its predecessor series, the Animated Series was aired out of order in an attempt to grab the largest audience they could.  However, as I have already established, with classic Star Trek, I am a production order person, and therefore I will be watching these for review in production order. Or as I like to call it, the true order.

The Klingon ship under command of Koloth

So, I generally enjoyed episode, I did notice some animation errors, like Mr. Scott having a mustache randomly appear on his face and go away.  Also, at one point Scotty had a captain’s rank insignia on his sleeves.  Speaking of rank insignia when did Dr. McCoy get his promotion? He is wearing commander stripes throughout the episode. I kept expecting them to revert to his normal lt. commander stipes but it never happened.  I haven’t seen this series since I was a kid so I am interested to see if that tiny detail stays.

McCoy in a commander's uniform!

It is telling that the first episode they decide to make upon their return is a sequel episode.  Nothing says “we’re back to continue what we started” like the follow up to an earlier story.  Considering how popular the original “The Trouble with Tribbles” was it was a great decision to start there.  They have had a sequel episode before with “I, Mudd” from season 2 to follow up “Mudd’s Women” from season 1.  You could argue “The Menagerie” was but I don’t consider a Part 2 a sequel just the second part and “The Cage” to which the episode was following never aired.  

I really enjoyed the battle with the Klingons.  It was fun and exciting.  It also showed off Kirk’s skill as a tactician with his use of the robot ships and the tribbles against the Klingons.  Poor Koloth, twice he messed with Captain Kirk and his Enterprise crew and each time walked away with ship invested with tribbles. How insulting for such a proud warrior.  You don’t mess with the best Koloth!

The Klingons’ new weapon was interesting but I also like how the plot disposes of it.  Otherwise, we would wonder every time we see them why they aren’t using it.  The power drain and the fact that it seemed to paralyze the user as well as the victim earn it a spot on the failed inventions list.

Poor Captain Kirk once again buried in tribbles.  That was a very funny easter egg that I greatly enjoyed.

FINAL GRADE 5 of 5